Predestined to Adoption; Redemption Through His Blood (Ephesians 1:5–9)

Eph. 1:5, 6. Having foreordained us to adoption through Jesus Christ in Him, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, with which He has graced us in the Beloved.

“Having foreordained”, προορισας,—having predestined—which is the same thing, for God’s determination was, of course, expressed in a divine utterance; besides, to name something for something is the same as to appoint and determine it for that thing.

The foreordaining of us to sonship, according to the Apostle, preceded the election to holiness; for he says: God chose us to holiness, having first foreordained us to sonship—and therefore after having foreordained us to this. This suggests the thought that the course of eternal predestination concerning the ordering of our salvation was as follows: having been pleased to save man, God was pleased to choose as the means for this the Incarnation of His Only-begotten Son—God the Word. As a result of this, all who are saved had to become sons of God. But to be sons of God one must be holy, as the Son of God Himself is holy. Therefore, having resolved to adopt us, God also chose us for holiness. Without holiness it is impossible to be sons of God. As soon as this latter resolve was made, the former was required as an inevitable condition. But in actuality the one and the other are inseparable. At the very moment when, in the resolve to serve God through faith, the beginning of holiness and blamelessness is laid down, there is also laid upon the brow of the spirit, secretly, the mark of sonship toward God.

— “To adoption through Jesus Christ”—through Jesus Christ. Adoption is mediated through Jesus Christ. Believers become one spirit with the Lord. As He is the Son, so also they are sons. Only He is Son by nature, while these are received into sonship for the sake of the Only-begotten Son. “As many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name” (Jn. 1:12). This adoption is not merely a naming as sons, but a birth from God (Jn. 1:13). By reason of this birth they are led by the Spirit of God, and in Him cry out: Abba, Father! (Rom. 8:14, 15), having received in Him also the obligation to be conformed to the image of the Son of God (Rom. 8:29).

“Do you observe,” says holy Chrysostom, “how nothing is without Christ and nothing without the Father? — The latter predestined, the former brings it to pass. This the Apostle (holy Paul) affirms, exalting what has been done, as he says in another place too: ‘and not only so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ’ (Rom. 5:11). Great gifts have surely been bestowed, but they become far more precious because they were bestowed through Christ; because to us—to slaves—God sent not one of the slaves, but His Only-begotten (Son).”

Blessed Jerome writes: “Of the Son of God, that is, of our Lord Jesus Christ, it is not said that He was forenamed or predestined; because He always exists with the Father, and the Father’s will did not in the slightest precede His being. The Father always exists, the Son always exists; for, having one nature, They are co-eternal. But concerning us—before we came to be, it was decided how we were to be, and then we also received being itself, in order to become what we were predestined to be. — From this it follows of itself that, although God has already predestined us to adoption through Jesus Christ, we cannot be sons of God before having received faith and the knowledge of His Son Jesus Christ. He is Son by nature, and we by adoption. He was never not the Son, whereas we, before becoming sons, were predestined for that, and only then received the Spirit of adoption, when we came to believe in the Son of God.”

He foreordained us to sonship—“according to the good pleasure of His will”. Here is the ultimate basis of our predestination to salvation! God predestined us to be sons because such was the good pleasure of His holy will. There was no determining necessity for this in man, nor in anything created apart from man. This is the fruit of the immediate, unconditional counsel of God’s will. “Yes, Father,” “for so it was well-pleasing before You”—so our Lord and Saviour confessed (Matt. 11:26).

Good pleasure denotes the will’s resolve toward something willing, with delight, with love (Jerome). “‘According to the good pleasure of His will’—that is, because He had a strong desire, or, if you will, in other words, because this constituted His chief aspiration. Ευδοχια(good pleasure) everywhere denotes the chief desire (the ground of other desires)… By it the Apostle understands the first will, the strong will, the will with longing, the irresistible will… This means, then, that God strongly desires, strongly wills our salvation. Why does He love us so, and where is the source of such grace of His? The source is solely His grace, because grace comes from goodness. It is for this reason that He foreordained us to adoption, desiring and strongly desiring this, so as to manifest the glory of His grace” (holy Chrysostom).

