Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome to Roots of Faith, where we explore God's word to understand his truth and its application to our daily walk. Today we are nearing the end of Ephesians chapter 4, a chapter where Paul urges believers to live in a way that honors their calling in Christ.
Paul started this passage by laying out the gifts God has provided for the church, particularly the leadership gifts that guide us in our faith journey. Now he shifts focus back to our personal walk, our daily lives, and the way we reflect Christ. In verses 17 through 19, Paul contrasts the believer's walk with that of the Gentiles, who were those outside of God's covenant community. He emphasized how their thinking and actions are disconnected from God. He calls believers to a different path, one grounded in our identity in Christ. As we examine verses 20 through 24, we'll see Paul challenge us to put off our old ways, renew our minds, and put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. Let's consider this powerful message and what it means to live a life that reflects God's image. Whether you're new to the faith or have been walking with Christ for years, today's episode will help you explore the significance of living a life that mirrors our Creator's love and holiness. So grab your Bible, open to Ephesians 4, and let's grow together in the roots of our faith.
[00:01:32] Speaker B: This morning I want to come to you, and we're approaching the end of chapter four in the book of Ephesians, and we've been looking at this chapter that began with Paul saying, as a prisoner for the Lord, then I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. His focus was on a calling, and then it goes through. And Paul kind of takes a sidestep. And he said, here is all of the gifts that I have supplied for the body of Christ, who have been called particularly in Ephesians 4. He talks about the leadership gifts that are in the body of Christ.
And then we come back to verse 17, and you need to look at that more carefully because verse 17 says so. Or therefore 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, in the emptiness of how they think. And what it's saying is Paul was going back now after he said, you have these provided gifts of leadership. And I want to return to emphasize again your walk and verse 17 through verses through to verse 24, deal with the walk that a Christian should have. When we say walk we mean the conversation of life, the way you live, the way you think, the way you understand what the Lord wants when you're to walk in balance with being called a Christian. So this is the part that we've been looking at. And last week we looked at verses 17 through 19, which were describing what is the walk of the other people, the other nation. The NIV translates it as Gentiles. And that's exactly how a Jewish mind would have thought about it. Anybody who wasn't Jewish, they are the people outside. But I want to remind you of something that while that was a Jewish thinking concerning the nation of Israel, and God had called them his precious treasure, people at the cross, when Jesus paid the full penalty for sin, he had said in the night before in which he was betrayed, he said, this is the New Testament, the new covenant. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you do show the Lord's death till he come. There was a change in the covenant that God was making.
And he was saying, okay, I had had Israel as my precious people, but all they have done is rebel. And I have pleaded with them to live and to walk as God's treasured people.
And he says, okay, I've got to put a pause on that. So he's putting a pause on the covenant that he had made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and David all the way through.
And he says, I put a pause on that because now I am going and reaching out to my entire creation, all of the other people as well. And I find it very unique that God had a call, a Jewish scholar by the name of Paul, who. Or Saul, who became Paul, who had studied under Gamaliel. He was well versed in Jewish law. And if you think about it, he should have been somebody talking to the Jewish people. He had excelled in his Jewishness. I mean, who else would sit there and hold the cloaks when Stephen was being stoned to death and then going out and persecuting the church in every place that he could find, ready to drag them back to a Jewish court because these people were following Jesus. But what Paul has been chosen by God to do is to minister to the other nation. He says, okay, now I want you to understand very fully. And what are we called? We're called his people. You are called in Christ. So verses 17 to 19 talk about the mindset that people have as a result of the fall. And it very carefully talks about these people. But I want to take one step back for a minute because we want to look from verse 20 through 24 today, in the time I got left and share with you what is a totally different walk. How many times have you come across in either the daily bread or your devotions or heard someone talk about the statement that says that you are to walk? And he says in verse 20, this, however, is not the way of life. You learn when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. So strong statement in the original language. Well, I want to take one step back and just plant something else in your mind. Why were we created? I'm going to run all the way from Ephesians 4 all the way back to Genesis 1. And it says in Scripture that you were created in the image of God. And when God created man, man is the only one in the book of Genesis that has dominion, stewardship over all of the rest of God's creation. Well, why is man so different? Why did God create Adam and then Eve? Well, we know partly why God created Eve.
