Ephesians - Imitate God in your Walk - Part 2 - Ephesians 5:8-14

People say we have to do what the world is doing in order to get their attention and win them. That is not true. We don’t have to imitate their methods. All we have to do is shine.

Now let’s join as we pray together. Father, as we study the Word, we realize that there are obligations that we have. Help us to accept them, to rejoice in them, and to realize that in fulfilling our obligations we are finding our opportunities. You have so much more for us if only we will trust and obey. And so I pray, help us as we study the Word now and apply it to our hearts. I pray in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Therefore be followers of God as dear children, Ephesians 5:1. The word followers means imitators, mimics. Don’t imitate the world with its fornication, its uncleanness, its covetousness, its filthy speech, its foolish talk, its coarse jesting. Do not imitate the world; imitate your Father in heaven. You get involved in the garbage of the world, the aroma of your life will not be fragrant. But he says we should walk in love as Christ also loved us and he’s given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma. The Old Testament priests used to offer the sweet-smelling sacrifices to God and that’s what we should be to God. And so we have to make our choice. If we walk with the world and imitate the world, we become garbage, and garbage smells. If we walk with the Lord as children of light, then we become fragrance unto the Lord.

Every life has a fragrance to it, every home, every church has a fragrance. I trust that our fragrance is pleasing to the Lord. Paul is telling us to live godly lives and he reminds us of what we are. We are the children of God, Ephesians 5:1-2. We are the saints of God, Ephesians 5:3-4. We are the heirs of God, Ephesians 5:5-7. And then in Ephesians 5:8 he reminds us that we are God’s lights. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. For the fruit of the Spirit, or the fruit of the light, is in all goodness, righteousness and truth, proving what is acceptable to the Lord. Now here’s the negative: 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 he says: Awake you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.

Paul gives us three reminders in Ephesians 5:8 and these reminders are the key to understanding this whole paragraph, Ephesians 5:8-14. He reminds us of what we were, then he reminds us of what we are, and then he reminds us of what we should do. It’s very simple. He reminds us of what we were: For you were once darkness. Then he reminds us of what we are: But now you are light in the Lord. Then as a consequence of this, he reminds us of what we should do: Walk as children of light. 

Let’s take that first reminder: Remember what you were. For you were once darkness. Now in the Bible, darkness often symbolizes that which is contrary to God. God is light and in Him is no darkness at all, 1 John 1:5. God is light. Now that which is opposite of God is darkness. For example, darkness is a symbol of sin. Ephesians 5:11, have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. Now what are these unfruitful works of darkness? Well, he’s named a few of them in Ephesians 5:3: fornication, uncleanness, covetousness. Ephesians 5:4: filthiness, foolish talking, coarse jesting, fornication, uncleanness, idolatry. You can go right down the line.

Now Paul names these things because he is writing an inspired letter for us to learn how to live the Christian life. But he says to them, don’t even have this thing named among you, let alone practiced among you. Why? It’s not fitting for saints. You’re a saint, you’ve been set apart. And he talks not only about deeds, but about words. Filthiness of speech, he had mentioned that before in Ephesians 4. Foolish talking, that means silly talk, treating holy things lightly. Coarse jesting, people who tell sordid jokes about holy things or about precious things. Coarse jesting, they’re just not fitting. This is sin and Paul sees it as darkness.

Now in the Bible, Satan is pictured in terms of darkness. In Luke 22:53, the Lord Jesus, when he was being arrested in the garden, said, "But this is your hour and the power of darkness." When Judas went out to betray the Lord Jesus, it was night and the darkness had moved into his life. So sin is pictured as darkness, so is Satan. Eternal judgment is pictured as darkness. Some people don’t like this; I was noticing in my Bible study recently that Jesus had a good deal to say about hell. We read in Matthew 8:12, "But the sons of the kingdom," referring to the Jewish people who should have known better, "the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." There is an awesome picture given in Jude 13, talking about these unbelieving people, "for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever." Not just darkness, but darkness forever. Not just darkness forever, but the blackness of darkness forever. That is an awesome thought. 

