The Armor of God

I love watching the show Mythbusters. They’re no longer making new episodes, but I literally have a couple of seasons worth of episodes on my DVR just waiting for me to find time to watch them. My wife and I will go through periods where we just binge watch Mythbusters for a couple of nights straight. It’s always fascinating to watch as they tackle the myths that the viewers propose.

Many of the myths I can deduce how they will turn out simply by watching the introductory dialogue. However, the myths that I have the most difficulty predicting are those that seek to determine what is bulletproof. They’ve shot lighters, pizzas, and even fish tanks and have discovered things that are bulletproof that I never would have thought possible.

Even today’s bulletproof vests aren’t entirely bulletproof. I remember being trained on bulletproof vests years back. It was explained that the mesh weave that the vests are made of is designed to slow down the bullet in order to minimize the damage. However, it was still very likely that a bullet would go through. That was why a metal plate was installed into the center of the vest, directly over the heart. It would be too heavy to make the whole vest out of metal, but the design of the vest was best compromise to keep the wearer alive while still allowing them to move.

Most people don’t wear don’t wear a bulletproof vest on a daily basis. While body armor very well may save your life, it’s just not practical to wear it during your normal routine. However, you can be assured that law enforcement and soldiers will strap on their body armor any time they believe they are entering a situation in which they might be shot at.

Likewise, as we finish up in our study of the book of Ephesians, Paul encourages us to put on the armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-20). At the time of this letter, it is believed that Paul was already under house arrest in Rome. With that being the case, the sight of Roman soldiers would have been the norm. It should come, then, as no surprise that Paul, seeing the spiritual warfare around us, would use the attire of a Roman soldier to impart spiritual truth.

He starts with the belt of truth. Within the Roman soldier attire the belt was the foundation. Everything built upon this one piece. You may think, “It’s just a belt. I could go without my belt if needed without any ill-effect.” However, our belts today, while they still wrap around the waist, are far different from the belt of a Roman soldier. The belt not only held the tunic in place so that it wasn’t flapping around while he was trying to fight, it also provided protection while not restricting movement. Studded, leather bands came down from the belt to help guard the legs of the soldier. Granted, metal plates covering your legs would likely have given more protection, but given the geographical region and need for mobility, they just wouldn’t have been practical.

So, the belt served for both protection and freedom of mobility, but it also provided a sheath for the sword. Can you imagine going out to battle and forgetting your belt? Yes, you’d be less protected, but you’d be more concerned with the fact that your sword was attached to that belt. The belt carries the tools that you need in order to protect yourself. Likewise, truth is what hold everything else together. Satan is the prince of lies. Without truth, we have no hope of combating him. Truth is what protects you from lies and awards you the freedom to use the rest of the armor of God.

Moving on we come to the breastplate of righteousness. The breastplate guards the most vital organs of the body. It doesn’t do anything in regards to offense, but it is everything in keeping you alive. The breastplate turns fatal attacks into useless and ineffective blows that merely glanced off the armor. So it is with God’s righteousness. We’ve been called to live holy and righteous lives. Just as the clothes in Jesus’ parable of the wedding banquet, righteousness is something that has been provided to us by Christ. When we put on the breastplate of righteousness and the holy life that Christ has for us, we are protected from the attacks of the enemy. Attacks on our character, our family, and our integrity that would otherwise prove fatal are useless and ineffective when we are protected by righteousness.

Next come the feet. We don’t really get a name for this piece of the armor. The scriptures simply say, “and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace,” (Ephesians 6:15) but a pastor friend of mine whimsically referred to them as the “gospel of peace shoes.” You may think that the shoes that are worn don’t make that much difference, but as any fashionista will attest, the shoes make the outfit.

A Roman soldier’s shoes, or sandals, were a fairly vital part of their outfit. It has been said that the attention given to the soldiers’ footwear was the secret of Roman conquest. These weren’t your average flip-flops. The sandals that adorned the feet of Roman soldiers could best be described as sandals with cleats. Hobnails were stuck into the soles which improved the life of the sandal in addition to giving the soldiers better footing. When pressed, soldiers were able to withstand the pressure without slipping and giving up ground. Tie this back to Paul repeatedly telling the church to withstand the devil and to stand firm. The gospel of peace, that is the good news of Jesus Christ, gives us the stability and sure footing that we need. Within the gospel, the believer finds preparation to withstand whatever assaults may come.

Paul then commands us to take up the shield of faith. In the beginning of the movie Risen we get a good look at the shields used by Roman soldiers. They were large and rectangular. Towards the beginning of the movie we see the soldiers line up and hold their shields edge to edge. They then proceed to march towards the assailants under the complete protection of the army of shields.

Paul calls this shield the shield of faith, but the faith that is referred to here is not a saving faith but a living faith. Our church is named Faith Community not simply because we have salvation through faith in Christ but because we trust in the promises of God and band together as a community of living faith. The shield of faith is our first line of defense. When we band together as a community of faith, we are protected from darts and fiery arrows thrown at us by the enemy. Though one may be weak, the many are strong.

Continuing in verse 17, Paul says to take up the helmet of salvation. Obviously the helmet protects the head, and that is precisely Paul’s point. We often get the idea that as we walk with God our intellect is unimportant. God doesn’t require us to be a rocket scientist in order to receive salvation, but our intellect plays a vital role in our Christian growth. When God protects our mind with the helmet of salvation, we will not fall prey to Satan’s attacks. I have seen Christians, pastors and laity alike, that have been coerced by the intellect and teachings of this world. The Christian that studies God’s word and uses their God-given intelligence to seek him will not be led astray. Paul demonstrated this as we looked at his missionary journeys in the book of Acts. He didn’t simply tell people about Jesus but gave them the intellectual evidence within the scriptures and their own lives.

Finally, Paul comes to the sword of the Spirit. Hebrews 4:12 states, “For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” It’s fitting that the sword is the only offensive item within the armor of God. We can think of the word of God merely as the holy scriptures, but never in the New Testament is “the word of God” used merely as a general reference to scripture. The word of God is the truth that he imparts to us. When Peter stood up at Pentecost and told the people who Jesus was the Christ, that was the word of God. When I preach on Sunday mornings, I am proclaiming the word of God. In your daily life, when you tell someone God’s truth, you’re proclaiming the word of God. That’s why it’s a sword that has been given to us to wield as a part of the armor of God, because we are to impart that knowledge into the lives of others. This goes beyond quoting scripture but includes interpretation as well as proclamation of what God has done in our own lives.

I could go deeper into detail with all of these pieces of armor. I’ve seen pastors do an entire sermon series on them, but for this message our focus lies elsewhere. As important as it is to know about the armor of God, what each piece is, and how each part works, more important is that we put it on and use it. Just like with a bulletproof vest, we can study and understand how it works and why it works, what it protects from and its limitations, but ultimately that vest isn’t going to protect you unless you put it on. This is why Paul states repeatedly in this passage to “put on the full armor of God.” While the helmet of salvation will help to protect your mind, without the breastplate of righteousness, you’re still vulnerable. While the belt of truth helps tie everything together, you’re not going to be effective in any battle unless you wield the sword of the Spirit.

Like it or not, we are in the middle of a spiritual war. People’s minds, be it politicians, church leaders, or even your neighbor or your spouse, are being polluted daily. We are in the middle of a war with the prince of lies. He wants nothing more than to see this world burn. “Put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground.”

The Christian Household

This week, Facebook has been reminding me that it was at this time last year that my family and I packed up to move to North Dakota and join everyone here at Faith Community Church of the Nazarene. I still remember the first message that I preached to this congregation on Mother’s Day last year. It’s funny, sometimes, how God works things out. As we’re working through the book of Ephesians, the same passage that I preached on that day is the same one we’ll be covering today.

You may not know this, but I struggled with what to preach that day. I believe that God had directed me to the passage that I ultimately preached that day about honoring your parents, but I had struggled with how much of this Ephesians passage to cover. While last year I covered “honor your father and mother,” I struggled with how to properly cover “wives submit to your husbands,” especially being that it was Mother’s Day.

However, just because a passage may be difficult or unpopular does not give us reason to skip it or ignore it. Especially with difficult passages, we need to dive into the scripture and determine what the author is saying within its given context and within the entire context of scripture, and as I stated last year, this entire passage hinges on one particular phrase.

