I began to meet with you and chat about how I do Bible study in order to share what I have been doing for many years. Answering people’s questions of “how do you know that?” and “how do you study?” was my purpose. However, as I’ve been following what I believe God has asked me to do, I’ve become aware that I cannot exclusively explain what I’ve been doing because not everyone has the tools I have. Nor does everyone need them. If you do not yet get to the point in your study where you ask questions that can’t be answered by the tools available to you, you do not need more books or Bible software. It’s often said that 80% of results come from 20% of the work. The same is true for Bible study. Most of the result, the learning, comes from your English translation you already own or can access for free.
To illustrate, if you take the concept of your daily cooking routine, the tools you use most of time are your chef knife, your sauté pan, and your cooktop. This is 80% of your cooking experience. To accomplish this 80% well, you want an excellent knife, a good pan, and an electric or gas burner that turns on when you want it. If you want to achieve the other 20% of cooking, you might invest in a Cuisinart to perform the fine shred instead of a course chop. You might invest in a panini grill to compress your grilled sandwich and evenly brown it on both sides simultaneously. These tasks can be accomplished well enough with the basic tools available, but to get more details in your culinary experience, you may opt to spend more for the nuances.
In the same way, in order to successfully accomplish the 80% of Bible study, the main tool you need is an excellent English Bible translation. The current modern translations that scholars prefer, as I’ve said, are ones like the ESV, NET, NASB, or the RSV. You don’t want to use a translation like the King James Bible because, while it was a wonderful piece of scholarship in its day, there just weren’t the available resources for translation. Remember we talked about the ancient manuscripts in Bite 5? The Sinaitic and Vatican for example? These older and more reliable manuscripts weren’t discovered until later. Additionally, language is always going through changes. Word definitions do not stay the same but morph over time.
Who knows the definition of the word froward? It’s used in the KJV but it isn’t a word that is used in our modern English. There is the word toward , meaning getting closer. Then there is froward, meaning going away from. If we don’t know the meaning of an English word, our tend to pass over it without going to a dictionary to look it up. We try to gather the meaning from the context or we simply ignore it and go on.
We don’t need to translate English as we are trying to discern what the original language said. That is basically studying a translation of a translation. Why would we start our study with the Latin Vulgate, translate it into our modern tongue, and then decide what Paul meant when he said it in Greek? This is not a stab at KJV users or the text itself, but an appeal to use the best scholarship available for your main tool.
All of that being said, as I was enjoying poking around this morning in my ESV interlinear (Logos Bible Software) that was giving me morphologies when I clicked on words, I wondered if there was such a tool on the Blue Letter Bible website. I didn’t find one.
But when I went to the NET Bible, I found there are some cool new tools. If you hover or click on a Greek word, all kinds of information pops up. Morphology, transliteration, definition. When I have the NET2 version open next to the Greek, hovering over a word in one will highlight where the word is occurring in the other. Nifty. Check it out.
I’ve gotten to verbs in my GRU (Greek for the Rest of Us) study. Finally, I’ve found someone who is explaining the differences between present, aorist, and perfect verbs in a way I’m grasping. I suppose it makes sense that it would take a professor to do it. Bill Mounce in Greek for the Rest of Us explained,
Aspect is perhaps the most difficult concept to grasp in Greek verbs, and yet it is the most important and most misunderstood. The basic genius of the Greek verb is not its ability to indicate when the action of the verb occurs (time), but what type of action it describes, or what we call “aspect.”
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In Greek, it sounds like there is less concern for the timeframe in which events take place and more concern for this concept of aspect. He goes on,
There are three aspects. The continuous aspect means that the action of the verb is thought of as an ongoing process.
“In pointing out these things to the brethren, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following” (1 Tim 4:6; NASB)
The undefined aspect means that the action of the verb is thought of as a simple event, without commenting on whether or not it is a process.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16; RSV).
The perfective aspect describes an action that was brought to completion and its results are felt in the present. (Of course, the time of the verb is from the viewpoint of the writer/speaker, not the reader.) In one sense, it is the combination of the undefined (completed act in the past) and the continuous (ongoing effects of that act).
“For the one who has died has been set free from sin” (Rom 6:7)
“For it is written. that Abraham had two sons” (Gal 4:22)
“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3:6).
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Having only gotten to chapter 7 in GRU so far, and having my interest so piqued that I skimmed a little further on (I’m letting some of my nerd show), I recognize I’m no expert. However, what I understand so far is that continuous aspect corresponds to the present tense, undefined aspect corresponds to the aorist tense, and the perfective aspect corresponds to the perfect tense. And the point is not when. Leaving English behind, when reading a translation of Greek, we have to keep this in mind. As I learn more, I will share more. EXCITING!
At this point, you may be asking but what about Ephesians? Well, I was studying the verbs and wondering if there was something I was supposed to learn from them when verbs ended up being what I was studying in Greek. Now that I’ve learned a little more about what an aorist is, I now know Paul didn’t have anything he was trying to specifically convey in his use of language with regard to tenses of verbs. Everything he described as actions God has toward us is in the aorist. Undefined with regard to aspect.
