Not That Kind Of Dead

 

You have probably heard the argument from Christian determinists, usually of the school of theology called Reformed Theology, that we cannot choose to believe in God because we are spiritually dead. This idea, it is claimed, is supported in a passage like Ephesians 2:1-5,

“1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—"

Not only is this idea supported by this passage, it seems to be strongly indicated by it, right? For instance, look more carefully at what it says, “you were dead in the trespasses and sins…” “and were by nature children of wrath…” So, we were dead in our sins and born that way, as verse 3 shows, because that is what “by nature” means. In other words, we were born as sinners into a sinful people, and we lived out the passions of that sinfulness and were therefore children of wrath. But thanks be to God, that we were made alive by the grace of God, and because of this grace we can now choose God, because God has given us the ability to believe.

An illustration might serve to help here in illustrating the determinist perspective: a dead body can do nothing for itself, right? And we were, spiritually speaking regarding the things of God, just like Lazarus. As a dead man Lazarus could do nothing for himself to make himself alive, Jesus had to do it for him. This compelling illustration, also from a Bible passage, John 11, comes together with this passage to support the determinist perspective that no one can choose God, unless God first gives them the ability, as Paul goes on to say,

“8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph 2:8-10).

This appears to be a game, set and match win for team determinist, and one cannot deny that there is indeed quite the symmetry between the illustration we drew from John 11, and what Ephesians 2:1-10 teaches from their perspective. The reasoning is sound, the logic is sound, the conclusion would seem therefore to be determined...so to speak. 

Except for two things. First, this passage need not be read this way, and second, we have established in two previous posts, here and here, that the Bible affirms man’s ability to choose the things of God. So, do we have a problem where the Bible contradicts itself, or is something else happening here? The answer is the latter, something else is happening here.

Firstly, as to being made alive by grace. Paul says, God has “made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—" This appears to be supporting the determinist position, until you observe that Paul explains in verse 8 this, “8 For by grace you have been saved through faith.” Paul uses the exact same phrases here, in both Greek and English, “by grace you have been saved…,” but in verse 8 he explains that the grace comes through faith. Note that determinists teach that the faith comes through grace. But Paul says exactly the opposite here, he explicitly says “by grace you have been saved through faith.” The grace comes through the act of faith. This makes complete sense, because Hebrews 11:6 tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God. Ergo, to note that grace, or favour from God, comes through faith is consistent with the Bible’s understanding of the relationship between his people and himself; it is contingent on faith. So, the second plank of determinism based on this passage is undone.

I say second plank, because the first plank is that we are dead, caput, morte, nothing but carcasses spiritually. As we noted Paul says, “2 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins…” and this is contrasted with being made alive (v.5). Therefore, the determinist can simply fall back to a rather impregnable position, correct? Dead means dead and dead bodies cannot drag themselves out of a river any more than they can trust in Jesus for salvation, right? The logic of this position says that this “state of deadness” necessarily means that one cannot believe, without first being regenerated, or born again.

However, the concept of dead in our trespasses and sins harkens all the way back to Genesis 3 where the man and woman rejected God and then died. We read there,

“6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths” (Ge. 3:6-7).

We see here that this death sentence (c.f. Gen. 2:17) did not take away Adam and Eve’s ability to decide the things of God. In fact, we read the opposite, as Moses wrote about the man and woman, after eating the fruit, “then the eyes of both were opened.” Eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil did not take away ability or knowledge, it actually added to it. It also added the death sentence that we all live under. We are dead in our sins, and we all die. Adam and Eve did surely die in the day that they ate, because the ticking time bomb on their passing began that day.

God himself affirms this did not take away their ability to choose, as he says, “22 Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” (Ge. 3:22). It simply took away their immortality, and God ensured they could not regain it, at this point, by kicking them out of the garden. The sense in which they died, is in the sense in which we all live under the sentence of death. That it takes time for the sentence to be carried out does not change the reality of the decree.

To confirm that being dead does not take away ones ability to choose, we need to observe how Paul himself uses this concept of death. For instance in Galatians 2 we read this,

“20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose” (Gal. 2:20-21).

Paul says here that all who have trusted in Jesus “have been crucified with Christ” and that we no longer live. Now, his point in this passage is that we live for righteousness through faith, because our old life is nailed to the cross. So, if we read this like the determinists read Ephesians 2 then we must conclude that no true believer sins, because every true believer is actually as dead to sin as every unbeliever is dead to righteousness. Do you see the problem there?

Believers still do sin, as John says,

“8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. 2:1 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 1:8-2:1).

But how can we sin if we are completely dead to it? The same is true with the concept of righteousness in Romans 6 to 7. In those passages the unbeliever is the slave to sin and the believer is a slave to righteousness. But the New Testament explicitly says believers sin, ergo, neither being dead to sin or being slaves to righteousness means we cannot choose, and it naturally follows that being dead in our trespasses and slaves of sin does not mean we have no ability to choose either. They simply point to either the state of condemnation we stand under, in the case of dead in our trespasses, and who our master is, in the case of slaves to sin or righteousness.

The problem comes when people over play the concepts of death and slavery to the exclusion of how the Bible itself uses these concepts, and also hold them over against other passages which say we can choose, as we demonstrated in other posts.

We are most certainly dead in our trespasses if we have not received the seal of new life in Jesus Christ. We most certainly deserve death and judgement. But Jesus has entered the world so that all mankind can be enlightened (c.f. John 1:9) and can choose whether to live in condemnation or hope of glory.  

It’s not enough to be able to prove from one passage that a concept is both logical and sound, you must be able to demonstrate that it harmonizes with similar teachings and concepts in other passages. I think we have demonstrated that one need not read in Ephesians 2:1-10 a deterministic perspective, though it is understandable why one does if you define dead as they do, but it is not the best understanding of the concept according to scripture. We are dead in sins, just not that kind of dead.