Ephesians 5:21, which also serves as a concluding statement for the previous section, serves as an introduction to everything we’re about to cover today. Under the context of this verse he then goes on to give specific ways that each of us are to interact within the family. In order to understand the context in which Paul speaking to us, we need to understand what Paul is saying in this verse.

While we are clearly commanded to submit to one another, we must understand that words have meaning. It would seem absurd for us to say that a master must submit to his slave or that parents must submit to their children, but that seems to be what Paul is suggesting. Typically when we think of submitting to someone or something else we think in terms of authority. If I submit to you then I am admitting that you are in charge and that I have to obey you. In turn, if you are in charge and I have to obey you, therefore I am not in charge and you don’t have to obey me.

We hear it a lot in my house. One kid will tell another to do something, even something as innocent as, “You’re supposed to put your plate in the sink,” and the immediate response is, “You’re not my boss!” It’s as if they’re saying, “You’re not an authority figure over me, and I don’t have to submit to you.”

However, this submission that Paul is talking about doesn’t have anything to do with the order of authority or chain of command. Who’s in charge of who or who has to obey whose commands is not the intent of Paul’s call to submit to one another. Rather it is how that authority is used as well as received.

In Matthew Jesus states, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you.” (Matthew 20:25). By our very nature, we desire to promote ourselves and to use what authority we have in order to gain more. Yet Jesus demonstrated to his disciples that to be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven that you needed to be a servant. It is out of reverence for Christ that we submit ourselves to one another just as Christ did for his disciples. In today’s modern world, that translates into two different areas. Loving and respecting those that we have authority over and loving and respecting those that have been placed in authority over us. This is what Paul is talking about when he tells us to submit to one another.

With all of that being said, we can now begin to look at the rest of Paul’s instructions within the context of this verse. Continuing on to Ephesians 5:22-24, we find our first controversial topic of the day, the relationship between wife and husband. Again, this is often an unpopular text and as well as one that is often taken out of context. The submission that Paul is speaking of in these verses is the exact same type of submission that we just finished talking about, not the idea of slavery but love and respect. Now to clarify, this verse does not place women in a subservient role to men. It is specifically stated to submit to “your husbands,” and not to men in general. This is not every man who you meet on the street. In that regard we fall back on “submit to one another.”

Paul gives two reasons for a wife to submit to her husband. First is because of the Lordship of Christ, and second is because the husband has been placed as the head of the household. Just as Paul states that we are to submit to one another out of reverence for Christ, he uses the same plea in regard to wives and husbands. Because of our love for Christ and the example he’s laid before us, we are to submit to one another out of love. Ladies, if that’s how we’ve been called to act to one another, how much more should that be the case for the man you chose to marry? The second reason, the man as the head of the house, leads us to the next portion of our text, Ephesians 5:25-33.

Like it or not, we as husbands have been called to a high task. Yes, scripture states that wives are to submit to their husbands, but as a wise man once said, “With great power comes great responsibility.” Men, we have been called to love our wives as Christ has loved the church. Christ’s love was a sacrificial love, a love that put the needs of other above even his own life. This isn’t to say that you must bend over backwards to meet every desire of your wife, but you must be wise enough to discern her needs from her desires and then how best to fulfill as many of both as possible.

Marriage has many purposes. It serves an emotional purpose, for God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone” (Genesis 2:18). It serves both a physical and social purpose of bearing children and fulfilling the natural desires of both man and woman (1 Corinthians 7:1-3). And here in Ephesians Paul indicates a spiritual purpose. Men, we have been given the responsibility of presenting our wives as holy and blameless before the Lord. It is our responsibility to ensure that our wives and our children are walking with Christ.

Ladies, this is the second reason the scriptures say to submit to your husband, because as the head of the household your actions reflect on him. God has placed him in charge of your well-being. God has tasked him with loving you with the same sacrificial and sanctifying love that Christ loves us with. God has tasked him to love you as he does his own body, because the two have become one flesh. If you truly love him as Christ intends and he truly loves you as Christ intends, loving each other and submitting to one another should not be a chore but a joy.

Moving on, Paul now directs the focus away from the husband and wife relationship and towards the parent child relationship in Ephesians 6:1-4. I’m not going to go too deeply into this one since I’ve covered it before, but it is clear that children are to honor their father and mother by obeying them. This dynamic changes as we grow into adulthood and are no longer children, but even then we are called to honor our parents and submit to them just as we do all others out of reverence for Christ. As Paul says, this is the first commandment with a promise, “that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.” I said it last year and I’ll say it again, this is not a bribe from God. This is not God telling you that if you’ll honor your father and mother that he’ll make you happy. This promise is the natural consequence of honoring your father and mother. You will learn from their wisdom. You will gain additional insight into the world, and you will your children what this commandment looks like so that in turn they will do the same when you are older.

Once again, Paul turns his focus back on the man of the house imploring us to not exasperate our children. Another translation reads, “Do not provoke your children to wrath.” This means that just as we are to love our wives and submit to them out of reverence for Christ, we are likewise to have the same respect and servant’s attitude toward our children. You are still in charge of the household, but Paul is saying that you’re to teach and instruct them in the most loving way possible.

I was scrolling through Facebook the other day when I came across a video that had the words scrolling across pictures of a dirty bedroom. They spoke of a mother that had been fighting with her son. She was stressed out from work and her son just didn’t seem to want to listen. The morning ended in the middle of a fight with him storming off to school and slamming the door. The mom so wanted to put him in his place and teach him that he had to respect her because she was his mother.

However, as she began to settle down she realized that he was likely just as stressed out as she was. With school, homework, friends, and chores, he didn’t need her yelling at him on top of it. She realized that when she was stressed out like that all she really needed was for someone to show that they cared. She began to pick up his room, do his laundry, and make his bed.

When he came home from school, he picked up right where they had left off. He began yelling and stomped off to his room. After slamming the door, he slowly came back out, walked down the stairs and quietly asked his mother, “Why did you clean my room?” She responded, “Because I love you, and I know that you’ve been stressed lately. I was hoping that by taking that chore off your plate that it might help lighten the load.”

Sometimes what your child needs is a loving gesture rather than a stern talking to. I’ll admit that I’ve fallen into that place where my thought is no longer about how to help my child but rather it’s an attitude of “I’ll show him. I’ll teach him that he can’t act like that.” “Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” Men, this is what we signed up for when we became husbands and fathers. Yes, the patriarchal, biblical view puts much emphasis on the authority of the man, but it also gives him much responsibility.

Finally, Paul begins to speak of the relationship between slaves and masters. You may look at passages like this and think that they have no insight for us in a modern society without slaves, but if we culture in which Paul is writing, these words could just as easily be written to employer and employee (Ephesians 6:5-9).

In those days, family and work were not mutually exclusive things. You didn’t put in your forty hours and then return home to spend time with family. The work that you did was just as much a part of your life as your family’s lives. The relationship between slaves and masters was most definitely related to family relations, but today it’s not uncommon for your wife or children to never meet your supervisor or, if you’re a supervisor, those under you.

Paul guides men in these relationships as well. You are to serve the one you work for as if you were serving Christ himself, submitting out of love and respect. As a worker, you should work diligently, whether you’re being watched or not, so that you might honor Christ. If you are a supervisor, you must treat those under you with properly, not showing favoritism or malice but submitting even to them just as Christ did with his disciples.

With today being Father’s Day, men, the focus is squarely on us. Today is a day in which our families show us how much they love and appreciate us, but it is also a day to remember what it truly means to be a father and a husband. Yes, God tells wives to submit to their husbands and children to obey their parents, but every time Paul mentions the responsibilities of somebody else, he always comes back to the responsibilities of the man of the house. We have been given authority over our entire household, but with great power comes great responsibility. Let us all submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Children of Light

For the most part, I grew up in church and had a fun time at it. As a child I attended VBS, Sunday School, and children’s camp, but it wasn’t until I entered the teen group that I really discovered how much fun it could be.

