Made New pt.1

Go ahead and turn to Ephesians 4:17-19 this morning

We have seen repeatedly a pattern displayed by Paul in talking about the individual Christian…

…and then the body collectively together as one…

and its been all throughout this pattern that we are able to see that the Christian life is more full than what many people think of it..

we see that the Christian walk is an “individual thing”..

but we also see that the Christian walk is a “collective thing as well”

so how we walk individually, flows into how we walk collectively…

and ALSO, … how we walk collectively, flows into how we walk INDIVIDUALLY…

so what goes around, comes around… and then goes around and comes around again… or something like that……

but we have just looked at so much about unity within the body for the good of each individual, the witness to the world, and the glory of God…

..and now Paul is going back to addressing the individual

so if you are physically able.. Stand

Read Ephesians 4:17-19

pray

So Paul goes back to this idea of “walking in a certain manner”

and so for us to understand what he is getting at, we actually need to go back and look at chapter 4:1

Ephesians 4:1 ESV

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called,

Just as Paul issued the call to walk in a manner worthy of the gospel, worthy of salvation and sanctification and future glory in Christ…

He now gives a stark contrast to the former way of life…

all throughout Ephesians we have heard talk aimed at the gentiles..

talk about how these gentiles who were once far off are now children of God..

How both the Jew and Gentile can have unity in Christ because of this new nature they have taken on…

and now we see the language of the Gentiles come back, but this time in a negative sense…

so let me explain what is going on here…

Paul is NOT speaking to the Jewish believers and telling them to not act like the Gentile believers among them..

Instead, he is making a clear distinction that has to do with how they VIEWED race, and how God desired they would understand Race..

In that time, if they had the same mindset that we do today, they would have viewed 2 different races…

the Jews… and the Gentiles..

and then a 3rd type would be added, which is the Christians…

Now, to try not to add to the already confusing process of understanding race, I’m just going to say it this way..

There is only one RACE… and that is the human race…

Our culture defines that differently..

but our God defines us all as Human…

now, there are different ethnicities..

there are different nations… and cultures…

Now the interesting thing.. is that if you look at the word for Gentile’s here, you get the word “eth-noss” in the greek

and this is where we get the word “ethnic” from..

and its used in a variety of ways in the New Testament..

it can mean anything from nations, peoples, heathen, pagans, or Gentiles..

so its a word that is used to speak of “non-Jews” in a national type of way..

but outside of being used in this way, it’s also used in a religious way

now for us to get the best understanding of how it is used in a religious way we have to look at 1 Thessalonians 4:4-6

1 Thessalonians 4:4–6 ESV

that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you.

“not in the passion of lust like the “eth-noss” who do not know God”

so we see this word used in multiple ways, and bringing about a proper context would help us understand that Paul is not now turning his back against the Gentiles who have became Christians..

but instead he is speaking about those who do not know God, in more religious terms…

So the point here , to start off with…

..is that you do not walk… and walk would be speaking of a daily manner of life…

that you do NOT live your daily manner of life like the people who don’t know God

It’s really that simple..

“You know God! Don’t live your life anymore like those who don’t!”

and you have to put yourself in their shoes..

they had the pagan life being lived out all around them…

..the results of the works of the pagan life were playing out right in front of them.. as well as affecting them..

…and it would have been really different to life a different life…

and honestly, it’s no different for us today.

just think about it.. For us Christians..

..we are made new!

..we have every ability to put to death the flesh, and to put on the new self..

we are “born again” as God’s children…

no longer slaves to the world, and children of wrath..

but Children with a whole new nature that isn’t bound in shackles to the devil..

and that old lifestyle, the one that we were once following blindly…

…we ought to be throwing off that old way of life…

and the call for us is to actually call the WORLD to conform to the way of God…

but instead, we find more and more, that we… and therefore the church… seem to conform to the way of the world…

we see more churches look less and less like churches.. and more and more like the world..

we see more christians lose any filters of godliness, and have mouths and actions that aren’t set apart for Christ

We can look at the works of the flesh.. or the way of the world…

Galatians 5 gives us a list :

sexual immorality

impurity

sensuality

idolatry

sorcery

enmity

strife

jealousy

fits of anger

rivalries

dissensions

divisions

envy

drunkeness

orgies and things like these…

and what is the warning with that?

