Learn Christ
Ephesians 4:20–21
Ephesians 4:20–21. In sharp contrast to their former manner of life, the readers are reminded of what they were taught concerning Christ, both in the initial proclamation of the gospel and through subsequent instruction. Over against the hardness, ignorance, and depravity which characterize the pagan world to which they once belonged, Paul sets forth the whole process of Christ-centered teaching. His expressions in vv. 20 and 21 are quite striking, and ‘evoke the image of a school’.
The first formulation, ‘you did not learn Christ that way’, is without parallel. The phrase ‘to learn a person’ appears nowhere else in the Greek Bible, and to date it has not been traced in any prebiblical Greek document. In Colossians, the same verb is used of the readers having ‘learned’ the ‘grace of God’ from Epaphras, who had given them systematic instruction in the gospel (Col. 1:7). Here in Ephesians Christ himself is the content of the teaching which the readers learned. Just as he is the subject of the apostolic preaching and teaching (1 Cor. 1:23; 15:12; 2 Cor. 1:19; 4:5; 11:4; Phil. 1:15; cf. Acts 5:42), so he is the one whom the hearers ‘learn’ and ‘receive’. This formulation signifies that when the readers accepted Christ as Lord, they not only welcomed him into their lives but also received traditional instruction about him. Colossians 2:6 and 7 (the nearest parallel to our expression) makes a similar point: ‘just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord’ refers not simply to the Colossians’ personal commitment to Christ (though this notion is obviously included); the statement also points to their having received him as their tradition (the verb 216 appears in this semi technical sense). Learning Christ means welcoming him as a living person and being shaped by his teaching. This involves submitting to his rule of righteousness and responding to his summons to standards and values completely different from what they have known.
The following twofold statement in v. 21, ‘if indeed you have heard of him and were taught in him’, explains more fully what was involved in ‘learning Christ’. The first expression, ‘you heard of him’, draws attention to the initial response to Christ, while the second, ‘you were taught in him’, picks up the point of ongoing instruction.The introductory ‘if indeed’ does not express doubt, but implies confidence and certainty (NIV has surely), since it confirms the preceding assertion about the readers having so learned Christ that they are no longer in the darkness and ignorance of the Gentiles. Although the first expression has been rendered ‘you heard him’ and taken to mean that Christ had instructed the readers through the voice of their Christian teachers, the Greek construction suggests that he was the one about whom they had heard. In the proclamation of the gospel they had first learned about Christ (cf. 1:13), and that preaching was reinforced in the systematic instruction they were given,220 through those especially equipped by the ascended Lord Jesus (4:11; cf. 2:20; 3:5).
In learning Christ the readers had heard of him and been instructed in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. This clause qualifies the preceding so that the whole expression corresponds to the first formulation ‘you learned Christ’ (v. 20). A contrast is set up with the ‘not so’ of v. 20 and indicates that the truth, as embodied in Jesus, was the norm by which the readers had been instructed in the gospel tradition of Christ, and so was wholly at odds with the Gentile lifestyle depicted in vv. 17–19.
The general sense of the clause ‘as the truth is in Jesus’ is clear enough, even if some of the details contain difficulties. First, the noun truth has no article in the original, but has been rendered as ‘the truth’, since this makes the most sense in the context.222 It is not unusual for abstract nouns to appear without the article (e.g., sin, death, and grace), and this is the case with truth in Paul’s letters, apparently for a variety of reasons. There is considerable stress on ‘the truth’ throughout this section of Ephesians. The apostle calls on these Christians to speak the truth of the gospel in love, rather than being misled by the malicious scheming of the false teachers, so that they might grow up into Christ as head (vv. 14, 15).
Next, reference is made to the new person who is ‘created according to God in righteousness and holiness of the truth’ (v. 24), while the immediate consequence of the new life in Christ is that each one should put away falsehood and speak the truth to his neighbour (v. 25; cf. 5:9; 6:14).
A second unusual feature is the use of the name ‘Jesus’, the only occasion in Ephesians where it occurs by itself (though cf. ‘Lord Jesus’ in 1:15). The change from the title ‘Christ’ seems to be deliberate, not because the name ‘Jesus’ was aimed at Gnostic teaching with its division between the heavenly Christ and the earthly Jesus, but in order to stress that the historical Jesus is himself the embodiment of the truth. The apostle reminds his readers that the instruction they had received in the gospel tradition was indeed ‘the truth as it is in Jesus’.
O’Brien, Peter Thomas. The Letter to the Ephesians. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1999. Print. The Pillar New Testament Commentary.
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