Ephesians 2:3

“among whom we also all once lived in the lust of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest”

“Among whom we also”: “We all lived among them once” (Gspd). “Most probably, among the disobedient--we Jews also followed our course of life” (Bruce p. 283). Regardless of race, privileges or culture, all found themselves in sin (Romans 3:23). “All”: Even Paul, the former gifted religious student, found himself guilty of terrible crimes (1 Timothy 1:13). “Once”: Something drastic is to change when one becomes. Christian (Ephesians 4:25-32). “Lived”: “Passed our lives” (Wey). It is scriptural to use the expression that one is "living in sin". Yet. think that. good number of people outside of Christ do not view themselves as living in sin. They might argue, "Well, once and. while. do something wrong, now and then. let down my hair, but for the most part. usually behave in. very responsible manner." “In the lusts of our flesh”: Stott makes some good observations concerning the expression of our flesh. “It means not the living fabric which covers our bony skeleton but self-centered human nature. There is nothing wrong with natural bodily desires, whether for food, sleep or sex. For God has made the human body that way. It is only when the appetite for food becomes gluttony, for sleep sloth and for sex lust, that natural desires have been perverted into sinful desires. Wherever self rears its ugly head against God and man, there is the flesh” (p. 74). “The flesh is anything in us which gives sin its chance” (Barclay p. 101). Thus opposition to God, and refusing to listen and follow His word, is living in the flesh (Romans 8:7).

“Desires of the flesh”: This would include sins which are especially dependent on the cooperation of the physical body for their fulfillment, such as fornication, homosexuality, adultery, and drunkenness. Observe that such things are “desires” or “lusts”, rather than manifestations of love. “And of the mind”: “and of our imagination” (Con). “The purest essence of sin is not some horrible, unthinkable atrocity. It is simply living for self. The desires of the mind can be just as bad and sometimes worse. The mind demands its own way in matters of anger, pride, resentment, and revenge. In Paul's day people were often taught by Greek philosophy that everything physical is evil. It must have shocked them, however, to discover that the (wrong) desires of the mind are equally sinful (with the wrong actions of the body)” (Boles pp. 221-222). “The waywardness of our thoughts seems to be denoted, the random roaming of the mind hither and thither, towards this pleasure and that, sometimes serious, sometimes frivolous, but all marked by the absence of any controlling regard to the will of God” (Pulpit Comm. p. 61). Often people forget that envy, jealousy, strife, hatred, and so on, are all just as bad as drunkenness and fornication. Such mental sins will condemn our souls as well (Galatians 5:19 ff; Mark 7:20; Matthew 5:28). The following may be news for some, but we do not have the right to think anything we want.

“By nature”: Unfortunately, all of. sudden people forget everything these verses have taught when they encounter this phrase. Immediately they think, "inherited nature", that is, that we were born totally depraved, inheriting the original sin of Adam. That is not what these three verses are teaching. These people are responsible for their former condition. They were dead because of their own sins (Ephesians 2:1), sins in which they had lived in (Ephesians 2:2), sins that were the result of listening to the ways of the world (Ephesians 2:2), sins that resulted from sharing the attitude of disobedient men (Ephesians 2:2), sins that resulted from obeying selfish physical and mental desires (Ephesians 2:3), and sins that resulted from refusing to control their bodies and their thoughts (Ephesians 2:3). “It is not an accident of birth into the family of Adam that condemns men; it is what men themselves have done!” (Boles p. 223). The phrase "by nature" here means that which by habit and practice has become nature, that is, an acquired nature or second nature. Calvinists run into big problems when they try to make by nature mean, "inherited nature". Remember Paul argues in the Roman letter that some Gentiles by nature did the things of the Law (Romans 2:14). How can people have an inherited sinful nature and at the same time do by nature what is good? See also 1 Corinthians 11:15. “Children of wrath”: The objects of God's wrath (Ephesians 5:6; John 3:36).

“God's personal, righteous, constant hostility to evil, His settled refusal to compromise with it, and His resolve instead to condemn it. Thus Paul moves from the wrath of God to the mercy and love of God without any sense of embarrassment or anomaly. He is able to hold them together in his mind because he believed that they were held together in God's character. We need,. think, to be more grateful to God for his wrath, and to worship Him because His righteousness is perfect He always reacts to evil in the same unchanging, predictable, uncompromising way. Without His moral constancy we would enjoy no peace” (Stott p. 76). This verse should forever settle the issue that God is not going to change His mind concerning any sin (Revelation 21:8; 1 Corinthians 6:9; Ephesians 5:5; Galatians 5:19). “Even as the rest”: The Jews found themselves in sin, just like the Gentiles (Romans 3:9).