Thank you, Music Ministry at Providence. If
you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn
with me
to Ephesians chapter 5, verse number 8, and we
will begin today by reading our text, which is
going
to be verses 8 through 14. The apostle Paul
writes, "For you were formerly darkness, but
now you are
light in the Lord. Walk as children of light,
for the fruit of the light consists in all
goodness,
and righteousness, and truth, trying to learn
what is pleasing to the Lord. Do not
participate in the
unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even
expose them, for it is disgraceful even to
speak
of the things which are done by them in secret
. But all things become visible when they are
exposed
by the light, for everything that becomes
visible is light. For this reason it says,
"Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and
Christ will shine on you." Now, as you know
since
the start of chapter 4, we've been working our
way through this second part of Ephesians,
which presents to us the pattern, if you will,
of Christian living,
how Christians are to live in this world. And
we can sum up what we have learned so far,
really,
with two statements out of the verses that we
've been looking at. Look first, and you'll
remember
this, from chapter 4 and verse 1, that phrase,
"Walk worthy." Remember, walk, meaning,
pattern of
living, manner of living. And then the second
phrase from Ephesians 5-1, "Be imitators of
God." Now,
that sounds like, wow, how can I be that? We
'll go back and listen to those sermons that I
preached
on that. You'll understand that better. I don
't have time to go back over all that now. But
those
two statements are really at the heart of what
Paul has been teaching us since chapter 4,
right up to
this very verse today. And the example of how
we are to do this is given in chapter 5, verse
2. You
remember this. He says, here's how you do it.
How are you an imitator of God? How is it that
you
walk worthy of the calling with which you have
been called? Chapter 5, verse 2, "Walk in love
,
just as Christ also loved you." So there's the
pattern, right, that we are to follow.
And there's a lot of detail in those verses
that we've looked at so far under those three
summary statements. So again, I won't go back
over all that material. And so far, as you
know,
Paul has used the word walk, right? A lot of
times, multiple times, to describe our
manner of living, our daily life, how you walk
. And we've learned so far that if we are to
walk
worthy, if we are to be imitators of God, if
we are to walk in love, just as Christ loved
us,
Paul's given us some markers, if you think
back, and you're thinking it's a humble walk,
it's a unified walk. We don't walk as unbel
ievers, don't walk as the Gentiles. He used
Gentiles
in that way earlier. It's a love walk. That
was our study last time. But now for the day,
we find that it is a light walk. Verse 8, look
at it. "For you were formally darkness,
but now you are light in the world." Big comma
right there. Walk as children of light.
Now, let's talk about that word light. We find
it in the Bible in Scripture.
Light is a symbol, actually, of two things
when we narrow it down. First, light is used
from the intellectual side. You ever heard
somebody, oh, the light went on, right? Maybe,
oh,
now they understand it. Secondly, it's used
from the moral side. Intellectually, light
refers
biblically to the truth, and morally, light
refers to holiness, righteousness. It's the
truth and the life. And so living in light
means living in truth and righteousness. And
then,
the contrast, as we're fixing to see here in
our text, is darkness. It's so interesting the
way
Paul writes and the way he lays things out so
perfectly. Darkness intellectually refers to
ignorance from the intellectual side, and
morally, it refers to evil. So you see just
the opposite
of light with both of those things. And you
find this all throughout Scripture. For
example,
Macon Ephesians 4, Paul, remember, talks about
their minds being darkened using that word.
Other times he talks about the deeds of
darkness, meaning moral evil. So light and
darkness is a
contrast, if you will, of both truth and
behavior. For example, look at Proverbs 6,
verse 23, and there are so many examples of
that. I went through so many. I mean, I could
have made
this a four-hour sermon just with the examples
in Scripture with these words. Well, the
commandment
is a lamp and the teaching is light. So here
he's not talking about deeds, he's talking
about truth,
right? The commandment, the teaching, light.
God's word is light, intellectual truth,
knowledge. Psalm 119-105, you know this one,
carries the same idea. Your word is a lamp to
my feet
and a light to my path. In 2 Corinthians 4-4,
Paul talks both about light and darkness. He
talks
about the lost in verse 3, and that is setting
up verse 4. Look at this one. In whose case,
the God, notice little g, God of this world,
has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so
that they
might not see the light of the gospel, of the
glory of Christ, who is the image of God. So
their
light is knowledge, right? And darkness is
being blinded to knowledge, being blinded to
the gospel.
