The Characteristics of an Almost Christian

Good morning and welcome to Dishman Baptist Church. Please take your Bibles and open them with me to Ephesians 5, Ephesians 5.

There are many concerns that vie for a pastor’s attention as he seeks to glorify God in the administration of His church. Will the lights turn on when you flip the switch. Are the carpets clean. Does the roof leak when it snows or rains. Will we make budget. But above all of these concerns, the greatest concern is for the people that God has given him charge to care for, to shepherd. It is for the people that the pastor toils and labors over a text of Scripture. It is for their spiritual well being and vitality that he fervently prays for - he prays for the physical concerns as well but those pale in comparison to the weight of the spiritual vitality of the church. And there is no greater fear or concern on a pastor’s heart than that one of the people that has sat under his care may one day be found to have missed the point entirely and to be sent away with the words “Depart from Me I never knew you.”

This burden must have weighed even heavier on Paul. I only have one church to be concerned with but Paul had many. He planted the churches in Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, Corinth, Philippi, and Ephesus. And he carried with him concern for their spiritual well being long after leaving each of them. That is why we have these great epistles that are so instructive for us today - they are Paul’s efforts to continue to shepherd and guide these churches. Paul didn’t just say that the church of Corinth could go off and do as they pleased because they were an autonomous church so their particular practice of worship didn’t matter as long as it worked for them it was okay. He was deeply concerned for them and for the Ephesians as he was for all of the churches that he planted that they would be found mature and that they would persevere until the end. In 2 Corinthians 11 Paul details all of the trials and persecutions he has faced and the litany is striking but he closes with this telling statement “Not to mention other things, there is the daily pressure on me: my concern for all the churches.” I love the way that the NASB translates this “Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches.” My persecutions though many are insignificant - they are external and temporal - compared to the weight of the pressure of concern for all the churches.

Paul wasn’t concerned so much with the physical trials the churches would face - although those would be a concern - as he was with the spiritual well-being and vitality of the church. His desire was to see them mature. And so he would often find it necessary to warn the churches of behaviors that continued to persist among the church that were not acceptable, were not the marks of a mature believer in Christ. This morning’s passage is one such portion of Scripture that I think bears a warning for each of us.

Ephesians 5:3–5 CSB

But sexual immorality and any impurity or greed should not even be heard of among you, as is proper for saints. Obscene and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks. For know and recognize this: Every sexually immoral or impure or greedy person, who is an idolater, does not have an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.

The trouble with these warnings is that they are always necessary. They were necessary in Paul’s day as he sat down to take up his quill to address the churches. They were necessary in 1661 when a Puritan named Matthew Mead took up the pen to write the powerful treatise “The Almost Christian Discovered” or alternately “The False Professor Tried and Cast”. In a time when books and libraries were at a premium and the possession of personal libraries was an extravagance and a privilege rather than the commonality that it can be today, this particular book and the entire corpus of Mead’s works were highly recommended among the Puritans - a prolific group of authors on all manner of subjects relating to the Christian life. Listen to these words from Mead “It is said of the truly righteous he shall scarcely be saved; and it is said of the seemingly righteous, he shall almost be saved “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” The righteous shall be saved scarcely, that is, through much difficulty; he shall go to heaven through many sad fears of hell. The hypocrite shall be saved with an almost, that is, he shall go to hell through many fair hopes of heaven.”

I believe it was in the mid-1980’s or maybe a little before that that the doctrine of the carnal Christian began to permeate the church. It was the idea that you could be saved and yet still primarily live like the world - but you were still good and safe. This concept was at the center of a battle over Lordship Salvation - whether Jesus can just be your savior (enabling the carnal Christianity idea to flourish) or if He must be both Savior and Lord (meaning that as our Savior He has paid for our sins and as our Lord that He has a right to hold certain expectations over His subjects). While much of that argument has been settled, the doctrine of carnal Christianity has so affected the Christian psyche that in many implicit ways the church still operates under the idea that we can live close to the world, and even maintain one foot in the world and still be saved.

