Walk in Love
Ephesians • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Call to worship
Welcome everyone!
LET US STAND AND WORSHIP!
“What a beautiful Name”
Words and Music by Hillsong
PRAYER OF PRAISE FOR WHO GOD IS
Lord,
“What a beautiful Name”
Words and Music by Hillsong
“What a beautiful Name”
Words and Music by Hillsong
PRAYER OF ILLUMINATION TO OPEN OUR HEARTS
Lord,
SERMON
Introduction
Chapter 5 has this overall theme of “imitating God”. And Paul says we do this in three specific areas:
5:2: “walk in love”. Remember that the metaphor of “walking” is about how we live. It is the habits we practice, it is a continuous everyday lifestyle that ends when we draw our last breath.
(v 8): look at it, “walk as children of light”. Paul discusses this in verses 8-14.
Then head down to verse 15, “walk not as unwise men, but as wise”.
We imitate God when we: “walk in love”, “walk in light”, and “walk in wisdom”
Our call as believers is to imitate the God that we love and follow.
The word imitate is the Greek word μιμητής (mimētēs). This is where we get our word “mimic” from.
Paul says we are to mimic God, BUT TOO OFTEN WE FIND OURSELVES MIMICING ONE ANOTHER.
OR we compare ourselves to one another, and instead of striving to be as Christlike as we can, we settle for being mediocre or just as good as someone else
I think if we lower our standards of righteousness, and godliness, then we will live less righteously
If we compare ourselves to Lukewarm Christian’s, what will our faith be like? LUKEWARM
If the mirror that we hold up to our lives is just a babe in Christ, then what will we become?
Paul says, let God be the standard of righteousness you strive for!
Paul says, as a child of God, be as much like Him as you possibly can! And never sets your sights for anything less!
How do we do that? 1) walk in love”
Ephesians 5:1–2 (NASB95)
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.
Notice of the three things we mentioned that Paul says we are to walk in: LOVE IS FIRST
Love is the most important characteristic of a believer
We can have every gift, and have the entire Bible memorized, can be the most faithful church member but if we do not have love we are living in disobedience
Jesus rebuked the church in Ephesus and called them to repent because the love they had for Jesus WAS LESS than they had at the start.
They had all the right doctrine
They did not tolerate evil on any level!
They were Bible scholars with empty hearts
Its not enough to be faithful
It's not enough to have a testimony about how we used to be
We are to be people characterized by love
What is love?
Love is two things in the Bible:
It is a spontaneous desire to show affection or kindness
This is the kind we are most familiar with
We have a desire to show love to someone, be kind to someone, show affection to someone, help someone
We love our spouses because we have a desire within us to do that
We love our children because we have a desire within us to do that
We love other people THAT WE LIKE because we have a desire within us to do that
That kind of love is easy
It comes natural
It is spontaneous
But there is another kind of love we see in Scripture: It is TO CHOOSE to show kindness or affection
Love is not always about feelings. At least not real love. Feelings are fickle. Feelings are unreliable. Feelings come and go!
Ashley can love me a whole bunch and the next day not have any ‘good’ feelings toward me the next day, and the same with me, but that doesn’t mean we do not love each other
We do not live the Christian life according feelings, we live the ChristIan life according to truth and truth comes with a choice.
We choose to believe it and live it or we choose to reject it!
We can choose to love people or we can choose to not love people.
We can choose to show kindness or we can choose to not show kindness!
It’s a choice!
And that means you and I can love anyone in this entire world if we choose to.
Think about this:
Wives and Husbands have you ever been in an argument with your spouse. I mean a heated argument with yelling, and arguing, and maybe even tears AND THEN SOMEONE CALLS and we instantly answer the phone, “hello, of hey how are you!?” Im good, laughing and joking, and smiling.
We had all kinds of feelings that made us angry, but we chose to be kind and considerate and compassionate to the person on the phone.
Love is a choice much more than love is a feeling
If marriage was based solely upon feelings, there would be very few survivors if any.
Do you know who Jesus told us to love?
He told us to love our neighbor as ourself
That includes anyone and all people
He also told us to love our enemies
“But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
How in the world are we really going to love our enemies if we only love through emotion?
Let me ask you something, how do you feel about that person who hates you?
