2:4-6 Made Alive with Christ These verses remind us of the control that Satan once held over our lives. Only through God’s mercy and Christ’s sacrifice do we now enjoy freedom from the power of sin and death. Our spiritual lives are so linked with Christ that we were in fact raised from the dead with Christ. He alone has given us life!
2:10 His Masterpiece Every artist strives to create what can be called their “masterpiece”—their best work by which others will know them. In Christ Jesus, you are God’s masterpiece. Not a mistake, not an accident. God takes you as you are—broken, disabled, or just a plain mess—and refines and chisels away until the person he created you to be—his masterpiece—is revealed. But unlike a gilded statue or a painting hung only for admiration, God fashions us to be useful in his Kingdom and to accomplish the work he planned for us from the beginning of time.
2:19-22 A Holy Temple The typical Jewish reader would have been familiar with the idea of God’s presence filling the Temple (1 Kgs 8:10-11; 2 Chr 7:1; Ps 11:4). Paul expresses the reality that now all who believe in Jesus become the new temple where God dwells. His Spirit fills us personally and corporately; God’s presence is manifest in our love, unity, and fellowship in Christ.