Yet the Bible would demonstrate for us that nothing could be further from the truth. 2 Cor 5:17 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, and see, the new has come!” Christ Himself warned His disciples Matthew 7:13-14 ““Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it.”

This passage this morning is contains some of the characteristics of the almost Christian and a warning for those manifesting those characteristics and then finally a plea to those who may be revealed as almost Christian.

The Characteristics

Ephesians 5:3–4 CSB

But sexual immorality and any impurity or greed should not even be heard of among you, as is proper for saints. Obscene and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks.

Paul has just spent the latter portion of chapter 4 demonstrating the differences between the old life of the unbeliever and the new life of the believer. Fresh on the heels of demonstrating the preeminent characteristics of a Christian calling for the imitation of God and walking in a life characterized by love, Paul is now going to start a section of the letter that will demonstrate the difference between the believer and the unbelieving world that we continue to reside in.

Of all the sins that could continue to plague the life of a Christian, sexual sins are some of the most pernicious and difficult. They are the polar opposite of the admonition that Paul has just given the Ephesian believers to walk in love. This class of sin, if there is a way to classify sins, is most completely demonstrated by self-satisfaction and self-gratification. They are also among the most difficult to identify in the lives of a believer - at least in the modern day - and even it would seem in Paul’s day. We will look at these verses later, but scan down with me to verses 11 and 12 of chapter 5. Eph 5:11-12 “Don’t participate in the fruitless works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what is done by them in secret.” The “fruitless works of darkness” and those that are done “in secret” are references to sexual immorality and greed.

Paul uses the term sexual immorality here to refer to any form of sexual perversion beyond that of the normal relations between a married couple of one man and one woman. This specific sin heads the list of works of the flesh in Galatians 5:19 “Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity,” and is the primary sin that Paul mentions in 1 Thessalonians 4:3 “For this is God’s will, your sanctification: that you keep away from sexual immorality,” with regards to our sanctification. The word here is porneia and it is the root word of our word porn. A vile and addicting habit that takes hold of the mind and makes it impossible for the person caught in its web to serve a holy God with all the heart, all their soul, all their mind and all their strength. It teases with the lure of fantasy that seems real - it’s been projected that the virtual reality porn business will be worth one billion dollars by 2025 - and it corrupts the minds of men and women. And because it is a mental activity it is often hard to detect in the life of the believer.

One of the reasons that they are so hard to identify is that until and unless it manifests itself publicly, these sins are very easy to keep secret. This is one of the reasons that the porn use statistics among believers is so high - because it can be done in secret. Even with all of the safeguards and accountability practices we can put in place - when you sit down with a cell phone in your hand anything is available. According to a quick google search 80% of porn is watched on a mobile device. According to the website Covenant Eyes.com 1 in 5 youth pastors and 1 in 7 senior pastors confess to using porn on a regular basis - that’s with a sample base of more than 50,000 churches. 64% of Christian men and 15% of Christian women say they watch porn at least once a month.

Coupled to sexual immorality Paul warns that no other form of impurity should be apparent among the believers either. This is a reference back to what Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:19 “They became callous and gave themselves over to promiscuity for the practice of every kind of impurity with a desire for more and more.” Not only does sexual immorality anesthetize the believer’s heart against the dangers of sexual sin but also makes the practice of other impure behaviors not only possible but desirous.

Paul next mentions greed - this is probably in connection with sexual desire and the need for more and more but it can also become an issue in the life of a believer when the desire for more and more things becomes the focus of their life and financial goals rather than the service that Paul has called the believers to in the readiness to use their financial blessings from God to serve the church body in times of need.

As I’ve said the challenge in all of these is not only are they internal but that they manifest themselves slowly over time. They are also the product of how closely associated with the world we are. Think of it this way - no one starts to covet the Tesla your neighbor brings home the first day they park it in their driveway. Well maybe right now you do because of the gas mileage - but under normal circumstances you start with admiring, and then wishing becomes lusting and then you are either working longer hours to try and pay for one or you just go out and get one because you have to have one. You greedily desire the things that you see around you.