If you look at the top, I have God and Father lined up. Slightly indented from that, I decided to line up the verbs I saw which answered the question “What did he do?” Do you remember that? These are three actions God has done for us. He’s blessed us, he chose us, and he predestined us. Since we’ve left all of our doctrinal baggage behind, none of these words should cause us any angst because we don’t assume we know what they mean. Right? Let’s investigate and see what these words mean. Because like it or not, these are actions God has taken.
I’m going to primarily use the following three resources and cite the page when I quote them.
BDAG–Arndt, W., Danker, F. W., & Bauer, W. (2000). A Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament and other early Christian literature (3rd ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
TDNTA–Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.
MCE–Mounce, W. D. (2006). Mounce’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old & New Testament Words. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Blessed
Let’s start with blessed. As I look in the resources, if there is content I find interesting, I will share it.
- BDAG–to bestow a favor, provide with benefits, (page 408)
- MCE–41× pr. to speak well of; to bless, confer a favor or blessing upon, Eph. 1:3, (page 1160); within the entry for the Greek word εὐλογέω (eulogeō) is a link to the usage of the English word bless in both the OT and the NT. In that entry, on page 69, it says that “Paul speaks of “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” (Eph 1:3). God’s blessing is to give his people spiritual blessings in life here and now and eventually welcome them into his eternal kingdom.”
- NET Bible tn 7–Or “enriched,” “conferred blessing.”
We learn that an action God has toward the recipients is that he has blessed them with spiritual blessings, which we can gather from the scripture, but we have more definition and understanding of the word. He’s conferred blessing, bestowed a favor, provided with benefits. Mounce seems to indicate that there is also an “already, not yet” aspect to the particular spiritual blessings Paul mentions in our text further on. But we’re not there yet so we’ll leave that alone for now. Just keep it the back of your mind.
Basically, as I interpret it, God must have good intentions toward his people in order for him to give spiritual gifts to them. At this time, I’m not investigating what those gifts are, but we know from the definition that they are beneficial to us. The spiritual life of his people is improved because God has moved. Sounds like a kindness to me.
Chose
Moving on to the word chose in verse 4 (even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world), let’s investigate what it means that he had the action of choosing the recipients.
- BDAG–② to make a choice in accordance with significant preference, select someone/someth. for oneself (page 305)
- MCE–ἐκλέγομαι eklegomai 22× to pick out; in NT to choose out as the recipients of special favor and privilege, Acts 13:17; 1 Cor. 1:27 [1586] See choose; elect; set apart. Looking at choose: God’s sovereign purpose is manifest in his choosing of believers before the creation of the world (Eph 1:4) (page 108)
We learn that an action God has toward the recipients is that he chose them. Within the meaning of eklegomai as Paul used the Greek here in Ephesians 1, are colorations of preference for a purpose and an effect. God chose for the purpose of special favor and privilege. Looking at our specific text, the result is a positional one–that we should be holy and blameless before him. The verb should be is in the present tense, which (I’m learning about this in Greek, remember?) looks like it means that it’s continuing to happen. Not a one time event but that the recipients are continuing to be holy and blameless before God.
As I interpret it, the recipients were chosen (Paul decided it was important to mention when the choosing took place: before the foundation of the world) for the special privilege of being positionally holy and blameless. Sounds like another kindness to me.
Predestined
Wrapping up for today, the last word we will look at is predestined. Remember I’m looking at this group of verbs because it looked to me like they were a group on my observation worksheet of actions God has toward the recipients. There are other verbs we will explore in the passage, but these looked appropriate to tackle together.
Knowing this word can tend to cause people to shrink and cower or conversely get their spiritual claws out, the first thing that strikes me about this word is that it is only used in the New Testament six times. Five times in the ESV it is translated predestined and once translated as decreed. For all the hubbub, I would’ve thought the Bible bristled like a porcupine has quills with this word. But it doesn’t. So let’s take off the backpack of preconceived ideas and set it down with an affectionate pat and walk away from it. Let’s begin by letting scripture define scripture before we head for the dictionaries.
In this first usage of the word predestined, the context is that Peter and John have just been arrested (for healing a guy) by the scribes, elders, Sadducees, priests–basically the frenemies of the religious world–and Pete, with word-smithing power of the Holy Spirit, shut them down in the interrogation. Pete and John went out to their friends to report the news of the event and they had a big prayer meeting. This is part of their prayer:
Acts 4:27-28 (ESV)
27 for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, 28 to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
There was a plan, on God’s part, for Jesus to be killed and it was predestined.
This next usage by Paul is the evidence he holds up that there is good for those that are loved by God and called for purpose:
Romans 8:29-30 (ESV)
29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
I hear echoes of the passage we are studying in Ephesians with the foreknowledge of the Romans. In addition to being known beforehand, there are people who are predestined to be squished into a Jesus-shape. Beyond that, those predestined ones are called, justified, and glorified.
