Ephesians
+ NewSaved by Grace through Faith — Ephesians 2:8-10
Eph 2:8-10 holds together what is often torn apart: "by grace you have been saved through faith... not a result of works," and yet we are "created in Christ Jesus for good works." Salvation is by grace; good works are its fruit, not its root. Augustine's maxim captures the logic all sides own — that when God crowns our merits he crowns his own gifts; the Council of Orange had already excluded any human initiative before grace. Luther seized on the gift-character of faith; Trent taught that this grace is genuinely transformative and bears fruit in love; and the Joint Declaration affirms together that we are saved by grace through faith, not because of any merit of our own. The relation of this gift to the good works of 2:10 is unfolded in Jas 2:14-26. The movement from death to life in 2:1-5 parallels the new birth of John 3:5 and anticipates the new creation of Rom 6:4.
Faith and Works in James and Paul — James 2:14-26
Jas 2:14-26 insists that "faith apart from works is dead" and that Abraham was "justified by works when he offered up Isaac." Read flatly against Paul this seems a contradiction; read carefully it is a complement. Calvin distinguished the ground of justification from its evidence: James targets a barren profession, Paul a works-righteousness. Trent read James as showing that living faith, formed by love, is itself part of justification. Both appeal to Gen 15:6, the text Paul cites in Romans 4. The Joint Declaration reframed the old dispute: good works flow from grace as the fruit and sign of justification, not its purchase. James's example of Abraham offering Isaac links to the binding of Isaac in Gen 22:9-12, and his concern for living faith echoes the fruit-bearing of Eph 2:10. The faith that justifies is never alone — it works through love.
The Aseity of God — Exodus 3:14
At the burning bush God names himself in Exod 3:14: "I AM WHO I AM." The divine name discloses God's self-existence — he depends on nothing outside himself for his being. Aquinas built his metaphysics on this text, naming God ipsum esse subsistens, being itself. Augustine contrasted God's unchanging 'I AM' with the mutable creature that merely becomes. Bavinck made aseity the root of all the incommunicable attributes. Jesus invokes this very name in John 8:58, "before Abraham was, I am," claiming divine self-existence for himself. The God who simply is stands behind the sovereignty of Eph 1:11.
The Sovereignty of God in Election — Ephesians 1:3-14
Eph 1:3-14 is one long sentence of praise: God "chose us in him before the foundation of the world," "predestined us for adoption," and works "all things according to the counsel of his will." Election is "to the praise of his glory." Calvin read this doxology as the warrant for the doctrine of predestination, and Augustine grounded adoption in unmerited grace. Barth reoriented the whole around election in Christ, 'in him' being the key phrase. The phrase "the counsel of his will" connects to the potter's freedom in Rom 9:18-21 and to the calling of Rom 8:29-30. Sovereign grace and assured glory are two ends of one purpose.
The Church as the Body of Christ — 1 Corinthians 12
1Cor 12:12-27: "for just as the body is one and has many members... so it is with Christ." By one Spirit all are baptized into one body, and the diversity of gifts serves the common good. Augustine's totus Christus — the whole Christ, head and members — expresses this unity, and Calvin treated the church as the mother of believers. The Catechism develops the body-of-Christ image for the communion of saints. The Spirit who distributes gifts here is the same Spirit of John 15:26 and Pentecost in Acts 2:17. The one baptism into one body connects to Rom 6:3 and Eph 4:4-6.