That so man would have somebody else in the car that would tell him where they're going and how to get there.
But it is also that God created man to glorify him. And we say glorify and it draws up so many negative ideas. You know, I don't want to glorify somebody else, no. But I'm glorifying the Creator, God, and he created us. And I'm stealing this from session two of Francis Chan's Bible study because it just made such an impact on me.
He says maybe the most beautiful thing about being a human, we are capable of receiving love from God.
Think about that.
God loved. He said his creation was good. He loved Adam and Eve. He placed them in the garden. He provided for everything. And it says our capacity to receive and to give love with God and one another comes from our Creator.
Because God love. Think about the message that goes throughout scripture.
In the Old Testament, he talks about having an everlasting love.
And we go to the most familiar verse to everybody, John 3:16. For God so loved the world, what did he do? He gave his only begotten son. I can never begin to wrap my head around that love that God supplies when we look at the walk of other people. Satan is the master of propaganda. Did you ever think about that? He is the absolute master of propaganda and the other people, the other nations. And I said this last week, that translation right there is ethnos, where we get our word ethnic. So you can just think it's every ethnic variety in the world.
And their thinking is diverted from the word of God.
It says in Ephesians 4 there in verses 17 to 19, there's no light, no peace, no satisfaction apart from God. And it says that they were separated from God.
And I love that last part because it says they've become totally anesthetized, totally insensitive to their pain of missing the mark of glorifying God. Did you ever do something bad as a kid and you knew right down in your tummy that you done did something and you want to hide called a conscience?
Where did that come from? Every kid has it and every adult has it too. The only problem is the adults have become more insensitive to it. And when the heart becomes cirrhosis hardened, then we say, or hey, let's do more of that. It's momentary satisfaction. But verse 20 says we're to have a deliberate walk in Christ. The actual original language that's found, because in the original language, this is a much. Verse 20 is a much stronger statement. Because what Paul was writing is he was saying that not only he says, indeed, indeed, you are not to walk. You have not so learned to walk with Christ. And when I say this, he uses the word learned. You have not so learned Christ in this manner.
The word for learn there is directly related to another word that we are very familiar with in the New Testament.
It is not the word daskalos to teach line upon line, but the word here is related to the word disciple.
Well, what's a disciple?
Well, a discipling process is one where we learn to walk in Christ Jesus, walking step by step with the master, learning from the master.
Our lives are to be those lives where we are looking to Jesus, the author and completer of our faith, and to learn of him. Because we are supposed to be reflecting. We are made in the image of God. Discipleship is not just by the law, but by the Gospel, by Christ himself. Christ does not stand for the doctrine of Christ here, but rather it stands for the very person and subject of what we are to be deceived.
Jeremiah chapter 32, 33 reads, they have turned to me their back and not their face.
And though I have taught them persistently, they have not listened to receive instruction. Ouch. That was the condemnation. Deuteronomy 4:1. When Moses preparing the people to go into the promised land. Deuteronomy is the second giving of the law. That's what Deuteronomist means.
And he had gathered them all together and he was giving the law again. He was teaching them what God had said and what God required of them.
And Moses said in Deuteronomy 4:1. And now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you, and do them that you may live and go in and take possession of the land the Lord your fathers has given you.
Where are we going? Where are we looking to possess?
We have a promise to be with Christ Jesus. I am going to prepare a place for you, and I'm going to come back and bring you to me.
If we've learned anything from looking at the history of what Israel went through, from the time of Moses being brought out of Egypt all the way through to the conquering of the land and to making themselves like the other people.
Are we like the People of Jeremiah 32:33 they have turned to me their back and not their face.
Is the church today.
Are we as believers turning our back and not their face?
Well, how have you learned to walk?
In Ephesians 4:21 we read this when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus.
There are two things there that it says, and it's first of all, when you indeed have heard, that is the intent and strength of that verse.