The youth leaders would always plan fun activities for us on Wednesday nights, but the real fun came a few times each year when we’d have a lock-in. In case you’re unaware, a lock-in is where a few naive or crazy youth workers would decide to lock themselves inside the church with a group of teens overnight. Of course, none of the teens ever go to sleep during lock-ins, so likewise, none of the youth workers get to sleep either.

The nights would be filled with snacks, movies and games, and the types of games were solely determined by the level of crazy found within the youth workers. One game that was a lock-in favorite was the game Sardines. This game is roughly described as hide-and-seek in the dark, but there’s more to it than that. In Sardines one person is given a few minutes to find a hiding place within the dark church. Once that time is up everybody else begins searching around the church looking for the one person. However, once that person is found, the person or people who find them, instead of announcing it to everybody, begins to hide with them. This begins to get interesting, because while one person can easily hide under a table or in a closet, after being found a couple of times, you begin to have two, five, ten, or even fifteen people trying to a small hiding place like a can of sardines.

Seeing as lock-ins always take place at night, games in the dark were always on the agenda. However, nothing ruined the game more than that one exit light that you couldn’t turn off or the lights from the street lights shining through the window. In complete darkness, even the faintest amount of light becomes a glaring beacon. Paul uses this fact to illustrate the difference between Christians and the rest of the world.

As we continue in our study of the book of Ephesians, I want to remind you about what we’ve discussed so far. There are two halves to the book of Ephesians, and as we continue our journey through the second half, it’s important that we don’t forget the first. While the second half of the book may seem like a bunch of rules, a list of do’s and don’t’s, it’s important that we see the big picture that Paul is painting. God loves you so much that he was willing to take the punishment that you deserved. All the sin and ugliness that you’ve done in your life, Jesus took it upon himself on the cross so that you might believe in him and live. To those that believe in him, he offers the honor of becoming a child of God, and along with that honor come certain responsibilities. Paul begins with speaking again of these responsibilities in Ephesians 5:3-7.

Most of this is pretty self-explanatory. Stay away from sexual immorality. Don’t be greedy. However, Paul goes on to say, “Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking.” This phrase can easily be glossed over due to it not covering what we’d consider to be the big sins. Paul seems to be grouping together three different ideas all relating to our speech and how we communicate with each other. We might take them each individually and say obscenity refers to crude gestures or foul language. We could go on to say that coarse joking is speaking of dirty jokes, but if we look at this grouping as a whole, a bigger issue begins to emerge.

If we sift through this group, we begin to see that foul language and dirty jokes aren’t the real issue. Years ago when the TV show The Office was in its prime, the same joke could be heard in office buildings across the country. “That’s what she said,” the famous catch phrase from Michael Scott, was repeated on almost an hourly basis. I remember working in an office in Moline, IL and hearing this joke on a regular basis. Seeing as it was the cool thing to do, I wanted to get in on the joke and get at least one well placed “That’s what she said.” I consider myself to be quick-witted. I can crack jokes with the best of them, but I could never seem to be quick enough to get in a good joke.

The more I tried to make a good joke, the more I discovered what was required of me to do so. In order to crack a good dirty joke, you need to be in the proper mindset. You can’t be thinking of puppy dogs and kittens and quickly spout off a joke like that. You have to be in the right state of mind, and in order to pull off a “That’s what she said” joke, you need to constantly be in that mindset so that when the opportunity arises you’re ready to strike.

A couple of weeks ago we looked at a quote from Jesus in which he said, “But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.” (Matthew 15:18). This is the root of the problem. While coarse jokes and foul language are a problem, they’re merely symptoms of a bigger problem. They are merely a reflection of what is on the inside. Paul isn’t saying, “Discipline yourselves to keep from doing these things so that you can be a better Christian.” He says, “No immoral, impure or greedy person […] has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.” It’s not because these things will cause you to lose your salvation. Instead, these things are the fruit of a dirty heart. They are the natural product of a heart that is focussed on the things of this world, and since Christ cleanses us when we ask for forgiveness, if we are the Christians that we profess to be, our hearts should not be dirty as they were before.

Paul goes on to illustrate the impact of the light within our lives (Ephesians 5:8-14). This is not to say that once you receive Christ you will no longer be tempted. Changing of the heart and changing of the mind are two different things. There was a time when I was younger that I thought it was cool to use foul language. I have since moved past that and don’t use that language anymore, but when I stub my toe or hit my elbow, you can be sure that sometimes the first word that comes into my head is not a nice one.

As Paul points out, we used to be darkness but now we are light. He didn’t say that we once lived in darkness and now live in light. We were darkness and now we are light. Just as the teen lock-ins showed, light and darkness cannot exist in the same place. Even a little bit of light begins to remove the darkness. As Christ’s light shines through us, the darkness has to diminish. The sexual immorality, the greed, the coarse jokes and language, the darkness that we once were, has to diminish the more Christ’s light shines in us. The only way for the darkness to remain is if the light stops growing or the light begins to diminish.

We have been made children of light. This is the responsibility and the worthiness that we’ve been talking about. We’ve been given this calling to be light in this dark world, but in order to be a light in the world, we have to be children of light. This requires that we be changed (Ephesians 5:15-20).

I understand, this feels like a lot. Get rid of greed, get rid of impurity, get rid of obscenity, don’t get drunk. It seems like God’s out there just trying to be a cosmic kill-joy, but that’s where we have to remember the first half of Ephesians. If a doctor tells you to stop smoking or it will kill you, we all understand that he’s saying that with our best interest in mind. Likewise, God has set forth his standard of righteousness because it is for your own good.

Last weekend my family had the opportunity to visit a church plant started by some friends we went to college with. Getting together with old friends we had the opportunity to reminisce about our time at Vennard College. A former professor there, Dr. Brad Penn, had an old saying, “The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time is today.” Each of us are at a different place in our journey with Christ. Some of us have a godly heritage that was planted many generations ago. That tree has since been watered and nurtured until it has flourished into the godly life and heritage that you hold today. Others have not been so fortunate. You didn’t have a mom and dad that raised you in church and told you daily of God’s love for you. You don’t have that heritage to fall back on, but even if your tree wasn’t planted long ago, you have that opportunity today. You have the opportunity to accept God’s mercy and grace and become a child of light. You have the opportunity to plant that tree so that the generations that follow will have that support to lead them towards God.

Copycat

We have a problem in my house. We actually have many, but one problem keeps coming back over and over. If you have children, I’m sure you have the same problem in your house, the problem of a copycat.

This problem has only grown greater as the number of children in our home has increased. One child, who is feeling extra rambunctious, begins mimicking or imitating another. It starts off as a fun game, but it quickly becomes annoying to the other child. We tell them, “If you stop talking, they’ll stop copying you,” but, as of yet, none of them have heeded that advice.

Another common occurrence is for the older kids to accuse the younger kids of copying them while doing normal activities. The older child wants a snack, so now the younger child wants one too. The older child wants to color in the Frozen coloring book, so now the younger child wants to too. Of course, when this happens we hear from across the house, “They’re copying me!” In this instance I try to pull the older child aside and explain to them what’s going on.

I was that younger sibling. I looked up to my big brother and wanted to do everything that he did. If he built spaceships out of LEGOs, I wanted to do it too. If he rode around the yard in his snowmobile, I wanted to do it too. Unlike the previous copycat game which served only to annoy, This game wasn’t intentional. As I explain to the children, the reason the little kids want to copy them is because they look up to them. In their eyes, the big kids are so cool that they want to be just like them. If the big kids want to play LEGOs, they want to do it too, because that means they’ll be just like them. That’s why I did it, and I’m sure that’s why the younger kids do it too.

As much as older siblings find it annoying, I’m flattered when my boys mimic me. As a father, it warms my heart to see that my boys want to be like me, and it makes me want to be the best man I can be so that I might be a good example for them. The fact that they follow me and imitate me means that they want to be like me. The fact that they imitate me shows that they love me and admire me. Likewise, as we continue through Ephesians, Paul tells us that we are to imitate God just as I imitated my brother and our children imitate us (Ephesians 5:1-2).

Within the Bible we have all the laws of God as well as the life of Jesus. We also have the teachings of the apostles about God’s law and Jesus’ life, and over and over again we see all of this is summed up with the simple command to love. While that’s all well and good,

sometimes we need a little more direction than just to love, and Paul gives us that direction (Ephesians 4:25-32).