He uses both of them there. Darkness here
means ignorance. It means lack of knowledge. I
was
talking about somebody last week, we're doubly
blinded. You have the natural blindness of the
unconverted person, and then Satan blinds your
minds into the double blindness that lest you
see
the light of the glorious gospel. Remember
back in Ephesians 4-18, how did Paul describe
the
unregenerate mind as being darkened? There's
that word again in their understanding. At the
end of
Romans 1-21, same thing, and their foolish
heart was what? Darkened. So we see it over
and over.
Light intellectually means knowledge. Darkness
means ignorance, lack of knowledge, but then
let's
go to the other side, which is morally. You
have behavior. Sometimes light and darkness
speak of
righteousness and unrighteousness. Look in
Isaiah 5-20. He says, "Woe to those who call
evil good
and good evil." Boy, isn't that a sermon for
our day? I could rail on about that one right
there,
but he keeps going. But substitute and look at
the words that he uses. Darkness for light
and light for darkness. So here we're not
talking about the intellectual sense. Here he
is comparing
good and evil with light and darkness, and
what is he talking about? Not intellectual
thought,
but behavior is what he's talking about here.
Now only we can go to the New Testament.
Romans 13-12.
Paul says, "The night is almost gone and the
day is near. Therefore let us lay aside the
deeds of darkness and put on the armor of
light." There's intellectual darkness. There
will always
be the deeds of darkness, and on the other
hand, light is knowing the truth, and what
does that
result in? Living out the truth in light. Are
you with me so far? We're laying a foundation
here.
As Christians, we walk our manner of living in
the light. Look, consider 1 John 1
5 through 7, and look how he uses these words.
This is the message that we have heard from
him
and announced to you that God is light, and in
him there is no darkness at all. If we say
that we
have fellowship with him and yet walk in the
darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth
,
but if we walk in the light, as he himself is
in the light, we have fellowship, one with
another,
and the blood of Jesus, his Son cleanses us
from all sin. Do you see how often
these words are used? Both that passage, many
others very clear, and out of that passage,
you must understand that what John is trying
to get across to us is that when we were rede
emed,
when we were born again, we were fully rede
emed. We were fully born again. We walk fully
in the light
for believers walking in the light. There isn
't even any residual darkness. Now, let me tell
you
what I mean by that. It's another way of
describing how there are only two types of
people in this
whole world. There are those who walk in the
darkness, and there are those who walk in the
light. And what I want to get you to see is
there's no middle position. There's no, like
the evolutionists
believe that the lizard is somehow, even
though not one single solitary fossil has ever
been found,
he turned into a chicken or some such animal.
There's no in between darkness and light as
you're walking. All people are either in one
or two situations. In Matthew 514, Jesus said
of all
believers, "You are the light of the world."
What's that word again? We are called sons of
light
repeatedly in the New Testament. Look at 1 Th
essalonians 5, 4, "But you, brethren, are not
in darkness
that the day would overtake you like a thief."
Verse 5, "For you are all sons of light." That
's all
believers. This is the definition of a
Christian. Somebody who walks in the light,
not in the
darkness. Look at Colossians 113. I love this
verse, "For he rescued us." What did he rescue
us from?
The domain of darkness. And there's that word,
"And transferred us to the kingdom of his
beloved
son." And guess what his beloved son said in
John 8 and verse 12? "I am the light of the
world.
He who follows me will not walk in the
darkness, but will have the light of light."
What I'm trying
to get you to see is this theme is all over
Scripture. And here we see it today in our
text.
Ephesians 5, 8, "For you," remember he's
writing to those that church at Ephesus,
those believers in the Ephesian church, "For
you were formerly darkness, but now you are
light
in the Lord." So what do you do? What do we do
, Paul? Walk then as children of light.
And again, it's either or. I don't believe
that a Christian can walk in the darkness.
Now, listen very carefully. I do believe a
Christian can do the deeds of the darkness,
yes. But when we do them, guess what? Think
about this. When you do the deeds of the
darkness,
while you're walking in the light, you do them
totally in the light. You do them totally
exposed
before God every single time, which is a very
convicting place to be. And you will be chast
ised
by the Father of lights. Now, Paul is fixing
to give us five things that we need to know
as children of light. Number one, the contrast
of children of light. Go back to verse 8 again
.
"You were formerly darkness, but now you are
light in the Lord." Walk as children of light.
