Ephesians 4:17-5:21 | Four Ways to Walk

Owen Huard continues a series on the book of Ephesians. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Here we go, guys. We cannot continue. Last and almost of the company of the year. Next week, we're gonna have a war. Tonight's gonna look a little bit different, uh, but more det more details to come right here at the end of the service. Um, but hey, we've got uh plenty to walk through, guys. This is gonna be the largest piece of scripture I will ever teach in however long my career is. Uh, tonight is gonna be the longest, so you're gonna have to lock in with me, and then we're just gonna uh kind of get into things. Before we just crack open um Ephesians 4, you guys would just imagine with me for just a second, okay? I have somewhat of imagination. I'm not the most creative person, but I do like to dream sometimes. And here's what you can imagine with me uh right now. Okay, imagine tonight at Salt Company, right? We do the whole, we do the whole worship thing, and then Tyson leads us in a couple songs. And normally, uh how this whole deal goes is Tyson will be, you know, stumbling his guitar, whatever he's doing. And right when he's about to get at the end of a song, he'll kind of like look over at me, like if he kind of like, hey, you're trying to come up. You know, imagine Tyson's getting to the end and he's kind of looking over and he doesn't really see me, he keeps going. And I'm just not over there, okay? I'm not over, I'm not in the room at all. And he kind of starts to panic. He's like, oh my gosh, is Tyson gonna be preaching today? You know, he's like, if he had to, he could, right? Really, he could. Tyson, I believe in you. But he's like, okay, we just gotta give him a little bit of time, okay? So he plays another song, something that he didn't even plan. And then finally, like at the end of this song, I come like sprinting in the room in the back, and I'm like out of breath. I come up here, my paper papers are all jumbled, and literally just like I get up here and I say, guys, I'm so sorry. Out of breath, hands up and he's like, guys, you wouldn't you would not imagine, okay, what I just went through. Okay, on my way here, I'm driving on 35, and I put my tire flat. Isn't that crazy? Like, I'm I'm literally stuck on the side of the road. So I do my I do my thing and I get my tire on my I I try to put it on, and literally as I'm like trying to put it on, the tire goes out into the highway. Imagine I said that to you, and you're like, oh my gosh, that's crazy. That's like a hazard for some people. And then I tell you this, I'm like, yeah, it was so crazy. I literally ran out after it and I got hit by the semi. It was nuts. It was nuts. I got hit by the semi, but no, I got I got the um, you know, I got the wheel here, got the tire, came back, put it on, and that's why I'm late. Okay? Like, imagine. Imagine me standing up here, still, like, you're hit by a semi. There'd be a question, like, brother, are you do you have a pulse? You know, are you alive? You just got hit by a semi. Imagine like I'm up here, and I just look the exact same, like, hey, let's preach, you know, salt company tonight, let's do it. And I'm just this the same guy, right? There'd be some questions that you have tonight. You'd be like, hey, dude, are you are you okay? Like you just got hit by you know this 18-wheeler semi on the highway. Yet you're here. Why are you not in the hospital? More importantly, why are you not like in the morgue? You know? Like you should be dead. Right? If that happened, you'd be like, okay, something is not right here. Okay, and tonight we're gonna hop right back into Ephesians because we're gonna look at what happens when we as believers, or I should say, as we as unbelievers get hit by something even bigger than that semi. When we get hit by the gospel, when we have an encounter with the living God, right? The creator of the universe comes down here and has an encounter with us supernatural ways when we get hit by that, just in the same way, as it'd be weird if I got hit by a semi and still look the same, as if, you know, we as believers were hit by the gospel, yet our lives look the exact same, right? No difference. Still live in the same way that we used to. Right? There'd be some questions. There'd be some thoughts from the people around you, like, dude, I I thought you just got hit by this, yet you look the exact same. Right, well, tonight, Ephesians 4, we're gonna look into five as well, and we're gonna take a look about how we are impacted by the weight of the gospel. When inevitably is gonna hit us like a truck in our lives, right? This this spiritual truck that's gonna run us over. But don't worry, it's a it's a good truck. Okay? Here you go. Paul's gonna, he's gonna continue right here in Ephesians chapter 4 on his commentary on how we ought to live, okay? The whole second half, how we ought to live as saints here on earth, right? This is why it's called citizens and saints, new uh, you know, citizenship in heaven. We are uh, you know, now citizens of a greater kingdom. And then now, how do we live as saints here on earth? And we're gonna kind of get four ways that we can walk worthy. Okay, last week, this should sound familiar for some of you guys. Walk worthy. Here's how Paul starts Ephesians chapter four. We're gonna reread it. If you're here last week, this is gonna be familiar. He says, Therefore, I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to walk worthy of the calling you have received. Okay, he's gonna continue on this train of thought. Worthy ways to walk. You can look at me in verse 17. Here, like I said, we've got a lot to read, so let's get going. 