Darkness symbolizes eternal judgment. Now, we were once in the darkness. Isaiah 9:2, "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light." When Matthew quotes Isaiah 9:2 in Matthew 4:16, the people aren’t walking in the darkness, they are sitting in the darkness. "The people who sat in the darkness have seen a great light." They just got tired of walking in the darkness and sat down and gave up. Once we were in the darkness, but even more, once the darkness was in us. Our outlook was so worldly and so godless that once the darkness was in us. The Lord Jesus Christ warns us about letting the darkness into our lives. Listen to Matthew 6:22, "The lamp of the body," said Jesus, "is the eye." He’s talking about your outlook. "If therefore your eye is good," now that means single, healthy, "your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad," that means unhealthy, evil, your outlook is for that which is sinful, "your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!" This is an awesome and terrible thing. When a person’s outlook on life is so sinful, so godless, so worldly, that it brings in the darkness. Once we were in the darkness, once the darkness was in us. 

Ephesians 4:18, our minds were darkened. "Having their understanding darkened." Not just that we were in the darkness, the darkness is in us. 2 Corinthians 4:4, "Whose minds the god of this age has blinded." In other words, there is mental darkness, intellectual darkness. The heart experiences darkness. There was once darkness in our hearts. We loved the darkness. John 3:19, "And this is the condemnation, that the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." We have darkness in the mind and darkness in the heart and darkness in the will. Ephesians 5:11, "unfruitful works of darkness." What we willingly work is darkness.

Now imagine, the unsaved person not only is in the darkness, the darkness is in him, but it’s worse than that. He tells us in Ephesians 5:8 that when we were unsaved, not only were we in the darkness, not only was the darkness in us, but we were darkness itself. "For you were once," not in the dark, "you were once darkness." We ourselves were darkness, fit only for hell. That’s a frightening thought, isn’t it? Once you were darkness. Now if you’ve never trusted Jesus Christ as your Savior, that’s where you are. You are darkness, you are in the dark, and the darkness is in you, and you are blind to the light. 

That’s why Jesus warned in John 12:35, "A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. He who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become the sons of light." That's quite a picture, lest the darkness overtake you. Not only is the unsaved person in the darkness, and the darkness is in him or her, and that person is darkness, but the darkness of eternal judgment is pursuing that person and one day it’s going to catch up with you. And that means eternal outer darkness. Remember what you were. 

Now remember what you are. "But now," oh I like that little phrase, "but now you are light in the Lord." God is light, in Him is no darkness at all. He is the Father of lights. The Lord Jesus said, "I am the light of the world; he who follows me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life." In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. Paul wrote to the Philippians and said I want you to be blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world. "You are the light of the world," the Lord Jesus said in Matthew 5:14. "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

How can Christ’s followers make a difference in this world? Well, we can shine. Let’s join Warren Wiersbe in Matthew 5:14. Now we are light because we share God’s nature. God is light, we are the children of God, therefore we have His nature. And the important thing to remember is this: when you were saved, God’s light came shining upon you. "Awake you who sleep," says Ephesians 5:14, "arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light." The light began to shine on us and we began to see. Thank God for the ministry of the Holy Spirit. We began to see ourselves for what we really are: lost sinners. We began to see our sin and we didn’t see sin so beautifully anymore; it was something ugly and filthy. Then we saw Jesus Christ in a new way, we saw salvation in a new way, and this leads to repentance. Repentance means a change of mind. This darkened mind, the light comes in, and God gives to us His salvation. This is the picture that Paul gives to us in 2 Corinthians 4:6, "For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." And our minds which were once darkened were enlightened by the Word of God and the Spirit of God. "The entrance of your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple," Psalm 119:103. The light shines within us. We become a new creation, we become the children of light. 