“THOSE WHO DO SUCH THINGS WILL NOT INHERIT THE KINGDOM OF GOD”

..

now, you start reading these things, and you start off ok… right, you start off by skimming over it real fast and it ends on “orgies and things like these” and you are like..

“ok.. I’m good!.. thats not me!”

then you start backtracking a little bit…

and you consider which of these things keep creeping up in your life, and you realize just how much of the world you’re still trying to hang onto…

there are so many areas of our life that we will find ourselves falling right back into the mold of the world if we are honest with ourselves…

now, the good thing about the text in Galatians is that when Paul says “those who “DO” such things will not inherit the kingdom of Heaven..

the word “DO” implies a sense of continual and habitual type of action…

and so believers will most definitely DO these things from time to time..

…but the point is that doing these things habitually without remorse and repentance is a sign of someone who is not born again..

.. those ARE the ways of the world…

and now going back to our text in Ephesians, we are called to NO LONGER WALK that way..

no longer walk in the way of the world like those who do not know God.

and so you’re saying “OK but what’s the key to success here?”

“what is it that will help me NOT to walk in this way?”

“what does it come down to for me?”

and of course.. we cannot move on without giving credit where credit is due..

ANY ABILITY, that we have to walk in a manner WORTH f the calling to which we have been called is thanks to the Holy Spirit who is at work within us

we cannot deny that…

but we also cannot let that be an excuse to just sit back and be lazy in our efforts either..

Now I want to be clear about something here, because this is where the waters start really getting muddied up…

When it comes to our salvation… Our contributing work to it is … nothing…

we were dead…

dead people don’t do stuff…

Our ability to love God came because God first loved us..

He acted first..

we reacted.. to put it very simply…

We didn’t have anything to offer or bring to the table in our salvation..

as we read in chapter 2 - so that no one may boast…

It’s by grace through faith that we have been saved..

and even the faith is not from ourselves..

its a gift of God…

so that is what we did to contribute to our salvation…

..nothing..

NOW…. as new creations in Christ..

we are called to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which we have been called..

we are called to work out our salvation with fear and trembling…

we are called to make every effort to supplement our faith with virtue, and virtue with KNOWLEDGE

now back to the question.. what is the secret to success?

how are we to find ourselves NO longer walking as those who don’t know God do…

we know the Holy Spirit works in us…

but there is a pattern in the next couple verses that give us more information…

along with the calling to supplement our faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge…

it comes down to the mind…

look at it…

Ephesians 4:17–23 ESV

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds,

the mind is the problem, or the solution…

think about it.. Christianity is a literal “Change of mind”

it is that we have this God given ability to no longer see things in the one direction of destruction that the world sees..

but that we can do an about face and turn to God

its about a change of mind…

and that is the content all within Pauls message here..

that the MIND affects how we behave..

and that what we understand to be true in our minds…

..is going to be reflected in how we live out every aspect of our life

and some people want to go in one ditch or another with this..

you have on one hand the “gnostics”,…

..in which it’s all intellectual.. and they completely forsake the spiritual..

or you have what I call the mystics…

..in which its SOOOO spiritual, that logic and reason are just thrown out the window…

I can actually tolerate the gnostics better than I can the mystics to be honest with you..

because at the least gnostics are intelligent…

but seriously though..

there is a huge TRAP in christianity today that is mysticism disguised a godliness..

there are people who will proclaim Christ at the top of their lungs all day long, meanwhile being tossed to and about by every wind of doctrine that gives them good “vibes”…

if it stirs an emotional trigger in them.. then it must be the Holy Spirit..

