Even the best of us are sinners. We're all fallen beings-some certainly worse than others. At the risk of sounding negative, if our lives were examined under a microscope, most of us would have more sin than good as the sum total of all of our works. But thankfully, we're not judged on the sum total of OUR works; but on Christ's, and our willingness to accept Him and what He offers to us.

In this particular verse, written to the Saints at Ephesus, Paul reminds them that-because of what Christ has done-they would be enabled to enter God's presence with confidence and, thus, boldly. In the Greek, these two words are different, but carry much the same meaning. The Greek for "boldness" means essentially "fearless confidence" and the Greek for "confidence" means quite literally "confidence" or "trust." In other words, the passage is saying that if we believe in Christ, we will return to God with a fearless confidence, knowing Christ has made this possible.

Now, there is an interesting insight in the Greek, which does not appear in most English transitions. The Greek word παρρησίαν can mean one enters God's presence with "freedom in speaking," and "open and frank" conversation, or without "concealment," "ambiguity," or "circumlocution." All of this implies some form of "conversation" or "discussion"-presumably between us and God. In other words, Paul seems to be saying, "Because of Christ and our faith in Him," at the judgement day-even though we have committed sins during our lives-we will feel no sense of guilt, defensiveness, embarrassment, or a need to justify our lives. We will have "confidence" and "boldness" because God will be judging us on Christ's life; and not on our own. As Paul said elsewhere, God "made" Jesus "to be sin" (even though He never sinned), that we "might become righteousness" (See 2 Corinthians 5:21).

The clear meaning of the Greek of Ephesians 3:12 is that our faith in Christ will give us a sense of boldness and confidence at the day of judgement because Christ is perfect, and our imperfections will therefore never come up. What a remarkable, beautiful, and hope-filled promise!