Ephesians 5:1-21
Ephesus was as sexually sinful as was Corinth. The craven lust was all over the Adriatic—the Roman lifestyle. Life was thought good, food was plentiful, the weather was wonderful, the mysteries of sex were intriguing; life was a new Sodom and Gomorrah. "Great is Diana of the Ephesians!" was the popular drinking song.
The similarity to First World life today is striking. The only difference is that our culture today is more dangerously under divine judgment, because ours is post-Christian, and those poor people then were yet to discover the beginnings of the faith of Jesus. The judgment that hung over their heads was not what "we" face, with all the light our world has been privileged to see.
Sexual promiscuity lies at the root of an enormous portion of the world's agony, whether in the Third World or the so-called First. It's the basic cause of the AIDS epidemic; it fuels most crime; it flourishes together with violence. Children and teens don't know how to evade its ravages. Even if disease doesn't strike them down, often marriage is poisoned before it begins. Industries are even created by making jokes about illicit sex. The entertainment business that flourishes in Hollywood inevitably gravitates toward sex or violence as its basic appeal for popularity, constantly seeking to infiltrate into children's TV programs and videos.
Whatever word can embrace the opposite of what the biblical word agape signifies, it is the modern plague of the human race. The Greek word was epithumia, which is translated as "concupiscence" in our English Bibles. The original word meant "a longing for what is forbidden." It's the root idea in that "enmity against God" that we read in Romans 8:7.
Why did God create us male and female? It's this mystery of holy love. But it becomes perverted and is the secret that provides the almost endless energy that fuels this "enmity against God." We would have to coin a word—maybe anti-agape would have to be it. It's the impulse to murder God, for "God is agape" (1 John 4:8), and that impulse found its satisfaction in the murder of the Son of God at His cross. It still wants to crucify Christ afresh.
Millions of sincere teens of every culture long for some power to clarify the muddle of life and deliver them from this phase of slavery to self, which they instinctively recognize to be slow moral suicide-bombing. They long for pure love; where can they find it?
Ephesians 5:1-4
"Therefore be followers of God as dear children. And walk in love [agape], as Christ also has loved us [with agape] and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma. But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks."
It becomes apparent as we move through Ephesians that its key word is agape. Never does the apostle command the people to "walk in love" without in close context reminding them of how Jesus has walked in love as He saves them. Agape is the very nature of God, but it was never seen so clearly revealed to the universe until the event of the cross. Only in the light of the cross can the mysteries of sex be understood.
That's why Paul is so enthusiastic about this "mystery" now revealed. Even the unfallen angels had no clear concept of the grand dimensions of the character of God until they saw the Father revealed in the Son as One who chose to go down to eternal death rather than see us be lost. At the cross, the character of agape is what we contemplate and "comprehend." Then the miracle takes place: our previously anti-agape heart is melted, and becomes tender, unselfish, loving!
But now the apostle reveals that his deep concern is this obsession with sex that has so plagued Gentile life. Unless these new converts to Christ understand the horror of this continued sin, they will face dangers like what we see today in AIDS, True, there was no AIDS in Paul's day that we know of, but AIDS is the modern symbol of the terror of "the wrath of God" that Paul warns the Ephesians about.
The "wrath of God" is not like the wrath of man, just as the love (agape) of God is not like the self-centered love of man. When God is angry, He leaves you to yourself—the most terrible thing that can happen to you. So with sexual sin; the healing ministry of Christ as "the light of the world" and of "our Great Physician" is constantly at work in our mortal bodies; but God looks upon sexual sin in a special way. He says He "hates divorce, for it covers one's garment with violence" (Mai. 2:16), In other words, there is always murder buried in the violation of the seventh commandment. And God hates murder. This violence poisons life on the earth.
If a person violates that holy commandment, there is often a penalty paid in one's physical organism; the immune system can break down (as it does in AIDS). "The Great Physician" does not want to walk away and leave the person to himself, because if that happens the healing ministry that God has built into our physical system is cancelled. Our Great Physician does not want to walk away! But, He may be forced to. That is why sexual diseases are so rampant and deadly.
Thank God, modern medicine can sometimes relieve the misery. But there is the greater pollution of soul that always follows. Multitudes would give anything if they could erase the memory of a few moments' foolish indiscretion. It's in love to us that God has given us His holy law of Ten Commandments, not as "kill-joy" negative commands but as a wall to protect us against destroying ourselves. Everybody needs a "wall" to protect him or her.
When the law of God is understood as a "law of liberty" (James 2:10), the apparently negative commands metamorphose into ten precious promises of eternal joy. Believe the preamble that says, "I am the Lord your God who brought you out... of the house of bondage," and the Lord says, I promise/You will not commit adultery"! Freedom at last from the plague!
Procreation is a solemn gift of a holy God; it's not only "not fitting" to jest about sex, it is perilously close to blasphemy. God doesn't like it, but children and youth pick up whatever crude and irreverent language is popular. They learn to despise and ridicule the holy privilege of procreation. Only those who are privileged to "survey the wondrous cross on which he Prince of glory died" can learn to hate the debauching language that is at heart a hatred of God.
Ephesians 5:5
"For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God."