Within these verses Paul begins to outline what it looks like to put on the new self and become a child of God. He finishes it off with the passage we began with, “Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children,” and uses that to segue into the next passage. But scattered throughout this passage are a few areas in which we should imitate God.

The first is in our speech. They say actions speak louder than words, and while that’s true, it does not mean words are unimportant. Jesus said in Matthew 15:18, “But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.” What we say is important.

In my house, we battle with children telling the truth on a daily basis. From, “Did you go to the bathroom?” to, “Whose shirt is this?” we’ve had to start putting consequences in place for lying. Surprisingly the children don’t understand why we don’t believe them when they tell us something. We tell them that if they lie to us all the time that we can’t trust them, but Paul takes it a step further. With love as the basis, the importance of honesty lies beyond people believing you. Love becomes the reason to tell the truth. Paul advises us to tell the truth because “we are all members of one body.”

How little respect must you have for someone to lie to them? Do you think they’re stupid? Do they mean so little to you that they don’t deserve the truth? Actions speak louder than words, but what you say really matters. It’s a direct reflection of what’s in your heart. That goes beyond just honesty. It’s reflected in everything you say to another person and even how you say it (Ephesians 4:29). This goes for how we speak to our friends, family, coworkers, children, spouse, and animals. If the words coming out of your mouth aren’t a benefit to someone else, think long and hard before they come out. If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all, but more importantly, if you can’t say anything nice, as Jesus pointed out (Matthew 15:18), it’s because it’s not first in your heart.

The second area Paul addresses is our temper. I’ll admit that this is one that I’ve struggled with all my life. As a child, I’d hit or kick whatever was around when I became angry. On the playground at school I’d fly off the handle at the smallest thing. Over the years, through the grace of God, I have mellowed out. There are times when anger still burns within, but the scriptures do not say to not be angry. In Ephesians 4:26 Paul is quoting from Psalm 4:4 which states the same concept of not sinning in your anger and not holding a grudge.

Even Jesus became angry, but as it says, in our anger we must not sin. However, the point being made here is the same point made in the Psalms. In 1 John 3:15 it says, “Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer.” Jesus says in Matthew 5:22, “But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister, will be subject to judgment.” Anger is in itself is not bad, but it’s not just the sinful actions of which we must be wary. There’s a reason we’re told, both here and in the Psalms, to not go to bed angry. As we dwell on that anger, it festers inside of us (Ephesians 4:31). If not dealt with, the anger will grow. Your anger will grow to bitterness and your bitterness to rage all at the expense of love. “Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold” (Ephesians 4:26-27).

The third area is our work. It makes sense guard our speech and our temper, but what about our work? Paul speaks pointedly about stealing, so why do I label this as work? As Paul points out in Ephesians 4:28, this is about more than just taking what doesn’t belong to you.  It’s not enough to simply stop stealing. If we are truly imitating God, we must go beyond simply not stealing and instead, in love, seek the betterment of our brothers and sisters through our own labor. Putting others first instead of selfishly hording the fruit of our labor is the true embodiment of God’s love through our work. God’s love demands that we go that extra step to love our neighbor.

All of this is then summarized in Ephesians 4:32 and the emphasis is placed on the love and forgiveness of Christ. We’ve been called to imitate God, not as an annoying little brother or sister, but as a dearly loved child imitates their father. Looking up to him in awe and wonder and desiring above all else to be like him in his standard of love. Through our speech, through our temper, and through our work, in all we do we must be an imitator, a copycat of God.

Be Changed

As we enter the spring months of the year, the weather is getting nicer, the grass is getting longer, and the kids are going outside to run and play. We have no shortage of children at our house, and it’s amazing how differently children see the world than we as adults see it.

A few times each week, without fail, the children come running into the house because somebody saw a bee or thought they heard one. As adults, while we don’t want to be stung, we understand that if we stay out of the bee’s way they’ll likely go about their business and leave us alone. Likewise, due to our many years of experience, we aren’t enthralled by the simple things in life anymore.

Just the other day my son was talking to me about caterpillars. The excitement in his voice reminded me of when I was his age and how I dreamed of catching a caterpillar, keeping it in a jar, and watching it grow into a butterfly. It’s really a simple yet miraculous thing that, once we become adults, we take for granted. When the time is right, this little, ugly worm makes a cocoon and emerges as a beautiful butterfly.

The butterfly is interesting, because while it’s very well-known, it’s metamorphosis is one of the most extreme. It’s so extreme that it’s often easy to forget that the beautiful creature flying around used to be a fuzzy worm. That fuzzy worm, if it’s going to live, must go through metamorphosis, if it fails to change, it doesn’t go on living as a caterpillar forever. If it fails to change, that’s the end of the line. As it begins that next chapter in its lifecycle, change is not an option.

As we continue in our study through the book of Ephesians, last week was kind of a turning point. Up to this point Paul has been speaking heavily about God’s love and God’s riches, the sacrifices that Christ made, and what that means for us. He spoke of the love that God showed to us and the inheritance that we have because of it. It’s been focused very heavily on grandiose ideas explaining our salvation and how important we are to God.

Last week began this turning point in chapter four. Paul’s attention begins to shift. Up until now it’s all been about God and what he’s done, the riches he’s given us, and his love for us. Moving forward, it all shifts away from God and to us. We started seeing that last week as we spoke of being worthy of this inheritance that we’ve been given in God’s kingdom and how it’s our responsibility to be unified in Christ, to be using our unique gifts for him, and to be continually growing in maturity. Paul continues down that same path as we look at Ephesians 4:17-24.

You can see here that Paul has shifted the emphasis from God and onto the person. We don’t like to talk about it much in church these days, but there was a time when in church there was a huge emphasis on how you act. In the Church of the Nazarene we did the same thing. In the Code of Christian Conduct in church manual we listed out do’s and don’t’s. We said, “If you are a good Christian, you don’t go to the movies. If you are a good Christian, you don’t swim in the same pool as someone of the opposite gender. If you are a good Christian, you don’t dance or wear jewelry, not even a wedding ring.” We laid out this list and said, “If you’re living a holy and pleasing life, this is what your life will look like.” But it became a problem. Many of the things that were labelled is wrong or sinful weren’t of themselves bad. Instead, they were things that could lead a person into a situation where they might be tempted but weren’t sinful in and of themselves, and so today we’ve shifted that emphasis. In many American churches we’ve swung the pendulum completely in the opposite direction to the point where we don’t want to tell you, “This is what you should do and this is what you shouldn’t do,” or, “This is right and this is wrong.” Instead we just tell you to live a life pleasing to God and leave it at that as if we’re supposed to know what that means.

We run a danger on either extreme. What I love about the book of Ephesians is that it covers the whole gamut. It covers from God’s love to our responsibility. It’s divided about half and half, but all of it is important.

If we shift to one extreme and only focus on our responsibilities in Christ, if we focus on how we are to live our lives, that’s a dangerous road to go down. It leads to a list of do’s and don’t’s. It leads to “you must act this way to be a Christian.” “A holy, Christian life looks like this,” quickly turns into, “If you’re a Christian you live like this, and if you don’t, you’re not a Christian.” We refer to that as legalism. It’s this idea that your salvation is dependent upon what you do, and if you can’t live up to that standard, you’re out of the family.

A religion like this is an empty religion. There are a number of religions in the world that will tell you how to live. Be kind to your neighbor. Don’t drink, smoke, cuss, or chew or go out with girls who do. Religion like that, solely based upon a list of rules, inevitably leaves you empty and frustrated, because no matter how hard you try to live up to that standard, you’ll inevitably fail. As soon as you fall, all that guilt and despair comes rushing in, that realization that you can’t do it of your own power. A life of solely do’s and don’t’s isn’t sustainable.

Then again, on the other side of the pendulum, a religion in which we speak, not of our responsibility, but only of God’s love, mercy, and grace, is empty as well. In a religion like that we are saved through faith alone in Christ alone, and while that is completely correct, we end up missing out. In focusing solely on Jesus’ sacrifice and solely on God’s riches and not looking at our responsibility, we cheapen God’s grace. God’s grace is suddenly just a Band-Aid to fix everything. You want to drink, smoke, cuss, and chew and go out with girls who do? It’s all okay, just ask for forgiveness afterward. You want to sleep around and live with your boyfriend? It’s all okay, just ask for forgiveness every day. Jesus loves you. Jesus forgives you. Don’t worry about that part where he said to live a holy and righteous life. Live your life however you want. As long as you say sorry it’s all good. That’s cheap grace.