The election to holiness and adoption are here contemplated by the Apostle as God’s pre-temporal acts of love toward us. God resolved to save us through His Only-begotten Son made incarnate. As a result of this, those to be saved had to be received into sonship, made holy, and furnished with everything necessary for this. The essence of predestination to salvation is the adoption of those to be saved into God the Father through Jesus Christ, following their sanctification by the grace of the Spirit. But since holy Paul was writing to Christians already chosen and sanctified, he at the same time points to what was present in them, explaining this temporal reality in terms of the pre-temporal. How much consolation and spiritual joy must pour into the soul through the consciousness of such good pleasure of God!

God chose us for holiness and predestined us to fellowship with Himself, to sonship with Himself. The one is inseparably bound with the other in the present order of salvation, but bound by God’s good pleasure and not by any necessity. God could have chosen us for holiness and yet not have willed to adopt us. This latter is the work of God’s good pleasure, decreed, however, at the same time as the determination that our salvation should be accomplished through the Only-begotten Son of God. In this lies the richness of grace.

Whether to save us or to leave us to perish was in God’s will. Having decided to save, to save in one manner or another—that too was in God’s will. Everything done toward this end God does according to the good pleasure of His will. But when God determined to save us through the death of His incarnate Son, then the entire structure of salvation—its whole economy—had to be ordained in accordance with the requirements of this founding determination; and all of this constitutes the plan of the economy of our salvation, outlined in eternity, being fulfilled in time, and destined to appear in all its greatness in eternity.

The pre-temporal determination of God’s counsel concerning salvation was the fruit of an entirely free good pleasure of God, proceeding from love. But through this free act of God’s will the pre-temporal plan of the economy of salvation laid itself as the foundation of the temporal course of being and the events of the material and immaterial world. For all that, or by reason of that very fact, the blessings poured out upon humanity together with the fulfillment of that plan can be appropriated by each individual only through free faith. And the hymns of praise that should burst from the heart must also arise freely, from the consciousness of the greatness of the salvation being appropriated.

In actuality adoption is accomplished through communion with the Son of God by the grace of the Holy Spirit, who is the executor in men of the work of salvation. How is this accomplished? — Through the word of the Gospel concerning Christ, which is followed by faith, grace, communion with Christ, and in Him sonship. The word of the Gospel, having descended to earth, moves through the earth. It is heard by the whole mass of humanity; but some are taken up and others are left. Those are taken up who have hearkened to the word and followed it in faith. How this interior hearkening and inclination comes about is a mystery of the spiritual-gracious life. No one comes to Christ unless the Father draws him. But the Father draws the one who extends his hand to Him. For God could create us without us, but He cannot save us without us. In the ordering of salvation, freedom and grace are wondrously combined.

And we too are foreordained for this. From the very moment of birth, this good pleasure of God’s goodness toward us meets us. God hopes that we will prove fully worthy of such mercy and will strive to be holy, so as to correspond to the foreordination to sonship with God. As glorious as it is to fulfill such a calling, so shameful and bitter is it not to answer to it. — For now the one and the other are not evident to all. But the one and the other are evident to God, the Angels, and the saints, and to the whole world they will be openly revealed on that day when God judges all and declares the heart’s counsels of each. How great a good lies in our hands—and how bitter to suffer the loss of it!

“To the praise of the glory of His grace”. This is the ultimate goal of the entire economy of our salvation! — The glory of grace here is the same as glorious grace, and the thought in this expression is the same as in our ordinary phrases: a glorious thing! gloriously done! Glorious grace—grace that is full, most perfect, leaving nothing more to be desired. When a small man gives a gift, even a modest gift fulfills its purpose; but when a king gives, a small gift does not answer the occasion: from him a kingly gift is expected. So also from God—grace is divine. God graced us in a divine manner. — What more can be expected? He received us into sonship with Himself, and in order that we might worthily bear this most exalted title, He commanded us to holiness, and for the attaining of it arranged everything.

