according as he has chosen us in him before [the] world's foundation, that we should be holy and blameless before him in love;
God dates His choice of us before anything existed at all. He also names its aim in three short words: holy, blameless, in love. So on what ground did He choose us, and what was He after?
Chosen in Him
The words "in him" carry the weight of the verse. Our actual history began somewhere else entirely.
But in blessing us in this wonderful way God has acted in keeping with something His mind did in a past eternity. Before the foundation of the world He chose us in Christ. Note those two words, "in Him," for they, or their equivalents, occur again and again in this chapter. As a matter of history each of us was in Adam before we were in Christ. But before Adam was created, God saw us as in Christ, and on that basis He chose us.
This answers the objection that rises the moment anyone measures himself against the standard of the verse.
You say, I am not holy. But look — is not He holy, and without blame, and in love before God? Oh yes. Well, I am in Him, that is the point.
Before, not from, the foundation of the world
Scripture uses two different phrases about God's plans, and the difference is deliberate.
"From" the world's founding does not mean the same as "before" it. Let us respect and learn from the very words of God. Think of the saints who are kept from yielding to the Beast at the close of the age. Their names were written from the foundation of the world in the slain Lamb's book of life… But the phrase used in Eph. 1:4, as in 1 Peter 1:20, is pointedly different.
What the early date proves
Some read the timing as the proof that grace is sovereign. One writer argues the point lies elsewhere.
God's choosing us before the foundation of the world is not what proves the sovereignty of grace by the time of the choosing. Suppose God were to choose us now — it would be just as sovereign an act as doing it then. The practical truth brought out in His choosing us before the foundation of the world is this: it proves we have nothing whatever to do with the world. Before its very foundation He chose us. We have nothing to do with the world but to get through it… God settled our living place with Himself before the world ever existed.
Holy and without blame
Each of the three terms has its own ground, and none of them describes what we are by nature.
If we are to be before God, we must have a suited nature. Could the natural man be at home with God, and find pleasure where all is holy? Impossible, it is opposed to his very being. And supposing it were possible to be before Him with a conscience not at rest, where would be the joy? How blessed, then, that we are to be "holy and without blame before Him in love!" "Holy," because we have His nature, a nature that finds its only portion in God. "Without blame," because of Christ's work; for who shall lay anything to our charge? "In love," because His love flows always into our hearts, and back again to Him its source.
The standard is not an abstract one; it is a description of God Himself.
It is wonderful that these three things should be said of us — that we should be "holy and without blame before Him in love." For these three things mark the blessed God Himself. Holy in His character; blameless in His ways; and love in His nature.
Before Him
One writer reaches for a family picture to explain the phrase "before Him."
"Before Him" — what an expression of His delight. Just as a mother puts her child out before her eyes so she may gaze on it and be satisfied in her love, so has He set us before Him in Christ.
A note on translation: the ESV joins "In love" to verse 5. The writers quoted here read it with verse 4, as words describing the saints.
Verse 4 and verse 5
The two verses are not saying the same thing twice.
Thus the blessing of verse 5 surpasses the blessing of verse 4. There it was sovereign choice that by grace makes us suited to Himself: here it is God's good pleasure that predestines believers to the relationship of sons.
Honesty about the present
Every honest reader will see how little he matches this verse today.
In the saint now there is much that is very unsaintly indeed, unlike God and His beloved Son. There is pride, vanity, foolishness, and all kinds of evil ways and thoughts that never flow from Christ… But for all this, are they not saints? God forbid they should not be. And yet this is the steady thought of God. How can that be? Because God looks at us here according to what He gives us in Christ, and nothing less.
Summary
- Chosen — in Him. God did not choose us and then place us in Christ. Before Adam existed, He saw us in Christ, and that is the ground of the choice.
- Chosen — before. "Before the foundation of the world" is not the same as "from the foundation of the world." Scripture keeps the two phrases apart on purpose.
- Chosen — for His nature. Holy, blameless, in love describe God Himself; He chose a people who would answer to what He is.
- Chosen — for His gaze. "Before Him" is the heart of the verse: God sets us out in front of Himself as the objects of His delight.
- Chosen — and seen in Christ. Real faults remain in every believer, yet God looks at us according to what He gives us in Christ, and nothing less.