Jesus didn’t die so that you can continue to live your life as you see fit. Both sides of the pendulum are too extreme, which is why in the book of Ephesians Paul covers the whole gamut. Yes, he focusses on God’s grace, but he also focusses on our responsibilities. He spells out that because of God’s grace, because of God’s mercy, because of the inheritance we’ve received, we have a responsibility to live a life that is worthy of our calling. That means we have to change. That means that we can’t continue to live our lives as we’ve always lived them. We can’t continue doing all the things that we did before. Paul says, “you must no longer live as the Gentiles do. […] 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.”

The natural response of new life in Christ, of experiencing God’s mercy and grace, is that we will be changed. No longer will we live as the Gentiles do, indulging in every kind of impurity with continual lust for more. That’s how this world lives. This world desires to satisfy itself. The more it does, the more violence, sex and drugs this world gets, the more it lusts for, the more it longs for, the more it desires, because that will never satisfy. Yet when we come to Christ and receive what he’s offering to us, we are a new person. Christ fills us when we ask him to fill us. No longer do we need to be filling our lives with the muck and impurity of this world. “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; 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.”

It takes the whole picture, from God’s grace to our responsibility. When you look at the whole thing together you see that we must be changed. There is no other way, because if you have not been changed, if you are the same person that you were before you accepted Christ, something is wrong. If you have not been changed, then you have not been filled, because that’s what Christ does. When Christ comes into our lives, you are a new person. The old self is gone and you put on the new self. The temptations are still there, but you are a new person. That means that you will act different. You will put off the old self, the old self that was continually satisfying the desires of this world, and you put on the new self that was created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. This is the calling that we’ve received. Throughout the rest of Ephesians Paul begins to detail this more and more, but I want us to understand, as we move forward through Ephesians and Paul begins to lay out, “This is how you need to act,” we need to keep this in mind with the entire book. This isn’t a list of do’s and don’t’s. This isn’t legalism. This is looking at the whole picture.

Because of the grace and mercy and inheritance that God has given us, we must live a life worthy. We must be changed from what we were before, and going forward, this is what that looks like. We spoke last week about being worthy, and the last and most important way that we live a life worthy of our calling is through our maturity, everyday walking with Christ and maturing in him. Moving forward, Paul begins to outline what that maturity looks like. It’s not a list of rules. It’s not do this and don’t do that. Instead, as you have been changed and as you continue to be changed this is what that change looks like. But if you’re not being changed, then you need to go back to the source. If you’re not being changed, I dare to say that you haven’t truly accepted the inheritance that is being offered to you.

Be Worthy

With Captain America: Civil War having recently come out in theaters, a great cast of Avengers took to the screen once again. It was awesome to see all of them, from Iron Man to Ant-man, fighting with and alongside each other. However, there were a couple of Avengers missing from the movie. Namely Hulk and Thor.

Both of them are scheduled to be involved in the next Thor movie, but while big action sequences and explosions are fun to watch, where these Marvel movies shine is in making these characters relatable. Not only do we get to see the heroes fighting the villains, we also get to see them hanging out, talking to each other, and just being normal everyday people. There’s one scene in particular from Avengers: Age of Ultron where many of the Avengers try lifting Thor’s hammer Mjölnir. Mjölnir can’t be lifted by just anyone, but they all have fun trying. 

The story goes that a long time ago Thor’s father Odin wielded the hammer Mjölnir before passing it on to Thor. Inscribed on the hammer are the following words, “Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of Thor.” Throughout comicbook history many have tried to wield the hammer, but few have been found to be worthy. There were even times when Thor himself was not worthy, but what does it mean to be worthy?

Nothing sells newspapers quite like a scandal. The tabloids are filled with celebrities and public officials who’ve done this or that. Many times the issues aren’t anything that unusual, but because it happened within a prominent family or to a prominent person, it’s suddenly big news. People lie every day, yet when Brian Williams was caught in a lie the media had a field day. Right or not, we hold prominent figures to a higher standard. Queens don’t get drunk in public, journalists don’t lie, and Presidents don’t get into domestic disputes. It’s beneath their status. Because of the position that has been given to them, we expect them to live a life better than the common man.

As Paul continues in his letter to the Ephesians (Ephesians 4:1-16), he comes to the same conclusion. Those who have faith in Christ are heirs within his kingdom. As such, we are to live a life worthy of that position. He starts this section by calling us to live a life worthy of our calling, or to live up to the standard of the position we’ve been given. Much like with a king, queen, or president, we as heirs to the Kingdom of God are to live a life worthy of that title, that calling. While we have a basic understanding of what this means, Paul lays out some guidelines for living a life worthy of the calling we’ve received.

He first calls us to unity. This isn’t the first time he’s called for unity among believers, but he reemphasizes it yet again. Specifically, within our own lives he tells us to “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.” While each of these things is a personal action, they are key to living in unity.

Patience is one of the things that I need to pray for often. It’s not just a personal thing, but it affects all those around me. When my patience is wearing thin and snap at somebody that certainly didn’t deserve it, do you think that affects the unity between us? When we choose to seek our own selfish desires instead of bearing with one another in love, do you think that affects the unity between us?

Paul spends a great deal of time focused on this idea of unity. “There is one body and one Spirit […] one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all.” No matter our differences, race, gender, age, doctrinal beliefs, we all serve the same God. We all have been called to the same mission and the same savior. Let us use those things that we share to unify us within his love.

In addition to calling us to unity, we are also to embrace our diversity. Unity does not mean uniformity. It does not result in each of us looking the same and acting the same. We don’t become clones of one another to which there can be no distinction. God has made each of us different and special. He has given us natural abilities and spiritual gifts that we are to use to accomplish the mission he has set before us. The way that I fulfill the mission will be different from the way you fulfill the mission.

This brings us to a portion of scripture has been repeated to me over and over as my family and I moved to Colorado and spent time at Nazarene Bible College, Ephesians 4:11. This passage was repeated over and over to emphasize to us that there are some men and women that have been called upon and set apart for this specific purpose.

However, I think that this passage has been pulled out of context way too many times, albeit for noble purposes. On the surface it can seem as if Paul is singling out those people who God has called to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastors. I’ve even seen churches in which, whether by fault of the pastor or the people of the congregation, the pastor does all the work of ministering to the community while everyone else comes to church a few times a week to hear the pastor speak. This formula is not only dangerous, it is completely wrong.

When taken in context, here is what Paul is actually saying, “We’ve all been called to unity in Christ, but Christ has apportioned to each of us different gifts and abilities. He gave some the task of being pastors, prophets, and teachers that they might help each believer to learn what it means to serve God and to train them in the knowledge and unity of Christ that all might become mature and full of Christ.”

The reason God has called certain people to be pastors, teachers, and prophets was not so that they might do the work of the church. God called me to be your pastor so that I might teach you more about Christ and his love and to help prepare you to use your gifts and abilities to accomplish the mission he’s called you to.

We often speak of God calling people to be pastors or evangelists, but the truth is that God has called each and every one of us. When Paul said to “live a life worthy of the calling you have received,” he wasn’t speaking to the pastors and evangelists within the church. He was speaking to the church as a whole. Each of us has been called. We’ve been called out of the sinful lifestyle that once was the norm, and we’ve been called to make disciples of Jesus Christ. In Greek the word for church is ekklesia. It literally means, “called out ones.” You have been called upon by God, out of the sinful mess that used to be your life and into his glory and fullness that you might carry his gospel message to the ends of the earth. That’s not the calling just for pastors, evangelists, and missionaries. It’s the calling of anyone that places their trust in Jesus Christ.

Finally, living a life worthy of this calling means that you must develop maturity. In 1 Corinthians 3:2 Paul spoke of giving the church spiritual milk because they were not yet ready for meat. Likewise he states in Ephesians 4:14-15, “Then we will no longer be infants […] Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the head, […] Christ.”