The praise of glory is that feeling which bursts involuntarily from the heart at the sight of an excellent thing or deed. Such full grace did God show toward us that all who understand it cannot refrain from praising both the grace and the very One who bestows grace—cannot help but cry out: most glorious grace! Such are all the works of God. They are not done in order to be praised, but they are so done that they extort praise. Not this praise is aimed at, but the full perfection of the work; praise is the consequence, the amazement involuntarily produced in the soul at the beholding of the perfection of a thing or deed. In this lies the blessedness of rational creatures. For the sense of perfection in what surrounds us is the sweetest feeling. — Holy Chrysostom says: “He foreordained us to adoption for this—to show the glory of His grace. — ‘To the praise of the glory of grace’; what does this mean? Does it mean that He needs everyone to praise Him, that we, the Angels, the Archangels, and all creation should praise and glorify Him? — No! The Godhead has no need of this. Why then does He wish us to praise and glorify Him? — So that through this He might make our love for Him the more fervent. He requires of us no service, no glorification, nothing else; He desires only our salvation and does everything for it. Indeed, the one who glorifies and stands in awe before the grace manifested in Jesus Christ will be more attentive and diligent (in respect of his salvation).”

“With which He has graced us”. The first thought at these words is—He poured grace upon us. Grace upon grace He gave us—a full cup, overflowing. Such “excess of beneficence, (once perceived,) moves even the tongue of the ungrateful to gratitude (and praise)” (Theodoret). Such is the thought suggested to us by the word “He graced”; but the Greek expression leads us to look further, beyond grace, to what is imparted by grace—that is, to the spiritual perfection communicated by grace to those who have received grace, by reason of which they become estimable, attractive, so beautiful that it is a joy to look upon them. It is precisely this that the most merciful God makes of all in Christ Jesus. Holy Chrysostom says: “He did not say: grace which He granted us — εχαρισατο, but grace with which He graced us — εχαριτωσεν ημας, that is, not only did He deliver us from sins, but He also made us estimable to Himself. Let us imagine: if someone, taking a sick man covered with sores, bent with age, worn down by illness and poverty and famished with hunger, were suddenly to transform him into a comely youth whose outward appearance would draw all hearts to itself, whose cheeks glowed with beauty, whose eyes, at their every glance, cast forth rays of sunlight; and then were to leave him forever in this flourishing age; and thereafter were to clothe him in a diadem and all royal ornaments—so precisely did God transform our soul, making it beautiful, attractive, and estimable, so that such a soul the Angels, Archangels, and all the other (heavenly) powers desire to behold. So He made us estimable and desired by Himself: and ‘the King shall desire,’—it is written,—‘your beauty’ (Ps. 44:12)! Note what bitter truths we were speaking before (those mournful words about the state outside of Christianity) and what gracious words we utter now! We marvel not at earthly treasures, not at what is here, but at heavenly (goods) and at what is in the heavens. — Of a child who, possessing a beautiful face, also knows how to speak pleasantly, do we not say: what a sweet child! Such are the faithful. Hear what words they speak when they are communicants of the mysteries. What can be more desired than those lips which, uttering wondrous words, with great beauty and boldness, with a pure heart and undefiled lips, receive communion at the mystical table? What can be more desired than those words by which we renounce the devil and join ourselves to Christ? What more desired than that confession—before the font and after the font? — Let us consider (at this) how much we have corrupted the grace of baptism, and in repentance let us sigh, that we may receive it again.”

