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But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even though we were dead in offenses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you are saved![a] and he raised us up together with him and seated us together with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, to demonstrate in the coming ages[b] the surpassing wealth of his grace in kindness toward[c] us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you are saved[d] through faith,[e] and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God; it is not from[f] works, so that no one can boast.[g] 10 For we are his creative work, having been created in Christ Jesus for good works that God prepared beforehand so we can do them.[h]

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Footnotes

  1. Ephesians 2:5 tn Or “by grace you have been saved.” The perfect tense in Greek connotes both completed action (“you have been saved”) and continuing results (“you are saved”).
  2. Ephesians 2:7 tn Or possibly “to the Aeons who are about to come.”
  3. Ephesians 2:7 tn Or “upon.”
  4. Ephesians 2:8 tn See note on the same expression in v. 5.
  5. Ephesians 2:8 tc The feminine article is found before πίστεως (pisteōs, “faith”) in the Byzantine text as well as in A Ψ 1241 1881 al. Perhaps for some scribes the article was intended to imply creedal fidelity as a necessary condition of salvation (“you are saved through the faith”), although elsewhere in the corpus Paulinum the phrase διὰ τῆς πίστεως (dia tēs pisteōs) is used for the act of believing rather than the content of faith (cf. Rom 3:30, 31; Gal 3:14; Eph 3:17; Col 2:12). On the other side, strong representatives of the Alexandrian and Western texts (א B D* F G P 0278 6 33 1175 1505 1739 al bo) lack the article. Without the article, the meaning of the text is most likely “saved through faith” as opposed to “saved through the faith.” On both internal and external grounds the anarthrous wording is preferred.
  6. Ephesians 2:9 tn Or “not as a result of.”
  7. Ephesians 2:9 tn Grk “lest anyone should boast.”
  8. Ephesians 2:10 tn Grk “so that we might walk in them” (or “by them”).sn So that we may do them. Before the devil began to control our walk in sin and among sinful people, God had already planned good works for us to do.