Talk 9 - Ephesians 4:17-5:1

0:00 Well, welcome to our third and final focus on our series in Ephesians. Just managed to switch my iPad off at that critical moment, wasn't that clever? So if you have a copy of New Testament, access to it, that would be great. And if you would hunt up Ephesians chapter four, because in a moment we're going to read from verse 17. This letter written probably around 62 AD or CE, if we're going to be politically correct, by the great Christian missionary and teacher and leader, Paul, while in prison in Rome, to Christians in the city of Ephesus, Christians who were seeking to do their best to be faithful to Jesus Christ, many of whom he knew personally because he had been instrumental in establishing the church there. Now, of course, when Paul wrote a letter, he didn't divide it into chapters and verses that we have in our letters today, they were added hundreds of years later to help us find our way around. But there is nothing haphazard about the way in which he wrote.

1:27 This isn't a series of random thoughts cobbled together in a wet Thursday because he had nothing better to do. There was a clear purpose and focus to his writing. And if you got your copy of the series guide, let me remind you that it's there. It may be gathering dust on some shelf somewhere, propping up the piano perhaps, or maybe you didn't get your copy. There are copies still available. At the beginning of it, there is a little suggested outline. And on page nine, it gives you a basic idea of the flow of thought through this letter. And it's focused particularly on God's purposes, the issue of purpose, a huge question for everybody.

2:21 Sooner or later, we begin to wonder, why am I here? What's the point of my life? What am I here for? Those questions don't go away. When you reach the advanced stage of almost 72, as I am, you still have that question. I'm still here. What for? What's the point?

2:38 What is the purpose for my life? And so Paul focuses in particular, not only on that, but in particular in that. First of all, God's purpose in creation. Why have a world in the first place? Secondly, his purpose, what God's been up to in human history through Christ and the establishing of the church. And then now we come on to the third major focus of God's purposes. So let's read from verse 17 of chapter four. So I tell you this and insist on it in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do in the futility of their thinking.

3:29 They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Now having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity and they are full of greed. That, however, is not the way of life you learned when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. You were taught with regard to your former way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires, and to be made new in the attitude of your minds, and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore, each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body, literally all members of one another. In your anger, do not sin. Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry. And do not give the devil a foothold.

5:09 Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work doing something useful with their own hands that they may have something to share with those in need. Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other just as in Christ God forgave you. Follow God's example, therefore, as dearly loved children. Wonderful just to have the opportunity to read and to listen to these words. It's unlikely that you're going to hear this kind of thing on the various chat shows and in the media that we listened to this week.

6:28 So refreshing to come to it. And the focus, I think, is clear from the word go. It's on this new life or on the new self, as Paul calls it in verse four. I tell you this, insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do. And then verse 20, that's not the way of life you learned when you heard about Christ. So the focus then is God's purpose for the new self. That is for every single genuine believer in Christ. This is God's purpose for you, for me, for us.

7:22 And we will notice a number of similarities in the couple of chapters now that follow in the pattern with the other movements in this letter. First, and we're going to come across this, particularly this morning, this before and now pattern. What things used to be, what they are now. In this case, the way they used to live before they came to know Jesus. Remember, most of them came to know Christ as adults, contrasted with the way they are now to live. Then you're going to come across next week a focus on illumination. In the first two movements, Paul prayed for the illumination of the Spirit in our lives. In chapter five, it's different.

8:19 The illumination is the Lord Jesus himself. And the whole idea there is that we allow Christ to shine on us so that we become lights in his light. That is the only way we shine as lights in this world, if we allow him to shine on us. That's next week. And then, of course, we'll come across opposition. In each of the three movements, there's a big emphasis on the opposition to God's purposes. And the one in chapter six is very famous because there we read about the armor that God has chosen for us to put on because we are invited to participate in a very real spiritual conflict, a spiritual struggle, and we are provided with resources, but we have to do the fighting. This isn't about, oh, God does everything and we just sit back.

