Walk Differently

Ephesians 4:17-32 - Ephesians Part 2 – A different Walk The Christian Church – May 31, 2020 Doug Partin My mother found an old picture album that her mother had put together of photos from when she was a young lady. I had never seen these pictures of my grandmother before, so my niece texted several of them to me. I especially liked the one where she was posing in front of a horse with her future husband on its back. I’ve been told that if you look at any photograph of people from before world war two, they will all have one thing in common. The people will seem slimmer and fitter than the average person of today. It wasn’t the cameras they used. Cameras tend to make people look like they’ve gained a few pounds. And it wasn’t just because they were in the prime of their lives, there are lots of photos of people who were well past their prime who look the same. What was the secret to their fitness? What was it that people did back then, that we don’t do as much of today? The answer is simple. They walked. Up until the Second World War, walking was the most common means of getting from one place to another. If you needed to buy something, you walked to the store. If you needed to visit the nearest neighbor (who might live a few miles away), you walked. You walked to work, to school, to social gatherings, and you even walked to church. But since then, with the advent and availability of public transportation and personal automobiles, people walked less and less. Even though they ended up traveling further and further. We travel further distances today because we don’t have to walk. It is about 8 miles from White Rock to Los Alamos and I might drive back and forth two or three times a day. But if I had to walk, I might not go that far even once a day. Since we don’t have to walk, we don’t think twice about driving to Albuquerque to go shopping for the day, and that’s about a hundred miles away. And many of us would rather drive up, than walk into a store or restaurant. At least, that is, when we didn’t have to worry about spreading a contagious disease. In Amish communities, which held on to that older lifestyle, they still average about 18,000 steps a day, because they tend to walk everywhere, except for those longer distances and then they use a horse and buggy; and yes, they tend to look slimmer. On average, the rest of us tend to take less than 4,000 steps a day, unless you are intentionally doing something to raise that step count. And those who do, also tend to look slimmer as well. Walking is not only good for us, but we were created to walk; but, when Paul told the believers in ancient Ephesus to “walk,” the “you” was a plural. He was not talking to an individual, but to a church. They were, as we learned last week, supposed to walk as one. They were not a bunch of individuals all doing their own thing, walking their own way, going their own directions. They were supposed to think of themselves as one body, moving together. Many parts, one body. There is a long history in the comic world of individual robots that form together to make one megabot that is able to do more together than any one of them can do on their own; like Voltron; which had fifteen members divided into three teams of five. Each team having their own specialty. But, as you might imagine, their strength was also their weakness, because there were times when they struggled to coordinate and cooperate. Times when self-interest outweighed their commitment to being a part of something larger than themselves. But even without that modern-day illustration, Paul made it clear that it was only by working together that the “one body” of the Church could walk as it was created to do. He made it clear that it would take all of them, with all of their variety of gifts that fit together as God had designed them, to serve as one. Ask any sports medicine professional and they’ll confirm that every system (muscle, skeletal, vascular, nervous, and all the others…) have to work together for something so simple as walking to happen. We may not think about what it takes to walk; but, as we learned last week, there was a time in our lives when we had to learn how to take that first step. But Paul wasn’t talking to these ancient believers about getting from one place to another. He wasn’t talking about the health benefits of walking, he was talking about living life together. Walking was just the metaphor he used. He also made it very clear that when there is a problem with one of our body parts, it can make walking difficult, if not impossible. There is the myth that if you are missing a big toe, you can’t walk. And while a nine toed gait is less efficient, you can still get from one place to another. And, with the help of modern prosthetics, there are some people who are missing a whole foot who have learned to get along quite well. But even with a good prosthetic, you don’t have the same balance, strength and ability as those who don’t need one. Unlike a physical body, whose problems related to walking might stem from an injury or disease or lack of use. The problems related to a church living life as one results from our choices. Not just our individual choices, but those that we make as a group. Evidently the Gentiles, because of their lack of understanding about what constituted a good choice, walked poorly as a group. Paul said that they walked “in the futility of their mind.” The term translated “futility” meant to squeeze something again and again. Where this might mold clay, it would have no impact on a rock, so it was a useless behavior. We’d say that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity. And in this sense, the Gentiles were. It is not that the Gentiles lacked intellect. They made a great many “discoveries.” But their thinking about how to live life, no matter how much they did so, would never came up with anything useful compared to what God had already revealed. What understanding they did have was, according to Paul, “darkened.” That is, it was shaded. The truth of God is often compared to light which reveals, but if that light is shaded, colored, or even blocked, you simply can’t see things as well, if at all. And they could not understand as God’s people did, because their choices had shaded the truth. No one, Jesus said lights a lamp and puts it under a basket, but places it where the light can illuminate the whole room. The Gentiles were, Paul said, because of these problems, “excluded” from the life of God because of the “ignorance” that was in them. The term for “excluded” means to be a “distant stranger.” It is not that God was keeping them out. They had moved