Again, it was a probability that Paul was speaking, but it was a probability in Paul's mind that he knew and was sure that they had already heard and were taught.
Ephesians 4:21 describes the process of conversion. You heard and you were taught.
And this picture is an acceptance not merely of a superior religious value, but it's hearing Christ and Christ Jesus. And it says, and you were taught.
Both of those are in the past tense. In other words, they were accomplished things.
You, you have heard and you were taught in I went through this passage so many times because it keeps saying, in him, in him, the whole focus is on the person of the One who was made flesh and dwelt among us so that we might understand.
What's the shortest verse in the New Testament?
Two words, Jesus wept.
Jesus in his love for you and me, knew how to shed tears of hurt because of the suffering.
And actually, when you are looking at this verse, and I understand why the translation is the way it is, but it says that you were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus.
Some other translations say you were truly taught. No, that's placing the word true in the wrong place.
You are taught in the truth of Jesus Christ. There is no mistakes.
And what we need to do is to learn God's truth, to go and dig in His Word and Draw it out and say, this is true, then I must walk that way.
And then he gives us in verses 22 and 23, the process of learning to walk.
He begins with put off, which is to renounce is the idea of putting off. What's carried through here is the idea of taking off your old clothes and putting on new clothes.
I'm going to go and take off my stinky work clothes that I've been sweating in all day. And then I'm going to come home.
And I better not sit down at the dinner table smelling like the pig outside.
I'm going to change, I'm going to shower, I'm going to change, I'm going to put off and put on.
And when you're putting off, it means to renounce. That is the other translation for the word that's used for put off.
But what it's saying.
There was a writer from England, his name was Walter Watkinson.
And when he was talking about this passage, he said, put off concerning the former conversation. The old man, the corrupt self that has been fostered under the influence of the worldly and carnal views. The mindset that we have from the old man is influenced by the propaganda of Satan and also by the propaganda of our own desires.
And he made some very cogent points. He said, the renunciation must be profound.
I must renounce. I must put off that old man in me.
It is renunciation that must be complete. I can't just part way take it out.
That would be as silly as having a splinter in my finger and using the tweezers and only taking it part way out.
What did it accomplish? Only made my finger hurt more and probably get more infected.
And renunciation must be immediate. When the Lord draws your attention to that which is reflecting our old way of thinking and our old processes. When there desires that begin to overtake and put God in another place and our desires come first, then we've got a problem.
And when God brings that to your attention, it should be our immediate recourse to put off the old man.
And finally, in verses 23 to 24, it has the best part.
He says, you're putting on, I've taken off my dirty work clothes, I've taken my shower, and now I'm putting on my clean clothes.
In verses 23 and 24, Paul writes that we are to be made new in the attitude of your minds made new.
The word also comes back to we are a new creation. The word made that's here is the word create.
You're made new in your mind, My thinking has to change. It has to be 360 degrees. No longer with my back facing God, but with my face facing God.
And I have to start thinking as God wants me to think in order to be in the image that I was created in so that I walk in a manner worthy of being called a child of God.
And he says in verse 24, and put on the new self created to be. Now notice this. Created to be like God.
I am in the image of God.
And I don't care whether you're 2, 22 or 202.
We never stop being created, merged, understanding what it is to be a child of God reflecting his image.
That child I mentioned to you that was standing out here needs to see and hear from this body of believers what the image of God truly looks like.
The people that we talk to, people that I hadn't met before yesterday.
What's her name? Terry or Tracy? Terry Shelley.
Huh?
Carrie. Okay.
Never went there. Never met her before.
Is she seeing from me, from this body?
Even in your personal relationship with her, to know what is the image of God that you are to be reflecting and seeing you.
You're a new creation in Christ Jesus. David cried out in Psalm 51, verses 10 through 12 in the NIV. It says, Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me from your presence or take your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me.
Oh, there is so much depth in that verse. I wish we had a million hours to go and just dig into the preciousness of that statement.
