Ephesians 1:13

In whom ye also trusted... in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed. — The insertion of the word “trusted” (suggested by the word “trusted” in the previous verse) is probably erroneous, nor is it easy to find any good substitute for it. It is far better to refer the whole to the one verb, “ye were sealed.” The irregularity of construction (arising from the addition to “hearing” of its proper accessory of “faith,” Romans 10:17) will surprise no one who studies St. Paul’s Epistles, and especially these Epistles of his Captivity, remembering that they were dictated, and in all probability read over again to the Apostle for addition or correction.

After that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. — There is a contrast hero between the Jewish believers, looking on in hope and gladly embracing its fulfilment, and the Gentiles, who had no such hope, and who therefore waited “for the word of the truth” (the full truth, not veiled in type or symbol), the glad tidings of a present salvation. The greater emphasis laid on the latter process seems intended to impress on the Gentiles a sense of the simpler and fuller means by which they were led to Christ.

After that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise. — The order is to be noted, and compared with the experience of the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:38). First, the light of the gospel shines before men; next, by faith they open their eyes to see it; then they are sealed by a special gift of the Holy Spirit. Such faith is, of course, the gift of God by the Spirit; but our Lord teaches us (John 16:8) to distinguish between the pleading of the Holy Spirit with “the world” “to convince of sin, because they believe not in Christ,” and the special gift of His presence in the Church and the believing soul “to guide unto all the truth.” This fuller presence is the seal of the new covenant.

Ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise. — This word “sealed” is found in exactly the same connection in 2 Corinthians 1:22. The original idea of this sealing (which, it should be observed, is not of documents, but of men) is best seen in the “sealing of the servants of God in their foreheads,” in Revelation 7:3. In that passage, and in the passage of Ezekiel which it recalls (Ezekiel 9:4), the sealing is simply an outward badge, to be at once a pledge and means of safety amidst the destruction coming on the earth. In like sense, circumcision appears to be called “a seal” of previously existing righteousness of faith, in Romans 4:11; and the conversion of the Corinthians “a seal” of St. Paul’s apostleship, in 1 Corinthians 9:2. (Comp. also John 3:33; Romans 15:28; 2 Timothy 2:19.) But the word is used in a deeper sense whenever it is connected with the gift of the Holy Spirit. Then it corresponds to the “circumcision not made with hands” (Romans 2:29; Colossians 2:11); it has the character of a sacrament, and is not a mere badge, but a true means of grace. In this connection we read first of our Lord, “Him God the Father sealed” (John 6:27), with a clear reference to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at His baptism (comp. John 1:33; John 5:37; John 10:33); next of His people (as here, in Ephesians 4:30, and in 2 Corinthians 1:22) as being, like Himself, baptised with the Holy Ghost. In this passage the very title given to the Spirit is significant. He is called (in the curious order of the original) “the Spirit of the Promise, the Holy One.” “The promise” is clearly the promise in the Old Testament (as in Jeremiah 31:31; Joel 2:28) of the outpouring of the Spirit on all God’s people in “the latter days.” The emphatic position of the epithet “Holy One” seems to point to the effect of His indwelling in the actual sanctification of the soul thus sealed. From this passage was probably derived the ecclesiastical application of the name “seal” to the sacrament of baptism, which is undoubtedly made the seal of conversion in Acts 2:38.