Now, I want you to notice something. Notice
how he says in this verse, "But now you are
light."
You see that? So we shouldn't be shocked that
he says that, that next he asks us,
since you are light, to walk as children of
light. That shouldn't be a shocking request
on Paul's behalf because he just said we are
light. As I've said many times, the Christian
life is all
about us becoming what we are. The Christian
life is all about becoming who we are in union
with Christ, living up to our identity, as I
've said many times. So the contrast here is
you were
that. You were darkness. You are this. You are
light. Live now. Live like what you are,
not like what you were. Which, look how he
says that here in verse 8. Oh my goodness,
what a phrase. You were formerly darkness. You
were. This is in the past for believers.
Remember back in Ephesians 2.1, "And you were
dead in your trespasses and sins." Verse 2,
"in which you formally walked according to the
course of this world, according to the prince
of the power of the air, of the spirit that is
now working in the sons of disobedience." What
a phrase. You were working according to the
prince of the power of the air. That is the
devil
himself. Verse 3, "Among them we too, all, all
formally lived in the lust of our flesh, indul
ging
the desires of the flesh and of the mind." Now
watch this. "And were past tense by nature."
It was your very nature to be what? Children
of wrath, even as the rest. What a designation
for all people who are outside of Christ as we
all once were. You are born into this world
as a child of the wrath of God. All of that is
past tense language. Remember Ephesians 2,
verse 12.
Remember that you were at that time separate
from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of
Israel
and strangers to the covenant of promise,
having no hope and without God in the world.
Verse 13,
"But now in Christ Jesus, you who were
formally were far off." Oh, look at that
phrase. "Have been
brought near." Pi, how? The blood of Christ.
That encapsulates all of the person and work
of Christ
and his substitutionary atonement on the cross
when we see the blood of Christ as a phrase.
Again,
the contrast is made over and over in
Scripture. Now let's go back to Ephesians 5-8
and let's dig
a little deeper with our shovel. Notice how it
says, "For you were formally dark."
He doesn't say you were in darkness, though
you were. No, he says here you were darkness.
You're not just a victim of Satan's world
system of darkness. You are a contributor to
it. In other
words, whatever dominion we are in, we are of.
All unbelievers are not just in darkness,
darkness is
in them. Darkness was in me. Great darkness
was in me before I came to Christ. In total
depravity, darkness permeates the child of
wrath through and through. There's no system
of evil
in the world apart from the darkness of the
individuals who are that system, whether you
're
talking about demons or whether you're talking
about men, you don't have it if they're not
in it, just like there's no system of light in
the world apart from those who are the light
of the world, be it Christ himself or Christ's
people. And so as believers, if we were
formally
darkness, but now we are light in the Lord,
look what Paul says next in verse 8 again.
As a result, what do you do? Walk as children
of light. Live your life, Christian, as who
you are,
children of light. So again, let me remind you
that the darkness here is both moral and
intellectual, and so is the light. They both
are just in opposite ways. It's not just
what we know. It is that, but it's also what
we are. Now let me show you something
continuing
in the way of comparison here. Let's ask the
question, what are some of the characteristics
of when we were formally darkness? Well, first
, we did the deeds of darkness. Look, skip down
to
verse 11 where it participates or where it
warns us not to participate. Look there,
excuse me,
in verse 11, in the unfruitful deeds of
darkness. I showed you earlier how in 2
Corinthians 4,
4 it calls Satan the God, little G of this
world. Now remember, God is sovereign and God,
or Satan,
is on God's leash. He can only go as far as
God allows him to go, and God gives him plenty
of leash
in his redemptive plan for mankind that ends
with the Second Coming of Christ. And for now,
we haven't gotten to the Second Coming, so
there's a lot of leash. And so when you were
formally
darkness, and darkness was in you, and you
were in darkness, guess what? You were doing
the deeds of the Prince of Darkness. I know I
was. Boy, I did a lot of them in your face.
And listen, no matter how much it might freak
people out to hear this, all unbelievers
fall right alongside what Jesus said to the
Jewish leaders in John 8:44.
Remember what he said? You are of your Father
the Devil,
and you want, you want, you will to do the
desires of your Father.
I can't imagine anything stronger that Jesus
could say. So if you are in the darkness, and
the
darkness is in you, you have real desire to do
the deeds of the one that Luke calls. Look at
the
end of Luke 22.53 there at the very end. Luke
calls him the power of darkness. That's our
adversary.