9:25 We actually have to do the fighting. And so he's given us armor. He's also given us constant access to him as our commander in chief through prayer so that we can fight and stand and continue to stand. So then the focus is on this lifestyle of the new self. And the opening is, well, it's emphatic. It reminds me sometimes of, you know, being a teacher as I was in a former life. And there are times when you just have to say to us, now listen, I need you to listen to me. If you miss everything else, get this.

10:13 And there are times we all have to do, sometimes we do that with our kids, sometimes we do that with each other. We need to get this. It is emphatic. Whatever else you do or don't understand, you are called to live differently, differently from the way you used to live, especially if you come to Christ as an adult, differently also from the nations and the cultures around you. And says Paul, I insist on this. And it's not just Paul's personal opinion. Notice he says, I insist in the Lord.

10:53 That is with all the authority of the commander in chief here. The clarity is refreshing, Especially at times when there appears to be so much confusion about how Christians are meant to live. And in a time when there is increasing pressure on us individually and collectively to accommodate to the so-called progressive thinking and values of contemporary society. And we've been told that all that Paul stuff, that's old fuddy-duddy stuff, and it was okay when he was writing. Well, it wasn't actually. It was totally radical when he was writing, and it is totally radical today. We're called to be different, and there's nothing new in the pressure. I think Paul is so insistent because he senses that there are people who are wobbling.

12:01 in their loyalty to Jesus. There's so much pressure. Peter writes about it in his letter about the culture around them. And he says to the Christians, your friends, your families, your neighbors, they are shocked, they're surprised that you don't simply join with them and do the stuff that they do. And perhaps some of us have felt that in the workplace. where in conversation or what you're doing at a weekend and it becomes clear that you're different. Now, I can remember a number of occasions in my own life, especially as a young adult, doing a kind of, well, I wouldn't say embarrassed walk, but this awkward thing of being different and being excluded because I had a different set of values, a different way of thinking.

13:04 And sometimes it's done nicely, sometimes it's done with abuse, but it is done because Christians are called to be different. And because we're so hot-wired to want to fit in, to find friends, to be part of things, it is so tempting then just to smudge the edges and blur the distinctions so that nobody really notices that actually we don't believe what they believe. We don't think the way they do. Let's just pretend so that we can get along. There is something tragically ironic about professing Christians who believe that to be truly radical and progressive, we need to set aside Paul and Jesus and embrace the ideas of contemporary morality. There's nothing progressive about it. It is a retreat into sheer paganism and the idolatry into which the gospel was first preached. And it's not just individual Christians, but whole churches and denominations are openly debating whether to remain loyal to Paul, to Jesus, and to the New Testament, or to just set that aside under whatever guise culture has changed, or scientific discovery, or whatever,

14:38 to set it aside and just accommodate to contemporary thinking. That pressure has always been there, but to see it now, I mean, we see the way, sadly, Anglicanism has torn itself apart over recent years. We've seen it in Methodism. We've seen it in the Church of Scotland. We see at least the beginnings of it in the Presbyterian Church in Ireland. I am told this by my Presbyterian minister friend. This stuff is very real. Working this through, how are we to live?

15:21 It's just some abstract idea. This is about loyalty to Jesus and understanding what it is that he wants us to live. And what tends to be forgotten is this, that the gospel challenges all cultures. It challenged first century culture in Ephesus. It challenges 21st century culture in Northern Ireland. It always has done. It always will do. Because it's a voice from the real world into this world.

16:08 We are called to be different. That's the bottom line. Now, we have to work out where those differences are and what that looks like. But the bottom line is this. If there is no distinction between the way we think, behave, our values, etc., etc., and the prevailing values of the culture around you, there is likely to be something significantly wrong. Don't live any longer like the Gentiles. That's a very strange way of expressing it, but Paul here is simply following the language that Jesus used. For example, when he was talking about religious devotion and prayer, he said, don't pray like the Gentiles.

