Off with the old and on with the new!
Ephesians • Sermon • Submitted
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Transcript
What are you going to put on today?
What are you going to put on today?
Introduction
In our everyday life we are given choices. Each day on average we as adults make 35,000 decisions. It starts from what time to wake up, an alarm may go off and we may decide to turn it off and sleep longer. We decide what we are going to wear, what we are going to eat, what we want to do or need to do, decisions, decisions, decisions. As we get older the decisions we make get harder and have a greater impact on us. When we have these decisions we need to be making them in the Spirit our new nature rather than our old nature the flesh. It’s hard at 1st because in the flesh we just decide without really thinking, it just happens naturally. But we are no longer in the flesh but in the Spirit. The Holy Spirit lives in us and He is our helper, counselor, comforter. If we cloth ourselves in Christ and take off our old cloths, take off our old self then in those 35,000 decisions we make each day we will make the right choice rather than the choices we have made in the past.
Paul continues to tell the church to remember who they are now because of Christ. They are members of His body. And while being a part of His body do not sin. Do not do the things you once did and what many who don’t know Christ still do. The church has been made new!
Today we are going to learn about what we need to take off and what we are to put on.
Let’s pray!
Lets read Ephesians 4:25-32
Verse 25
Take off the clothing of lying
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Therefore is connecting the context from before in the letter putting on the new self verse 24 with verse 25 taking of the old.
It’s more than outward image or looks Paul is concerned with. We can come to church and dress the part and still be practicing sin. The Lord is cleaning us from the inside and Paul is pleading or begging the church to stop with what they were doing before being chosen by Christ. We have been given a new life and a true life. An everlasting life. Once we have tasted this life we slowly begin to die to our old ways and begin to find life in Christ and following Him. Our old life no longer satisfies.
We are to take off lying and deceiving. We have been taught the truth that is found in Christ just as the Ephesians had been taught. Verse Eph 4:21-23
If we have received the truth/Jesus Christ then truth will set us free.John 8:31-32
There is no freedom in lies whether it’s lies from false teachers, or it’s lies the enemy tries to fill our thoughts with, or the lies we tell others. We are not to put on the lies of the world, the lies of false teachers. We need to be able to tell truth from a lie. We are to be true because Christ is true. When we speak we are to speak truth because we are part of the body. We have been made one with Christ.
Put on Truth
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13 In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise,
We have heard the truth, we have received Christ, and at the moment of faith in Christ the Holy Spirit came to dwell in us. The truth is now a part of us. It’s who we are.
16 “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; 17 that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.
There are some in the world who don’t know this truth because they do not know Him and they do not see him but we know Him because he lives in us.
Why is it important for us to remember and know of His Spirit that dwells in us?
because if we don’t walk in the Spirit we will walk in the flesh and if we walk in the flesh we will sin.
Put on truth!
16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.
When we walk by the Spirit that Spirit is what controls us, He drives us, He powers us, He gives us abilities we never had before.
We die to ourselves in the flesh and find life in Him. We cloth ourselves in the One who gives us life. Paul speaks of the old ways and compares them to our new ways in Ephesians 4:25-32
In verse 26 and 27 it speaks of anger
Take off the clothing of anger
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We can have a righteous anger but we cannot be angry just because we woke up mad or get angry because we didn't get our way, or someone says something mean or our neighbors are loud that kind of anger is sin. What should anger ourselves is sin but again we need to be careful how we react to that anger. We cannot let our anger control us. We should not hold onto anger for long periods of time. In verse 27 is says not to let the sun go down on your anger. In other words don’t go to bed mad. And further in the verse it goes on to say if we do the devil will set a trap for us to fall in. We give the enemy the power to cause harm to us and others. We must not give him that opportunity.
So take off the clothing anger and put on love,joy,peace,patience,kindness, faithfulness,goodness,gentlenss,and selfcontrol. new
You may say I have to put all that on after taking off anger. No! Walk in the spirit or be controlled by the spirit, be powered by the spirit. Then all these things will be for you and I to use. It’s the fruit of the Spirit in us or another way to say it is because we believe and He now lives in us the result is or what Christ in us produces love, joy, peace, patience. It’s not enough to just take off anger because we will just replace it with some other sin like greed, pride, jealousy, lust, selfishness or the long list of other sins. We are to put on holiness, righteousness, and be obedient.
