March 12, 2023 Lent 3
Lent 3
Ephesians 5:1-9
March 12, 2023
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Good is good and bad is bad, right? It’s that easy, right? Everyone knows what’s good. Everyone knows what’s bad, right? It’s so simple and easy, right? We never get them mixed up at all, right? You know what’s good. You know what’s bad. And everyone agrees with you, right?
Wrong. Let me give you the biggest case in point ever. Jesus is good, right? Can we all agree? Yes, He is the best of the best, absolutely good, Son of God. He is good. Period. And everybody, then, knew He was good, right? No. In the Gospel today they actually call Jesus a demon. That’s right. They say He’s in league with Satan. That’s how He’s doing all these miracles, they say. So there you go! That’s how crazy screwed up we people can get about what’s good and what’s bad. They call the best person ever, Jesus, evil. This isn’t as simple and easy as we think, friends!
In fact, we consistently get good and evil screwed up and mixed around. I can’t think of a better example right now than what our state of IL is doing in regard to abortion. Our Governor and our legislatures want to expand abortion as much as possible and, at the same time, they’re trying to pass legislation to effectively shut down pregnancy centers. So look here! Killing babies is called the good. Helping mothers and babies to live and thrive is called bad! And all with a straight face!
But before you get in a huff over our culture, which is worth getting in a huff over, let me remind you that you and I are just as bad at mixing up good and evil. It’s not nearly as easy to distinguish them as you think it is. How often we pass off greed as a good thing; how often we justify selfishness and laziness; how we excuse our anger and bitterness; how often we gorge ourselves and drink too much and then laugh it off as a big joke; how often we worship the world and all its stuff and pretend that God is pleased with all our shopping.
So now take to heart Ephesians chapter 5 today. Go through it with me and take to heart Paul’s words. He wants to clearly, clearly, clearly show you the good from the bad, the good path from the bad path, the right way to walk from the wrong way to walk. Look here, before we go through this text together, take a moment to picture these two paths of walking that Paul is describing. The bad, he says, is walking a path of darkness. The good, he says, is walking a path of love and light.
Now let’s get a good picture in our mind here. The path of love and light in Jesus, he also says, is a fragrant and pleasing smell to God. So you picture some place that you love to be where the sun is shining and there’s a warm, comforting smell in the air. Where is it? How about walking the beach on a sunny, warm day with the smell of the ocean? How about walking amongst the fragrant flowers on a bright, warm day? How about a shiny, hot day next to the sweet smell of the grill? You know what I can’t wait for? (I already talked to Bob about this and we agreed.) I can’t wait for a bright, warm day sitting on the mower with the smell of the cut grass. I loved the smell of freshly cut alfalfa hay when I was a kid when you were riding in the sun on the tractor.
Now you get that warm, sweet-smelling path in your mind because that’s the path of the light and love of Jesus Christ. The path of sin is a pitch-black, cold, frightening path through hell. But the answer to finding that good and right path, that bright and warm path, is Jesus Christ! He’s the answer! He’s the good. Follow His love and follow His light and you’re in the way of the good and right and true!
Now let’s hit it. Hit the good path of Jesus. Ephesians 5:1. “Brethren, be imitators of God, as beloved children. Walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” The word imitate in the Greek is “mimic”. Mimic God. He walks in love and light. So you walk in love and light. Reflect Him. He’s the center of the universe. He’s the Sun. So He imparts His love to us and we mimic it. We reflect it.
Like a little puddle reflecting the sun and we see a rainbow. Or like that little tiny rainbow mimicking the great rainbow in the sky. So God and His love for us sits at the center of everything in the universe and we imitate His love by giving ourselves to others.
How do you know this good path? Each one of you—how do you know to walk in this good path of love? Because Jesus. That’s how. Jesus loved you, imitated His Father’s love, and gave Himself up for you, Paul says, a fragrant offering. Here’s where that sweet smell and aroma comes in. In the Old Testament sacrifices, over and over it talks about how they would produce a pleasing aroma to the Lord. So Jesus giving Himself for you in love on the cross produced the most pleasing aroma of all time to the Lord.