17 says this, therefore, I say this and testify in the Lord. You should no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thoughts. Okay, right there. You can see it, okay? You should walk no longer as the Gentiles do. Okay, kind of an odd way to put it, odd way to kind of start this whole section. But hey, you know, I guess we we kind of get it. The first way that we can walk as Christians, walk as believers in Christ, is by walking in a different direction. Paul, he kind of just contrasts here. Hey, who you used to be, who the Gentiles are, who you are. He says, hey, you should walk not like they do, not like the Gentiles. Right? Don't do it. What Paul is doing here, he's making a clear distinction about those who know God and those who don't. The ones who have been hit by the gospel, going 100 miles an hour, and those who haven't yet. Okay, back in Ephesus, right, who this was written to, the church in Ephesus, there would have been both Jews and Gentiles, right, in this city. Both Jews and Gentiles, but the majority of them were probably Gentiles in the city. And before Jesus, before the new covenant came, these people would have been split. Okay, Jews are the people of God, and then the Gentiles are those who don't know him. Okay? They would have been living two radically different lives. But because of Christ, and we've covered this already, okay, unity. We talked about this last unity within our community, a unity on a greater scale that crosses ethnic boundaries. Christ brings these two people together. They're unified in his crucifixion, and there's no longer the distinction between the two, at least in the eyes of the God, uh of our God, okay? There might be differences, okay, ethnically between the Jews and the Gentiles, but in the eyes of the Lord spiritually, they are the same. They now have the same axis that the Jews do. I'm like, sure, they might be different, but God doesn't look at you know the color of your skin. He doesn't look at your ethnicity, ethnicity. He more so looks at your heart. He looks at what's on the inside. And what he points out here is the actions of the people, the actions of these Gentiles, the people who are not following God, they're not living it out. Chasing, they're just chasing after what their heart desires, not what God desires. He says, guys, to the church in Ephesus, he says, stop it. You're running just like these people. You're living the same life as these people. And he says, Don't do it. Stop what you're doing. And then he shows us why. Keep reading, verse 18. He says, They are darkened in their understanding. That's the Gentiles, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their hearts. They became callous and gave themselves over to promiscuity for the practice of every kind of impurity, with a desire for more and more. Here's what the evidence that Paul gives us. Here's the way that they are living. How they choose to spend their time, their money, who they hang out with. Characteristics that make up a life of a godless person. Are those of futility, ignorance, promiscuity, a lack of self-control? There's now a callus that's formed over their heart in the godlessness that they partake in, but it has no effect on their consciousness. It has no effect on, there is no conviction in their life. Here's the thing that we have to understand, though, when we read this. And the church would have had to back then, because they were living it. That at one point, those same characteristics that make up a godless life are the ones that make up our life as well. Because we used to live like that. We were also at one time godless, just like they were. This might be true of us at one point, but Salt Company, guys, if you're a believer, if you've had an encounter with this living God, you've been hit by the spiritual semi that is God. This is no longer true of you now. The sin in our lives that we've once sought out so passionately now tastes bitter in our mouth. Guys, it's like dark chocolate. Okay, no one likes it because it tastes bitter. Give me milk chocolate. We used to chase after this stuff, but now it tastes bitter in our mouth. Life is now found not in the things of this world, but the grace and the mercy of Christ. Guys, Paul knows this. He knows this. And in verse 19, he's gonna say this. He's gonna continue on. He says, The Gentiles, man, they became callous and gave themselves over to promiscuity for the practice of every kind of impurity with a desire for more and more. You can kind of see that life different. And then he kind of he switches it up. Verse 20. But that is not how you came to know Christ. Like, hey, those things that they're doing, guys, I don't know if you know, but that's not the things that brought you to know Jesus, okay? That that those are not the things that lead to life. This is assuming you heard about him and were taught by him as a truth is in Jesus. And then he gets to what the Christian life is made up of, day in and day out. Verse 22. Take off your former way of life, the old self that is corrupted by deceitful desires, to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, the one created according to God's likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth. To live as a follower of Christ is to walk in a new direction. Forgetting the past, put off the old self, right? Who you used to be, the desires you used to have. Man, leave it behind. Walk in the opposite direction. Don't look back. Guys, this is what we call repentance. Okay? You might have heard that if you grew up in the church, that word repentance. That's what it looks like. It's choosing to turn away from the sin and towards Christ. You're walking one way towards the thing that you think is gonna fulfill you. You have that encounter, and all of a sudden you're not walking the complete opposite. No chance you're looking back. Repentance. The language that Paul uses here, it's interesting, okay, in you know, 20 through 24, the language that he uses is interesting. It's kind of like, you know, it's the same words that if I took my wife to like Tanger Outlet. She's like, okay, we're gonna buy some new clothes, okay? Maggie's not a big shopper, but man, if we went to Tanger, she's like, hey, can I get some new clothes? She'd want to do that, shopping. She likes to shop. I don't, okay? I don't find any, you know, really joy in it. I just find a good chair and I sit down. Anyway, my wife, man, goes to Tanger. She's like, hey, let's get some new clothes. Okay? Paul, man, he's the same way. Right here. He said, hey, we are getting new clothes tonight. Okay? Like, think of someone who's just released from prison. Right, this dude, and he's been locked up for life. Good behavior, gets some parole, he gets left out. Man, I can even imagine. It almost brings me to tears sometimes. Like, you know, man, the people who are rehabilitated into society, they get to re reunite with their family, and they literally walk past the gates. Okay, the gates open for him, and the guards that he's known day in and day out, as he's been just locked up in his cell. He walks past them and he's now a free man, okay, in society. And imagine the next day, he just wakes up in his bed and he's still wearing the yellow jumper. The jumpsuit that he has lived in for however long. That's only represented one thing in life, and that's slavery. Right? Slavery or just being in prison. Imagine if he just woke up in the same jumpsuit. Right? That doesn't make sense. I mean it. If I ever go to prison, Lord willing, I hope I don't. I hope I don't. Right? But if I ever get let out, first thing I'm doing is like, where's the new assault merch, okay? We are getting out of this uh orange jumper and we are getting into some new clothes. Right? Imagine I go to the gym. Okay? Doesn't happen often, obviously. But imagine I go to the gym, I get a good pump in. It's just me and Trent out there. And I get all sweaty. I come back, I take a shower, I'm all clean now, and then I put the exact same clothes on. You'd be like, dude, that's disgusting. Okay? Don't do that. I mean, it's the same way here in the Christian life. We see that what we used to live in is not the same. We are given a new pair of clothing. We're given a new identity in Christ. Because what happens when you have an encounter with the living God, the God of the heavens and of the earth, the God that defeated death itself is something that lasts not a day. Right? It doesn't change you for just a day or two, but it's something that happens for a lifetime, an effect that we feel for a lifetime. You could ask yourself, man, would the would your closest friends notice something different about you?

unknown 13:33

Right?

SPEAKER_00 13:33

Maybe the high school friends that you haven't seen in nine months, you go back home for the summer here in just two weeks. If they went and they saw Owen, man, is is something different about him? Right? He doesn't like the same things that he used to. The way that we used to act in high school, man, he doesn't want to do those things anymore. I mean, can you ask yourself that? When you have that encounter, have you put off the old self? Have you put on the new? Is there visible change that you've been hit by the spiritual semi? That is Christ. I mean, that's a question that you might ask yourself. Here's your going home for the summer here in just a couple weeks. Are you truly walking in a new direction? Like Paul's telling us to do here. Something to think about. Okay, let's continue on. We're gonna look, we're gonna kind of jump here for just a second. Ephesians 5. Here's what you can do. There's a big section there. We're actually gonna skip past this last portion of chapter 4, but we gotta move, okay? If we want to be out of here before finals week, we gotta kind of move. Here we go. Ephesians 5. We're gonna start in uh in verse 1. Okay, same chain of thought here. It's gonna all make sense. He says, Therefore, be imitators of God, as dearly loved children, in this, and walk in love as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us. A sacrificial and fragrant offering to God. Okay, guys, it's pretty obvious. The second way that we as believers should now walk is in love. We need to walk in love. Why? Because Christ has already loved us. Okay? We love because he first loved us. He's the example that we have to follow as believers. He is the one that we ought to be imitating. Okay, just like Dylan Ryola, okay? I couldn't imagine this guy. Like, any of the dudes know that name, I think. Okay, maybe. Uh he used to be the quarterback at Nebraska. He