Proseuche Commentary: The Good Word

Proseuche Commentary

Melisa Williamson

Ephesians 1:3

The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is blessing, the one blessing us in every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ.

This verse intrigues me. 

 Let me explain.

           Greek word order is different than English.  They have places that they prefer to place words, and there are rules, but it is more fluid than what we are able to do.  We have a subject (Jill), a verb (sat on), and an object (the hill).  If we changed the order to read, “The hill sat on Jill,” the meaning of the sentence changes—a lot!  In Greek, there are identifiers at the end of the word telling you what part of the sentence it is, enabling them to arrange words for emphasis rather than form.  Right now, if I wanted to emphasis that Jill sat on the hill, I put the words I want to emphasis in italics.  But in Greek, you can make the word create emphasis by making a word the first or last that you read.  This is what happens here, by placing “blessing” (the object) first.

            Ephesians 1:3 is literally ordered like this:

“Blessing is the God . . . , the one blessing us . . . .”

But, because “God” has the word “the” in front, we know it is the subject and must be translated first.  Paul chose to put “blessing” first to emphasize it—like bold letters.           
    
What is so special about this highlighted word, “blessing”? 
           It may not be what you would expect.  

Our English Bibles sometimes translate different Greek words with one English word.  For instance, in Greek there are various words for “love,” but we only have one English word that we modify with adjectives: brotherly love, erotic love, unconditional love.  When we think of blessing, we not only have years of subjective religious baggage defining what we think it means, but we also have more than one Greek word for blessing. 

            I think that the most common understanding of blessing probably comes from the Beatitudes in Matthew 5, “Blessed are you when . . . .”  This Greek word, makarios, has the meaning of divine favor that causes happiness in you.

            What is so intriguing to me about this passage, is the word chosen here, eulogetos, which is often translated as “blessing.”  You may recognize this word as a root word for our term, “eulogy.”  A eulogy is word (speech) that highly praises someone, often spoken at a funeral.   

The actual Greek term literally means good (eu) word (logos).      
          "Good Word"

          The Greek Lexicon (Dictionary) by Liddell and Scott says that that it was used:
                  by Pindar as a eulogy (d. 433 B.C.),
                  Thucydides used it in the sense of being fair (d. 395 B.C.),
                  Plato meant it as fine language (d. 347 B. C.),
                  Aristotle used it to mean something that was reasonable (d. 322 B.C.),
                  and it was an idiom for alms collected for the poor. 

In the New Testament, several hundred years later, we translate the word as:

praise, flatter, blessing, benefit, gift, and a kind act towards someone else. 

Which begs the question: how should we translate it in Ephesians 1:3?   

            The Louw and Nida Greek Lexicon translates this verse with the meaning of praise and a kind act towards someone:

“Let us praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

for he has acted kindly toward us” (LN, 88.69).

The translators of the KJV, NKJV, NASB, and ESV translate both words as “blessing,” while the Amplified Bible shows the various meanings by writing, “May blessing (praise, laudation, and eulogy) be to the God and Father . . . .”

            After sitting with this for some time, I keep thinking back to similar key terms:

            the word (Jesus; scripture) is logos

the good news (gospel) is eu-angeliov    

            the good word (blessing, praise) is eu-logetos

In John 1:1 we correctly translate it as “the Word was God,” although the Greek word order places “God” first for emphasis.  Here, the Greek word order places “good word” [blessing] first.  In Greek, “the good news” is a thing (noun), the message of Christ crucified and resurrected. It is also an action (verb), since we are able to “good news” others (Luke 1:19; Acts 8:35). 

Here, God (The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ) is the Good Word and He is the one Good Wording us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens through His Son, Christ Jesus.. 

            God is the good word.

            God is the one good wording us in every spiritual good word.

            God is blessing.

            God is the one blessing us in every spiritual blessing.

            God is kindness.

            God is the one acting kindly to us in every spiritual kindness.

            God is the gift.

            God is the one gifting us with every spiritual gift

            God is the Good Word.

            God is the one Good Wording us in every spiritual Good Word.

            Beloved of God, The Good Word has come to bring us the Good News: that we can receive every spiritual Good Word—every spiritual blessing—through Jesus Christ.

            Are you ready for a Good Word?

                        Amen and Amen.