Paul says that these things - sexual immorality, impurity of any kind and greed - should not even be named among you.

This is not to say that we shouldn’t talk about these things - that there is some sort of gag order that is placed on Christians when it comes to sexual immorality or impurity. That would, in fact, play in to exactly what the world wants from us. They want us to be at the very least silent about these issues and not call them what they are - sin. In fact, what they want is our un-equivocating approval of their behavior. But the Bible does not whisper about these issues - it shouts about them.

What Paul is saying here is that the character and culture of the church should be such that these are not found among the members of Christ’s body. We are to look so different from the world that the characteristics that mark our world are not at all apparent within the church. We are called to be salt in the world - salt has a way of permeating into everything. I was working in the kitchen a few nights ago and I reached onto a shelf and knocked a pumpkin shaped salt shaker out of the cupboard, onto the granite counter top and shattering it all over the kitchen. Try as we might - we could not get all of the salt off of the floor. For the next few days we kept finding it surfacing in different places throughout the kitchen. This is the influence that Christians are meant to have on the world - we are to permeate, to creep in to every nook and cranny, every dark corner, every hidden crag of our society such that there can’t help but be an influence felt there.

And that this is to impact our speech as well. The three terms here for speech are only found here in the New Testament. Obscene speech is defined as that which flouts social and moral standards or is in defiance to social and moral standards. The challenge to that is that the moral and social standards of our day are so low that really there is no such thing as obscene speech anymore. Does that mean that anything goes and that we can be dropping any four letter words that come to mind into our daily conversation? No. Our words are to be of a higher standard - I think Paul would freely add the idea that our words are meant to meet Biblical standards not merely those of moral and social norms.

Foolish talk is characteristic of the talk of a drunk sitting on a stool. It literally means talk befitting of someone who is mentally deficient. It is talk that is uttered only to draw a reaction and usually is either crude in nature or designed to bring shock value. Crude joking is more the quick witted person who always has a remark or can turn any statement into a lewd innuendo. It is characteristic of that person at the water cooler at work who can turn anything into a dirty joke.

Instead our manner of speech should be characterized by thanksgiving - a thankful person demonstrates a level of unselfishness that is a pointed contradiction to all of the vices and speech patterns that Paul has just mentioned. Instead of tearing people down for their own sordid gain or selfish pleasure they use their actions and words to build people up, to see holiness grown in them and to see them drawn closer to Christ. All of these sins that Paul mentions are self-centered and bring gratification to one person - you. Paul is now going to deliver a pointed warning to those who practice such things.

The Warning

Ephesians 5:5 CSB

For know and recognize this: Every sexually immoral or impure or greedy person, who is an idolater, does not have an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.

It is important to state up front here that Paul is not saying that you can lose your salvation here. What he is saying in a pointed fashion is that if you have confessed Christ and yet your life continues to be characterized by these filthy behaviors that it is very possible that the confession of your mouth carries no weight in the condition of your heart and that you have made a false profession.

Dr. Steve Lawson says it this way “If you claim to know Christ and He has not changed your life, you can be assured that you have never met the risen, enthroned Christ.”

Paul tells the troubled church of Corinth that those people who continue and persist in these behaviors will not inherit God’s kingdom

1 Corinthians 6:9–10 CSB

Don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit God’s kingdom? Do not be deceived: No sexually immoral people, idolaters, adulterers, or males who have sex with males, no thieves, greedy people, drunkards, verbally abusive people, or swindlers will inherit God’s kingdom.

Yet there are many who will protest that they have been in church their whole lives, they have read their Bibles, taught Sunday school classes, they may have even led someone to Christ - and yet the truth is that there are people who have done all of those things but are not saved because they do not know Christ. They have not submitted themselves to Christ, have not confessed their sins to Him and surrendered the Lordship of their lives over to Him.