16:54 And he explained what he meant. The Gentile approach to prayer is they think they're going to be heard because of their many words. In other words, it's all about technique and ritual and repetition and enthusiasm and fervor. And it isn't about those things. Jesus taught when you pray, say, Father, it's about relationship with God. It's not about technique, although it's so easy for that kind of emphasis, that Gentile emphasis to creep its way back into the church. He also taught that there is a Gentile mindset when it comes to motivation for daily work. Because the Gentiles go to their work to get food and covering.

17:46 And you say, well, what's wrong with that? That's why I need to pay my mortgage. We knew all of that. God knows all of that. But that's not the fundamental reason we go to work. The fundamental reason we go to work is to seek first God's kingdom and his righteousness. And then all the other things are added in. But the primary motivation is to seek an experience of God's government and to live out his righteousness in our life, the formation of character.

18:15 That's very different. And we'll come out in the workplace in many different ways as we seek to live for Christ as Christ. Don't live like the Gentile. And here, the fundamental thing, and there's an awful lot more Paul could say, but he brings it down to a simple but brilliant analysis of what is fundamentally futile and empty about the Gentile way of thinking. Their mindset, he says, is futile because their understanding is darkened. They are separated from the life of God because of the basic ignorance that is due to the hardening of their hearts. So Paul is tracing it, this futile thinking, this empty way of life, right back to a core basic attitude of heart. A hardening of heart.

19:18 And if we want to know what he means by that, he has expanded on this in Romans chapter 1, where he writes, although people knew God, that is, they knew there was a God, a supreme creator, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him. There was a hardening of their heart. They resented God. They didn't want to acknowledge dependence on God. You know that feeling, don't you? You'd like to feel that you're not an individual in your own right and that you can make decisions for yourself and you're in charge. The idea that you had to be thankful to God and not just once but all the time and live in a state of thankfulness and dependence. There's something in the human heart that resents that.

20:11 That Nietzsche expressed very well once when he said that if there was a God, I couldn't bear not to be he. We want to be our own gods. There is this clash, this hardening of our hearts against God, a resentment of him, a refusal to acknowledge him as God and my dependence on him, a refusal to be thankful to him. And as a result, Their thinking became futile. This isn't a question of intelligence. There is no denying the intellectual brilliance of, for example, a man like the late Stephen Hawking. His work on black holes was groundbreaking. But when it came to a question of ultimate reality, he got it terribly wrong.

21:08 And therefore, his conclusions were wrong, claiming that because there is something, gravity, the universe can create itself from nothing, which is just a nonsensical statement that was right in the center of one of his final pieces of writing. Because there's something that can create itself out of nothing. I mean, it's just philosophically silly, but he's driven to it. And that's where people are driven to in the end, thinking that, well, something just comes out of nothing and there is no God behind it. And we pretend and live as if God isn't there. And many brilliant minds, fantastic intellects refuse to acknowledge God. It's nothing to do in the end with intellect, but it's something much deeper at the level of the heart, the deepest desires, the motivation of the human personality.

22:07 We will not have God. We will not allow a divine foot through the door, as one famous professor of biology said. And of course, then if you deny God, you're walking away from the light. And that by definition means that you find yourself in the dark because there is no alternative source of light in the universe. To live as if there is no God, as if they had created themselves, is futile. It's empty. It is ultimately irrational because it denies the basic ground for reason.

22:49 And it's strange that so many prefer to attribute their existence the mindless matter and processes than to a rational creator claiming that it's their intelligence that leads them there. This kind of empty thinking leads to empty living. Life in the dark, alienated from the true life of God. Notice what he says. It leads to a loss of sensitivity. Sensitivity to God and to the voice of conscience. That little judge that God has placed heart of everybody that operates in very uncomfortable ways, that gets you excusing yourself or blaming others. Evidence of the creator.

23:34 But if we deny him, it's like an alarm clock. The more times we shut it off and shut it off and shut it off when it goes off, we'll end up not hearing it. We lose our sensitivity to the voice of God. And that leads, says Paul, to increasing sensitivity sensuality. So a loss of sensitivity leads to an increase of sensuality, where desires and feelings and preferences take center stage. Because if we won't have God's voice, so the voice of conscience, the voice of his word, the voice of his son, the voice of the Holy Spirit, then we've got to listen to some voice. And it is often in the end, the voice of our own preferences and desires, which in turn, says Paul, leads to every kind of impurity and lies that are dominated by greed. Now, of course, there's not everybody who goes the full extent of this analysis.