now transferred to be like a second or third string at Oregon. But it's like Dylan Riola, imitating and copying Patrick Mahomes, okay? He's a Texas guy. We know Patrick. It's the hair, the glasses, the way he walks, the way he plays football. Honestly, he's doing a pretty good job at it, okay? He looks kind of like Patrick Mahomes. And I heard, actually, I heard this, okay? Not in my notes. Patrick Mahomes was at Cactus Canyon, like not that long ago. Just crazy to think that you know you might run into uh Patrick Mahomes in Argyle someday. Anyway, it could be Dylan Rayola, actually. Um, but Dylan Ryola, man, he he imitates after Patrick Mahomes. He sees someone that's already made it. Okay? He said, I'm gonna imitate this man in every way. Not only his football, but also literally how he looks the hair, the glass, everything. He's imitating him. Yet we don't desire to be more like Patrick Mahomes. Guys, we should desire to be more like Christ. More like Christ. Love is the very thing that Jesus is, the very thing that Jesus lived to be. It is his nature. Jesus and love are not separable. They cannot be separated. 1 John 4 says this. Beloved, let us love one another. For love is from God. Love is from God. And whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God. Why? Because God is love. Not only is God love, but the very idea of love came from God. When Jesus came down, when the Creator humbled himself among humanity. This is love. Without God, there is no love in our life. This is where I challenge almost every single atheist that I talk to. Okay? Sometimes when I'm out on campus, uh we've been tabling a little bit. And during like the first week of school, I'll try to talk to as many students as I can. Okay. I'm I'm man, I'm out there. I want to chat it up with people. And I come across many atheists. Okay, when I chat at chat with them, this is something that I go to every single time. Okay? I go to love. And just humor me in this combo because I think it's like the coolest thing ever. Okay, it just makes so much sense in my mind. It might be helpful for you too. Okay? But an atheist will almost always believe in evolution. Okay? Almost always. Macroevolution, microevolution. Less like they believe in it, okay? That's something that we kind of teach in our schools. You biomajors, you know, that we were once like just a clump of cells. Uh, and we eventually evolved, you know, from the crick that we were in to uh then like this small like amphibian, maybe a frog, who knows? Um, and then we like uh found land, got you know, lungs, and now we're humans, okay? The evolution, we teach this in our schools. All right, but here's what here's the problem with that is that the Bible does not teach that, okay? Because if we were really just some cells that evolved into humans, then the idea that we are just a clump of cells still holds true to this day. Right? Doesn't change. All right, so let's say in this theoretical conversation, I have another theoretical situation going over here. Okay, I'm applying for a job. Me and John, okay, are applying for a job. Same position. Right, what's stopping me from just killing John? Because I want the job, right? Seriously, what's stopping me? Survival of the fittest, right? We know that. Seriously, for an atheist, this should make so much sense. It's like, you're just a clump of cells. I don't see why not. You're just trying to survive, feed for your family, continue your bloodline, right? But the problem with that statement, in in, you know, it if I actually said that, even the atheists should say, wait, wait, wait, wait, you can't just go and kill someone. That doesn't make any sense. Every single one of you should also say that, okay? Hey guys, you can't just go around killing someone. Why? Because that's not loving. That that is literally not loving. And the reason that we can apply value to people's lives, right? Whether they're a believer or unbeliever, okay, this is not an exclusive thing. The reason that uh we can love every single person is it ties back to creation. Genesis 3. When God was creating everything, he created humans. He created humans to be different. Okay, in a different way, he created us. And in that way, we actually see that we are made in the image of the creator. In the image of the creator. We were made. Guys, how loving is that? We love because Christ first loved us. But even before Christ died on the cross, God's love was still made known to us in creation. That we might bear his image. In creation and in the redemption of humanity, the love of Christ is plastered across history. We walk in love because he first loved us. Okay, let's keep reading. Paul's gonna give us some practical ways to walk in love. How we can walk in love. Here's what chapter 5, verse 3 says. But sexual immorality and any impurity or greed should not even be heard of among you, as is proper for saints. Golly, what a s what a verse right there. Verse 4. Obscene and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks. For no one recognizes 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. Or he gives us ways for us to walk in love. That might be scary for some of us. A lot of, you know, very scary condemning words. Judgment right there in that sentence. Okay, but it's not what it seems. He gives us specific ways that we can walk in love. I'll give you three right here. Here's the first one. You can watch your tongue. You