Do you feel like showing them kindness and affection?
NO! Of coarse not!
How can we be obedient to this command then?
By choosing to love them despite how we feel about them
And the third people Jesus told us to love?
He told us to love one another
That is the people inside the church, inside the covenant relationship with God Almighty, the very children of God, our brothers and sisters in Jesus.
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
And that is the primary thrust of this passage today.
It is a call to truly love one another in this body.
This call to “walk in love” is primarily focused about how we love each other in here
How are we to love one another?
The same way Jesus loved us
“walk in love, just as Christ also loved you”
This is not in feeling though that is ok too, but in action
Jesus did not just say to us, I feel good about you, I like you
(v 2) “He gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice”
Jesus demonstrated to us what love is by offering His life on the cross as a sacrifice for our sins
“Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.
Therefore our love, is to mimic the love of Jesus, AND BE SACRIFICIAL LOVE
The love God wants in the church is the willingness to make sacrifices on the behalf of others
That means if they ask for our time, we should be willing to give it
If they have a need, we should be able to meet it if we have the ability
If showing kindness or affection comes at a cost (and it will) be willing to make that sacrifice
Notice that Jesus’ sacrifice was a “fragrant aroma” to God
OT sacrifices as a soothing aroma
When animals were sacrificed in the OT, they were burned in pieces of meat and fat
And you could imagine what that smell was like to have an entire bull, or sheep, or a goat burned on the alter
All of that meat and fat sizzling over that open flame
And the Bible says this was a soothing aroma to the Lord
What a thought that when we love sacrificially, it is like a pleasing aroma to the Lord.
That just by making sacrifices in our lives on behalf of others, we become the fragrance of Christ
Application
We should expect real love to cost us.
I am not saying we must become a door mat and do everything everyone asks or wants from us.
Use discernment
But we are never more Christlike than when we love sacrificially
IN CONTRAST TO THAT, PAUL NOW EXPLAINS WHAT IS NOT “WALKING IN LOVE”
But immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints; and there must be no filthiness and silly talk, or coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks.
Paul gives us a couple of vice lists of sins to avoid
The first group have to do with our behavior
immorality
encompasses all sexual sin
homosexuality
any extra marital physical relationships of any kind
Incest
Anything outside the bounds of Christian marriage is immorality
Impurity
This is anything that is unholy.
It could be sexual impurity, it could be actions that are not godly, anything that is incompatible with holiness.
greed
This is the selfish desire to have more than we truly needs
It could be of material possessions
It could be of money
It could even be someone’s spouse
The word is also translated “covetousness”
And the 10th command says, “you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
Then Paul says, “these things should not even be named among you”
He is not saying that we should not be talking about these things
But that these sins should be so absent from our lives that the world would not even be able to name them in association to this church
Why? BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT PROPER OR “fitting” FOR THE SAINTS
the word ‘saints’ means “holy ones” and refers to the children of God
What does sexual immorality, or greed, or impurity have in the life of a “holy one”?
It doesn’t. It does not fit in the life of a believer!
He goes on (v 4) THINGS PERTAINING TO SPEECH
and there must be no filthiness and silly talk, or coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks.
filthiness
This is doing or saying things that are shameful
I have heard people say that the Bible never prohibits cussing
But cussing would fall under this category of filthiness
silly talk
this is better understood as “foolish talk”
It means one who talks like a fool.
It’s not about intelligence, but about morals.
Someone who makes light of high standards of behavior, thinking that it is somehow funny or sophisticated to tear down anything that is praiseworthy in God’s eyes.
We see this all over our culture anything on social media that talks about God or good behavior is laughed about
course jesting
this is a form of humor usually at the cost of someone else
Now he’s not saying Christians should not have sense of humor
Humor is ok, but we should be cautious with it because joking can easily lead us into sin or hurting others if they are the subject of our jokes
In contrast to these sins, we should “give thanks” (v 4)
What should we be thanking God for?
we should be thanking him for the good things God has delivered us from
A Godly marriage
Our salvation
deliverance from our sinful past
Kind, edifying, words used to build each other up
The opportunities to demonstrate sacrificial love
Opportunities to share and be generosity
For Him making us more like Christ
For this you know with certainty, that no immoral or impure person or covetous man, who is an idolater, has an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.