Take off the clothing of stealing
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Verse 28 says we are not steal but do honest work. We all know those who steal. maybe it’s a car or a bicycle, a tank of gas, internet, electricity, and other way of unjust gain. We are to take off the desires to steal, the desires to take advantage of others or justifying our reasons for taking what is not ours, and we must put on honesty: working with our own hands. Why? So we can pay for the things we need or want and we can help others and share with them who are in need. Again we just don’t stop stealing and get a job so we can make a lot of money and get all the things we always wanted. No that would be sin. We work honestly so we can buy what we need and help others who have needs. We take off the bad and put on the good.
Put on honesty and help those in need
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29 Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear.
Take off the clothing of offensive or worthless talk
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We all have been guilty of this one even the most holy ones here today. We may not use profanity but we say gossip that may or may not be true, we tear someone down rather than building them up, we tell a dirty joke, we may stop talking to someone only to talk with a neighbor about the one you stopped talking to. Take off the offensive and worthless talk.
8 But no one can tame the tongue; it is a restless evil and full of deadly poison. 9 With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God; 10 from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way.
So if a human can’t tame their tongue Who can? The Spirit in us can, when He controls us, He can control our tongue. In those Spirit led decisions we will not lose control because we aren't the one in control. He is! We are to surrender and trust in Christ.
Who knows the Lord’s prayer?
Do you know what Matthew 8:10 says?
Your kingdom come, your will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.
His will for us is to have a tame tongue, to not lie, to not steal.
In that same prayer that most know it says in Verse 13
Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.
We can see the difference from His will verses our will in the flesh. He gives us free will and He wants us to use that free will to chose to cloth ourselves in Him. Choose the Spirit over the flesh. Be careful to chose right. We have 35,000 decisions to make every day lets think before we speak.
We need to be careful with our tongue! Many verses talk about our words. Here are just a few.
10 For, “The one who desires life, to love and see good days, Must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit.
6 Let your speech always be with grace, as though seasoned with salt, so that you will know how you should respond to each person.
19 When there are many words, transgression is unavoidable, But he who restrains his lips is wise.
11 “It is not what enters into the mouth that defiles the man, but what proceeds out of the mouth, this defiles the man.”
19 This you know, my beloved brethren. But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger; 20 for the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God. 21 Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. 22 But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; 24 for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. 25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does. 26 If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is worthless.
6 And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body, and sets on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell.
Put on words of edification or use words that build up.
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Rather than using our tongue for evil lets use it for building up others in the church. lets us it to share the Gospel with those who have not heard it. Lets use it for good and not evil. Lets take off our old ways and put on the new.
Lets read Ephesians 4:30
Take off the garment of being contrary or opposite of good
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Every time we sin we do the opposite of what Christ planned for us to do. We turn from Him and walk in our old ways. We put on the old dead man and sin. When we do this we grieve the Holy Spirit who lives in us. We grieve Him! We cause Him sadness, sorrow, pain, anguish or severe pain. Why does it pain Him so much to see us sin or cloth ourselves in our old self? Because we were sealed with Him. The Holy Spirit in us is a guarantee that we are saved. With Him in us and with us always He gives us all we need to overcome sin. To be victorious, to be free from sin and not a slave to it.
5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, 7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,
12 So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh— 13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. 10 If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
Put on Holiness, HIS ways, Righteousness
We need to stop doing the opposite of what the Spirit in us is trying to lead us to do. Take off the old and put on the new.
31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.
Take off the Clothing of unkindness
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We as believers must not cloth ourselves in these things. We should know better. And in time with the hearing, reading, studying. memorizing, meditating, and applying the Word of God the Spirit in us will give us knowledge and wisdom. And always we must remember to cover ourselves in prayer. That should always be done first.
Put on kindness, compassion, and forgiveness
32 Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.
12 So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience;
Conclusion
We should be clear in our thinking of what we need to take off and what we need to put on. What is old and not good for anything or anyone and whats new and good for everything and everyone.
The Lord has done all the work on the cross as far as salvation goes. But He does not dress us like little children every morning to prepare us to go out to the battlefield of this dark world. We need to cloth ourselves. He has given us free will. He did not want to make robots who do right without thinking. He made us so we would chose to cloth ourselves in Him once He chose us and made Himself known to us. So every morning think carefully and prayerfully before you make one of the 35,000 decisions we each make daily. Get into the Word and learn what is true and what is false. Know that Christ is always with us and we must abide in His ways.