… if it makes them want to lose all self control and act like a fool…

..then they say “I’m a fool for Christ”….

now listen…

thats not what Paul meant in 1 Corinthians when he said “we are fools for Christ’s sake”…

a lack of self control is actually the opposite of the fruit of the spirit…

but all of this type of behavior comes from a place…

and that place is the mind…

you’ve heard the phrase… “God gave you a mind for a reason” ..

and He did…

it was because our mind is capable of receiving truth and living life in a way that is honoring to him…

but more on that next week…

in the case of our text today..

we just need to know what to look for to avoid!

And so Paul gives a list of some of the behaviors and results of those behaviors.. that are displayed in those who do not know Christ…

so we walk in this new life…. by in part… avoiding the old..

lets look at some of those old ways..

and once again… these are the ways in which the unregenerate walk…

the first thing we see is:

in the Futility of their minds

now.. these are going to be harsh words toward the unregenerate..

but we need to understand just what this “futility” is speaking toward..

the word simply means to be devoid of truth..

we know that truth comes from God and those who do not know God do not therefore understand or KNOW truth…

another term we would use to describe this would be that they are “morally depraved”…

I actually wanted to look up how some other pastors described those who walk in the futility of their minds

and John MacArthur had this to say:

“ They are intellectually unproductive. As far as spiritual and moral issues are concerned, their rational process are distorted and inadequate. Their life is empty, vain, and without meaning”

and he cited Romans 1:21-28 as one of the verse to support that statement

Spurgeon was slightly nicer and said “without Christ, the mind may be educated, but it is not enlightened”

and then He also said “all the wisdom of man, apart from God, is but splendid folly”

I think if we were to take from the words of these men, and the rest of the passage we could conclude this:

The unregenerate mind is futile , because it rejects God

That is natural man’s inclination after all… is to reject God..

when you reject God, then truth will be foreign to you..

when you reject God.. truth.. REAL TRUTH… isn’t anything thats even coming up on the radar…

.. you don’t even know it exists…

..and therefore, your reality of depravity.. is as far as you can see…

and so your truth.. is nothing more than a lie…

and so Paul’s warning is DON’t walk in this way!

which way?

a way in which you reject God!

and therefore reject truth!

you know what REAL truth is!

…don’t ignore it..

don’t forsake it…

don’t pretend like you don’t so that you can go on with your sinful behavior and act like you didn’t know better when you know you do..

so we have a futility of the mind

then we have

darkened in their understanding…

it’s kind of the same language here..

just as truth doesn’t exist in the futile mind of the unregenerate…

their understanding of things is less and less informed..

these words “darkened in their understanding”..

..would be literally read like “blind to the mind”

so as the mind is futile because it rejects God..

the understanding becomes darkened as a consequence of continued sin…

sin has consequences..

..some that are physically able to be observed…

and some that dig a person deeper and deeper into the pit of darkness..

and there are results of this dark pit that is dug..

they are “ALIENATED from the life of God”

why?

“because of the IGNORANCE that is in them due to their HARDNESS of heart”

Listen..

one thing I think many people don’t understand is that God has a common grace and a love that He bestows on all people

and one way that He does this is by restraining people from being as deeply depraved as they possibly can be..

we see this picture over and over again with Pharoah and Moses..

you see that it says that Pharoah hardened his heart

Pharoah hardened his heart

Pharoah hardened his heart…

then GOD hardened Pharaoh’s heart…

the picture here is not that God CAUSED Pharoah to sin..

the picture is that God had a restraining hand on pharoah from being just as despicable as he possibly could be..

..but the more and more that pharoah dug deeper and deeper into sin..

the more hard his heart became..

the more he became alienated of that graceful hand of the Lord that was restraining the morally corrupt beast inside…

until finally God gave Pharoah exactly what He had been digging to..

the bottom..

