Episode Transcript
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Let's turn our attention to Ephesians,
chapter four, Fusians four, verses seventeen
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through twenty four. Now this I
say and testify in the Lord, that
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you must no longer walk, as
the gentiles do, in the futility of
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their minds. They are darkened in
their understanding, alienated from the life of
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God because of the ignorance that is
in them, due to their hardness of
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heart. They have become callous and
given, have given themselves up to sensuality,
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greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But this is not the way
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you learned Christ, assuming that you
have heard about him, and we're taught
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in him, as the truth is
in Jesus, to put off your own
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old self, which belongs to your
former manner of life and is corrupt through
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deceitful desires, and to be renewed
in the spirit of your minds, and
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to put on the new self created
after the likeness of God, in True
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Righteousness and holiness may be seated.
We saying him before we started. I
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want to read to you again.
Be requested this one hundred and seventy two
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the things that are spoken of in
this hymn are very much what is spoken
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of in our passage one hundred seventy
two. Speak O Lord, says.
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Speak O Lord, as we come
to you to receive the food of Your
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Holy Word, take your truth,
plant it deep in us, shape and
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fashion us in your likeness, that
the light of Christ might be seen today
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in our acts of love and our
deeds of faith. Speak a Lord,
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and fulfill in us all your purposes
for your glory. And the other two
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verses are along these lines. To
sway that this this prayer that, as
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God would speak, not only would
we begin to see rightly, but that
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our lives would be changed by it, that something would happen by the power
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of his word, the power of
the word of the truth, as Paul
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says here in Ephesians, that is, in Jesus Christ. This is an
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extremely important connection, because there are
people who will claim that when you preach
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and teach a strong Gospel, a
clear Gospel message, that were saved not
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of ourselves but of Jesus Christ and
him alone, that people will abandon all
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good works, that people won't care
about the law and even be against the
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law, or sometimes they're called Antinomians, anti law Ian's is another way to
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put that. The idea is it's
or the accusation as if you tell people
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that Jesus is the soul source of
their salvation and that everything is given freely
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in him and that they contribute nothing
of their own works to that, that
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they'll just live of lives that are
ungodly, that they won't try anymore,
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what do you you'll have churches that
are full of rotten and terrible people,
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people that claim to be of God
but show nothing of that in their lives.
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But what the hymn says and what
the scriptures say is that's not what
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happens. We've just gone through a
passage on before this that emphasized that the
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Lord Jesus, in his ascended glory, works in his church through the Ministry
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of the word, that he pours
out gifts on his church and evangelists and
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pastors, teachers, apostles prophets to
be ministers of the word, to establish
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us and make us strong, to
help us grow into maturity into the head
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who is in Christ. And then
here in this passage, after emphasizing the
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gift of that Ministry that Christ gives
to us and the benefits of it,
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now he talks about the way in
which our lives are changed. He commands
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us on the basis of these things
that God has promised, these things that
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God is doing, this grace alone
that we have in Christ alone. He
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tells us how that affects our walk. Teaching centered on the word of Christ
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has an effect, and that's true
of every lesson right that's truly learned.
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Right, if I teach a student
to fight, take a cellow student,
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let's say, and I teach them
how to hold the bow properly and on
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your pinky goes here and your index
finger goes here and you want to wait
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it this way. I could tell
them all that, I can show them
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pictures, but until they take the
bow in their hand, hold it properly
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and draw it across the string and
make a beautiful sound, the lesson really
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hasn't been learned, at least not
for this objective, not that, for
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the objective of making beautiful music on
a cello. Well's the same thing with
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Christ. God's objective in teaching US
Christ as not so that we might be
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able to list off a handful of
things that are true about him, like
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memorizing a chart or a graph,
even as those things are true, but
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it's that our lives would be changed, that they would be conformed to him,
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is, to his image. God's
goal, as he says, is
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that we would be renewed in our
minds, that we would put on the
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new self, as he says in
Verse Twenty Four, created after the likeness
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of God, in True Righteousness and
holiness. Well, I get frustrated sometimes
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as a when I teach cello,
occasionally that I'm not able to produce the
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results that I want. Not Always, most of the time, but not
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always occasionally. There are instances where
it seems like work and we'll work and
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we'll work, and yet we struggle
still to reach the objective. God,
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however, always reaches his objective,
his word. It never goes out and
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returns to him empty. They he
changes our lives, he makes wisdom truly
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happen. So when the spirit of
Christ accompanies the word of Christ, we
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might say that beautiful music is made
in our lives, beautiful music for the
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praise of God. That's what this
passage is about and it's it's a way
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of helping us to see and understand
and live in very clear terms the way
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we ought the way we ought to
live, the way we ought to to
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walk. What does he say?