24:49 This is a kind of a high level little grid to help us to understand what is going on. Paul doesn't specify exactly what this looked like in Ephesus, although we know a lot about the city of Ephesus and so we can clearly come up with it. That's not the point because we don't live in Ephesus. We live in Northern Ireland. What Paul is giving us here is this brilliant analysis that certainly helped me as a student at university because I came across this for the first time really when I was about 18. At a critical moment, trying to figure out why it was that so many people weren't believers. Where was I going to go with my own life? Beginning to understand what is going on in the culture.

25:44 Why do people think this way? Why are they constantly pushing the boundaries of sexual liberation and all the rest of it? This is crucial to understand what is going on and work it out in our own culture. This appeal to sensuality. All cultures have their own ways of expressing this. All cultures have their own slogans that sum them up. And today's world, if you want to understand the culture, look to the experts in advertising. Because they know how to appeal to these instincts, if you like, that have been cultivated in culture.

26:30 We think of these brilliant slogans that they come up with. We could do a little quiz. You know, he said, just do it. Do we know the brand? Nike, yeah, no problem. We know it. It's in our head. You're worth it.

26:48 L'Oreal, yeah, there you go. Have it your way. Burger King or McDonald's, I'm loving it. And all the other social mantras such as love is love, meaningless. And yet, it can mean anything, and that's why it's so useful. It stops all discussion. It's something we can chant and put in banners. If it feels so good, it can't be wrong.

27:14 My body, my choice, and on and on it goes. All designed to appeal to the self, the independent self, to be free to follow his or her own desires. You owe it to yourself. Have a bit of fun. just do it you're worth it how often have we been persuaded against our own better judgment and the voice of our conscience to go down that line with one of these little mantras come in because they're the little slogans that enable us to justify to ourselves things that we otherwise wouldn't do we need I think to think through what's going on now Paul doesn't simply say don't live that way. He gives a reason. This is not the way of life you learned when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus.

28:13 In other words, it's, well, live according to truth. Not your truth as opposed to my truth, but truth in the sense of ultimate reality, the way things actually are. A bit foggy this morning on the drive down, and you know what it's like driving in the winter and the fog, and you're driving along, and you think you know that there's a tree at the corner. I mean, you know there's a tree there, but you can't see it. So maybe it's gone. Maybe it's not there anymore. Well, of course, you wouldn't be so stupid as to drive as if it had gone simply because you can't see it. you drive according to reality.

28:58 You drive according to the truth. At least you better or you're going to be in trouble. We live according to the truth. That is the truth in Jesus or perhaps better truth in Jesus. This use of the name Jesus is quite rare. Paul normally refers to him as Christ or Messiah or Lord or the Lord Jesus Christ. Truth in Jesus is an emphasis on the historic person. Jesus, a real person who is truth, who is ultimate reality.

29:35 The one who said, I am the truth. What did Jesus teach about these things? About how we are to live. Well, they should know that because Paul and the others had taught them, well, do we know it? When I was a teacher in school, I used to have a bit of fun with the sixth form classes, especially those who were Christians and started asking them questions about basic things, basic morality. And it never ceased to amaze me as so on. Oh, but you mustn't judge. Really?

30:13 Because Jesus said we mustn't judge. Really, is that all he said? What about not casting your pearls before swine? Did he say? Oh, he did say that too. Well, do you not have to judge who the swine are before you cast your pearls? Oh. Do you know what he taught about marriage?

30:34 About gender? It's clear. It's there. It's historic. It's related back to Genesis. This isn't hard. Oh, but let's not let the facts get in the way of a good story. Let's reinvent Jesus and wrap him in the flag of our particular cause.