want to love others well. Watch your tongue. Paul makes this so clear for us. Verse 4. Obscene and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks. Okay, guys, I love a good joke. I do, right? As much as the next guy down the line, I do love jokes. But ultimately, guys, we gotta watch the way that we talk about people. More importantly, how we joke with people. Okay. Last week we kind of talked about unity among our people, unity within our community. And the fastest way to break that unity, I think, could be by making a joke. Seriously. Like making uh guys, like I said, I love joking, okay? Making an an improper, a crude, foolish joke could be one of the easiest ways to do that. People's hearts are tender, okay? Our words have weight. You want to hear more about this? Drake taught a great sermon. Want to really be cautious and love people with how you are using your words. Back in James, Drake preached a phenomenal sermon, better than I'll ever preach, on how we can control our tongue. Okay. But guys, growing up, this was my weakness. Okay, watching my tongue, weakness. I'm I'm kind of good at it now. I can like you know have some self-control. But growing up, guys, I would just let it fly. Like, seriously, it doesn't matter who it is, I'm letting it fly. Okay. I had no uh like social awareness. It was like girls, guys, sisters, uh, friends, whatever it was, I'm like saying it, and I kind of wanted to be the jokester, okay? I really did. But it was bad. I would literally sit in my bed sometimes, and I'm like, after I like screwed up, I'd be like, okay, can we just go like one week without getting in trouble for something I said? But guys, this is really something that I had to like work on and really pay attention to what I was saying. But we need to watch our tongue for crude joking, man, for foolish talking amongst ourselves. We can ask ourselves just a couple of questions before we say it. Like, man, is this life-giving? Is this gonna be life-giving for someone? Sometimes, man, a joke is. One of my best friends back in Michigan, we would just joke with each other. I don't think we've ever had a serious conversation in our life. And he's like, My best friend, he's sitting at my wedding. I think that for some people that can be life-giving. Man, is it kind? How can it be insensitive to someone in the situation that they're in? Right? I think if we just thought a little bit more before we talked, before we washed our tongue, that our world would be a lot better. Okay, next, here's what we can watch. We can watch our eyes. We can go back in verse 5. For know and recognize this every sexually immoral or impure or greedy person who is an idolater does not have inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Guys, both guys and girls in the room, I'm talking to you all right now. Right, when we're at the gym, when we're at the pool, across campus, guys, where do our eyes go? Right when we jet when we dress in those places, whose eyes are we attracting? Or what are we looking for? Who are we trying to look at us? Because I think that some of us, some of the places that our eyes tend to wander in this world, we start to objectify the people that we look at. Objectify both sisters and brothers in Christ. We need to watch our eyes. One of the worst days at Michigan State's campus is when it's like, I went to Michigan State in college, one of the worst days, ask anyone who goes there, is when it's above 50 degrees and the UV is above two. Okay? Guys, we don't have the winners like you guys do, but it's like anytime there's just a glimmer of sunshine, like all of the girls on campus are out. Like any green space is a blanket and a girl and a bikini, the sororities, everything. It's like, it's kind of terrible, okay? But we would have to like run around campus, and it was brutal. I had to be like, man, keep me accountable because I need to like focus on this on this path right here. It's like, guys, what are we doing? Okay. I mean, we have we had to have like a conversation in our connection group of like, hey, when we walk around campus, are we fighting to like keep our eyes where they're supposed to be? Because, guys, it's it's not loving to objectify the brothers and sisters that are in this room at all. I mean, Paul, Paul is pretty clear and he doesn't give much grace for it here. He says that there's not even inheritance in the kingdom of God for those who are sexually immoral or impure. I think this is guys and girls both. It's not loving to view our brothers and sisters in this way. We need to watch our eyes. Okay, lastly, we need to watch our heart. Greed is included in this list. I think the best way to see if we're living a life that is loving is by looking at our heart, seeing what's inside of it. Okay, 1 Timothy 6.10 says this. It is the love of money, guys, or in this case, anything that's material. It covers a multitude of things. And the love that's in our sight. Is it does it matter more than our time in the Word? We need to watch our heart. Where when our heart yearns for this stuff, the the money, the car, the children, the family of our neighbor, more than it does its own time with Jesus. That's we can see greed in our own heart. You see, I mean the you know, the grades of the other person, the relationship that that this you know neighbor has. Okay, the car that your friend drives. Probably paid by their dad, so I wouldn't be too too greedy