Ephesians Chapter 5

From The Open Bible Project

5:1 Be therefore imitators of God, as beloved children.

5:2 Walk in love, even as Christ also loved you, and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling fragrance.

5:3 But sexual immorality, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not even be mentioned among you, as becomes saints;

• (1) Now he comes to another type of affections, which is in that part of the mind which men call covetous or desirous: and he reprehends fornication, covetousness, and jesting very sharply.

5:4 nor filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not appropriate; but rather giving of thanks.

• (a) Jests which men cast at one another: that no lightness is seen, nor evil example given, nor any offence made by evil words or backbiting.

5:5 Know this for sure, that no sexually immoral person, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ and God.

• (2) Because these sins are such that the most part of men do not consider them to be sins, he awakes the godly to the end that they should so much the more take heed to guard themselves from these sins as from most harmful plagues.
• (b) A bondslave to idolatry, for the covetous man thinks that his life consists in his goods.

5:6 Let no one deceive you with empty words. For because of these things, the wrath of God comes on the children of disobedience.

5:7 Therefore don't be partakers with them.

• (3) Because we are most ready to follow evil examples, therefore the apostle warns the godly to always remember that the others are but as it were darkness, and that they themselves are as it were light. And therefore the others commit all evils (as men are accustomed to do in the dark), but they ought not to follow their examples, but rather (as the property of the light is) reprove their darkness, and to walk in such a way (having Christ that true light going before them) as it becomes wise men.

5:8 For you were once darkness, but are now light in the Lord. Walk as children of light,

• (c) The faithful are called light, both because they have the true light in them which enlightens them, and also because they give light to others, insomuch that their honest conversation reproves the life of wicked men.

5:9 for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth,

• (d) By whose power we are made light in the Lord.

5:10 proving what is well pleasing to the Lord.

5:11 Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather even reprove them.

• (e) Make them open to all the world, by your good life.

5:12 For the things which are done by them in secret, it is a shame even to speak of.

5:13 But all things, when they are reproved, are revealed by the light, for everything that reveals is light.

5:14 Therefore he says, "Awake, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you."

• (f) The scripture, or God in the scripture.
• (g) He speaks of the death of sin.

5:15 Therefore watch carefully how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise;

• (4) The worse and more corrupt that the manners of this world are, the more watchful we ought to be in every situation, and give regard to nothing but the will of God.

5:16 redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

• (h) This is a metaphor taken from the merchants: who prefer the least profit that may be before any of their pleasures.
• (i) The times are troublesome and severe.

5:17 Therefore don't be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.

5:18 Don't be drunken with wine, in which is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit,

• (5) He sets the sober and holy assemblies of the faithful against the immoral banquets of the unfaithful, in which the praises of the only Lord must ring, whether it is it in prosperity or diversity.
• (k) Every type of disorder, together with every manner of filthiness and shamefulness.

5:19 speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs; singing, and making melody in your heart to the Lord;

• (l) With an earnest affection of the heart, and not with the tongue only.

5:20 giving thanks always concerning all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God, even the Father;

5:21 subjecting yourselves one to another in the fear of Christ.

• (6) A short repetition of the end to which all things ought to be referred, to serve one another for God’s sake.

5:22 Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.

• (7) Now he descends to a family, dividing orderly all the parts of a family. And he says that the duty of wives consists in this, to be obedient to their husbands.
• (8) The first argument, for they cannot be disobedient to their husbands except by also resisting God, who is the author of this subjection.

5:23 For the husband is the head of the wife, and Christ also is the head of the assembly, being himself the savior of the body.

• (9) A declaration of the former saying: because God has made the man head of the woman in marriage, as Christ is the head of the Church.
• (10) Another argument: because the good estate of the wife depends on the man, so that this submission is not only just, but also very profitable: as also the salvation of the Church depends on Christ, although to a far greater degree.

5:24 But as the assembly is subject to Christ, so let the wives also be to their own husbands in everything.

• (11) The conclusion of the wives’ duties towards their husbands.

5:25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the assembly, and gave himself up for it;

• (12) The husbands duty towards their wives is to love them as themselves, of which love the love of Christ towards his Church is a graphic image.

5:26 that he might sanctify it, having cleansed it by the washing of water with the word,

• (13) Because many men pretend the infirmities of their wives to excuse their own hardness and cruelty, the apostle wishes us to mark what manner of Church Christ received, when he joined it to himself, and how he does not reject her for all her filth, and uncleanness, but ceases not to wipe it away with his cleanness, until he wholly purifies it.
• (m) Make it holy.
• (n) Through the promise of free justification and sanctification in Christ, received by faith.

5:27 that he might present the assembly to himself gloriously, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.

• (o) The Church as it is considered in itself, will not be without wrinkle, before it come to the mark it aims at: for while it is in this life, it runs in a race. But if it is considered in Christ, it is clean and without wrinkle.

5:28 Even so husbands also ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself.

• (14) Another argument: every man loves himself, even by nature: therefore he strives against nature that does not love his wife. He proves the conclusion, first by the mystical knitting of Christ and the Church together, and then by the ordinance of God, who says that man and wife are as one, that is, not to be divided.

5:29 For no man ever hated his own flesh; but nourishes and cherishes it, even as the Lord also does the assembly;

• (p) His own body.

5:30 because we are members of his body, of his flesh and bones.

• (q) He alludes to the making of the woman, which signifies our union with Christ, which is accomplished by faith, but is signified in the ordinance of the Lord’s supper.

5:31 "For this cause a man will leave his father and mother, and will be joined to his wife. The two will become one flesh."[6]

• (r) See Matthew 19:5

5:32 This mystery is great, but I speak concerning Christ and of the assembly.

• (15) That no man might dream of natural union or knitting of Christ and his Church together (such as the husbands and the wives is) he shows that it is secret, that is, spiritual and such as differs greatly from the common capacity of man. And it consists by the power of the Spirit, and not of the flesh, by faith, and by no natural bond.

5:33 Nevertheless each of you must also love his own wife even as himself; and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

• (16) The conclusion both of the husband’s duty toward his wife, and of the wife’s toward her husband.