Paul says now, on the basis of
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all these things, now this I
say and testify in the Lord, that
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you must no longer walk as the
gentiles do in the futility of their minds.
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He says this in a very interesting
way. Right he's talking to these
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Ephasians who themselves were gentiles, the
meaning those who are not biological children of
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Abraham, those we are not Jews. He speaks to them as gentiles,
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and usually the contrast in scriptures between
the gentiles and the Jews. But notice
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what he says. He doesn't say
I want you to no longer walk as
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gentiles. Instead I want you to
walk as Jews. He says I no
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longer want you to walk as gentiles, I want you to walk in the
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way that you learned, is cry
in Christ, which is not disconnected from
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what we have in the Old Testament. But there is something that's remarkably new.
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He wants them no longer to walk
his gentiles, but to walk his
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Christians, and it's a different kind
of way. These Ephesians used to live
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one way and now they ought to
live another way, and that's important to
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note. That there is a different
way of Christ. There are people who
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think, or pretend sometimes, that
they can talk about Jesus with their lips
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and yet fail to love them with
their hands. They are deceived, and
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that's because, as he says here, they've either not been taught properly or
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they've refused to learn. Bad teacher, bad students, one or the other.
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But he says, notice what he
says. He says Verse Twenty.
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But this is not the way that
you have learned Christ, assuming that you
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have heard about him and we're taught
in him, as the truth is in
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him. There is a way of
Christ, in other words, and this
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is important, to know, a
way of walking, and it's a way
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that is marked by contrast from the
gentile way. It's the opposite of ignorance,
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it's the opposite of sinfulness, it's
the opposite of callousness, and you
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can learn something there. If you
do not know, or if you do
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not care about knowing Jesus, if
you have a callous heart, if you
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don't feel the importance of his commands
or have a desire to obey him,
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if you are, as he describes, greedy not just for things but greedy
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to practice impurity, like that's the
thing that you're thinking about meditating on.
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What are the ways in which I
can practice impurity? Then you should know
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that you're not a Christian. You're
not walking in the way that you learned
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in Christ though. You are walking
in darkness and ignorance, in the ways
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of the gentiles. In other words, as we have testified in many places
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throughout scripture, the way you walk
can tell you about who you are.
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So what is the Christian way then? Paul says it's putting off these old
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things and setting them aside, putting
taking off the old man and putting on
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the new man. There's this old
spaghetti western that I like to watch from
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time to time and it begins with
this cowboy who's being drug through the desert
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on a horse. It's very slow, goes on forever, but he's he's
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being drugg by this horse. He's
on a kind of Cot that's at an
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angle, so the top parts attached
to the horse somehow and then the bottom
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parts just dragging along the ground and
he's going through the desert and all this
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dust is being kicked up and he's
just sleeping through the whole thing and,
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as is a dust everywhere, dust
everywhere. Well, he finally reaches his
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destination. He closed times into a
bath. The bath turns, you know,
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dark with mud. Basically finally gets
out of the bath a little bit
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cleaner. He takes his shirt,
does one of these fool things, fills
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the fills the air throughout the room
that he's in with dust, I guess,
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just this big cloud of dust,
and then he puts on his shirt
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and and leaves. It's a funny
scene and it but it's a way of
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introducing this character. It tells you
something about him. One thing it tells
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you about this particular character is that
he's lazy. He just doesn't want to
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do any work. He doesn't want
to do anything. The other thing it
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tells him it tells you that this
is a guy who doesn't change. He's
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set in his ways. In that
character gets played throughout the movie. I
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always think about this scene when I
think about this language of putting on and
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putting off and how ridiculous it is
to take our sins and our dirt and
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our crime to be made new in
Christ, to be baptized into the name
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of the father, the sign of
the Holy Spirit and the todake care old
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sinful flesh and just put it right
back on. Right. When Christians put
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off the way of life, they're
putting off something that's corrupt, something that's
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dirty, something that's impure. You
don't put that kind of thing back on
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after you've been baptized, after you've
been cleansed, after you've been washed and
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regenerated. Instead, we are to
put on new, clean clothes. And
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you know what that feels like,
right, if you've been working out in
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the yard and you're dirty and sweaty
all the way down there through every single
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layer, and you take a bath
and you come out and you put on
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fresh, clean clothes, it feels
great. If that's true for working in
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the yard. Can you imagine whether
that is? How true that is in
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spiritual terms and eternal terms? And
the way that we put on is not
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some arbitrary way, it's not of
a bunch of random rules that somebody came
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up with. It is the very
way, the very law and love of
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God, the way in which Jesus
himself locked. As you read through the
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Gospels and see Jesus acting and interacting
in various ways, you ought to always
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be amazed at how pure he is, how wisely he always act, how
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I acts, how loving he always
is. Think about this example that we
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read earlier in the service with him. In this rich young man, young
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man, comes to him and ask
them this question. What must I do
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to have eternal life? and Jesus
says, you know, just do all
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the commands. Well, I've done
that right, the young man says,
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I've. Well, which commands?