I’ve known way too many Christians that have been going to church their whole lives but are still only drinking spiritual milk. They haven’t moved past reciting bible stories from Sunday School to actually digging into God’s word and allowing him to make a real impact in their lives. And so, as Paul says, they are “tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming.” If we are going to live a life worthy of this calling, we have to grow up. We can’t go about our lives playing church, going to church on Sundays and neglecting our calling the rest of the week. That is not a life worthy of God’s calling.

Each of us have been called to something greater than ourselves. We have been called out of sin and into the service of the all-powerful, all-knowing, living God, and with such a high calling, such a high status or rank, comes the responsibility of living up to that calling. Paul urges us to live our lives in a manner that is worthy of the calling we’ve received. Can you honestly say that you’re doing that? As you examine your life, is God’s unity with the body evident in your life? Have you embraced the mission that he’s called us to and the diversity that we all bring to the table? Are you actively working toward spiritual maturity?  Are you living a life worthy of your calling?

God’s Glorious Riches

Next year, one of my favorite shows as a kid is coming back to television, and no, it’s not Matlock. Hewey, Dewey, and Louie as well as Scrooge McDuck and Launchpad McQuack will all be returning in a reboot of the famed cartoon Ducktales.

I loved watching it as a kid and can’t wait to see what they do with it next year. One year for Christmas I even received Hewey, Dewey, and Louie dolls. Looking back, one of the most interesting characters had to be Scrooge McDuck, or maybe it was just the Duckburg society and how they handled their money. As a kid, I didn’t think anything of it, but as an adult I have to wonder, how practical is it to keep your entire fortune next to your mansion in a large building with a money symbol on it? It surely made it convenient to swim in, but I honestly don’t think I’d want to. Honestly, wouldn’t it have been more practical to get the total of your fortune in bills? That may have even made it easier to swim in.

Suffice it to say, with large building housing all of his earthly wealth, there was no denying that Scrooge McDuck was rich. In fact, there were more than a few episodes that focused around this fact. Whether it was how Scrooge made all of his money or stories telling how he lost it and subsequently regained it, Scrooge McDuck’s immense wealth was almost its own character within the show.

As we’ve been studying Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus, this theme of God’s riches has been persistent. Just like Scrooge McDuck’s money bin, this idea of God’s riches has been looming since the beginning of the letter, but up to this point we haven’t been given a clear picture as to what these riches are.

When we think of riches, our mind will typically settle on an image such a Scrooge McDuck. We think of riches and we picture piles of money or big, luxurious houses and cars. However, not all riches are tangible, physical things. Someone can be rich in love, rich in wisdom, or rich in knowledge.

As we once again take a look at the book of Ephesians (Ephesians 3:14-21), Paul begins to describe the glorious riches that God has made available to us, and it’s little surprise that God’s riches have little to do with physical wealth. 

Within this prayer, Paul asks for four things that come from God’s glorious riches. Like I said, these things aren’t physical things. It’s not a get rich quick scheme. Just as Paul has repeatedly spoken of spiritual things thus far, the riches of God are no different. If someone told you that believing in Christ would make you wealthy, if someone told you that if you give $100 to their ministry God will bless you with $1000, I’m sorry, but they lied to you. Nowhere does scripture say that God will give you money if trust in him, but he does promise to give to us out of his glorious riches.

The first thing that Paul prays for out of God’s glorious riches is strength. His prayer is that out of his riches God would strengthen us through his Spirit. Again, we’re not talking about physical strength. We’re not going to be imbued with God’s strength and then, like Hercules, have the strength of ten men. That’s not the strength that Paul is referring to here.

The strength that Paul is speaking of is an inner strength, granted by God’s Spirit dwelling within. It is a strength of mind and a strength of will. This isn’t a strength that you can gain by pumping iron. It’s a strength of the inner man. While our outer being decays and perishes, the inner man can be renewed and strengthened through God’s Spirit. When this inner man submits to God’s Spirit and allows him to take control, only then can we truly understand the riches of God’s strength.

It is through this strength, our faith in Christ, that Christ, the Spirit of God, dwells within us, and as Paul continues to pray, his prayer is that we would be rooted and established in the love of Christ. The three words Paul uses, dwell, rooted, established, give us an idea of depth. In fact, to dwell literally means to settle down and feel at home.

We spoke of this before. Paul’s prayer was that the church might know Christ, not a breadth of knowledge where they know facts about him but that they might have a depth of knowledge in which they truly know him. That is, an understanding and closeness that goes so deep that they might feel at home and comfortable in his presence.

As we dwell with Christ and are rooted in him, just as a tree sends its roots deep into the ground, we are rooted in Christ’s love. The roots of a tree are its source of life. They provide stability so that the tree can grow, but they also provide nourishment. Likewise, our roots must be deep in the love of Christ so that he might be our nourishment, our stability. The most important question we can ask ourselves is, “Where does my source of nourishment, my source of stability, my source of strength come from?” If there’s no power in your Christian walk, it’s because your source of nourishment, stability, and strength are coming from somewhere other than the love of Christ.

Paul continues to pray that out of God’s glorious riches we may “grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge.“ The problem with having an all knowing, all powerful, all present God is that we have a hard time truly understanding him. Paul’s prayer is that we might know God’s love which surpasses knowledge. It sounds rather odd to pray that we might know something only to then continue to say that it can’t be known, but just because we can’t completely understand something doesn’t mean we can’t grasp it.

I’m a big fan of the Flash TV show, and if you’re not familiar with the comic book character, the Flash is a superhero that can run super fast. More than that, he can everything at super speed. He can move fast, and he can think fast. He can move his arms so fast that they create a tremendous amount of wind. He can vibrate his body so fast that he can separate his molecules just enough to allow him to go through solid objects.

One of the most amazing things he can do with his speed is travel through time. They’ve played around with this a bit in the TV show, but the comics are full of story arcs where the Flash has to go back in time for one reason or another. Sci-fi writers love this concept of time travel, but we as humans, living in a completely linear timeline, have a hard time wrapping our heads around the possibility of time travel. It is truly a topic that surpasses knowledge, but while we still have more questions than answers, even the least seasoned of sci-fi nerd can grasp the basics of time travel in their fictional world, and this is Paul’s prayer for us. Not that we will completely understand everything there is to know about God’s love, but that we will grasp it.

This word, to grasp, comes from the Latin word prehendere. It’s where we get our words such as comprehend or apprehend. These words both carry the idea of grasping an idea or a concept, but they differ slightly.

When we use the word comprehend we indicate a level of knowledge or understanding. Before graduating high school you had to show that you could comprehend basic algebra. You don’t have to agree with it, you don’t have to like it, but you need to be able to have a basic level of understanding.

When we use the word apprehend, we don’t typically use it in a mental sense. More often you’ll hear the word used in criminal justice. When the police track down and capture a criminal it’s said that they apprehended the person. When spoken of in the mental sense the meaning is quite similar. In contrast to comprehension, apprehension means more than just a basic understanding. To apprehend something suggest getting a hold on something for yourself. You can comprehend something like communism yet reject it as your life’s philosophy. However, to apprehend something, you go beyond just a head knowledge and take hold of it within your own life. Paul’s prayer here is that we might apprehend, grasp and claim for ourselves, how deep, wide, long, and high Christ’s love truly is.

Finally, Paul prays for fullness, “that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” This is the last and probably the most important of God’s riches, that we might be filled completely with the fullness of God. This is truly the measure of our Christian life. All too often we as Christians attempt to measure our spiritual lives by comparing ourselves to other Christians. We look at others and say, “Well, I’m better than they are,” but that doesn’t matter. Our goal is not to be better than the worst. Our goal is to be filled with Christ, and no matter how that compares with those around us, if we are not completely filled with Christ, we still have room to grow.

God has made his riches available to us, his strength, depth, apprehension, and fullness, and his desire is to fill us completely with himself. This is accomplished by surrendering our lives to him, to walk daily as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. Christ longs to live among us and within is, to strengthen us and to fill us, but we must be willing to lay down our lives for him. We must be willing to apprehend Christ’s love by faith in him. When we grasp him and claim him as our own, we are then able to grow deeper with him, sending our roots down deep within his love. Our God is faithful, and if we will seek after him, he will surely fill us and make us complete through his glorious riches.