So when you, you function in the darkness,
you are actually empowered by the Prince of
Darkness to do his deeds. And I'm telling you,
even as Christians, it is extremely hard for
us to see this in people outside of Christ
on a regular, ordinary basis. It's very hard
for us. I mean, it's easy to see
the worst criminals of our society. For some
reason, I have a fascination with watching how
homicide detectives piece together a murderer
and how they go about finding, they have a
television
show, an ID investigation discovery. And I'm
fascinated by the process of finding these
heinous
criminals. And so it's not hard for us at all
to see the darkness in them that they are
definitely,
I mean, you know, Jeffrey Dahmer or Derek Todd
Lee, it's very easy for us to see that they
are
empowered by the Prince of Darkness to do
their deeds. And in fact, some of the crimes
are so
heinous. It's my personal belief that there's
actual demonic involvement with a serial
killer
that can do such heinous things to people. But
scratch them for a second. We all get that.
What about the guy in your neighborhood?
Whether you're in the suburbs or, you know,
live on a piece of property, you got a next
door neighbor and he's clearly not a Christian
.
You've established that as you got to know him
, but he's such a nice guy. What about that guy
?
I mean, he's always helping people. He's there
at the jambalaya cook-off of the little handic
apped
girl when she needs the money to get a new leg
brace. He doesn't smoke, drink or chew a girl
's
who do even. I mean, you really like this guy.
I mean, you go out in the yard and you're glad
to see this dude, right? Hey, there he is, old
Bill or whoever. And you talk with him. I mean
,
he's even a conservative. He might even have a
mega hat that he wears from time to time. I
mean,
I mean, is he empowered by Satan? Sounds like
the church lady on Saturday night, like, "What
,
Satan?" Right? He's not foaming at the mouth
when you see him. You've never caught him
sacrificing a goat in his backyard with some
candles around it. In fact,
he may generally be a very moral person. Well,
all that may be true. And there's lots of
people
like that, especially here in the South. You
go up North, you don't find as many. It's just
personal
experience. And I'm generalizing. I'm not
saying there's no nice people in the North,
but we generally
have nicer people down here, but we have to
realize this. Whether it comes to a heinous
serial killer
or your neighbor that you really like, who
clearly made it clear he's not a Christian,
but he's so nice. In our evaluation, it all
comes down to a matter of degree.
As Brother Moke used to call him, the same sle
w foot who controls the same world system,
evil world system, as just has different ways
in which he controls things and different ways
and different degrees in which he controls
people in his evil world system. It's the same
problem, folks. It's only a matter of degree.
And again, it would be easy. It could be
demonic serial killer, easy to label walking
in darkness, filled with darkness, empowered
by
darkness, but the generally morally very nice
person. But then ask him about his religion.
And he says something along the lines of, well
, look, man, religion is good. I even believe
in
God, but all roads lead to Rome. You can
believe whatever religion you want to believe
in. Everybody's
going to go to heaven when they die. It's just
whatever one you pick. Do you realize how
deadly?
Eternally deadly that is, especially if he
convinces the nice guy, somebody else,
of that position. When I was being drawn by
the father to the son, I had a man who was
influencing
me with New Age religion. And he actually told
me, and I'll probably tell you this,
but I'll tell you again, he actually told me,
well, you know, hell's not really in the Bible
.
It's not in there. And, you know, being raised
Catholic, I was like, yeah, I think it's in
there.
I'm pretty sure it's in there. I mean, we just
have to go get a Bible and look around. But I
think it's there. Let me tell you, the same
hell will be occupied by some very nice people
as well as the blood drinking witches of the
occult. They'll all be there.
All unbelievers, whether they know it or not,
are literally being ruled and dominated by the
Prince of Darkness in varying degrees and in
different ways to accomplish his purpose of
blinding the minds of those who believe not
the
glorious gospel, lest they be saved and go to
heaven when they die. And he's a tricky dece
iver.
He deceives at all different levels. And it's
hard for people to realize that. It's hard for
Christians to realize that. It's impossible
for the lost man to realize that, but it's
hard for
even Christians to realize, folks, there is so
far much more going on down here in
responsibility
land in the unseen world that's happening
right now at this moment that we can even
comprehend.
