Walk This Way

INTRODUCTION

We are continuing our series through the book of Ephesians this morning. Last week, we walked through this prayer from Paul that really shifts our perspective for praying for people. Paul looks at circumstances, good or bad, and ultimately prays that whatever is going on in your life, it will serve as a vehicle for moving you closer to Jesus. And that’s really the idea of the book of Ephesians; it’s about how, in Jesus, all things are made new. God is forming this new family formed in Christ, and the cross and the resurrection of Jesus form this patten for our new life, both as individuals and as the church. This new pattern is different though. It can be hard for us to see, because in many ways this new life reverses the natural ways we are prone to think about the world and relationships and spirituality.

Let’s pray and then read today’s passage together.

PRAY

Ephesians 2:1–10 (CSB)

And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient. We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also. But God, who is rich in mercy, because of his great love that he had for us, made us alive with Christ even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace! He also raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might display the immeasurable riches of his grace through his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift—not from works, so that no one can boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.

There’s this word in Greek, peripateo, that brackets the passage and forms what’s called an inclusio. What that means is that everything in between that bracket is defined by the bracket. The word peripateo means to walk, or to go about. It has to do with the way you live your life. I’m not just talking about conduct, or what you do. I’m talking about where you go, how you think, what you are living for, what kind of world you are working to bring about. And Paul says here, there are two ways to walk. There’s the way of death, and there’s the way of life. The way of the world, and the way of heaven. The way of humans and of “disobedience” (more on that in a bit), and the way of Jesus.

THE WAY OF WRATH (2:1-3)

Paul starts and says, listen, before Jesus came along, things looked a lot different. You walking, but you were dead. You were the walking dead. This is biblical proof for the existence of zombies, right here in Paul’s letters.

Seriously though, Paul is describing the way of death. Every human being, regardless of your heritage, your genetics, your knowledge or your career, is born under the same three forces of influence and authority. Paul lists them right here:

The ways of this world: this is the social, cultural, economic, and political environment all around you. It’s friends and neighbors; it’s television and social media and movies and magazines; it’s your career and keeping up with the Joneses; it’s in the language utilized by powerful figures and influencers. All of these systems and ideologies and relationships are handing you the script for living life according to their standards. And the better we follow it, the more acceptance we find.

The ruler of the power of the air: Paul’s talking this spiritual being that has worked to undermine the good work of God’s world from the beginning. We call him Satan, which means the adversary. He and other spiritual beings are in this constant state of rebellion against God. And these spiritual rebels are influencing and directing the human rebellion against life and beauty. There are forces at work beyond what you can see or understand, drawing humans away from God and toward domination and destruction. Paul even says that these very forces orchestrated the crucifixion of Jesus (1 CORINTHIANS 2:6-8). Humans killed the Son of God, but demons drew up the plans.

Our fleshly desires: Paul calls these the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts. It’s the cravings of my physical body and the reasons of my mind. Whatever I feel and whatever I think, that’s determines and drives my direction. If I feel angry or sad or amorous, I let that play out however it wants. And I use my mind to justify and defend and support however I need.

This is our birth state, according to Ephesians. All of us are born under the same forces that rule and guide everything we are and everything we do. And these forces push down on us and trap us under their weight. From a spiritual perspective, we have no chance in the natural way. You are walking, going about your life and trying to make something of it and enjoy it or whatever, but you are dead. These forces trip us up and upend the good life God planned for humanity.

Paul says we are all this way. Not just Ephesians or Gentiles, but Jews too. You can be born into a church-going family, or have different comforts or whatever, you can know all the right things to do and to say, but on your own, the same forces that have surrounded all of human history bear down on you too. You were dead in your trespasses and sins.

And as a result, Paul calls you a child of wrath. All of us in fact are by nature children of wrath. Now, that word “wrath” is scary and feels kind of condemning and evokes pictures of an angry God who hates us just for being imperfect and having impulses and not making the right decisions all the time. That’s usually how we define it, right? No one wants to think about a God of wrath. Right?

But we have to, because it’s here, staring us in the face. So what does that mean? How is it fair that we are born into wrath?

So let me define this for you, and I hope you understand where the Bible is coming from on this. The good news is that wrath is not the end, but it’s the middle, and it’s important.