Paul is not teaching something here that he has not told the Ephesians in the past - he says for know and recognize this to remind them that they have been taught all of this before. He repeats for them the litany of sins that he has just said should not characterize or be mentioned amongst the believers - sexual immorality, impurity and greed. But he could go on. And I wish he would’ve gone on because there are many sins that we continue to allow to dominate and exemplify our lives that will just as assuredly keep us from Heaven’s gates as these. Laziness. Gossip. Bitterness. The list could go on. All of these if they are allowed to remain in our lives demonstrate that our confession may not have been valid. But Paul would write this to the Corinthian church and it bears heavily upon this conversation 2 Corinthians 6:14-16 “Do not be yoked together with those who do not believe. For what partnership is there between righteousness and lawlessness? Or what fellowship does light have with darkness? What agreement does Christ have with Belial? Or what does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? And what agreement does the temple of God have with idols? For we are the temple of the living God, as God said: I will dwell and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

These verses are not specifically about being married to an unbeliever - they are about being involved in a manner of life that is antithetical to the Gospel, that is antithetical to Christ’s teachings and is detrimental to the soul. Look at the words here - partnership, fellowship, agreement, have in common - all of these are the joining together of two entities to accomplish a task. Righteousness with lawlessness. Light with darkness. Christ with Belial. a believer with and unbeliever. And the last phrase bears the most weight on us today. What agreement does the temple of God have with idols. What agreement does our heart have with those behaviors that characterize the world and place idols in the temple of God? We simply cannot harbor these behaviors

Now the danger of a statement like that is that it wounds the tender heart and is completely ignored by the calloused heart. I am not preaching or exhorting you to some sort of sinless perfectionism - that is simply not possible this side of Heaven. What I am exhorting you to is to make sure that you are killing the sins in your life and that you are not simply content to live with them thinking that they can exist side by side with Christ. Puritan John Owen said “Do you mortify; do you make it your daily work; be always at it while you live; cease not a day from this work; be killing sin or it will be killing you.” And so the tender hearted among you will be wounded by this thought that you may not actually be saved and be worried by it - can I comfort you brothers and sisters that if this thought worries you it is not your soul that I am concerned about. It is those who can hear these words, who can live in that manner without the slightest concern for their well-being.

Jonathan Edwards said this of those who would live this way “The hypocrite has not the knowledge of his own blindness, and the deceitfulness of his own heart, and that mean opinion of his own understanding, that the true saint has. Those that are deluded with false discoveries and affections are evermore highly conceited of their light and understanding.”

It is very possible that there are those here who are calloused in that way. There may be those hearing me who are harboring these sins (or others) and thinking that they are okay, that they are saved. Friends - Christ’s warning is no less grave or true today than it was when He issued it to the disciples - Matthew 7:13-14 ““Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it.” Paul here reiterates this warning for us today Ephesians 5:5 “For know and recognize this: Every sexually immoral or impure or greedy person, who is an idolater, does not have an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.”

Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 13:5 “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith. Examine yourselves. Or do you yourselves not recognize that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless you fail the test.” We are called to examine ourselves and yet that is where most of us fail. We have been deluded into a false sense of security that says - I go to church, I read the Bible, I’m not as bad as that person, I do good things - and yet we have never fully come face to face with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Alistair Begg said this “It is very possible to stay close to the Word of the Lord and not be close to the Lord of the Word.” It is very possible to stay close to everything that gives off the appearance of being a Christian and not actually be a Christian. Oh friends - it is my deepest concern, my deepest fear that some of you sitting under this very teaching may one day be dismissed with the words “Depart from me I never knew you”.

But here’s the good news - if you are harboring these sins in your life, if you are feeling the conviction of the Spirit right now that you may not actually know Christ the way you thought you did - know this God’s grace still resides on you and your opportunities to receive His forgiveness are not gone. Repent and place your faith in Him today. Recognize the promise of these crosses on the wall - that Christ came and lived a perfect life with the primary purpose of dying as a sacrifice for us so that salvation could be made available to us. That we receive this salvation not by our works or anything that we can achieve but only through faith granted by grace in the Lord Jesus Christ and the confession of our sins. His death and resurrection have achieved salvation for His people and has made it available to us today - wont you receive what He purchased for you?