I can tell you the demons of hell hate what's
happening in this room right now. They hate
it. If they could get permission to burn this
building to the ground with all of us in it,
they would, but the grace of God restrains
that from happening. You can't escape the fact
that
as believers, we were just think about
literally all says it, transferred out of that
kingdom of
darkness over into the kingdom of his beloved
son, as I quoted earlier. And if you are a
person who
is a part of that kingdom of darkness now, and
you, you, you do the deeds of Satan, you have
to
understand whether it's apparent to you or not
, doesn't really matter. You are literally
under
the dominion of the prince of darkness right
now. And as a result of being under his domin
ion and
doing his deeds to all different types of
levels, you actually live and breathe under
the wrath of
God right now, even a child of wrath. In fact,
as I quoted earlier, you are by nature, a
child of
wrath. And if you don't repent and believe the
gospel of Jesus Christ, when God stops your
air
and he stops everybody's air at one point or
another, you don't repent and believe before
that air stops, you will end up in an eternal,
never ending place of darkness, like you can't
conceive of. Jesus himself said this,
referring to all, to the unbelieving Jews in
context,
but applied to all, all unbelievers in Matthew
812, one of the most frightening verses in all
of
scripture, but the sons of the kingdom, there
he's referring to the people of Israel, will
be cast out
into outer, what? Darkness. In that place. It
will be weeping. Tea. You ever hurt yourself
so bad?
That's what you'll be doing in eternal
darkness. We can't even begin folks to imagine
the abject
horror of the outer darkness that Jesus
himself is speaking of here. I didn't make
this up. These
are the words of Jesus Christ. Any more than
we can really wrap our minds fully around what
heaven is going to be like. All I can do is
know that the general reality that one is
going to be
incomprehensibly good better than I can
imagine, the other is going to be incomprehens
ibly
terrible. We get a few clues, but trust me,
nothing can compare anyone or either of those
situations. And so Jesus made clear, if you
want darkness, you can have it, and you can
have it
forever. And once you're eternally in it,
there's no exit. There's no exit ramp. There's
no exit door.
There's no remedy. Now go back to Ephesians 5
and Christian, though you were formerly
darkness and headed for eternal darkness, aren
't you glad on the Lord's day, on Palm Sunday,
what Paul says next? But now you, Christian,
are light in the Lord. Paul continues to make
this
tremendous contrast. That's why he picks
darkness and light. They are absolute oppos
ites. No longer
do we do the works of Satan. Now we do the
works of God. Remember Ephesians 2-10, for we
are his
workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good
works. We are no longer under the rule of
Satan.
We now exist under the Lordship of King Jesus,
the King of the universe. We are no longer
under the wrath of God. We now exist in union
with King Jesus, adopted by grace into God's
family,
and into the kingdom of his glorious light. In
wonder of wonders we become inheritors
of God's eternal kingdom of light. He's
showing us, folks, in this whole text how
opposite these things are. And he's telling us
, now listen, now that you know this,
if you're in the kingdom of light right now,
if you're living and breathing in the kingdom
of light,
then next, verse 8, walk as children of light.
And shouldn't you want to
live the rest of your life like children of
light, not like children of wrath? Be what you
are. Be
who you are. And how, folks, can you not, once
you understand all of this from God's Word?
Now next, Paul is going to give us some of the
characteristics of children of light. Look at
verse 9, "For the fruit of the light consists
in all goodness and righteousness and truth."
And you don't need to be a heavyweight theolog
ian to unpack that, right? I mean, even I can
understand
that. Goodness, righteousness, truth are the
marks of those who walk in the light. You
might be a
churchgoer. You may have walked the aisle and
professed saving faith in Christ and been
baptized,
but those things are not the real test of
whether or not you are a child of light. Now,
listen to
me carefully. Children of light do go to
church. Children of light do profess faith.
Children of
light do follow the command of Jesus to be
baptized, but the real test is, do you
manifest the
fruit of light in your life? Goodness,
righteousness, and truth. Now real quick,
goodness has to do
with how we relate to other people in our
lives. It's what Paul meant in 1 Thessalonians
5, 15.
Look what he says. "We see that no one repays
another with evil for evil, but always see
after
that which is good for one another and all
people." Very simple. If you're walking in the
light,
you should exercise goodness in terms of how
you deal with other people. Next word,
righteousness.