The Mystery

Growing up, I remember I loved going to school. I was the kid that was excited the first time I was able to bring home homework. I’d seen my brother and sister do it on many occasions. However, as much as I loved going to school, I equally loved being able to stay home from school. Whether it was during the summer or I was sick, I loved being able to stay home because it meant I could watch one of my favorite shows, Matlock.

Most people remember the late Andy Griffith as Sheriff Andy Taylor from the Andy Griffith Show, but in my mind, he will always be Ben Matlock. During the day they’d always run two, maybe three episodes in a row, so whenever I’d find myself at home I’d scan the channels to find it. We only had four or five channels, so It didn’t take long to scan them all.

I’ve never been able to get into reading mystery novels, but I’ve always loved a good “who done it” show or movie. I absolutely loved the first Mission Impossible movie with Tom Cruise. I love it when you can watch something guessing the whole while who the culprit is. At the end when they reveal it, you want to go back and watch it again knowing who it really is. When you watch it the second or third time you keep finding different clues throughout that, while there the whole time, you didn’t notice the first time around.

As we continue our study of Ephesians, Paul has been laying out a mystery for us. Don’t feel bad if you didn’t catch it. We glossed over it quickly in Ephesians 1:9. Since that point, Paul has been laying out hints as to this mystery, giving us clues along the way. In Ephesians 3, he finally begins to clarify what this mystery is as well as the importance of it.

An interesting thing to note, Paul, as a person, while a scholarly man had some idiosyncrasies. Throughout his writing, it’s not uncommon for him to make up his own words or to write massively run on sentences. In fact, while our bibles, when translating from Greek to English, have give us rough two dozen sentences, within the first two chapters of Ephesians the number of sentences Paul used could be counted on one hand.

Throughout his writing, Paul has a tendency to become distracted. When I write, I tend to write just as I talk. If you read any of my writings, my goal is that they read just as if you were having a conversation with me. Paul tends to do the same thing. As we read in Ephesians 3:1, it seems to end abruptly, but he moves on to a new thought in verse 2. Likewise, if you skip ahead to Ephesians 4:14, Paul picks up just as he did in verse 1. It’s like he began a thought but mentioned his imprisonment for the Gentiles and had to follow that rabbit trail before he could regain his train of thought.

As we continue down the rabbit trail with him in Ephesians 3:2-6, Paul begins to unravel this mystery for us that he started talking about back in Ephesians 1:9. This mystery, that the Gentiles, through the gospel, are heirs together with Israel, doesn’t sound like that big of a mystery. It’s something that has been taught to many of us since we were little. Today it is common knowledge that through faith in Christ we have the privilege of becoming heirs of God, but when Paul was writing this letter, this was a completely new revelation. The ramifications of this mystery, which had been God’s plan all along but was hidden from countless generations, are game changing.

This mystery changed the life of Paul, formerly Saul. In this passage, Paul refers to himself in two different ways, as a prisoner and as a minister. As we look at these two descriptions and as we look back to the time we spent in Acts, the reason Paul was in prison was because of this mystery. Paul was in prison because he vehemently believed in God’s plan to unite Jews and Gentiles.

Even though Paul had grown up learning the Jewish laws and customs, after Christ’s revelation to him, he spent many years in the church in Antioch (Acts 11:19-26). This church was one of the few that ministered to both Jews and Gentiles. Later, when the Jerusalem Council met regarding Gentile believers, Paul spoke up and reminded everyone of the grace that God had extended to them and the importance of unity (Acts 15; Galatians 2:1-10). Paul knew early on that he had been called to bring the gospel to the Gentiles. This is the primary reason he found himself in prison.

Paul was often accused of being prejudiced against Jewish believers, even though he did everything he could to unify Jews and Gentiles. He even took up an offering among the Gentile churches for the church in Jerusalem, which was graciously received. Yet it was his affiliation with the Gentiles that aroused the people (Acts 21:27-29). It’s likely that if Paul had ministered only to the Jews that they would not have rioted against him. But Paul wasn’t bitter about this in the least. 

As he expounds upon this in Ephesians 3:7-9, we see that the importance of this mystery extended beyond Paul himself and to the Gentiles to which he ministered. God’s plan all along was for Paul to take this gospel to the Gentiles (Acts 9:15-16). Why is this important?

As I was hopefully able to convey to you last week, Christ’s sacrifice changed everything, definitely for the Jews but especially for the Gentiles. Through Christ the Gentiles are now fellow-heirs with the Jews. They’re not second class citizens. In Christ, there is no difference between Jew or Gentile. One group doesn’t get special privilege over the other. Both share the same riches God has promised. Though the Gentiles were once on the outside, they’ve been brought inside and have been included in God’s covenant.

Not only have they been made fellow-heirs, they also have access to the power of the Holy Spirit that Jesus has made available. In verse 7 Paul speaks of the power that has been given to him as well as the great riches in verse 8. So that there is no confusion, this power and these riches aren’t something reserved solely for Paul or for God’s apostles. Paul points that out when he labels himself “less than the least of all God’s people.” If God gives this power and these riches to the least of his people, and he has allowed the Gentiles to be made equal with the Jews, neither receiving any special privilege, how much more will he give to any Gentile who believes in him?

Finally, the importance of this mystery extends to us today. As evidenced in Ephesians 3:10-13, we the church, each of us, Gentile by birth, in Christ and through faith in him, have access to everything Paul spoke of to the Gentiles in Ephesus. The power, the status, the riches, both here and in eternity, every single one of them is available to us today. I’m afraid many Christians today don’t realize this. It’s the reason so many Christians feel weak and ineffective, because they aren’t taking advantage of the power that God has made available to them.

During the early days of the church, everyone believed that the gospel message was only for the Jews because it came to them through the Jews. However, God had an ace in his hand. He knew all along that this was his plan. God sprinkled this truth, this mystery, throughout the Old Testament. Later, through Paul and through Peter he revealed this mystery to the world. Yes, God had a “secret,” but he doesn’t want it to be a secret anymore. God’s mystery has been revealed, and it’s for his glory that we’ve been included.

No longer are we to be second class citizens. God has made available to us his glorious riches and power. The question is this, are you taking advantage of it? Is your Christian walk empowered by God’s Holy Spirit, or are you walking through life feeling weak and defeated? God’s power is available to you.

Strangers

Recently, the news has been ablaze with talks of Harriet Tubman replacing Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill. People are up in arms because they don’t want to see Jackson removed, but on the same note, they agree that Harriet Tubman deserves to be honored.

It’s interesting to think back on our national history. We hear in the news about racism and how everybody is subconsciously racist, but when we stop to look at our history, we’ve come a long way. It was less than two lifetimes ago, about 150 years ago, that Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation which essentially freed all slaves. It was less than 50 years ago that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. walked the streets organizing nonviolent protests in support of equal rights. Our current president, the first African-American president of the United States, was two years old when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

During the life of Harriet Tubman, however, this country looked much different. Men and women, just like you and I, were bought and sold like possessions. There were even laws stating that slaves were only equal to ⅗ of a person when counting population of a state. Today, we have no idea what it’s like to not be considered equal. We may complain about this in justice or that, but in truth, we have no idea the trials that these people faced.

Throughout history, we see example after example of one group of people enslaving or excluding another group, whether due to skin color, heritage, social status, or religious affiliation. Even when Christ walked this earth, there was a clear distinction made between Jews and Gentiles. As we continue in our study of Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus, Paul begins to address this very issue in Ephesians 2:11-12. 

As we teach in the church and read through scripture, many times we come across this word, “Gentile.” We covered this word briefly when we studied the book of Acts. To the Jewish people, the nation of Israel, there were two different types of people in the world, Israel, which was God’s chosen people, and Gentiles, everybody else. The word Gentile comes from the word, in both Greek and Hebrew, which means “nations.” It didn’t necessarily mean that they were atheistic, ungodly heathens. The Greeks believed in many gods, so you couldn’t necessarily call them atheists.