“He graced us in the Beloved”—that is, in His Only-begotten Son, who became incarnate for our salvation. Christ the Lord—the archetype of our perfection—is in the highest degree the object of God’s love, in whom He rests with His full good pleasure (Matt. 3:17). Only insofar as we become one with Him through faith and faithfulness, and God sees us in Him, do we also become estimable to God. But we are in Him only by having become a new creation, having been re-formed according to His image. Therefore in the words “in the Beloved” one can see the entire economy of salvation. God made us estimable to Himself by this: He sent to us His Beloved Son, who, having come and accomplished all things on earth, ascended into heaven, from where He sent the Holy Spirit, who gave life to all the world through the establishment of His holy Church in its midst, in which to this day He accomplishes wonders—in the bestowal of grace and salvation upon us. All who enter into this God-established order become estimable to Him. There is no other way for God to look upon us with good pleasure. All is in Christ and through Christ, in His Holy Church.

Let us briefly summarize the spiritual blessings in the heavenly realm in Christ that have been indicated so far. The summit of all is adoption; the condition for it is holiness and blamelessness; the producer is Christ the Lord by the grace of the Holy Spirit; the true beginning of all is the good pleasure of God’s will; the motive is love; the goal is the glory of grace. In a few words, how many mysteries of God are indicated! But this is not yet all. b)

Eph. 1:7. In whom we have redemption through His blood, and the forgiveness of transgressions, according to the riches of His grace.

How did He “grace us”—make us estimable? — Through redemption by blood and the forgiveness of transgressions. Created in the image of God, we were by nature beautiful. But sin came and darkened this beauty. Redemption removes this alien covering, and the beauty of our nature appears in its original light. Blessed Theodoret writes: “The death of the Lord made us worthy of love. For through it, having put off the defilements of sin and being freed from the bondage of the tyrant, we recovered the features of the divine image.”

“Redemption” — ατολυτρωσις — properly the ransoming of captives for a known price. Christ the Lord redeemed us from the captivity of the prince of this world, in which we were held on account of the ancestral sin, and the price which He gave for the ransom is His blood.

To whom was the price of blood paid for our redemption? — Christ the Lord paid it to the eternal righteousness of God, which could not release us from guilt and punishment for sin until satisfaction had been rendered to it. Following upon the satisfaction of God’s righteousness and the restoration of peace with God, the power of Satan over us fell. Grace came and destroyed the fortress of Satan—sin. His power clung only to this sin and because of it. It was not a natural power, but an accidental one, a predatory seizure.

“And the forgiveness of transgressions” we have through the same blood as redemption; both the one and the other “according to the riches of His grace”. — We were redeemed from inherited sinfulness, guilt, and liability to God’s wrath, and we received the forgiveness of the sins which we ourselves committed. Or put another way: redemption is a divine act, universal in scope, while the forgiveness of sins is the application of that redemption to each individual believer. Each believer is manifested as redeemed through the remission of his sins, by faith in the Only-begotten Son of God, crucified for the sins of the whole world. His blood cleanses us from every sin and thereby accomplishes redemption in us. This is how the pre-eternal blessing is realized in us and what calls forth the glory of grace.

The Apostle says: we have in Him redemption and the forgiveness of sins. Christ the Lord is a ceaselessly flowing living fountain of redemption and the forgiveness of sins. The work accomplished once on the cross abides in His person as eternally active. This is why we have in Him an ever-present Mediator, and He intercedes for us, being eternally alive, or having obtained an eternal redemption. On earth the continuation of the work of Jesus Christ proceeds through the mediation of the Church, which is the dispenser of the gifts of redemption, of the forgiveness of sins, and of regeneration.

In all of this lies the riches of grace—an inexhaustible treasury of every kind of mercy from God, acquired by the blood of the Lord. “Not only this is wondrous here,” says holy Chrysostom, “that He gave up His Son, but also that the Beloved Son was slain. What great overabundance of love! He gave up the Beloved for those who were hated! — See how He esteems us! If, when we were still enemies, He sacrificed the Beloved for us, what then, one might ask, will He not grant us when we are deemed worthy, through grace, of reconciliation with Him?… Nothing is so great as the shedding of divine blood for us;—that God spared not His own Son, this is greater than adoption and all other gifts. Forgiveness of sins is undoubtedly a great thing, but it becomes still greater when it is accomplished by the blood of the Lord. That this is far above all, see how powerfully Paul expresses it here, saying: ‘according to the riches of His grace…’”

“According to the riches of grace”. Our redemption and salvation could have been arranged differently. That it was arranged through the blood of the Son of God—this is according to the riches of grace, and at the same time for the sake of the riches of grace. The deeper the Apostle penetrates into the contemplation of what has been granted to us in Christ Jesus the Lord, the more irresistible his tongue becomes in depicting and glorifying the abundance of God’s mercies manifested in Him.