of that, right? But it's like, hey guys, can we look at our heart and see where our heart yearns for the things of this world more than it yearns for God? It says, Neither the sexually immoral, the few the foolish joker, nor the greedy have a place for them in the kingdom of heaven. A warning from Paul here. Seriously, something that we need to consider. Okay, let's continue. These next two, we're gonna go quick. Okay, you can look at me with verse eight of Ephesians 5. It says, For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. For the fruit of the light consists of all goodness, righteousness, and truth, testing what is pleasing to the Lord. Don't participate in the fruitless works of darkness, but instead expose them. Okay, we walk in a new direction. We walk in love, and now Paul is urging us to walk in the light. Walk in the light. Man, growing up, quick story here. Growing up, me, I I had four sisters. We were all homeschooled, okay, for a while. Yeah, I know. Shocker, crazy. Owen was homeschooled. Uh hey, anyone else homeschooled? Like, we're my people. Yes, come on, a couple people. More than I thought. Let's go. Homeschool people. You these you guys are my people. Let's go. Anyway, homeschool class thing, me and my four sisters, and we've got um, you know, a president, or not president, a principal and teacher, Mrs. Heward up there. And and I'm like fairly honest, I don't remember much, but I do remember that we were in the unit of history where we were some for some reason talking about Helen Keller, okay? I don't know why. We were learning about Helen Keller for just a little bit. Okay. But I remember at this time, my sister, just older than me, her name's Grace. I probably shouldn't have said that. Not now, you're gonna, you know, whatever. Uh, this is an embarrassing story on Grace. I didn't not ask her if I didn't say this, by the way. Uh anyway, Grace. Uh she's like, I want to act like Helen Keller. Don't know why. Okay, don't know why. So what do we do? And it's like we literally get one of my dad's ties from his thing, we tie it around her, and we're just like, she's pretending to be Helen Keller around the house, okay? She's like walking around and stuff like she's blind, pretty much. Okay, I don't know if that's like, you know, insensitive or whatever, but she's literally walking around. For some reason, she just starts running and then just goes full mop four into like a wall or something, into wall, double doors, whatever it is. I can't remember. I was young, guys. But I do know that she ran into a wall and chaos ensued, okay? She comes out like a day or two later. Man, she's got a black eye. When she goes out, people are like, like, okay, Mrs. Hoover, what kind of homeschool are you running here? Like, your daughter has a black eye, people are asking questions, like, what are we doing? Okay. But anyway, right, my sister walking around with a tie around her eyes. I mean, she's walking in the darkness. What happened? She ended up with a black eye, okay? If any of you ever meet Grace, do not bring that up to her. But I mean, she was walking and living in the darkness. Guess how that worked out for her? She tried to tackle a door, okay? It did not work out. Living in the darkness is hard. It's not until she stepped into the light that she could see and walk around normally. Guys, it's when we live our lives in darkness, that's when sin thrives. When we live in darkness, sin thrives. It grows there, it becomes stronger, it takes a hold of our lives to the point where sin becomes natural for us, it becomes normal. Makes me think back to how the Gentiles were just living. All right, Paul says they live with a callused heart. They've become numb to sin. Man, I know we got some lifters in here. You know, calluses are good. For lifters, like on the hand, it protects the hands from the hard work that it's doing. Okay? Anyone who works in construction, I'm sure they've got calluses. Calluses are good for hands. They are terrible for the heart. Terrible for the heart. Because it's when we have a callus over our heart, is when we become numb to sin. It's like that reel that Zach got posted when he was preaching at a conference. Okay? When the cross becomes distant, sin becomes normal. Or when the blood becomes, I don't know, something like that. I don't know, I didn't write it down. But something like that. Right? Here's two things that we can know about living in the light. Okay, here's the first thing is that you're forgiven. When we're living in the light, remember that you are forgiven. That there is no sin that God does not know about. The hookah that you just did last weekend. Okay? The one night sin that you regret, the sin that you never thought anyone is ever gonna know. Okay? The gossip that you that you engage with about your professor. Any sin that you've already committed, that you're gonna commit, you've been forgiven for it. Romans 8:1. There's there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. You can have it now. Right now, in 2026, April 23rd, there is therefore now no condemnation. Your sin has been paid for. I know the fear of waking up and thinking, oh my gosh, I bet God doesn't love me as much as he did last night because of this thing that I did. Here's something that I have to tell myself every day. I heard Mark Vance say, he's one of the pastors in our in our network. Man, when it feels like God loves you a two out of