5.15.45 10.7.2018 Ephesians 5.21-6.9 Building Strong Relationships

Robert C. Beckman Jr.

Engaging the empire • Sermon • Submitted 6 years ago

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Entice: We might be in the worst relational environment in the modern era. The politics of identity is gutting our nation and its effects are felt throughout the world.

• Entice: We might be in the worst relational environment in the modern era. The politics of identity is gutting our nation and its effects are felt throughout the world.

Engage: Let's reflect for a moment. Your spouse, your parents & kids…your boss. These are defining relationships for virtually every human being. They touch on our existence as sexual, social, and economic beings. As Christians we see the root of these issues as matters of universal, created identity. God made us this way.

• Engage: Let's reflect for a moment. Your spouse, your parents & kids…your boss. These are defining relationships for virtually every human being. They touch on

our existence as sexual, social, and economic beings. As Christians we see the root of these issues as matters of universal, created identity. God made us this way.

Expand: From Eden on we have been seeking to repair relationships that were broken by the fall. Our relationship to this world and our work within it was altered. Everything from chattel-slavery, wage-slavery, and selfish management is colored by the fall. The relationship between kids and their folks has been altered by the fall. (Aside..exactly where were Adam and Eve when Cain was beating Able to death?) Even the battle between the sexes began with he-said, she-said before the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

• Expand: From Eden on we have been seeking to repair relationships that were broken by the fall. Our relationship to this world and our work within it was altered.

Everything from chattel-slavery, wage-slavery, and selfish management is colored by the fall. The relationship between kids and their folks has been altered by the

fall. (Aside..exactly where were Adam and Eve when Cain was beating Able to death?) Even the battle between the sexes began with he-said, she-said before the

Excite: We cannot fix broken marriages, families, or workplaces by better plans, clearer direction, or stubborn assertiveness. Humility is the balm applied by those who follow Jesus. God has a design. It may not be popular or culturally acceptable but it works.

tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

• Excite: We cannot fix broken marriages, families, or workplaces by better plans, clearer direction, or stubborn assertiveness. Humility is the balm applied by those

Ephesians 5:21 ESV

21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

who follow Jesus. God has a design. It may not be popular or culturally acceptable but it works.

•

Explore:

• Explore: God's design for relationships is mutual submission within the structure of creation and the context of culture.

God's design for relationships is mutual submission within the structure of creation and the context of culture.

It works everywhere for everybody

• Explain: Each relationship shares the same basic design…

Explain: Each relationship shares the same basic design…

▾ Body of Sermon:

1 Husbands & Wives

▾ 1 Husbands & Wives

Ephesians 5:22–33 ESV

22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

1.1 Equal but distinct Responsibility.

1.2 Equal but distinct Responsibility.

• Submit to your own husband

• Love your own wife.

1.2 Spiritual Mandate.

▾ 1.3 Spiritual Mandate.

• Man is the head of the home like Jesus is the head of the Church

• Woman is subordinate to man as the Church is to Jesus▾ 1.4 Biblical Precedent.

• Woman is subordinate to man as the Church is to Jesus.

▾ 1.4 Biblical Precedent.

1.3 Biblical Precedent.

• In marriage a separate home is created when man and wife leave the authority of their individual homes.

▾ 2 Parents & Children.

2 Parents & Children.

Ephesians 6:1–4 ESV

1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” 4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

2.1

▾ 2.2 Equal but distinct Responsibility.

2.1 Equal but distinct Responsibility.

• Children obey your parents...

• Parents do not provoke, exasperate, or bait your children.

▾ 2.3 Spiritual Mandate.

2.2 Spiritual Mandate.

• 2.3.1 It is the right thing to do

• It is the right thing to do

▾ 2.4 Biblical Precedent.

2.3 Biblical Precedent.

• In the law this is the first commandment with a promise.

▾ 3 Bosses & Workers.

3 Bosses & Workers.

(We are talking economically. In the Hellenistic world slaves were in effect the only kind of employee that existed)

3.1

Ephesians 6:5–9 ESV

5 Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, 6 not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, 7 rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man, 8 knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he is a bondservant or is free. 9 Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

▾ 3.2 Equal but distinct Responsibility.

3.1 Equal but distinct Responsibility.

• Workers obey bosses. (We are talking in economically. In the Hellenistic world slaves were in effect the only kind of employee that existed)

• Workers obey bosses.

• Bosses Do not bully, belittle, or be unjust.

▾ 3.3 Spiritual Mandate.

3.2 Spiritual Mandate.

• Work like all work is for Christ.

• Don't work only for attention.

▾ 3.4 Biblical Precedent

3.3 Biblical Precedent

• There is no partiality with God…

▾ Will it Preach?

Will it Preach?

• When I read a text like this, and prepare a sermon like this it is challenging. Not much about conversion. There are some almost poetic passages in the section

• When I read a text like this, and prepare a sermon like this it is challenging. Not much about conversion. There are some almost poetic passages in the section about marriage but nothing prophetic. This passage speaks to those already saved. You can uses these words to teach, to correct, to encourage-but does it really preach?

about marriage but nothing prophetic. This passage speaks to those already saved. You can uses these words to teach, to correct, to encourage-but do the really

Does. It. Preach?

preach? Do. They. Preach?

YES

• Every person I have ever met is a child. Most are parents. We all do something to make a living. My guess that there are a lot of people in coal mines and Oil fields that think of themselves in terms of slavery. Just about all of us are married. Marriage is one of the great playgrounds for our current cultural fist-fight.

• Every person I have ever met is a child. Most are parents. We all do something to make a living. My guess that there are a lot of people in coal mines and Oil fields

• Will it preach! Are you kidding me? Does anything else REALLY preach? Does anything else resonate in our fallen world so much as God's design for relationships?

that think of themselves in terms of slavery. Just about all of us are married. Marriage is one of the great playgrounds for our current cultural fist-fight. Will it preach!

Does anything else REALLY preach? Does anything resonate in our fallen world so much as God's design for relationships?

• Maybe you are from a broken home. These words speak to heal and encourage you. Perhaps you have been in an abusive employment situation. These words speak to heal and encourage you. Maybe you have been the rebellious child, or the antagonistic parent-maybe you've been both. These words speak healing to these relationships as well.

• Maybe you are from a broken home. These words speak to heal and encourage you. Perhaps you have been in an abusive employment situation. These words

speak to heal and encourage you. Maybe you have been the rebellious child, or the antagonistic parent-maybe you've been both. These words speak healing to

• We are human's in relationships with other humans and the Gospel of Jesus Christ addresses us all with the power, majesty, simplicity, practicality, needed to fix what is broken and set us on the proper course.

these relationships as well.

• We are human's in relationships with other humans and the Gospel of Jesus Christ addresses us all with the power, majesty, simplicity, practicality, needed to fix