Ephesians 1:7
“in whom we have our redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace,”
Where this sits
From the long opening sentence of Ephesians, in which Paul lists what God has done before the letter argues anything.
Reflection
The last phrase is the one that changes the size of the verse. According to the riches of his grace.
Paul could have written out of his grace. He does not, and elsewhere he uses the same distinction deliberately. Out of describes the source; according to describes the scale. A wealthy man who hands you a small note has given out of his wealth. A wealthy man who gives according to his wealth gives on a scale that reflects what he has.
So the measure of the forgiveness is not the size of what needed forgiving. It is the size of the resource behind it — which means it does not vary with the case, and cannot be strained by an unusually bad one.
That matters for a specific fear. Most people who worry about forgiveness are not worried about the general principle. They are worried that their particular thing is larger than the usual allowance. This phrase removes the allowance entirely; there is no ceiling to be near.
And the mechanism is named without euphemism: through his blood. Paul does not let the abstraction float. Riches, grace, redemption, forgiveness — these are all large words, and he pins them to something physical and specific that happened on a particular afternoon.
We have our redemption, again present tense. Not a hope. A holding.
- Theme:
- Forgiveness
- Book:
- Ephesians