Go back home today. Take out your Bible, look at those verses, Psalm 51, 10, 12, and think about what that means. Because a new man is one who has new feelings, new principles, new desires, and he's laid aside his old principles and practices. And in everything that pertains moral character.
Romans 8:1 4 says, There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ.
Folks, this is why I love languages.
And it's why I like that phrase in Christ.
Because when you have that little preposition N en in Greek, and then it says Christ, it's saying not just in some association with him, but rather, it is in Christ that I am. I live and have my being.
When you walk out on the production line at work or when you're doing a job, how often do we remember that we are in Christ and it says that we're to be righteous and holy?
Verse 24.
It says created to be like God in true righteousness.
Holiness. You can put that in another way. You can add the word true to both of those words, in true righteousness and in true holiness. And I was surprised because I was looking for the normal word for holiness when I was looking here, and it wasn't the same word.
I had to go back and look. Righteousness has to be how we deal with other people.
But the word holiness that's used here has to do with your attitude towards God.
It is an attitude of the heart.
It's an inward life.
Holiness is seen as a heart separated to God in accordance with the truth of God's word.
That's practical Christianity.
You might object and say, boy, you're setting the standard very high.
That's a high bar.
We're not setting a high bar because it's not me doing the work.
It is me opening myself up to the Holy Spirit living in me to change my life so that I. And going back to what I started with. It's me going back so that I can in turn return the great love of God who created me to receive his love.
Well, the practical steps of our walking then is, how are you hearing?
And how is your learning being tested?
I had my. The president of the company and my boss and then one of the other managers. We were sitting in a large meeting with supervisors, and there's a couple of guys that talk so quietly.
So I got my trusty little thing out for my hearing aids, and I turned it on, and I made sure I turned it over towards them so I could at least try and pick up at least a little bit of what he was saying. Because this guy constantly talks.
And maybe we need our hearing aids tuned so that we hear the Savior who bought you with his own precious life and rose again, conquering death so that I would not suffer the eternal death and punishment, which is absolutely just because of sin.
How's your hearing? How are you hearing?
What are you turning your hearing aids towards?
And when I thought about it says that you hear and you learned.
And I thought about learning, and the first thing that popped into my mind is, boy, I hated those pop quizzes.
In college and in school, pop quizzes were the worst.
But you know what it is the testing of what you've been hearing and applying.
I'll close with this. I know I've gone over time, but I'll close with this.
I had a lab mate who later was my roommate.
His father was the general practitioner on campus, and John was the same As I was. We were in pre med together and we were in zoology class and we had clams for our lab project.
And you were supposed to go in and open the clamshell just a little bit. You. You were supposed to go in with your scalpel and go back to the very back and cut the muscle so that you could open up the clam and then identify all the parts of the clam.
It was the first lab that we actually had enough lab specimens for everybody to have their own.
Up to this point, John let me do the labs because I had more fun.
I want you to notice John did become a doctor.
I didn't.
But when John was finished with his, we could have had a very nice diced clam dinner.
There was nothing left to be identified in that clam because he was going in and he was digging in every place that he could. I have no idea what specialty John did. I sure hope it wasn't surgery.
He hadn't learned the practicality at that point.
You and I are to hear and to learn and expect pop quizzes.
Expect the lab tests so that your life is being mirrored and reflecting and you are growing in the person and nature of the one that we were created in his image to show.
And he did it because he loved us with an everlasting love.
I challenge you to go back and just take a look at some of these things.
And if you think it's profitable, come and join us tonight for the first one where we're talking about who is God?
Because it's the way we learn and every bit that I can do to hear who God is, then I have to apply it and learn.
Let's learn of Christ Jesus.
Let's bow in prayer.
Father, you have given us your word.
[00:37:46] Speaker A: Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Roots of Faith, a ministry of Lawn Evangelical Congregational Church in Lawn, Pennsylvania. We hope today's message has uplifted you and deepened your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember, whether you're new in the faith or have walked with him for years, God's word is always fresh and powerful to transform. If you were blessed by this episode, share it with a friend. And don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an update. Until next time, stay rooted in the word, stand firm in faith, and keep growing in Christ.