Tell me first. Which commands do you
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mean? He says, well,
you know, honor Your father and your
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mother, don't murder, don't commit
adultery, you know the law. And
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he says, I've done all that. Then Jesus cuts to his heart and
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he says give away your possessions to
the poor. He tells him this because
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the man had great possessions and was
treasuring them above all things. But the
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man didn't want to follow Jesus.
Man didn't want to give those things away.
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He didn't want to follow and serve
things that were lasting and eternal.
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He wanted his stuff and he went
away a sad jesus, in this whole
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interaction, speaks perfectly in accordance with
truth. Doesn't have to use a lot
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of words. Even there is this
he says what he says and love and
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an honesty. He offers the man
eternal life. Follow me, he says,
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let go of the things of this
world. This is what our Lord
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is, this is what he does. And Paul says that this is what
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we become, this way of holiness
and wisdom and Righteousness, true righteousness,
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True Holiness, not just pretend righteousness. Yes, of course I do all
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the Commandments, but righteousness that is
from God. Righteousness, this from Jesus,
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when we are renewed by the spirit, when we are created, he
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says, after the likeness of God
and True Righteousness and holiness. This is
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what we become. So let me
ask you for a second. What does
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that life look like? Right?
So, if you were to describe this
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way of life, this way of
Christ, a life of a living in
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him, what might that look like? What kind of ways would you what
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kind of ways would you desire to
walk? Well, Paul tells us he
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doesn't leave it to our imaginations,
although certainly we could come up with some
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good things and relying on our memories
in the word, but listen to what
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he says and verses twenty five through
following. This is the verse is right
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after our passage for this evening,
he says. Therefore, having put away
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falsehood, let each one of you
speak the truth with his neighbor, for
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we are members one of another.
Be Angry and do not sin, do
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not let the sun go down on
your anger, and give no opportunity to
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the devil. Let the thief no
longer steal, but let rather let him
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labor doing honest work with his own
hands, so that he may have something
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to share with anyone in need.
Let no corrupting talk come out of your
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mouths, but only such as good
for building up, as fits the occasion,
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that it may give grace to those
who hear, and do not grieve
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the Holy Spirit of God, by
whom you were sealed for the day of
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redemption. But all bitterness and wrath
and anger or and clamor and slander be
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put away from you, along with
all malice. Be kind to one another,
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tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as
God in Christ forgave you. Therefore,
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be imitators of God as beloved children, and Walk In love, as
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Christ loved us and gave himself up
for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice
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to God. He continues on this
way through the rest of the chapter outlining
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these various ways in which we we
walk the way of Christ, that we
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live learned in him. The Paul
doesn't say it explicitly here because he's been
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saying it explicitly in all the verses
before this, but Paul is Paul has
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very much in mind that this life
is not ours by some kind of a
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personal strengthen us. It's something that's
given to us. Remember he said you
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were dead in your trespasses and sins. You have been saved by grace.
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In other words, we walk differently
because of what God has done in our
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lives. Notice verse thirty that I
just read a moment ago. Do Not
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Grieve the Holy Spirit of God,
by whom you were sealed for the day
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of redemption. We act in a
way because God has done something. According
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to his ways and his life.
Paul has been teaching us that our hope
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comes not from our personal holiness or
our actions, but by the actions in
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the power of God who has saved
us in Christ. So if you think
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that you can obtain life in God
and and take his power and His Holiness
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out of Heaven, kind of like
plucking an apple from a tree, you've
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not been listening. You don't understand
what it means to walk in this way,
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to walk in Christ. We don't
obtain life in God by grabbing it
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from him, by taking something from
ourselves which does not belong to us.
