At one time you were like a dead person because of the things you did wrong and your offenses against God. 2 You used to live like people of this world. You followed the rule of a destructive spiritual power. This is the spirit of disobedience to God’s will that is now at work in persons whose lives are characterized by disobedience. 3 At one time you were like those persons. All of you used to do whatever felt good and whatever you thought you wanted so that you were children headed for punishment just like everyone else. 4-5 However, God is rich in mercy. He brought us to life with Christ while we were dead as a result of those things that we did wrong. He did this because of the great love that he has for us. You are saved by God’s grace! 6 And God raised us up and seated us in the heavens with Christ Jesus. 7 God did this to show future generations the greatness of his grace by the goodness that God has shown us in Christ Jesus. 8 You are saved by God’s grace because of your faith.[a] This salvation is God’s gift. It’s not something you possessed. 9 It’s not something you did that you can be proud of. 10 Instead, we are God’s accomplishment, created in Christ Jesus to do good things. God planned for these good things to be the way that we live our lives. (Ephesians 2:1-10, CEB)
Every Translation falls short at some point and I believe the CEB does in this passage in verse 8.
Now some of you may say this is because this is the Lutheran verse, We are saved by grace through faith not of our own doing that no one my boast. Well no, it isn’t because of that. I also have been known to say as Lutherans we do not take our verse far enough and say only 2:8-9 and we need to include 10, because God created us to do good works.
But no, the CEB says, “you are saved by God’s grace because of your faith.” Because of my faith, it is my work and therefore I can be proud of it. It is something I do. Thankfully the committee left a footnote there that says, “Or through his faithfulness“. Which makes it all God’s work and not ours. Because that’s what grace is, an unearned, unmerited gift. Even with the second half of that verse saying it is God’s gift, the your is really out of place for me. We are saved because Jesus was faithful and trusting in the plan and did what was needed to show us how to live a life that is pleasing to God. That is grace and what saved us, to do good works so that others will know about the love of God.
So go and share the grace you’ve been given.
Love People, Love God.
aSacredRebel 