God “hardening Pharaoh’s heart was God releasing that retraining hand on pharaohs capacity for wickedness…

It’s the same picture we see in Romans where it says

Romans 1:24–32 ESV

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

In ignorance, the natural man is continually ignorantly hardening his heart..

that’s why scripture says that “no one seeks God”

thats why there is no such thing as a “seeker friendly church”…

that type of church is a lie because that type of person is a MYTH

if anyone is wandering toward the direction of God, it isn’t because they are seeking , it is because God is DRAWING … let’s give credit where credit is due

let’s move on…

it says the one who does not know God becomes callous

now…

I tried this last week, maybe I’ll have more luck today..

Does anyone play guitar?

Ok.. so I have a guitar or two hanging up in my office on the wall…

I used to play them every day..

and I used to have no feeling in my fingertips because of that…

that is what is means to be callous here …

its to not FEEL anything..

to be apathetic to it all..

that broken moral compass that all men are born with becomes more and more corrupted as sin continues in their life..

and this results in being given up to:

sensuality,

and a greediness to practice every kind of impurity

Now this is the path that every person heads toward..

..and the reality that some people might not reach the extremes of what we see here is once again due to God’s common grace in restraint of their wickedness…

But let’s just recap the call here..

We are called to no longer live like those who don’t know God…

there is a clear distinction between the life of a believer and the life of an unbeliever..

we have been enlightened by the truth..

and we see that our former way of life is so contrary to the way of Christ

We should be so aware of our need to reject futile ways of thinking and the influence of the godless culture around us…

we should understand that the consequences of a darkened understanding brings about alienation and ignorance.

We have every ability to gain true knowledge through Christ and His Word, as the Holy Spirit works within us to give us an understanding..

we have to remember that we are no longer excluded from the kingdom, but citizens of it in Christ!

We are no longer hostile to God, we are brought into an intimate relationship with Him instead!

And then think about the way of the lost, how easy it is for them to fall deeper and deeper into sin…

now consider sin in your own life..

you know how it is…

when you walk in sin… its easier to dig deeper and deeper…

you become callous, or desensitized to it before long, and you no longer care..

but DON’T be this way… thats the way of the LOST..

no, instead we should be pursuing purity in truth and conforming to Christ who saved us and gave us new life!

These words of Paul are not mean to be a bashing session aimed at the unregenerate..

they are meant to be a wake up call to the Christian…

It should serve us as a reminder of what we have been called out

but on top of that it should act in a way to stir up a sense of compassion within us to see the lost come to know Christ…

if we have any love for mankind..

look what mankind is headed toward…

remember that you too were once a child of wrath..

alienated from God and darkened in your understanding..

But God graciously did a work on your heart…

and He did that through His Word…

Which means someone had to get that word to you..

do you remember that?

Now , I know that personally, it wasn’t in an instant when someone shared the gospel with me that I fell to my knees in faith and repentance …

I was a little stubborn..

but someone brought the Word…

they planted the seed of God’s HOLY LIVING WORD..

and God did the work on the soil of my heart…

He tilled that baby up good….

we are called to spread the Word faithfully…

and trust God to do only the work that He can do on a hardened human heart….

but sometimes we need a little extra motivation…

we need the motivation to know what it looks like to be set apart from the world…

while at the same time seeing the world as it truly is, and loving it enough to want to see it saved from the dreaded darkness that it’s in…

Let’s keep our minds on Christ..

Keep our minds focused on studying God’s Word…

and let’s keep IN mind.. that there are lost people, who need to know the truth…

and listen… let me be clear…

this condition.. this worldly condition that Paul notes here..

its not merely an intellectual problem, but a moral and spiritual one…

Let’s be clear that those who don’t know God don’t simply need more information..

..but instead they need REGENERATION…

and Only God can replace the heart of stone with a heart of flesh, and renew the mind through the Gospel

Ezekiel 36:26–27 ESV

And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

Let’s be faithful to no longer walk in darkness, but in the truth of the light.

pray