We are not to conclude that the sins of fornication (sex between unmarried people) or adultery (the same committed by married people) cannot be forgiven if the sinner comes to the Savior and receives the gift of repentance. For a very good reason, God hates this sin in particular (Mai. 2:14-16), and the Son of God was tortured and murdered because of it—but He will forgive. His forgiveness actually takes the sin away, and forever after, the forgiven sinner hates that sin like poison.
But if he does repent, he prays David's prayer of repentance, where the psalmist says he feared he may have lost his soul forever (Psalm 51:11). It's the unrepented sins of fornication and "uncleanness" that must bar the way into the New Jerusalem for the simple reason that people carrying such pollution would be totally miserable there. The reason why no person guilty of sexual sin "has any inheritance" there is not because of some extreme prudishness on the part of our heavenly Father; if anyone enters the New Jerusalem with that sin still buried in the heart, he will become a poisonous cancer eating out the heart of the City. It's love (agape) that is forced to close the doors. And it's love to the unrepentant sinner, too, for he would find the purity of eternal life in the Holy City to be a hell to his soul.
"Covetousness" is included. Possibly Paul's intent here is to mention the tenth commandment that says, "You shall not covet your neighbor's wife" (Ex. 20:17). All pornography feeds the violation of that simple command of holiness, because all such lust is impure coveting. Watching another woman's immodesty is the sin of covetousness, the lure of pornography. Paul did not realize what sin is until he discovered the meaning of that command against coveting one's neighbor's wife (Rom. 7:7). Paul was as human as any of us!
Ephesians 5:6, 7
"Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them."
That blessed gift of forgiveness, worth so much more than Donald Trump's or Bill Gates' billions, can be given free. Believe that the Savior has forgiven you; ponder it; count its blessings; appreciate it and what it means; and you will forgive yourself—something you once thought you could never do. You will become "pure in heart" (Matt. 5:8). "The wrath of God" simply leaves "the sons of disobedience" alone.
Frightful loneliness, that is, away from God!
Ephesians 5:8-14
"For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), proving what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret. But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore Fie says: 'Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light!"
The apostle says something strange here. Instead of saying as usual that we were once "full of darkness" or we are now "full of light," he says we were "darkness" personified, and we are now "light" personified "in the Lord."
What he means is that God's New Covenant promise to Abraham is being fulfilled—we are a blessing wherever we go because we are the Light itself shining in us, that is, Christ is dwelling in us by faith. We don't have to worry about giving Bible studies to our neighbors or fellow workers; silently, probably unconsciously, we are exuding light and a knowledge of the gospel by the way we live and speak.
Paul urges the Ephesians again that since they are the "light" personified, "walk as children of light." Again, he is not laying upon them a legalism burden; he is reminding them not to forget who they have become through the grace of Christ.
The Holy Spirit is in the process of bearing fruit within them. Having become acquainted with Jesus, they have learned to love "goodness, righteousness, and truth," and their love is contagious. Other people are saying, "I want what those people have!" That is what the word "evangelism" means.
But conflicts are unavoidable. These people are no longer attending the drinking or sex parties; but the apostle's counsel to "expose them" does not mean necessarily that they are to create stormy sessions of denouncing these things. By not taking part, the "saints" are automatically "exposing" the evil without the necessity of railing against it.
People often say we must "denounce" sin/'tell it like it is!" There are times when "Elijah" is needed; but don't envy that prophet, because more often "Elisha" is needed, the quiet, gentle spirit. In fact, Paul has told us in Ephesians that we are to seek "lowliness and gentleness" (4:1). It may accomplish much more than "Elijah" is able to do.
In fact, Paul expressly warns against trying to "speak of those things which are done by them in secret." The Holy Spirit will flash into their minds the details that only He can bring up safely. He brings the light that "exposes" the evil; let Him do it unless you have unmistakable evidence that it is your duty to do so.
The call to "awake, you who sleep," reminds us of the call of Jesus to His Eleven to "awake" in Gethsemane. Too much is happening today in the church and in the world for any of us to "sleep." Practice good health reform, keep your body healthy and your mind clear and active. "Abstemiousness in diet is rewarded with mental and moral vigor," says some old counsel,
Ephesians 5:15-21
"See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God."
It seems unusual to us that Paul would speak of getting drunk with alcohol in the same sentence as he speaks of being "filled with God's [Holy] Spirit," But there may be a connection. Alcoholics Anonymous teach their successful people never to say that they are no longer "alcoholics." The once-captives know that they must forever remain humble, for alcoholism per se is never curable, they say.
Whether they are right or wrong, we must never claim that we no longer have a fallen, sinful nature, even though the Lord has given us victories. We are still sinners by nature and will be until glorification. But by the grace of God we condemn sin in our sinful nature—Christ condemned sin in the nature He "took" from us. The alcoholic can condemn within himself the sin of drinking.
Thank God for the "psalms and hymns and spiritual songs" the Holy Spirit has inspired. Don't deprive yourself of the comfort and strength that singing New Covenant songs inspires. But be thoughtful. Don't sing carelessly, any more than pray carelessly. The Father seeks thoughtful people who worship Him in Spirit and in truth (John 4:23).
Generally, we don't learn overnight to "give thanks always for all things." If we had more wisdom and understanding, we would do so, for Romans 8:28 says that "all ... work together for good to those .,. who are the called according to His purpose" (which is you, if you believe and appreciate the message of Ephesians!).