That more has to do with our relationship with
God and our living in obedience, not in
perfection,
but in obedience to Him during this process of
sanctification that we're in. And then truth
has to deal with our own selves, goodness and
relating to others, righteousness and relating
to God, but truth as we view our own selves,
what we are, what we say that we are in things
like
honesty and integrity and responsibility and
reliability, that's in contrast with the fals
eness
and the hypocrisy that we used to live in when
we were formally darkness. It's such a change.
All Christians bear fruit. Did you know that?
Now some bear more fruit, some bear less, but
all bear some fruit. True fruit bearing is
what most demonstrates that we're walking
in the light. And you could say, as Jesus
explained, "Lord, Lord, didn't I do this and
do that and do
that?" You could do that all the way to the
end, all you want to. But unless there was
true biblical
fruit in your life, He's going to say the
scariest words that a human could ever hear.
"Depart from me. You worked iniquity. I never
knew you. I never even knew you in the first
place.
You were pretending to be a Christian and you
never were. I can't think of anything
more terrible. No fruit, no eternal life, that
simple. And all who truly walk in the light
will bear fruit." It's guaranteed. Why is it
guaranteed? Not so much on us. It's because
that's
God's plan. God's plan is to be glorified as
He takes undeserving guilty sinners and
conforms
them to the image of Christ throughout a
lifespan and then brings them to heaven,
which they don't deserve, and I don't deserve.
Now, look at verse 10. "Trying to learn what
is
pleasing to the Lord." Now, look at that
phrase, "trying to learn." In the Greek, that
carries the
idea of testing or proving to learn by clear
and convincing evidence what is truly honoring
to
God. That's what it means. The point is, as we
walk as believers in the light of the truth,
the knowledge of the Lord's will for your life
will become more and more clear.
And the result is you will become actually a
living verification of what is pleasing to God
with your life. And if you're truly walking in
the light, that is something. If you're a
Christian
in here and you hear me say this, you're
hearing these words, you say, "Yes, that is
what I want."
That is what the goal is for me. And you know
what that does? It's really great.
All of these things I'm telling you serve to
give us the assurance of our faith,
that we really truly have been saved, that
when we're tested in that area, how do we hold
up to
self-examination? And only you can answer that
question about yourself. And when you answer,
"Yes," not perfectly, of course, but, "Yes,"
it serves to give you great assurance
that you are one who is walking in the light.
Because guess what? Those who walk in darkness
as we formerly did have absolutely no interest
in anything that I have said here today
whatsoever
at all. No interest. It doesn't affect them.
It doesn't convict them. They could care less.
They
think I'm stupid. They think it's foolish. For
the natural man, receive it not the things of
the
Spirit of God, but they are what? Foolishness
to him. They're foolish, but not to us. We
hear them,
we say, "Yes, that gives you evidence." All
right, then verse 11, we get a command. Verse
11,
"Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of
darkness, but instead even expose them."
The Greek intensifies that phrase, "Do not
participate as this," and this is a much
stronger
word. "Do not fellowship with those things."
That's even stronger. "Don't get involved at
all with the
unfruitful deeds of darkness. Don't get
involved with the immorality in the world." It
's not because,
no, don't go ever near anybody else. Just stay
in your house because we have to witness the
Gospel
to human beings, right? So we have to be out
amongst them, but it's the deeds that we're
not to get
involved with. If you do, you will wipe out
your testimony. I mean, just think about it.
Old Philip over there, old Brother Philip, he
says he's a Christian, but boy, look where I
saw him
walking out of the other night. "Destroy your
witness." And then lastly, verse 11, "Oh, boy,
but instead even expose them." These deeds,
wow, don't do what they do, but go further,
expose them.
And I can think of no better example of that
than what we see pastors like Brian Gunter
and Jeff Durbin doing right now, this year in
these state houses across the country,
being a prophetic witness on the floors of
these houses of legislature, exposing the
deeds of the darkness of the murder of the un
born as a prophetic witness for the church.
They are exposing that. Or the work that we
did in exposing the deeds of darkness,
of transgenderism at the state capitol, as we
did, we exposed them. America is in the
condition that it is in more than anything in
general, because the church long ago stopped
doing this, stopped following this. We stopped
being that prophetic voice in politics and the
culture, and we bought into the myth of what's
called neutrality, meaning we stayed inside
the four walls of the church where it was safe
, and the results are clear to see.