People often want to know the ultimate question when it comes to Christianity: “am I going to heaven or hell?’”
Heres one way to answer it: If those sins listed above, even one of those sins describe your life then you are in danger of hell
It is who we are that gives the best evidence of our eternal destiny
But I don’t think Paul writes this to condemn, but to cultivate a holy fear of God to motivate that person to repent and get the sin out of their life
I want you to notice that the verb in this verse describing the sinful person is in the present tense: “who is an idolater”
The best way to determine where you stand spiritually is to look at your life right now
How are you living in light of this vice list right now
Why the list of sins after the command to walk in love?
Because those who walk in these sins (and other sins) are stumbling blocks to the rest of the church.
And the complete opposite of walking in love, is to live in sin and tell others it is completely acceptable to God because Jesus died for all sins.
Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
LET NO ONE DECEIVE YOU!
That is anyone inside the church or outside the church
The church walls do not determine heaven and hell boundaries
There are people inside the church who live as sons of disobedience in their private lives and the wrath of God abides upon them
And what those people often do is try to convince others that it is completely acceptable to live sinful lifestyles just as they do and there will be no consequences.
Application:
Let no one deceive you. Let no one convince you what the Bible does not teach is true.
Listen to no one that practices things which you know to not be godly.
All ChristIan’s are called to imitate God, and if someone is not striving to do that then do not listen to them!
They will take you to hell with them.
DIRTY JOKE ILLUSTRATION
When I came to faith, many years ago, the church I was at was doing duct work under the old parsonage that was used for our youth group.
I volunteered to help because I wanted to be involved with the church.
I was there that Saturday, under the house working, and the music leader at that time who was also our adult Sunday school teacher.
And we took a smoke break from crawling under that dirty old house and he began to tell a dirty jokes. Nothing just terrible, but not what I expected to hear from the music leader and Sunday School teacher.
And I remembering as a brand new Christian knowing how that affected me. I wondered, “is that ok?”. This guy is clearly a man of God, but why is he telling dirty jokes? And it did not cause me to stumble, because I knew it was wrong. But I never forgot the absolute shock it was to hear that.
Do you know that he is no longer in church (to my knowledge) and has fallen completely away.
Let No one deceive you, what a person does is who they really are. And if they do not imitate God, THEN YOU DO NOT LISTEN TO ANYTHING THEY TELL YOU.
THE WRATH OF GOD THAT IS COMING TO THEM, WILL COME UPON YOU AS WELL.
LET NO ONE DECEIVE YOU WITH EMPTY WORDS
“Empty words” just means statements that lack truth.
They say things that are manufactured by their own thinking not founded in the Word of God
They are according to human philosophy
They are according to the world’s way of thinking, not God’s truth
And if we want to know truth, we must be sure to get it from the right source, right from the mouth of God
“FOR BECAUSE OF THESE THINGS THE WRATH OF GOD COMES UPON THE SONS OF DISOBEDIENCE”
Why does the wrath of God come upon them? “Because of these things”
Because of immorality
because of impurity
because of greed
because they like dirty jokes
because they like use foolish talk
THE BOTTOM LINE: because they imitate the world and not God
The biblical truth about the evidence of one’s conversion is always the way they live
by their fruits you will know them
bear fruit in keeping with repentance
Conclusion
How does this relate to the gospel?
Walking in love is as much like Christ is we will ever be
If those sins or any other sins characterize our lives, then we must repent
God is gracious ands God will forgive, but He will not forgive if we do not turn from them
Get them out of your life
~PRAYER~
RESPONSE
PUBLIC INVITATION
“What a beautiful Name”
Words and Music by Hillsong
OFFERING
We will now worship the Lord through our tithes and offering.
BENEDICTION
Numbers 6:24-26 “The Lord bless you, and keep you; The Lord cause His face to shine on you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His face to you, And give you peace.’”
Business Meeting
Business Meeting
Opening Prayer
Reading of last months minutes
Any Questions?
Vote to approve last months minutes
Treasurers Report
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Vote to approve the treasurers report
Unfinished Business
Electricity is fixed
Planning committee is put
New Business
change mileage reimbursement to whatever the federal mileage rate is for that year (right now we have it set at .50/mile
vcation
Any other new business?
Meeting adjourned