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No, we obtain life in God
when he takes us like a dead branch
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and grafts us into himself and then
does this miracle so that what is dead
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comes to life by the power of
his life in us, his spirit in
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you. That's how we begin to
grow and that's why we trust Jesus and
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his strength for our righteousness, far
a way of living, for forgiveness for
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doing all of these hard things that
Paul outlines, and other hard things he
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will say to some of them up
using five verse when he says be imitators
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of God. If you want to
do that, apart from God, good
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luck. I don't know what else
to tell you. I it's it's it's
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going to be a vanity, a
striving after the wind, but with God
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working in you, with the spirit
of God who has sealed you for the
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day of Redemption, with Christ who
is ruling over you and working in you,
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you cannot you cannot fail, because
God will not fail. He will
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work in you and perfect you and
purify you and in one day he will
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glorify you and make you more alive
than you've ever experienced in your entire life.
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This passage, then, is about
the way of growth. The live
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branch produces fruit, the dead one
lying on the ground does not. The
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Christian walks by faith in this new
way. The unbeliever walks in unbelief,
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in the old ways of sin.
If you are a Christian, don't walk
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in the old way. Why would
you want to when you've been given this
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very gift of God? If you're
not a Christian, then God's message to
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you tonight is that you are in
danger. God's message is that the callousness
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of in your heart towards the things
of God makes you ignorant and alienated from
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him. You know what it is
to be calloused, right? Let's few
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burn your hand really badly and it
creates a callous, or something like that
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on it, so that you cannot
feel any more. That's what it's like
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when our hearts are calloused. We
we don't feel any more, our consciences
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aren't pricked by the things of God. Being alienated from his life being callous
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to his things. We are enslaved, tricked by the deceits of our own
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hearts. If you are not a
Christian and you continue to walk in the
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gentile ways and in the darkness and
ignorance of your heart, then in a
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sense, you might say you are
a trapped soul, trapped not by something
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outside of you but by something inside
of you. Your soul is held captive
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by its very own nature. You
lust after impurity, and impurity you get.
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But these desires, this impurity,
leads nowhere but to the grave,
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or corrupting talk, like he says. Why? Why is it called corrupting?
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Because it leads to death, to
corruption. The way of the gentiles,
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the way of unbelief, leads nowhere
but down. Momentary pleasures exchanged for
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eternal alienation from God. And if
this is the way in which you walk,
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this is a dangerous way, is
a way of death. But perhaps
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you knew this already. There is, however, a second word for you
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here as well, if you're not
a Christian, though Paul writes to the
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Ephesian Church, though he writes to
Christians. What the Christian has is what
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you can have as well if you
turn to Christ. The thing you've got
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to remember is that the Christian who's
sitting next to you tonight is nothing special.
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They're just like you. As you
heard from this passage. They were
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trapped, enslaved, greedy in their
former way of life, just like you.
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What happened? What changed? What
happened was that they heard the way
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of Christ, that they were taught
the way of Christ, just as you
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have been taught tonight. They heard
the call to follow him and they did
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not because of any kind of greatness
in them, but because God was working
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in their lives. The Light of
the Gospel shined into their lives and they
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followed the light. They let it
draw them out of the darkness. Will
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you, and if you are a
Christian, let this be reminder to you
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now that the you belong to him. There is still a battle inside,
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a battle between the old man and
the new men, the things of the
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flesh and the things of the spirit. God has not completely finished his work
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in you and he calls you to
be a part of that work. He
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calls you to be wise in the
truth that you have learned, to walk
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according to the light that he has
given you, to become more and more
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sensitive to His grace and his ways, to not put to put off the
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old, dirty garments of sin and
to put on the clean robes of righteousness.
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You will tell me that this is
difficult. You will tell me that
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the ways of the devil are deceitful
and trick you. You will tell me
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that the battle is hard. Am
I answer to you? Is I know.
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I know, but, as will
come to eventually in chapter six,
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God has not left us alone,
but he's given us armor to put on,
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the armor of God, which is
strengthened by Christ himself, by his
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spirit who is at work in us. So how do we walk in the
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way of Christ? In the same
way we began in Christ, by faith,
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by trusting in him and everything that
he is for us. Let's pray