ten, he actually loves you a ten out of ten. God's love for you does not change no matter what you do, no matter what what you're gonna do. Whenever it feels like it's a two out of ten, it's actually a ten out of ten. Okay, second thing is this that there's freedom in confession. Freedom in confession. Confession to both God, but also to the Christians, to the people who are around us. Right? Knowing that God loves us 100% of the time, 100% of the time. This frees us up to openly confess both to Him and to the people around us. Here's what James 5 says It says, therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is very powerful in its effect. Drake touched on this just this past Sunday. It was true on Sunday, it's still true on Thursday. Important note here about confession and about what we just saw in James 5 is that we don't confess our sins to be saved, but we do confess our sins to be healed. We confess the sin in your life with the people around you, the people that know you, the people that you trust. You are peeling back the callous on your heart. You're making room for the grace and mercy of God to heal you. Confession may feel like judgment, but in reality, it's mercy. It's God's kindness reigning as supreme over our hearts in every single area. We are forgiven. And there's freedom in confession. Okay, last point. We're gonna read it in verse 15. Pay careful attention then to how you walk. Another walk. Not as unwise people, but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil. So don't be foolish. Don't understand, or but, not don't, but understand what the Lord's will is. Here's the last way that we can walk worthy of the calling that we have received is by walking in wisdom. Walking in wisdom. It means paying attention to the life that we have left. Okay? Now I can understand who I'm preaching to right now. A room full of fairly young people, 18 and 22, okay? Some of you guys are still 18. That's that's like nuts to me. Okay. But I'd imagine that most of you guys aren't just going on on your day-to-day basis thinking about like death or like, man, what like my life here is almost over. It's okay. It doesn't feel like it is, but in the grand scheme of reality, kind of is, okay? But I'm imagining that you guys aren't just lit like thinking about this day to day, okay, on the daily basis. If you are, we should talk after service. But in a healthy way, Ephesians 5, man, it brings up death. It brings up eternity, it makes us feel something about the time that we have left. It gives us a healthy reminder for what we live for and ultimately this truth that we live to die. That we live to die. This might sound strange to some of you, but as Christians, man, we are living for the day that we might stand face to face with our Savior in heaven. That is what we are living for. Most people are like living to just maximize this life. Man, how can I live to 120? Okay? Like, I mean, I'm gonna unplug my Wi-Fi at life, no microplastics. I'm not like, you know, doing any of that stuff. I'm living to 120. I'm taking every single supplement that I can. I don't want to live to 120. Seriously, I don't. Okay? You're not gonna catch me doing that. But that doesn't mean that we just neglect the time that we have here on earth, okay? Paul says in Philippians, to live is Christ and to die is gain. Okay? There is still purpose in our days here on earth. We should walk in wisdom, making the most of the time. He's talking about eternity here. He's saying that living in wisdom looks like having a sense of time management. Okay, that's like exactly what all of you guys want to hear about. Man, how should college students spend their time? That's exactly why you guys walked into this room tonight. Okay, here. Hear me though. I'm not talking about your day today. Okay, I'm not talking about what you're gonna do tomorrow, how you can manage your time right now well, right, in in the next day, day and a half, whatever. Certainly, those are things that you should think about, okay? Guys, Google Calendar is your friend. You should make a plan for your week. You should um, you know, make time for the Lord every single day. Guys, you're in college, you should go to class, make priority for those things. But what I want you guys to see here, and what Paul ultimately wants to see here, is one thing, and that's eternity. Eternity. He wants you to get past the physical life and into the spiritual, into the next. That what we do here on earth, right now, in 2026, matters for the rest of eternity. How you spend your next four years in the Lord within the next 40 years, that it's gonna matter for eternity. It has eternal effects, okay? I know that one day, right, I'm gonna have to stand you know in the throne. I'm gonna have to stand before God. And I'm gonna have to give an account for how you know I live my life here on earth, not in judgment. Not in fear of judgment of, oh my gosh, is God gonna accept the years that I have? That you're how I live my life. I don't have a fear over that because Christ has already paid that. But I'm still gonna have to give you know an account for it. And by golly, I don't want to have any doubt in my mind that when God looks at me, that's not something along the lines of well done. Good and faithful servant. That's not somewhere along those lines. I don't want to leave room for doubt. I hope that you guys wouldn't either. Okay? I hope that you guys live