away from God, they wanted to distant themselves from God, and as a result, over time, they had become ignorant of Him and His ways all together. And as a result, their hearts were hard. A soft heart is one that loves as God loves; that longs to do to others as they want to be treated. A hard heart shies away from compassion, and seeks after its own interests. They had become hard hearted, because, generation after generation they moved further and further away from God. This probably began with an individual, but that person influenced their family and friends; which would, in time, influence their tribe, and eventually their nation. These nations, and that is all Gentile means, ended up so far removed from God that they simply didn’t know anything about Him or His ways. They had made up replacements for Him based on their own ideas of right and wrong, and their own ideas of what a “god” ought to be or do. But it didn’t help. And since these people tended to look out for themselves at the expense of others. They might seem nice enough, most of the time, until they were asked to do something for another, especially a stranger, that might endanger themselves. Their refusing to help would seem “hard hearted” by the person needing that help. It was only because of God’s directions that the Israelites left the corner of the fields for the poor, and took up alms to help those in need. You didn’t find that sort of thing in the other nations. Hard hearted is how many in Jesus’ day felt about the Pharisees. They knew God, and loved His word, but they had made choices that led them away from living by it. Jesus said that their hearts were far from God, that their hearts were hardened because of their legalism. Refusing to help a person because it might break their understanding of the Sabbath laws; or because of their self-importance, like what happened in the story of the Good Samaritan. It is not so obvious in English; but Paul used some interesting words in describing how this separation from God led them to embrace “sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” The term translated “sensuality” is a compound word. The first part meant “the opposite of” and the second part meant “contentment.” So, it was the lack of contentment that lead them to acts that were (akatharsias) another compound word, which meant “the opposite of cleanliness.” These unclean acts never satisfied them, so they were left wanting more and more. No one wants to be ruled by a feeling of discontent. You are always seeking after more of the things that cannot satisfy which only makes the problem worse. And that is where you will be if you don’t know God’s ways. Paul reminded the believers in Ephesus that they did not learn to walk that kind of way from Christ. As He told the believers in Philippi, upon reflecting upon all the various situations in which he lived – times when he had a lot and times when he had not enough - “I have strength for every situation through Him who empowers me.” Paul said that if these believers in ancient Ephesus had really “heard” what Jesus had to say about living life together, then they would have let go of their old selves, their old ways, with its discontentment; which was corrupted by deceitful desires that seek more and more; and they would have renewed their minds with God’s way of understanding themselves and the world around them. They would have put on their new self, which was, according to Paul, being made better and better by the truth; by what God said was the right and best way of meeting our desires. It was for this reason that Paul told them to lay aside all falsehood, all the lies we are told about how the old way is better, and speak the truth to one another. We need to remind each other that trying to meet our needs as the world suggests is never a good thing. It will never, can never lead to the contentment that our soul seeks. And it would also keep them from walking together as one. I had a professor what put together a chart listing all the spiritual gifts, their definitions, what a person using them could add to the life of a church, and the problems that a person might encounter that kept them from using them for the church. Next to every gift, in this column, was pride and selfishness.         Paul ended this chapter with several examples of the kinds of changes they needed to make in order to walk as one. Things from the old way of living they needed to leave behind. I could probably preach a sermon on each of these, but, don’t worry, I won’t. 1. They were to be angry, but not sin. Anger has its place. Jesus drove out the money changes from the space that was supposed to be dedicated to prayer. The sun did not go down on his anger, he expressed it. But He did not hold onto it. He loved those money changers and gave His life as a sacrifice for their sins. 2. They were to stop stealing and work. And what they earned from working they were not only to use for themselves but to share part of it with whose who were in need. 3. They were to guard the words that came out of their mouths. Not only the unwholesome vocabulary but their unwholesome thoughts that brought forth the words. Remember how Jesus said that when you call a brother a fool you are in danger of condemning yourself? That it wasn’t just avoiding murder or adultery, but the thoughts that led up to those acts. 4. They were to use words that built each other up, and which extended grace to one another. Because that was how they really felt about one another, and what they wanted to do. 5. They were to stop doing the things that grieved the Holy Spirit, which were expressions of bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, slander and malice. 6. Instead, they were to be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another. Even as Christ had forgiven them.         Can you imagine a church trying to walk as one that had never given up their old ways? Or even one in which some had not done so? They would walk like a cripple. Since Christ is the head of the church, the mind would be sending the right signal, but only some of the muscles, nerves, bones, etc… would respond as they should; and the others would prevent them from doing so. I don’t want our church to limp along, but to walk as we were created to walk. And if you were wondering about our “destination,” we’ll find as we move into the next chapter that our goal is to look like our Heavenly Father, imitating Him, expressing love to one another and to the world He created. We are to live life together, expressing His love in all that we do. Prayer: May we, together, walk as one who is healthy, happy, and holy. Amen.