Wanted: Dead or Alive
Eph 5:1-10
INTRODUCTION
A. Death & life are complete opposites; we are either dead or alive. Something cannot be both
dead & alive at the same time.
B. It works the same way spiritually. A person cannot be both spiritually dead & alive at the same
time. It’s either one or the other.
C. We are here given the characteristics of those who are dead & of those who are alive. Are you
dead or alive?
DEAD
A. People are spiritually dead because of sin, v 1.
1. Sin separates one from God (Is 59:2), and therefore makes one spiritually dead.
2. Js 1:14-15.
3. Sin is a cancer that always proves fatal. Sin should be our most dreaded “disease.”
B. People are spiritually dead when they follow their own desires.
1. In vv 2-3, the Bible basically says, “You did what everyone else was doing, you did what
your own flesh told you to do.”
2. In following their own desires, they follow Satan.
a. V 2.
b. A great paradox occurs here. In trying to do their own thing, these people
became followers of Satan. They became his slaves.
3. People who are spiritually dead are “children of wrath.”
a. The wrath of God rests upon them.
b. Wrath belongs to everyone—“children of wrath, like everyone else.”
ALIVE
A. Christians are made alive by God, vv 4-5.
1. We did not make ourselves alive with Christ, but it was the working of God.
2. Since God is love (1 Jn 4:8), he wanted to make us alive with Christ.
3. God’s mercy allowed him to make us alive with Christ.
B. Christians are made alive by grace, vv 5-9.
1. We do not deserve to be made alive, but God does so because he loves us.
2. Grace did not come as a result of anything we did; we could not do anything to deserve
grace.
3. “Amazing grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but
now I’m found; was blind, but now I see.”
C. Christians are made alive for good works.
1. We are created for good works—they are our purpose.
2. God prepared this to be our way of life.
3. We need to walk in good works & thus fulfill God’s expectations for us.