In fact, there were ways within the Jewish law for those not born of Jewish descent to worship God and show their devotion to Him, but no matter how much they wanted to, there was no way for them to become a Jew, one of God’s chosen people. The people of Israel liked this idea. They were God’s chosen people and everyone else was only second class. They set themselves apart through circumcision. This was a major hurdle to cross for a grown man to proselytize or become a full believer in the God of Israel. Even those that went through circumcision remembered their time prior.

Paul points this out when he writes to the church telling them, “you who are Gentiles by birth and called ‘uncircumcised’ by those who call themselves ‘the circumcision’ […] – remember that at that time you were separated from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel.” Just like the slaves who were considered ⅗ of a person, Gentiles among the Jews were considered second class citizens separated from God and without hope, but then came Christ, but through Christ’s sacrifice, those who were separated from him, those who were far away, have been brought near (Ephesians 2:13). Finally, through Christ we have hope. This is detailed even further in Ephesians 2:14-22.

When we looked at the passage in John 4 regarding Jesus’ conversation with the woman at the well, I explained to you the muddied relationship between the Jews and the Samaritans. I won’t go into all the details this morning, but as I stated, when Israel was conquered, their conquerors left behind some of their own people in order to intermarry with the Israelites. This was a common practice. The resulting offspring would be a mix of the two nations. The idea was that the offspring would be a part of the kingdom. Through their bloodlines they would have common bond. They would no longer be strangers in a foreign land but would be brothers and sisters with those who had conquered their parents.

Likewise, Jesus has joined us together through his blood. Through his sacrifice he has bought us and joined himself to us. If we will accept him as our savior he will make the two one. He joins with us, by giving us his Spirit, that we might be united with him. No longer are we strangers living in a foreign land. Instead, we have been joined with him through his blood and subsequently joined to each other. He has torn down every wall that divides us. Not just the walls between Jews and Gentiles but the walls between race, gender, ideologies, economic status, and more. He has unified us all under the banner of the cross within the family of God.

Even though you were once strangers, separated from God with no hope, Christ paid the price so that you might become a part of his family. As a nation, we’ve come a long way, from owning slaves 150 years ago, to equal rights within our lifetime, to an African-American as our commander and chief, but this is nothing compared to the unity that we have in Christ. Through Christ, man and woman, rich and poor, and every ethnicity represented on this earth have been joined together by his blood.

Saved By Grace

Grace. It’s a word that’s often used in the church, but not often understood. It used to be that saying a prayer before a meal would be called “saying grace.” We sing songs like “Amazing Grace,” but do we really understand what grace is and how significant it is.

In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul speaks on this topic of grace, but before we can understand God’s grace, we must first understand our situation. In the first part of our scripture this week, Paul is setting the stage (Ephesians 2:1-3). He lays it out for the church and tells them, “you were dead in your transgressions and sins.” We talk about this in church regularly, we’re all sinners. We’ve all done things that keep us from upholding God’s holy standard. However, sometimes I think we get so used to this idea that we forget the gravity that it holds. We get bumper stickers that say, “I’m not perfect just forgiven,” but do we really take the time to ponder the implications of that sin? Paul said, “you were dead.” Death is a serious, heavy thing.

I love the field of Christian Apologetics. Some great Christian Apologists helped to bring me through a rough patch in my walk with Christ. This week, a pastor friend shared a video with me of a Christian Apologist. The speaker’s name is Dr. Voddie Baucham, and his message was so powerful I had to share it. He speaks of his time on college campuses speaking with students. Inevitably one student would find him after the presentation and ask him the loaded question, “If God is so powerful and so good, how come bad stuff happens?” I absolutely love his response. It demonstrates clearly the importance of the topic we’re addressing this morning. There’s no way I could do it justice, so I’ll let him tell you himself (see the full video here). 

Too often we forget that there is a price to be paid for our sin. Paul writes, “for the wages of sin is death.” In a world that glorifies sin, we joke around and trivialize it. I fear that we don’t take this problem of sin seriously. We ask the question, “If God is so powerful and so good, how come bad stuff happens?” All the while asking the wrong question. We have no right to be here. We have no right to be gathering together and singing songs. If we were to receive what we were due, God would strike us down where we stand. “Why, oh God, does your judgement and your wrath tarry?” Why is it that God hasn’t struck us down for all the times we’ve cursed him and turned our backs on him? Why hasn’t he destroyed us for turning up our noses at him and telling him we don’t need him or even denying his existence?

One of the attributes of God is love, and they say that as God relates himself to us that attribute of love manifests itself in two different ways. The first is through his mercy. I’ve tried to instill in my children this concept of mercy. As I explain this concept to them, I try to simplify it in a way that they can understand. I explain to them that mercy is when you don’t receive the punishment that you deserve. If you know that the consequence of your actions is that you have to go to bed early, mercy would waive that punishment. In disciplining our children, I make it a point to let them know when mercy is being shown. It’s not shown all the time. There are times when, as a father, I feel that desired outcome will not be accomplished if I show mercy. There are even times when, knowing they’ve done something wrong, my children will ask me to show mercy. This concept of mercy is the same whether it relates to my children and me or to God’s children and him. If the consequences of your actions, the wages for your sin, is God’s judgement, wrath, and death, but that punishment is waived, that is mercy.

Paul touches on this in Ephesians 2:4-5. We know that the wages of sin is death, so “Why, oh God, does your judgement and your wrath tarry?” It’s because God has chosen to show us mercy. Our God is rich in mercy, and by his grace we have been saved. This brings us to the second way that God’s love manifests itself as he relates to us. It is through his grace.

We show grace to our children all the time, but unlike mercy, we don’t typically tell them, “I’m showing you grace right now.” What is grace? A simple definition would be “unmerited favor.” Just like mercy is not getting a punishment that you deserve, grace is receiving favor that you don’t deserve.

We, as parents, want to give our children nice things or do things for them just because we love them. We want to buy them that bike or take them out for ice cream, not because of good grades or a job well done. It’s not because they have necessarily done something to deserve it, but simply because we love them and want to show that love to them.

Likewise, God chooses to show his grace to us (Ephesians 2:6-7). Just like a father desires to show grace to his own children, God has demonstrated his love for us by not only showing us mercy and saving us from our due punishment, but he demonstrates his love for us by allowing us to share in his incomparable riches.

The beauty of grace is that it’s not merely favor, but it’s unmerited favor. God’s desire to share with you the riches of his grace has nothing to do with anything you’ve done. You haven’t earned it, and you don’t deserve it. But that’s exactly the point (Ephesians 2:8-10).

I heard a story of a pastor that went to the barber for a haircut. He knew the barber well, and he knew his views on God. All during the haircut he sought a way to shift the conversation toward God, but the barber never gave him a chance to interrupt.

When the barber was finished, the pastor went to the counter to pay. Finally, as the barber was ringing him up, the pastor had a chance to speak, so he asked the barber if he was a good man. The barber said yes. The pastor then asked him if he believed in God. The barber, again, answered yes. The pastor finally asked the barber if he believed that he would one day go to heaven. The barber said, “Reverend, I believe in there is a God. I believe that God holds the keys to heaven, and I believe that when I get there he will look at my life and let me in because I’ve been a good man all my life.”

Seeing the barber’s boldness, the pastor decided to try a different tactic. He quickly changed topics and, looking at the barber and seeing his shaggy hair, told him that he could use a haircut as well. The barber agreed, relieved that he had dodged the pastor’s questions. He told the pastor that he’d just been too busy to take time to get it done.

The pastor looked at him and said, “I have a few minutes now. If you’ll sit down in the chair, I’d be happy to cut your hair for you.” The barber politely refused stating that the pastor hadn’t had any training or experience in cutting hair.

The pastor reassured him telling him, “I may not have formal training, but I’ll surely do my best to give you a great haircut.”

The barber looked at him and laughed saying, “I’m sure you would, but honestly, your best just isn’t good enough to do it right.”

The pastor responded, “That’s right, and no matter how good of a person you try to be, your best will never be good enough to enjoy God’s riches in heaven.”

The good news is this. While we’ve established that each of us are terrible, vile people, each of whom is deserving judgement, God, in his mercy is willing to postpone that judgement. Through his grace, he has extended to us the opportunity to be raised up with Christ and to be seated in glory with him. This isn’t because of anything we’ve done, for there’s nothing we can do to earn that position.