30:55 Because if Jesus were here today, this is what he would say. Really? You're confident in that? Are you? Wow. So he would contradict himself. The truth that is in Jesus. And they had been taught it.

31:15 But some, even in the first century, in the first church in Ephesus, were beginning to wobble because of the pressure of conflicting ideologies and religious philosophies in the city. Fantastic that so many kids are out in these little rooms of devoted teachers who are teaching them the truth that is in Jesus. Because they might not hear it anywhere else. What a wonderful thing that is. God has given us a new life. This new self created to be like God. Christianity is not a self-help religion. And yet self-help is what most of us want.

32:21 The seven steps to living your best life now. The five keys to being a better you. Be a better version of yourself. These things sound Christian. And a lot of the stuff in them isn't bad. it just starts in the wrong place. It's Christianity without the Holy Spirit. It's self-help religion.

32:59 See, Jesus didn't come into the world just saying, listen, you just try harder to be better and if you do that, you'll earn forgiveness of your sins. We all know that. We couldn't have been forgiven of our sins because we're all fallen. guilty before God, no matter how good I can be now, nothing can deal with this. Jesus came to present himself as a sacrifice for a sin on the basis of which God could forgive us freely. But Jesus also didn't come and say, now that you're forgiven, try your best, do better. Become the better version of yourself. Learn the seven steps to X, Y, and Z. He didn't.

33:43 what he said was, I'm going to give you a new life. That new life in you by the Holy Spirit of God. The secret to holiness, to living this new life, is not a set of rules. However useful rules are in their own place, and I'm not knocking that, disciplines and so on, But that's not where it's at. Where it's at is this relationship with Christ himself, by his Spirit. Paul puts it this way later in chapter 5. Wake up, those of you who've fallen asleep, wake up and let Christ shine on you, and then you will shine his lights. It's not, you do your best to shine, you know, get all your resources together and fire them out there.

34:44 That's not the way round it is. Sometimes it can feel like that because there's work to be done, there's effort, there's discipline, but it's coming from a different place. It's coming from the recognition that all the resources that I need to live this life have been given to me by Christ in this. I need to turn to him and seek him and develop that relationship and look at his face and let him shine on me and allow that then to transform me and allow this new self to develop. What does it look like as I draw to a conclusion? Well, let's take our principle of living according to the truth that I've already mentioned in this sense of what is real. Verse 25, speak truthfully to others because we are members of one body, members of one another. That's the reality.

35:46 If you are a believer, a genuine believer, you are a member of all the other genuine believers. We are members of one another. That's quite personal, isn't it? It's quite intimate. It's not even saying you're members of Glen Abbey Church. We welcome the new members of Glen Abbey Church. But that's an expression of something actually bigger. The body of Christ.

36:17 We share the same life. In that sense, it doesn't matter what label you use. Whether you use labels of Pentecostal, Reformed, Baptist, charismatic, Christian, Catholic, no label at all, whatever. It doesn't matter. What matters is that if you trust Christ, his life is in you by his spirit. You're members of one another. Now, why would you want to damage your own body? You see, sometimes, maybe due to trauma, every due to something going wrong in our thinking and so on.

37:04 A person might be tempted to take a knife and stick it in their own arm, but we would all recognize that it's not healthy, is it? It's not a good idea. Why would we do it spiritually and stick knives in one another? It's a way of spiritual self-harm. Gossip, slander, rage, anger, all of these things. If we're going to live according to the truth, then we put away these things.

37:50 We all get annoyed and angry. It seems to be a recognition of that with Paul. In your anger, don't sin. Don't let the sun go down. Get over, recover. Don't let it fester. But sometimes we do. And sometimes with our words and our behavior, we can wound other Christians very seriously.

38:18 Why? Why would we do it if we're living according to truth? It doesn't make any kind of sense. See, being members of one body is not simply a theology, a nice idea, nor is it an aspiration. One day we might be able to act as if we were. It is a reality. We are this. So let's live according to the truth.