We are not studying Romans, so we aren’t going to explore all the definitions of those powerful words here and now (another time!). You know verse 28 that comes before, And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those that are called according to his purpose. Do you see there is another action that God is performing there? For those who love him, he WORKS things together for good. That is the context of our word predestined in Romans.
Two of our uses in the NT were in that last example, so this is the fifth example. We should have started with this one because it is in Ephesians (remember our concentric circles in Bite 2?), but we’re studying this together and as we study together, I guess you can see I don’t study perfectly. That’s okay, we have a direction of being better students of the Word. Not perfection but direction.
This example is within our current passage so we should have some familiarity with the context.
Ephesians 1:11 (ESV)
11 In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will…
Here we’re told the recipients have an inheritance because they are predestined. We will be looking further into that word later, but for now we can assume an inheritance in the Greek here means something similar to what it means in English. It sounds like a good thing to have, otherwise the translators would have called it something else. If it were a bad thing, they might’ve translated it “in him we have obtained our sentence…” But they didn’t so let’s consider it as an asset.
What I see from these examples of usage in the NT is that the word predestined involves a plan and a purpose. From these examples, it also looks like all of these usages are plans for good. Even the predestination of Jesus to be tortured and killed–ultimate good. Being squished into a Jesus-shape sounds like it could hurt (probably will hurt) but again, ultimate good.
With our fuller understanding of how the Greek word is used in the NT, let’s move to the dictionaries to see what else we can learn.
- BDAG–decide upon beforehand, predetermine, of God (page 873)
- MCE–προορίζω proorizō 6× to limit or mark out beforehand; to design definitely beforehand, ordain beforehand, predestine, Acts 4:28; Rom. 8:29, 30 [4309] See predestine. (page 1256) In the entry for predestine–proorizō means “to predestine; choose, determine, set apart beforehand.” It is derived from pro, meaning “before” or “ahead of,” and orizō, meaning “to appoint, decide, determine. God is always the one doing the action of this verb. …the word is associated with God’s purposes for believers determined ahead of time. God “predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ” (Eph. 1:5). (page 533-534)
- NET note 13 for predestining—sn By predestining. The aorist participle may be translated either causally (“because he predestined,” “having predestined”) or instrumentally (“by predestining”). A causal nuance would suggest that God’s predestination of certain individuals prompted his choice of them. An instrumental nuance would suggest that the means by which God’s choice was accomplished was by predestination. The instrumental view is somewhat more likely in light of normal Greek syntax (i.e., an aorist participle following an aorist main verb is more likely to be instrumental than causal).
If we look at this word predestined strictly from a semantic view, this word is neither good or bad. It simply is. It is a decision made ahead of time. A plan. On its own, because we’ve studied it, this word should never again cause us to cringe.
As we look at it in the context of scripture, it is God deciding ahead of time his plan for his world. His plan for his people. Including his son.
Again, no cringing required. In our small individual worlds, we all have predetermined plans, don’t we? We’d be on the side of irresponsible if we didn’t.
One of our sons is in the army and so for a season, we looked for patches that would be fun and appropriate to get stuck on personal items like his army backpack. One that my husband and I liked so much that we bought two of them (one for Mitchell and one for us) says, “Hope is not a good plan.” This is not salvific hope. Hope like “Gee, I hope this works out even though I didn’t make a plan.” We make plans because without them, things don’t go great.
When we have plans, we are mimicking our Heavenly Dad; we’re following the template he made for us.
As I interpret this word, here in our passage, God has the action of planning ahead of time to adopt the recipients as his kids through Jesus according to his purpose.
Putting it together
In my study, I saw Paul identify three actions from the start that God made toward the recipients:
- God blessed them
- God chose them
- God predestined them
We learned that to be blessed was to have good things pronounced upon the recipient. Additionally, we learned that to be chosen was to be the recipient of special favor or privilege. Finally, we learned that being predestined meant that God has had a plan. It’s a plan that has been in place even before there was a world as we know it.
Since these words are listed off as being associated with each other within the text, and that there are no words that indicate contrasts, these words are all meant by Paul as positive actions in the lives of the recipients. He’s calling out a blessing on God–basically praising God for his active nature in the lives of believers.
Continuing on just a little further, these actions are according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:5b-6 (ESV)) We are still on the step of interpreting, so I will not press this too much right now, but try to let the truth of these kindnesses (namely that our Good Father is active for good in our lives because of the blood of Jesus) resonant in our hearts. May this truth cause us to pour forth blessing and honor on our Great God.
Our Bible Study Bite for today is to remember to leave our backpacks of theology and doctrine (and whatever other junk might be in there) behind and let the scripture tell us what to believe. Once we hear truth, we may need to unload some of the contents permanently and change our beliefs. Or potentially, we may need to pick up our backpack and continue on because our beliefs right now line up with scripture. Either way, how glorious! To be refreshed by truth is beautiful.
Next time, we will continue through our passage interpreting.
