Hendriksen:

16. For God so loved the world that he gave his Son, the only-begotten, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

God’s infinite love made manifest in an infinitely glorious manner, this is the theme of the golden text which has endeared itself to the hearts of all God’s children. The verse sheds light on the following aspects of this love: 1. its character (so loved), 2. its Author (God), 3. its object (the world), 4. its Gift (his Son, the only-begotten), and 5. its purpose (that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life).

The conjunction for establishes a causal relation between this and the preceding verse. We might paraphrase as follows : the fact that it is only in connection with Christ that everlasting life is ever obtained (see verse 15) is clear from this, that it has pleased God to grant this supreme gift only to those who repose their trust in him (verse 16).

1. Its character.

The word so by reason of what follows must be interpreted as indicating: in such an infinite degree transcendently glorious manner. Great emphasis is placed on this thought and in such a.

So loved. The tense used in the original (the aorist egapmsen) shows that God’s love in action, reaching back to eternity and coming to fruition in Bethlehem and at Calvary, is viewed as one, great, central fact. That love was rich and true, full of understanding, tenderness, and majesty.⁸⁰

2. Its Author.

So loved God (with the article in the original: ho theos, just as in 1:1 where, as has been shown, the Father is indicated). In order to gain some conception of the Deity it will never do to subtract from the popular concept every possible attribute until literally nothing is left. God is ever full of life and full of love.⁸¹ Take all human virtues; then raise them to the nth degree, and realize that no matter how grand and glorious a total picture is formed in the mind, even that is a mere shadow of the love-life which exists eternally in the heart of him whose very name is Love. And that love of God ever precedes our love (I John 4:9, 10, 19; d. Rom. 5:8-10), and makes the latter possible.

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Bucer:

ELECTION

OUR ELECTION TO an eternal inheritance is the first theological theme dealt with by Paul in this Epistle to the Ephesians. He is reminding the Ephesians of the benefits God had conferred upon them, and so he begins with the first and greatest of them all, namely, his eternal election and embrace whereby before all time he embraced both the Ephesians themselves and all his own to give them eternal life and salvation. Paul says that the efficient cause of this is the sheer grace of God and the merit of Christ. (The word ‘grace’ (gratia) here signifies the free (gratuita) favor and goodwill of God, although in addition, the free gifts of God are also figuratively spoken of as ‘grace’ in the Scriptures.)¹ The final causes of our election are holiness of lie and the glory of God, the chief end being not the holiness of our lives but the very glory of God, the ground and the goal of the creation of all things and of our regeneration. [20] The second subject treated in this Epistle is our calling and faith.

We should always keep the aim of the writer in view. Now the aim of this Epistle is the increase of godliness, both in the Ephesians and in ourselves, not merely in knowledge but in practice, and nothing less than eternally, to the end that a strengthened faith may blossom forth more profusely in every good work. Most appropriately, therefore. the apostle begins with the praise of God and with our immutable election, the knowledge of which both immeasurably strengthens faith and actively kindles in us a’ zeal for purity. So the thanksgiving we meet here not only attests Paul’s perfect love but also stimulates a like gratitude in the Ephesians, Thus he writes. ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ’. In this verse he summarily recounts the benefits of God, and calls them to the remembrance of both the Ephesians and ourselves. The Hebrew word brk, to bless, sometimes means to bestow a benefit and sometimes to praise. When it is used of God, it denotes his showering us with benefits, but when it is predicated of ourselves, then it means to praise and give thanks. And indeed God is worthy of all praise and thanksgiving, ‘who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing’. Chrysostom² takes these blessings of ours as though they were being directly contrasted with the blessings of God’s ancient people, because to them God promises and presents only temporal blessings but to us ‘spiritual’ ones. But God did promise and present to that people too spiritual blessings as well, as the book of Deuteronomy everywhere bears witness, when God says that he has chosen that people to make them share in the enjoyment of all good things, including even eternal life. And when he is treating of temporal goods, he also requires them to call upon his name.³ We too, like them, need the good things of this life, and ask for them in prayer, and receive them; hence we pray, ‘Give us today our daily bread.⁴ Anyone who possesses the gift of faith is blessed by God with a spiritual blessing; that is to say, he is justified, he is given faith and hope and love and increased in the same, he is made a partaker of Christ and of his heavenly kingdom.

