"According as he has chosen us in him before the foundation of the
1. God's design in our election was that we should be holy: "According as he has chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him" (Ephesians 1:4). There has been much difference of opinion among the commentators as to whether this refers to that imperfect holiness of grace which we have in this world, or to that perfect holiness of glory which will be ours in the world to come. Personally, we believe that both are included, but that the latter is chiefly intended; and so we shall expound it. First, of that perfect holiness is Heaven. That this is the prime reference appears from the amplifying clause "and without blame before him": it is such a holiness that God Himself can find no flaw in. Now the imperfect holiness which the saints have personally in this life, though it be a holiness before God in truth and sincerity, yet it is not one "without blame": it is not one God can fully delight in.
Second, as God has ordained us to perfect holiness in the world to come, so He has ordained us to an evangelical holiness in this world, or else we shall never come to Heaven: unless we be made pure in heart here, we shall never see God there. Holiness is the image of God upon the soul, a likeness to Him which makes us capable of communion with Him; and therefore the apostle declares that we should "follow holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord" (Hebrews 12:14). As reason is the foundation of learning, no man being able to attain it unless he has reason, so we cannot reach the glory of Heaven unless the principle of holiness be divinely communicated to us. Therefore, as God's first design in our election was that we should be holy before Him, let us now make this our paramount concern. Here too is solid comfort for those who find indwelling sin to be their heaviest burden: though your holiness be most imperfect in this life, yet is it the earnest of a perfect holiness in the life to come.
Holiness must needs be the fruit of our being chosen in Christ, for it is essential to our having a being in Him. It would be a contradiction in terms to say that God chose a man to be in Christ and did not