For sinners there is no more perceptible good than the consciousness that all their sins are forgiven. This assurance alone of being pardoned and received back into the love of God the Father is for the sinner a perennial richness of grace. Sins are forgiven to the penitent and believing because the blood of the Son of God washes them away and makes the sinful soul white as snow. Sins are not merely overlooked in the penitent and believing—they are blotted out in him. For there is laid as the foundation of his moral constitution a resolve as firm as death to walk from now on according to God’s will, holily and blamelessly. The one who approaches the Lord in the sacrament of baptism or repentance, if he fulfills all the conditions as required, becomes holy and blameless in every way. The remnants of sinful corruption in him are no longer his, though they are in him; for they are not consented to, are rejected, are driven out. They are branches on the tree of the man’s newly enlivened life in Christ, sentenced to wither—because the juices that could nourish them are not allowed to reach them.

We have all been redeemed and forgiven through the blood of the Son of God. Glory to God’s grace—for what is more worthy of glory than this?! Attend to this and enter deeply into these mysteries. See how greatly God loves you, and yourself love Him who has loved you so. And glorify Him not with words but with deeds, manifesting in yourself the working of His glorious grace. We were bought at a great price. Having been bought so dearly, do not sell yourself for nothing, do not surrender yourself again into captivity—do not abase the grace that saves you, and do not offend it by a manner of life and conduct unworthy of it, you who are obliged by everything to glorify it.

Eph. 1:8. Which He caused to abound in us in “all” “wisdom and understanding.”

And all that has been mentioned up to this point—redemption and the forgiveness of sins, adoption and the bestowal of holiness and blamelessness—all of this is already a great richness. After all this one might say: here is what has been done for you; appropriate it and you will be saved and receive eternal blessedness. But God’s goodness was not satisfied with this, and found the possibility of making even this richness of grace still more abundant. So says holy Chrysostom: “Even that was wealth, but this is far greater. The wealth was already there, and He increased it further—that is, He poured it out in unspeakably abundant measure.” After this our holy father adds with deep feeling: “It is impossible to express in words what has been done with us and for us. We have been given wealth—wealth immeasurable, wealth not human but divine, so that words are utterly powerless to express it.”

In what did this increase consist? — “In” “all” “wisdom and understanding.” “That is, (in the fact) that He made us wise and understanding in true wisdom and in true understanding” (holy Chrysostom). By these words one may understand in general all divine revelation—everything which it pleased the Lord to reveal to us concerning creation, providence, redemption, and the hopes to come (blessed Jerome). The increase of grace in this may be expressed thus: here is what has been done for you! Believe—here is grace for you, here are the rules of life: live thus in faith, with the help of grace, and you will be saved. But as to what is and happens and what will be—do not inquire. It is not your concern! And one would still be saved. But God was pleased to increase this grace, by enlightening our minds with clear conceptions of all things, from the beginning to the last days of the age and even of eternity itself. He has told us all things clearly and definitively. We do not walk in darkness, as others, but in the light of divine understanding. Ambrosiaster writes that wisdom and understanding are an addition to grace. “To the enumerated goods (that is, holiness, adoption, redemption) is added the gift of wisdom and understanding in spiritual things.” We might have been left to walk in the twilight of faith; but we have been given the light of knowledge concerning all things, and especially concerning how to save one’s soul and how it is saved, passing through the various degrees of spiritual perfection. This may be regarded as a superabundance of grace.