38:54 So don't let unwholesome talk come out of your mouth. You might think it, but don't let it out. What's meant by unwholesome talk? Well, Paul gives us his list. Rage, anger, brawling, slander. In the next chapter, he writes of obscenity and foolish talk and coarse joking. He doesn't mention the precise things that were happening in Ephesus. What good would that have done?

39:21 Every culture has its own way of being coarse, of being obscene, of expressing anger and rage, its own choice of ways in which to slander each other. It's up to us to think those three and realize that this kind of talk just is not appropriate because we're members of one another. This has nothing to do with being old fuddy-duddies and, oh, we're taking us back to the Victorian age, et cetera. It's about being members of the body of Christ and choosing to say only those things that are going to build someone up according to their needs. please note, not your needs, according to what they need. In other words, listen, work out. What could I say in this context that might help?

40:19 Don't resort as sometimes, sadly, people do to just quote in a wee verse because you feel you have to say something or some evangelical jargon. Oh, God works all things together for good and people are going, this person doesn't understand what's going on here. Listen. Make sure that the words that come out of your mouth are actually going to help someone, and if they're not, say nothing. Just listen and be there. Something to work on. Why? Because we're members of one another.

40:56 It's in our interest as individuals to see the body built up and strengthened according to their needs. And finally, for this morning, let me finish with the statement at the very end. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other just as in Christ, God forgive you. Follow God's example, therefore, as dearly loved children. And this is the second principle of how to work this out. The first is to live according to truth. The second is to live in imitation of God and Christ. To live in imitation of God and Christ.

41:42 I learned a lot of things through imitation. I learned how to shave, although I gave it up, as you can see, by watching my dad and imitating him. It's great fun with soap and a comb. I remember it well. I learned how to bake wheat and bread by watching my mum. Imitation is not about faking something. It's different from saying I have an imitation watch share. Well, you fancy buying it?

42:10 It's Apple, but it's imitation. No, no, no, I wouldn't do that. There are different kinds of imitation, but imitation is a fundamental way of learning anything. And when I was a young fellow trying to learn to play cricket, I tried to imitate Jeffrey Boycott. I never managed it. Those of you who are old enough to remember Jeffrey Boycott as a cricketer, I'll talk to you afterwards. But I never managed it. But his example was one to it inspired me,

42:41 and I got better through imitation. That's how it works, and that's how it works here. Not about faking things, but a principle of learning. We may not get on very well at the start, but this is what we do. It's a bit like anything in life. You get better with practice, don't you? You get better at music with practice, regular practice. You get better at photography with practice.

43:15 You get better at being a husband with practice, don't you, 47 years in? And I'm still learning. You get better at anything with practice. What about trying to get better at forgiving? That's the thing that's highlighted here. As God forgives. Well, you say, how does that work? Does God just forgive and that's it?

43:45 And just, oh, I forgive you. It doesn't matter if you admit it or confess it or repent of it. No, he doesn't, does he? You need to think it through. There's a difference between the willingness to forgive and that disposition and the actual transaction of forgiving, which depends on acknowledgement of wrong and repentance. These things are distinct. It's complex. But watch God.

44:12 See how he does it. See how he warms a person. See how he encourages a person. See how he gives a person courage to come before him and say, I am a sinner. And see how he then forgives freely and totally and follow him and model him in the warming, in the compassion, in the kindness, in developing a disposition in your heart that will forgive. Practice it. It's one of the reasons we're part of a church, because church gives you lots of opportunities to practice. Family life is the same.

44:48 Relationships are the same. Lots of opportunity to imitate God and live the new life that he has called us to live. Let's pray. Father, thank you for the real down-to-earth nature of what we've been talking about together. And we do ask for your help to understand your clarity of what this looks like, this expression of the new self that you have placed within us, this new life through your spirit, what that looks like for us in our home, in our marriage, in our relationship, with our parents, with our kids, in their workplace, in our church, in our community. Help us to do the hard thinking, to work this through so we can live to your glory and the strength that the Holy Spirit provides. In Jesus' name, amen.

45:55 Amen.