‘In the heavenly places’: this phrase varies in meaning, for on occasions it denotes the very abodes of evil spirits; Paul speaks elsewhere of treacherous powers of wickedness active in the heavenly places,⁵ But here it is taken to indicate those blessings which come to the elect by the gift of Christ, for already they live the life of heaven. For Christ dwells in our hearts and will not desert us even until the consummation of the world; he comes to the man who loves the Father, and abides with him.⁶ Therefore, although the saints fall into sin every day, nevertheless by their higher nature⁷ they are heavenly. Our faith and our sanctification are heavenly, and are bestowed by Christ who is in heaven, and we keep company with him through faith and ardent desire. Paul adds ‘in Christ’,⁸ because it is through his righteousness and merit that all the godly obtain all good things.

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Knox:

LIMITED ATONEMENT

Substitution in sin-bearing is the center of the New Testament doctrine of the Atonement, as well as the Old Testament adumbration of it. A Realization of this makes impossible the concept that Christ’s redeeming work is continuing in Heaven now, or that we can join our obedience to his as part of the act of redemption.

On the other hand, there is a way of viewing Christ’s satisfaction for sin which limits it in extent, so that Christ’s atonement is not co-extensive with humanity, but is limited to those elect of God only. However, that the work of Christ extends uniformly to the whole of humanity becomes clear when it is considered under the following heads:

(a) The Incarnation. When Christ rook man’s nature in the womb of the blessed virgin, he rook the nature which all men share, and not the nature of the elect only.

(b) Christ’s Perfect righteousness. When Christ lived a life of perfect obedience to the law of God, he fulfilled the obligation which rests on all men equally, and nor an obligation which the elect alone have.

(c) Christ’s Victory. When our Lord overcame all the wiles of the devil and bound the strong man, he overcame the common enemy of mankind, and not the enemy of the elect only.

(d) Christ’s Bearing of the Curse. When our Lord, through his death on the cross, became a curse, he bore the curse which God threatens against all breakers of his covenant, and nor the curse which is particularly applicable to the elect.

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Ware:

Objection 2

The universal, impartial, and equal love of God for all people demonstrates that unconditional election cannot be true. Since God is love, and since God’s love is the same for all people whom he has made, it cannot be the case that the reason some are not saved is owing to God’s choice, ultimately. Rather, some are not saved because they choose not to be saved, yet God would gladly (in love) have saved them, too, had they but come. Therefore, the election spoken of in Scripture simply cannot be unconditional election.

Reply. While Scripture clearly teaches God’s universal, impartial, and equal love for all people, this is certainly not the only, or the most central, meaning of the love of God. As D. A. Carson has explained so helpfully, the Bible actually speaks of the love of God in five different senses.³⁸ One of those five senses is God’s universal love for all (e.g., as seen in John 3:16). But another sense, one more prominent in Scripture, is God’s particular, selective, and discriminate love for his own people. Consider two representative passages, both of which reflect God’s special love for his own people, a love that moves him to save them and benefit them in a manner that distinguishes them from all others.

First, Isaiah 43 begins in a manner that believers have often found greatly comforting. “Do not fear,” God tells his people, “for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are Mine” (lsa. 43:1 HCSB). Further, God promises, “I will be with you when you pass through the waters, and when you pass through the rivers, they will not overwhelm you” (lsa. 43:2 HCSB). So God establishes the fact that he is the God of his people, and he will be with them to provide for them and to protect them, for as he says to them, “you are Mine.”

The true significance of God’s special claim upon this people, his people, is about to be seen more clearly, however. We read on: “For I the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, and your Savior, give Egypt as a ransom for you, Cush and Seba in your place. Because you are precious in My sight and honored, and I love [from aheb, “to love”] you, I will give human beings in your place, and peoples in place of your life” (Isa. 43:3-4 HCSB). Here, then, is the particular, selective, and discriminate love of God for his own. He loves his people Israel by saving them at the expense of (“in the place of”) many lives of Egyptians. Clearly this is a reference to the favor shown the Jews at the time of their exodus from Egypt. For, although God could have given the same warning and instruction in Egypt regarding the upcoming angel of death as he did among the Israelites prior to the exodus, he did not. Nor did he intend to do So.³⁹

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