The wrath of God is sourced from our injustice. Back at the beginning of Ephesians, we talked about the word predestination, remember? It means that before we ever came to be, God laid out these boundary lines of what is good and beautiful and right, and he drew lines of belonging around us, those who belong to God experience his love and gentleness and provision and care. But then humans rebel. They turn on God, and they turn on each other. They redrew the lines of good and beauty, and they cause pain and suffering to others.

My oldest son just started karate lessons a few weeks ago. I visited his class this week and the Sensei was talking to the kids about fighting and aggression and how to handle yourself in conflict. And he made the point that out of all created beings, only human act aggressively and fight and kill their own kind for any reason other than survival. The human race is unique in its bent to dominate and destroy.

And this redrawing angers God, rightly. And it’s not because God is so easily aggravated or is naturally vindictive. He’s not an angry God. He’s a patient God, slow to anger. But God desires to bring about life and joy and peace and beauty, and all of that gets up turned and causes death and destruction, and it is absolutely counter to what God wants for you or for anyone else. So yeah, that angers God. Rightfully so. When my family is treated unfairly, it upsets me. When people treat themselves destructively and hurt themselves emotionally or physically, I’m frustrated by that. There is an unselfish, others centered anger at things that break apart relationships and keep people from experiencing the good life they were always meant to have. And, incredibly, it’s that wrath, that anger, that sets in motion the greatest act of redemptive reversal in all history.

THE WAY OF GRACE (2:4-7)

Now, you would think that a just God might exercise his wrath to punish humans, right? When we think of justice, we usually think of retributive justice. You hurt me, you push me down, you take something away from me, it’s only fair that you feel what I feel, you experience my pain, my loss. We expect a just God who is angry at the injustice humans bring about to act retributively. Which makes the next line all that amazing:

Ephesians 2:4–5 (CSB)

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of his great love that he had for us, made us alive with Christ even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace!

You expect God to respond out of his wrath. But instead, God responds with his mercy and love. And that is because God, by nature, is not a wrathful God. He is by nature a compassionate God. A gracious God. A Kind and loving God. Actually, it says he is rich in mercy, extensively loving, And so, instead of us taking the punishment that we deserve, we were made alive in Christ. You are saved by grace.

That phrase is one of the most confounding phrases in all of Christianity. Grace is unexplainable to human ears. God looks at the world and sees these walking dead, held down by rebellious forces and striving the undo his good plans of creation. Humanity is spiraling into war and destruction and power struggles and division and chaos, human lives are being devalued more and more. And yet, God’s mercy never fails. His kindness does not cease, his love for us does not wane. Instead, God enacts his plan to reverse the curse of sin and death. And through Jesus, the dead are raised to life. Grace the literally defined as the helping those who cannot help themselves. You know what I found fascinating this week? The phrase “made us alive” is one Greek word, and it is 100% unique to Christians writings. It does not exist anywhere else. And that is because it is unfathomable anywhere else. No other being can restore dead things to life. Restorative justice is impossible, so we work retributively. An eye for an eye, a life for a life. This is the way of the walking dead, the pattern for children of wrath. But not so with God.

Here’s the reversal I mentioned. In the ways of the world, you start with our selfish desires. You are carried about by the whims of your mind and your body. And it leads to wrath, and it leads to death. But because of Jesus, everything is flipped. In the way of life, God starts with his selfless desires, and he carries them out by love and mercy. And it leads to life.

But not it is not just mere life. Paul says that you are also raised along with Jesus and seated with him in the heavens. Past tense, not future. Now, what does this mean? Think back to the old way. Before, you were under the thumb of these rebel forces. The ways of the world, the power of the air, the fleshly desires. They held you down, they conformed you to a pattern of condemnation and death. And no matter what you did, or how well you tried to make the best of it, you were ruled by them, you were a vessel for disobedience. But now look. You have been raised. What that raising means is that the forces of the world no longer have any power over you. They do not rule you, they do not define your life, they do not seal your fate. In Christ, you have been set free.

