Blake Long

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins”
‭‭(Ephesians‬ ‭2‬:‭1‬)

Perhaps you’ve heard the analogy before of God saving us. We were drowning in the ocean and God threw out a life raft to us. By our free will, we took hold of the life raft and He drew us in and brought us to shore.

Our drowning is a picture of our condition before coming to Christ. God throwing the life raft out to us, of course, is Him making the offer of salvation available to us. Our taking hold of the life raft is our decision to trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ. God drawing us to Himself is His salvific work.

This is a nice illustration and all, but if we read Ephesians 2:1 biblically, this analogy falls flat. Allow me to have the late R.C. Sproul explain the better analogy:

What God did for you, if you’re in Christ, is that after you went down the third time and you were stone cold dead at the bottom of the sea, God the Holy Spirit dove into the water, picked you up out of the water, took you up on the shore, and resuscitated you and brought you alive again through the power of His creation. You are a new creation in Christ. And that’s grace.

Dead people don’t believe. God, through the Holy Spirit, had to breathe life into us so that we may believe. This is what it means when some say, “Regeneration precedes faith.”

Friends, what’s the point to this? As you read this devotional today, I want you to display humility. We must humble ourselves at the sovereign work of God on our behalf! We were dead in our trespasses and sins, but God made us alive in Christ. Glorious!