By the way, this reminds me often of what happened to Peter when he was in prison. Paul is quoting in Ephesians 5:14 some verses from Isaiah, probably Isaiah 60:1, possibly Isaiah 26:19. "Awake you who sleep, arise from the dead and Christ will give you light." That’s what happened to Peter, Acts 12:7. "And behold, an angel of the Lord stood by him and a light shone in the prison." All right, there’s the light. "And he struck Peter on the side and raised him up saying, 'Arise quickly,' and his chains fell off his hands." Wouldn’t you love to have an angel for an alarm clock? And he tells Peter to get dressed and follow him and Peter walked right out of the prison. Now this is a beautiful picture of salvation. Once we were asleep in our sins, He says wake up. Once we were dead in our sins, He says arise. Once we were in the darkness of our sins, and He said I’m going to give you light. Oh, we are light in the Lord. The next time you’re tempted to wallow around in the sewage of the world, whether it’s in your living room watching television or looking at the magazines in the drugstore or whatever it may be—the next time you’re tempted to wallow in the sewage of the world, remember what you were: darkness, and what it did to you. And remember what you are: you are light in the Lord. Not just in the light, not just the light in you—that’s true—but you are light in the Lord. And God wants us to be out there shining for the Lord Jesus Christ, which leads us to the third reminder. 

Remember what you should do: walk as children of light. He’s told us to walk in love because Christ loved us and God is love. Now he tells us to walk as children of light because God is light. And he gives us a series of contrasts here. He contrasts the children of light and the children of darkness. He contrasts fruitfulness and unfruitfulness. "For the fruit of the Spirit," says Ephesians 5:9, "or the fruit of the light, is in all goodness, righteousness and truth." Now these are three topics that philosophers have been discussing for centuries: the good, the right, and the true. What is good? What is right? What is true? Walk in the light and you'll find out. Fruitfulness. When God sees His child walking in the light as he ought to walk in the light, then there is fruit produced in that life. The fruit of goodness, the fruit of righteousness, the fruit of truth. I tell you, you can build your home on goodness, righteousness and truth. But you see, the unsaved crowd has unfruitful works of darkness, Ephesians 5:11. "Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness." There's a contrast between being fruitful and being unfruitful. Take your choice. You want to live in the cesspools of iniquity, there’ll be no fruit from your life. Nothing to glorify God. He has chosen us that we might bring forth fruit and that our fruit might glorify Him. 

Fruitfulness contrasted with unfruitfulness. Pleasing God contrasted with pleasing ourselves. "Proving what is acceptable to the Lord," Ephesians 5:10. The child of God walking in the light wants to please the Father. Proving by experience is what the word means. It means to test the circumstances. It goes along with Romans 12:2, "that you may prove by experience what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." Now the unsaved crowd walking in the darkness can’t prove anything. They can’t test these things. But we can, as we are walking in the light, the light of the Word of God, the light of God, the light of His Spirit, we are able to know the will of God. 

There's a contrast between separation and contamination. "Therefore do not be partakers with them," that means don’t go into partnership with them. Don’t get together with them in a yoke that is wrong. "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers, for what fellowship has light with darkness?" He repeats this of course down in Ephesians 5:11, "Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness." That doesn’t mean isolate yourself from unsaved people; you do that and you cannot witness. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 5:9-10 that if you want to get away from this thing, you have to leave the world. No, they need our witness. But don’t fellowship with their works. People say we have to do what the world is doing in order to get their attention and win them. That is not true. We don’t have to play their music and use their humor. We don’t have to imitate their methods. All we have to do is shine. And I tell you when a blind person wants light, he has to come some place where there is light shining. And you and I are to shine as lights in this dark world.

There's separation contrasted with contamination. There's openness contrasted with secrecy. It’s a shame even to speak of the things that they do in secret. By the way, too much of that is going on today. So-called Christian writers and lecturers are talking a little bit too openly about some of these things. Let’s be very careful about this. Avoid their works, expose what they are doing, but don’t be in contamination because of it. Paul did this in Ephesus, didn’t he? He exposed the filthiness of the religion of Diana of the Ephesians. How’d he do? By letting his light shine, by preaching the Word of God. There's a contrast here between the wrath of God and the glory of God. We live for God’s glory, but the wrath of God is going to come on these people who are practicing sin. Let’s walk as children of light.