Christians are not marked by death, but by life. Christians are not forced to follow the patterns of the world, of Satan or demons, or of selfish desires. We now walk this earth as peculiar creatures, filled with life, filled with hope, filled with grace and mercy and love and kindness that we did not earn, and we need not seek. It’s is lavishly poured out on us. And so when we talk about living differently than the rest of the world, this is what we mean. It’s not that we’ve somehow cracked the code on following a set of rules and regulations that make us better people or give us more satisfaction in the end. It’s that we have been set free from death, from decay, from chaos, from slavery. We are like windows, displaying what Paul calls “the immeasurable riches of his grace through his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.” God’s plan is show the world who he is by lavishing every square inch of generosity and care to those who have found their life in him. Christians now live expectantly, in light of this future hope, and it is by way of this extraordinary kindness that we can live as an extension of Jesus, bearing out the same love to the world around us.

Now, it’s easy for me to say all of this. I’m just relaying to you the truth Paul states here. It’s one thing for me to say, and for you to hear. It’s another thing entirely for you to believe.

And that’s okay. Because Paul has one more thing to say.

NOT FROM WORKS, BUT FOR WORKS (2:8-10)

Ephesians 2:8–10 (CSB)

For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift—not from works, so that no one can boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.

This last passage here sums up everything you need to know. If you only hear one thing today, hear this.

Everything this world says about your identity says that it is sourced in you. You are the product of your works. So what you think, what you desire, what you crave, what you do, this becomes the foundations of who you are and what you boast in. Your glory—and glory in the Bible just means the outward emanation of what you truly are—is revealed by your work. And that work saves you, it gives you life and meaning and purpose. This shouldn’t surprise you. I’m not speaking out of turn here. This is broadcast everywhere, it’s branded in everything. The perpetual search for meaning and purpose is the human pursuit of glory. Every human has this inner fight to find salvation somewhere. It’s the striving to write my own story with a happy ending.

But inevitably, humans find that when the striving ceases, when death comes, despair follows, because whatever meaning you may have grasped onto here on this earth, you cannot take it with you. And humans are fickle creatures, and our human salvations only go so far and only last so long. Salvation from work ends with futility. It’s a pattern that humanity has experienced over and over and over agin, a vicious cycle of pride and despair.

But the good news that Jesus brings is you are not saved from works. It is by grace through faith—by clinging desperately to Jesus—that you are saved. And this is the kicker. When you are brought to life, free from the forces that pinned you down, freed from the endless cycle of striving, you are created anew. God calls you his workmanship. The word in Greek literally says you are his poetry. God is now the one writing your story. You do not determine your worth, your value, your meaning or purpose. God writes it on your heart. And all of this new life, this abundant grace, this kindness, this extensive self-sacrifice, this overwhelming generosity, it begins your path. Paul ends by saying that God has prepared a path for you to walk now. A new way of life (the word “to do” there is actually “to walk”). The old you was created to find salvation from work. The new you has been saved for work. What Paul means here is that you don’t work to be good. You are good, and so you work. The things a good person does is good. It’s the natural order of things. You were by nature children of wrath. Now, you are by nature children of grace, and that changes everything.

I’ve struggled in the past with thinking through and talking about good works, because I feel like that term has been cheapened a bit by a Christian culture that falls back into the old way of walking. “Good works” often comes out like reading your Bible a lot. Going to church every Sunday. Not drinking. Not cussing. Wearing the proper attire. Fighting for Christian issues in the political sphere. It’s the path of legalism. It’s working for my own salvation, and guess what? It’s leads down the same road as license. It leads to self-righteousness, where I’m right and good and worthy because of what I do. I’m not saying that some of those things I listed aren’t “good” things to do; it’s just that Paul had no thought of these things when he said it.

So, what are “good works?” It’s the work of Jesus. It’s generosity, giving because you have so much you have been given. It’s humility, thinking of others because you are so well thought of. It’s justice, lifting others up from their pain and hurt, because you have been so lifted. It’s love and kindness, because you have been shown the same in exceeding proportions. Whatever good you find in Jesus, working out in you to determine everything you are in him? That good now works out in your life. It’s that simple, but it’s that profound.

You may struggle to see this working out now. But that’s okay. Remember, Paul says that in the coming age you will see the fullness of God’s kindness and love displayed in you. And that’s because it is a process. As the human way unravels and the divine way unfolds, you are being transformed into a creature of goodness. God has patience with you. The good news is that in Christ, the way of death has come to an end, and the way of life is just beginning. As you partner with Jesus, as you cling to him for life, you will experience more and more of his goodness, and more and more of his goodness will work itself out into your relationships, into your thoughts and words and deeds, and the world will see God through your journey.

PRAY