But it is better, understanding by the increase of grace the fact that what is communicated to us from above is not grace alone but also knowledge, wisdom, and understanding, to take by this not the whole domain of the knowledge communicated to us, but only the enlargement of it. To have knowledge of God and divine things is necessary for those being saved; therefore it is not a surplus of grace but a necessary part of it. When God resolved to save us through His grace, the bestowal of knowledge—or revelation for the enlightenment of the mind—had necessarily to enter into that determination. But in the domain of knowledge there are subjects which it is necessary to know, as conditions of salvation, and there can also be subjects about which information is given only for the completeness of knowledge, as it were for the adornment or finishing of the house of wisdom represented by divine revelation. — All knowledge, divine knowledge, is boundless. The tiniest portion of it, the most indispensable part, God has revealed to us concerning Himself and His works. But He was not limited to what is necessary, and told us also what must be regarded as an increase of His grace toward us.

And what precisely is that? — That which is spoken of immediately after, namely the recapitulation of all things in Christ Jesus. The mind of the Apostle was full of the contemplation of this; the rapture arising from this contemplation impelled him to write the epistle itself; to it, as to the ultimate boundary, he brings every discourse.

Eph. 1:9. Having made known to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Him beforehand.

Here and following is an explanation of what constitutes the increase of grace in the communication to us of wisdom and understanding: namely that God was pleased to tell us “the mystery of His will”. “Or, in other words, He revealed to us what is in His heart” (holy Chrysostom). “He called it the mystery of His will, referring to His hidden will” (Theodoret). — No one could have surmised this most hidden will on his own, but God was pleased to reveal it. And in revealing it, He thereby showed His most abundant good pleasure and love toward those to whom He revealed it, for secrets are disclosed only to the near and sincere. Holy Chrysostom exclaims: “O what great love and trust!”

What is this mystery? — That God resolved to gather together / recapitulate all things in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Son of God came, became incarnate, suffered, died, rose again, ascended into heaven, and became, as the God-man, the head of all—both of things in heaven and things on earth. Of these acts of the incarnate Son of God almost all are evident in themselves, so that there is nothing remarkable in their telling—all is evident from the Incarnation to the sitting at the right hand of the Father. What, then, is not evident? — The recapitulation of all things in this God-man who sits at the right hand of the Father. This is precisely the mystery hidden in God—the one that could have been left undisclosed without detriment to the work of salvation, and which God revealed only out of the superabundance of His grace, thereby increasing through this disclosure the already great richness of His grace. The Apostle is chiefly occupied with this mystery throughout the entire epistle: it is what he has in mind here as well. Holy Chrysostom says: “The mystery is that man is seated on high.” — And by this very fact the recapitulation of all things is accomplished.

“According to His good pleasure”. By this is expressed either the same thing as above by the words: “according to the good pleasure of His will”. There was no necessity compelling the disclosure of this mystery. God’s good pleasure alone was pleased to disclose it. Holy Chrysostom says: “It was His strong and heartfelt desire to tell us somehow the mystery of His will.” — God resolved to bestow upon us so many goods in the Lord Jesus Christ. Taken together they express or constitute God’s good pleasure toward us. And out of this same fullness of good pleasure He also disclosed the mystery of His will concerning the recapitulation of all things in Him—according to that law of goodness of which the Apostle speaks in another place: “how shall He not also with Him freely give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32).

Or, since such good pleasure was already spoken of in this same passage (for it is all one continuous passage), it is permissible here to read it thus: with respect to, or in the matter of, His good pleasure, which God set forth in the Lord from the beginning, from before the ages. Almost all that God resolved to accomplish through the Lord for our salvation is evident and took place before the eyes of all. But the mystery of God’s will within all this good pleasure toward us—what in the end must arise from all of it, having been outlined from the beginning—the ultimate goal of it all was hidden in God. This mystery, relative to all of His good pleasure toward us, He disclosed—out of the superabundance of grace—namely that all this is done in order to “gather together / recapitulate all things” in the Lord.