Passage: Ephesians 1:13-14
The Big Idea
Ephesians 1 shows the will of the Father (verses 3-6), the work of the Son (verses 7-12), and now the witness of the Spirit (verses 13-14). When you heard the gospel and believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise: a finished transaction, a mark of ownership, a bond of security and the imprint of Christ’s own face. The Spirit in you is God’s guarantee that every promise will come true.
What God Has Done So Far
We’ve been mining for gold in Ephesians, searching out God’s glorious mysteries, and we’ve been richly rewarded:
- He chose us, predestined us and made us accepted (1:4-6).
- He redeemed us, forgave us and poured out His rich grace on us (1:7-8).
- He made known to us the mystery of His will (1:9-10).
- He gave us an inheritance (1:11-12).
And now, the witness of the Spirit.
In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:13-14).
“In Him You Also Trusted”
The Spirit’s witness is very intentional. You can tell when the Holy Spirit is involved, because He draws all the attention to Jesus. He draws us to trust in Christ.
We always need to be careful about any message that draws our eyes to something besides Jesus. Jesus said that when the Helper comes, the Spirit of truth, He will testify about Jesus (John 15:26).
Jesus is a person we trust. We don’t trust a system or a religion.
- Every time we trust a religion, we’re really trusting ourselves: our own performance in a system of rules.
- But when you trust a person, you’re free! Free from performance-based living. You trust a promise that a person made.
- That promise is called the gospel.
“The Word of Truth, the Gospel of Your Salvation”
You heard the truth about your situation, and the solution. The word of truth was that you’re a sinner, yet God loves you, wants a relationship with you, and has made provision for you in every way. He has become your salvation. That’s the good news, which is what gospel means.
The amazing thing is that the gospel bears fruit just by being heard. You aren’t responsible to talk someone into it. God says, “Just tell them,” and He does the work of drawing them by His Spirit. Sometimes the hardest sinner responds to the simplest sharing of the gospel. It honors the Lord when we simply tell people.
Why don’t we?
- We’re afraid. But God hasn’t given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7).
- We’re shy. But Paul says that since we have such hope, we speak with great boldness (2 Corinthians 3:12). When the leaders saw the boldness of Peter and John, uneducated and ordinary men, they were amazed and realized they had been with Jesus (Acts 4:13). And when the believers prayed for boldness, the place was shaken, they were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God boldly (Acts 4:29-31).
We’re all given the job of telling people the gospel. It isn’t optional or a suggestion. It’s an act of love, a fruit of the Spirit.
Can you say this?
- The problem: We’re all sinners, separated from God by our sin.
- The answer: God loved us so much that He sent His Son Jesus to die on a cross and pay the penalty for our sins. He paid a debt He didn’t owe, because we owed a debt we couldn’t pay.
- The question: Do you want to believe in what Jesus did for you?
Done. You’ve shared the word of truth, the gospel of salvation. They may respond or they may not. That’s the Holy Spirit’s work.
“Sealed with the Holy Spirit of Promise”
This is also the Spirit’s work the moment someone believes.
First, I love that He’s called the Holy Spirit of promise. Not the Holy Spirit of works! No one earns the Spirit. No one is good enough. But He’s promised and given to everyone who asks and believes, freely.
The word sealed is full of treasure. Here are four pictures of what it means.
1. A finished transaction
On the cross Jesus cried, “It is finished!” (John 19:30). In Greek that’s one word, tetelestai, a word that carries the idea of “paid in full.”
Many Bible teachers have pointed to ancient practice to illustrate it. A convicted criminal’s crimes might be listed on a certificate of debt, and when his sentence was served, the debt was marked as paid, so he could never be made to pay for the same crime twice. Paul uses a similar picture when he says the record of debt against us was nailed to the cross (Colossians 2:14).
The Spirit’s seal says the transaction is complete.
2. A mark of ownership
It’s often said that timber buyers in Asia Minor would select trees, stamp them with their seal, and float the logs downriver to the port at Ephesus, where the seal identified the owner. God stamps us with His seal, showing that we belong to Him.
In Revelation, sealing speaks of ownership and protection: the angels are told not to harm the earth until God’s servants are sealed on their foreheads (Revelation 7:3).
Who owns us now? Paul says your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God; you aren’t your own, for you were bought with a price, so glorify God in your body (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).