When you guys walk in the love of Jesus, on that bright, warm, sweet-smelling path of love, it brings a pleasing aroma to the Lord. He loves to see you, His beloved children, walking in that same love that He’s loved you with. When the Philippians sent Paul a gift of love, here’s what he said about it in Philippians 4:18, “I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God.” Your gifts and sacrifices of love to your neighbors are a pleasing aroma to the Lord, acceptable and pleasing.
But now God warns us of the other path, the path of darkness and stench and evil. The path of impure love—loving the things of the world rather than God. So Paul says, “But sexual immorality and all impurity and covetousness must not even be named among you.” I especially want to take you to verse 6 of this same point, “Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of the these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not associate with them; for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light.”
Now here we have this key problem that I started with – that we are so often deceived with empty words and we think that the evil is actually the good. The devil and the world lie to us and tell us that the path of darkness is actually the path of light. That’s how you get people actually calling Jesus evil. And you and I better pay attention because many evil things today are being called good.
On the inside page of the bulletin insert I put a list together by just going through Ephesians 4 and 5. On the left side is all the evil things Paul wants you to see are on the path of darkness. On the right is everything he mentions on the path of love and light. Now it seems pretty clear when you look at it light that, right? But let me give you some examples how evil gets passed off as good.
How about sexual immorality? Today our culture excuses nearly every kind of sexual sin with these empty words, “Well, love is love. It’s natural to love, right? You’ve got to follow your heart.” So we excuse everything – polygamy, adultery, living together before marriage, pornography, homosexuality. We celebrate it all with pride. Surely we can’t deny ourselves any pleasures, right? And so we call the evil path of darkness good.
And what about our greed and covetousness? Covetousness is that desire to have more and more and more. And we excuse that under words that sound good like business and investments and savings and retirement funds. People get paid very good money just to tell other people what to do with all of their extra money. And we justify it all as good business sense.
And we excuse all our crude and vulgar joking, our foolish and silly talk, our ranting about nothing, our gossiping about our neighbors and jokes at their expense—we excuse it all with, “Well, I just need to unwind, to let loose. It’s all just good fun. It doesn’t hurt anyone.” God doesn’t think it funny. Verse 4, “Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place and out of character.” You should be thankful.
Look at how easily we’re deceived about the evil path of darkness. But Paul brings us back. At one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord! Walk as children of light, for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true. If you want to know what’s good, what it means to walk on the good path, then you bring everything into the sun. Listen to what Jesus Himself says in John 12, “The one who walks in the darkness doesn’t know where he’s going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become children of light.”
Jesus has shone His light, the light of the world, into your hearts to give you faith and to drive away the darkness. Now you’re light. And you know you’re walking in His good path when you’re producing fruit that is good and right and true. Just like this spring the sun will shine and blossom into all kinds of good fruit on trees and plants, so the light of Christ shines into your hearts and blossoms into the good and right and true.
The good fruit is kind fruit. Being kind to one another, forgiving, tenderhearted. Bearing with one another in love and gentleness and humility. The right fruit is the fruit of justice and honesty and hard work, making the best use of time and doing the Lord’s will. The fruit of truth is always speaking the truth in love and being mature in Christ, not being tossed to and fro by every wind of false teaching.
Now we need to end today with a word I’ve been using a lot over the past few weeks – the word “fight”. Fight the good fight of faith. In this case today, you need to fight to stay on the good path of Jesus, the path of love and light. The world and the devil are working hard on you to convince you that darkness is actually light. To convince you that all kinds of evil are actually good. There are many evil things that are being called good today. I’ve already talked about many of them so I won’t list them all again. But beware and fight for what’s right. Make sure you’re walking in the path of Jesus where the sun is shining, where’s it warm, and where the smell is very pleasing. The path of love and light.
The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