Well, look at verse 12, "For it is disgraceful
even to speak of the things which are done by
them
in secret." It certainly is disgraceful to
actually even talk about what physically
takes place in detail in the murder of an un
born child. That is a disgraceful thing
to talk about. They don't talk about it. In
fact, they've done a great job of not talking
about it to keep your eye off to what's really
happening in an abortion. And it's so disgrace
ful
to talk about what really goes on when drag
queen story hour at the library ends and what
goes on
in the transgender community behind closed
doors. I really even hate to bring that
thought up in a
sermon, but I'm here to tell you it is wicked
ness and disgraceful, but how else do you
expose it
unless you say it? It's disgraceful. In line
with that, look at verse 13, "Oh, but all
things
become visible when they are exposed by the
light. For everything that becomes visible is
light." Now,
that might be a little bit confusing to you.
Let me tell you why. That last phrase is
better
translated this way. Listen to it. "For it is
light that makes everything visible." Is that
better
understood there? Other translations say, "Are
made manifest by the light." That's better
understood.
In other words, the pure truth in the light of
God's word exposes all the secrets of the
deeds
of darkness. Well, we've seen some exposing
going on this year of some evil, haven't we?
And it hasn't
even been the Word of God that's done it. It's
just been right things that have exposed. But
back
this out. Back all this out. We're going to
close. What's the reason? Why, Paul, do we
expose the deeds
of darkness? Well, nobody gets saved unless
they repent, sin. A word they don't like to
say anymore
in the church. It's not evangelism just to
tolerate people in their sin, to just love
them and never,
ever, ever talk about their sin like the "he
gets us" commercials that you see on
television
during the Super Bowl. Those are evil. True
evangelism by necessity has to make people
face the fact of their sin just like we had to
face the fact of it before we believe.
God loves you and has a wonderful plan for
your life by itself. Never saved anybody ever.
I never
will. The only hope for anybody is that the
true light of the gospel would shine and make
manifest the sinner's great need of grace. And
you cannot do that apart from exposing the
deeds
of darkness. That's why, listen, sitting in
this little small church, we right here, and I
tell you
this all the time, I'll continue to tell you,
in your circles of influence, we are the only
true lights in the world that exist in so many
different people's lives. There's nobody else
in
their life that will expose sin and bring the
gospel message except you. It's so many people
's
lives. So the contrast is clear. Darkness and
light. You're going to walk as a child of
light.
You walk in goodness, righteousness, and truth
. You don't have anything to do with the deeds
of
darkness, but rather you expose them because
you are the only light available to expose and
point
the way to the only alternative, which is the
light of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And then,
lastly, and I promise, we're closing right
here. I don't know why sometimes I say we're
closing
and we're really not closing. I'm kind of a
preacher problem, but this is really fixed to
be it. Lastly, Paul closes this text with an
invitation. Verse 14, "For this reason it says
."
What says Paul? Well, that's a reference it to
Isaiah 60, verse one, but let's keep looking
in verse 14. "Awake, sleeper, and arise from
the dead, and Christ will shine on you." Now,
that comes from Isaiah 60, verse one. Look
what it says. "Arise, shine, for your light
has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen
upon you." Now, that's not a direct quote,
but here's what's even more fascinating. That
verse there in Isaiah looked forward to the
Messiah,
and now in the New Testament, you have Paul
making this interpretation of that verse
here in Ephesians 5, 14, as he looks backward
to what Christ has done. It's an incredible
verse.
He puts Christ in Isaiah's words because it's
Christ that is the fulfillment.
And let me give you a little aside. Many
commentators believe that this is a line put
into an
Easter hymn sung by the early church. It's an
imitation, and you may be sitting here today,
or you may be watching online, and your
response upon hearing this message is just, "I
don't think
I'm walking." I think I may be walking in the
darkness. Goodness, righteousness, truth is
this
explanation. I don't have those things in my
life, and so here the invitation comes to you,
as it does throughout the history of the
church. Verse 14, "Awake, sleeper, and arise
from the dead,
and Christ will shine upon you." Today is the
day of salvation. Don't wait. Don't put it off
any
longer. Repent and believe the gospel before
it is everlastingly too late. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you for this tremendous word
from the Apostle Paul written all those
centuries ago.
Incredible how it still has our number, every
one of us. It so perfectly describes the state
of man, both in darkness and in light, and
that is because it is the truth. How we thank
you for
your truth. I pray, Lord, that you have given
your people ears to hear this word today that
we might go forth from this place, make
application of it in our lives, and live in
such a way that
we bring you glory. In Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.
[BLANK_AUDIO]