In Ezekiel 9, before judgment fell on Jerusalem, the Lord told a man to go through the city and put a mark on the foreheads of those who grieved over its sins. The Hebrew word for that mark is tav, the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which in the ancient script was written like an X, a cross! That mark set them apart and protected them from judgment. Believers are sealed too, marked as belonging to Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come (1 Thessalonians 1:10).
3. A bond of security
A seal was set to prevent something from being opened. The lions’ den where Daniel was thrown was sealed by royal decree (Daniel 6:17). Jesus’ tomb was sealed too (Matthew 27:66).
How secure is your eternal future? Jesus said He gives His sheep eternal life; they will never perish, and no one can snatch them out of His hand. And the Father who gave them to Him is greater than all, so no one can snatch them out of the Father’s hand either (John 10:28-29).
This all assumes you’re in Christ, trusting Him and believing in His work on the cross. His saving work never fails those who trust in it.
4. An imprint of identity
In ancient times, each person’s unique seal, pressed into wax, left his identity behind. God places the Holy Spirit in us as His signet, His seal of authenticity.
The Holy Spirit makes us look like Jesus. His face is seen in our lives as we’re crucified with Him and live by Him. It’s a bit like a president’s face stamped on a coin, showing whose it is.
Paul says he has been crucified with Christ; it’s no longer he who lives, but Christ lives in him, and the life he now lives he lives by faith in the Son of God, who loved him and gave Himself for him (Galatians 2:20). And when Christ, who is our life, appears, we’ll appear with Him in glory (Colossians 3:4).
F. B. Meyer wrote, “For sealing there are needed the softened wax; the imprint of the beloved face; the steady pressure. Would that the Spirit might impress the face of our dear Lord on our softened hearts, that they may keep it for evermore!”
“The Guarantee of Our Inheritance”
The Holy Spirit in our hearts is the proof that all of God’s promises will come true in our lives, now and in the future. Heaven is real, and its glory will be given to us without fail.
Paul says it is God who establishes us in Christ, who anointed us, sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee (2 Corinthians 1:21-22).
Paul is telling us we have undeniable proof that we’re saved: the witness of the Holy Spirit. Until “the redemption of the purchased possession,” the day we receive our full redemption, what we have is the Holy Spirit as a down payment.
How do I know I have the Spirit?
Have you had a victory over sin this past week?
Maybe there was at least one moment when you were tempted, faced with a choice to sin, and you were able to say no. Why? Because of the guarantee of the Holy Spirit living in you.
Every spiritual victory you’ve experienced, or will experience, confirms that you’ve received the pledge of God’s Spirit. And our present victories over sin are just a foretaste. The best is yet to come, when we’ll experience permanent, perfect victory over sin!
Life looks so different for someone without the Spirit. They’re an unknowing slave of sin. Even if they want freedom from its power, it escapes them. They find that Jesus was right: if you try to do it on your own, your righteousness would have to exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 5:20).
Yet freedom is just a prayer away.
“But I blew it.”
Maybe you’re thinking, “I know I was set free, but I gave in to my flesh anyway.”
Know this: if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).
Repentance is a fruit of a heart filled with the Spirit. Does your heart long for the forgiveness that comes only from Jesus? That’s proof you’re saved!
And Paul says to walk by the Spirit, and you won’t carry out the desires of the flesh (Galatians 5:16). The answer is never trying harder. It’s walking with and in the Spirit.
Read the Bible and pray,
abide in Christ all day,
and your flesh will get out of the way.
How do I abide? How do I walk more with Him? How can I experience His life in mine? Jesus said that those who abide in His word are truly His disciples (John 8:31).
So the witness of the Holy Spirit says, “You can know you’re Mine, because you look like Me, because you walk with Me, because you believe the gospel.”
This is completely real, more real than the world can ever know. We’re alive spiritually. A fountain of living water flows from our hearts.
- The will of God the Father.
- The work of God the Son.
- The witness of God the Spirit.
Grace Takeaway
You didn’t earn the Spirit; He was promised and given the moment you believed. His seal says the debt is paid, you belong to God, you’re secure in His hand, and Christ’s face is being pressed into your life. Every victory over sin, and every longing to come back after you fall, is His witness that you’re saved. Walk with Him, abide in His Word, and rest in the guarantee.
← Experience Your Inheritance | All Ephesians notes | Power to the People →