till you're 80. You know, and you have great lives. The way that, you know, the the life uh expectancy is going, probably not gonna be most of us, okay? 50, 60, maybe 70 at best for some of you guys. But guys, I hope, I hope, as as we're leaving here tonight, okay, as we're leaving here tonight, that we would have eternity on our mind. That we would have, okay, we can bring back, that we have eternity on our mind tonight. That the conversations that we have right now for the rest of our life, the conversations that we, that almost almost a throwaway, right? When we're going in the grocery store and we're in the checkout line, the person behind us, the cashier that's checking out, when we're walking in the park, and there's the old lady that that stops you and asks you, man, what's, you know, what's that, what's the salt company on your sweatshirt? It's those, it's those interactions, the small conversations that actually have eternal effects. Who we marry, you know, what job we take after college, the kids that we're gonna raise, they all have eternal effects. The words that we speak to them, are they gonna be of life or of death? Or in other words, are you gonna are you gonna share the gospel with them? Are you gonna cower away? Guys, Paul makes a case that we should have eternity in mind every single day from here on out. I hope that you guys would too. Okay, as we close tonight, I want to leave you guys with one last encouragement. I know we've we're kind of we're kind of running with running with it. You guys, I want to leave you with one encouragement tonight. I understand that there's a lot of verbs here, okay, in what we just read. A lot of do this, a lot of don't do this, walk this way, don't walk this way, live this way. A lot of verbs, and that can that can feel weighty for a lot of people. Going here is like, oh my gosh, I gotta change a lot in my life. Okay, there's certainly a good amount of conviction that you should feel over how you're living your life. But I want to I want to leave you with an encouragement and not feel like you're leaving here dreaded. What Paul and ultimately what the Holy Spirit is calling us to live here is he's he's living us to call or to walk worthy, not to walk perfectly. We have a call to walk worthy, not to walk perfectly. Because there is there is a burden to feel like, man, we've got to do it. We've got to actually be the Christians now. This is exactly what Ephesians 4, uh, like the rest of Ephesians is about. How we can walk as Christians. There's important that we don't we actually don't have to feel that weight. We have the freedom now to walk worthy because we don't have to walk perfectly. There is already one man who has already walked perfectly for you. Right? That man's name is Jesus.

unknown 40:03

Right?

SPEAKER_00 40:03

He walked perfectly from the throne of heaven, from the right hand of the throne of God, all the way down. He humbled himself to walk amongst us. He walked for 30-some years of his life, obedient in every way, as a carpenter, living his life per like perfectly, being faithful in every single area, even when he wasn't doing ministry. He was living perfectly, walking perfectly, yes, worthy, but also perfectly, and then most importantly, he walked perfectly. From a place in Jerusalem, carrying a cross all the way out to Calvary, to where he would get up on that cross for both you and for me, so that we don't have to walk perfectly. That for all the imperfections, all the ways that we're not gonna live up to what to what Ephesians 4 and 5 say, to the entire book of Leviticus, the way that we're not gonna live up to that. That's the way that he walked. The invitation is open to you tonight. I pray that you would take it and that you would walk worthy of the calling that we have received, not perfectly in his steps, but worthy in his steps. God, let's pray and we'll worship some more. For this room, for the semester that we've had this spring, and just thinking back to the fall, Lord, I'm so grateful for you know how you've gone before us. Every single week we're able to gather and worship only one name, and that's your name, the name of Jesus. The one who has already walked perfectly in every single way that we were unable to walk. Lord, I pray that you would just open up our hearts tonight. Would Lord, would you, would the Holy Spirit just peel away the callousness of our hearts? The sin that might be in our life. And Lord, would we just feel the sting of scripture, the sting of conviction from you? Lord, it doesn't feel good, but Lord, we know that it's for our own good. God, pray that people would leave from this room and that there would be change. That their friends, their family, the people that they go back to in the summer, that they would go back and be unrecognizable, that people would ask questions. What happened? What happened at UNT? What happened at Texas Women's? And Lord, would they respond in boldness? Would they respond with the gospel? Would they have eternity in mind? That they would be a witness to those people, that they would be an ambassador for Christ, to the friends, the family, the people that they interact with daily. God, I pray that you would use our changed hearts to change the hearts of thousands more, of everyone more, of nations, of cities, of states here in Texas, in America, everywhere. God, I pray that your spirit would go before us. Pray all this evening. Amen.