The Church & I: Conclusion (Eph 3: 14-21)

Snippet of Sermon by Rev Tan-Yeo Lay Suan

SERMON PROPER

John Stott summarized Paul's letter to the young church at Ephesus like this, “It portrays a new society of Christ's making that stands out in bright relief against our colourless world of oppression, heartache, separation and division. Paul's letter, with its exultant vision of a renewed human community.” 

FROM SELF TO COMMUNITY

I remembered that in the early years of my Christian life, I was very much aware only of myself and that I have become a Christian, How did I know? Well, my participation in worship, obedience and ministry had taken on a more serious note. Yet, on hindsight, I would say that my Christian life then was centered around myself. It looked to me that I was living for the transcendent glories of the kingdom of God when in fact I was but living for myself. Daily I was bowing before the throne of self, driven by anxiety-bound needs. A self-preoccupied Christian life: How God would meet MY needs… how God would show ME his will… how God would save me from MY difficulties and MY fears… It was all in earnest but that wasn’t what God had intended when he received me into his Kingdom.

Paul reminds us, “Be aware of our tendency to start our thinking with ourselves, our experience of God.” That’s exactly what happened to the Jews. Because they begin thinking with themselves, their vision about their role in God’s world became narrowed. Their vision was not large enough or broad enough to handle all the facts about God’s covenant with them. Consequently, they get twisted and deformed ideas about themselves and cling on only to a partial view of the truth. 

What is the truth? In the verses that follow, we are going to list down those blessings that have become ours because of what God has done in Jesus Christ. Notice that:

·         …he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. (Ephesians 1:4 RSV) We need to go back before the beginning of time, before the foundation of the universe, God had been at work.

·         He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:5-6 RSV)

PRIOR to our coming to receive Jesus, God had a plan all rolled out, to bring Gentiles into his family. In the past, only Jews were members of his family. He had a plan to adopt us as his sons through Jesus Christ, which we may become members of his family, partakers of his nature.

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace which he lavishes upon us. (Ephesians 1:7-8 RSV)

We were adopted through the redemptive price of the life of Jesus Christ. The barrier of our sin and guilt had been removed, utterly taken away…

For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. (Ephesians 1:9-10 RSV)

God has also taken us into his secret council and unfolded to us what he has planned to do, what he is going to accomplish in the future: to gather all things, those in heaven and on earth, together.

In him, according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will, we who first hoped in Christ have been destined and appointed to live for the praise of his glory. (Ephesians 1:11-12 RSV)

We have come into this state of blessedness, having been appointed to live for the praise of his glory. This appointment does not begin only when we go to heaven. In fact Paul says that we are involved with the “heavenlies” right now. These heavenlies, which occur throughout this letter and in other parts of Scripture, really refer to the realm of invisible reality, of things which are true about life in the world, in the cosmos, but which we can’t see or touch right now. And yet they are very real, and they play an important part in our lives now. Therefore, if we want to endure, if we want to live above the plodding, puny circumstances of our own present experience to the greatness of what God is doing, we must give our attention to these great thoughts —

· planned before the foundation of the world,

· begun even before there was an earth,

· we were designed to reveal the greatness of God’s grace, his compassion, his tenderhearted love, his forgiving ability, his power to restore,

· all these have been made available through the one Person who in all the scope of history is able to accomplish what no other man could do, Jesus Christ himself, and

· resulting at last in the healing of all division and the breaking down of every barrier.

We all have the tendency to think of ourselves as somewhat remote from the Church. Every now and then someone will come to me and say, "The Church ought to do so-and-so." Those who believe in the truth about the church will reply, "Well, you are the Church; go to it." The fact that they are the Church seems to strike them with a degree of amazement. Someone said to me not long ago, "The Church ought to be more friendly." I said, "All right, you and I are the Church, let's be more friendly."

The Church is the people within it. Every believer is a member of the Body of Christ---the Church. We cannot forget:

1. The invisible reality is continually affected by our responses. We contribute to the state of things which are true about life in the world, in the cosmos, but which we can’t see or touch right now.
2. God’s unfolding plan, Project “Restore” involves all of us. He planned it like that so that we can grow in our understanding of His grace and mercies and incredible power.

As we mature in Christ, He needs to increase and our own agendas and plans need to decrease. We move from thinking just our personal Christian lives and experiences to thinking corporate. We begin to avail ourselves to the service of the larger community and grow to be absorbed in the successful unfolding of the plan of God in this world. An isolated Christian life is missing out on the cosmic reality that God is working out his good and perfect plan in our world. Our sense of God’s reality is compromised when we adamantly refuse participation in the body, the church.

Reflection question: Are you a part of this scheme? Are you part of this family? Have you joined the family of God through Jesus Christ our Lord?

· New Humanity: We are so aware of division within our homes, our work environment, places where people are divided into cliques and camps and nations, all against one another, with all the consequent hurt and injury and malice and hate and prejudice. God’s great movement in our lives, as individuals, and in history at large, is to heal and make whole, to bring together all things in Christ, to restore harmony once again in his universe. God is at work to remedy that. He is healing it. He has already begun. He is breaking down the barriers, removing the hate and enmity, restoring and bringing together.

The exciting thing about that, according to this letter to the Ephesians, is that it has begun already. We, the church, have felt the force of this great movement of God in breaking down barriers and healing divisions. And the more visible it is, the more the world will see God at work. That is what this letter is all about — how to allow this healing flow from the great God behind all things, through his Son Jesus Christ, to touch our individual lives and heal us of all our illness and injury.

Reflection question: Are you on the Lord’s side? You can tell whose side you are on by the effect of your life. Are you gathering, or scattering? Are you healing, or hurting? Are you bringing together, or breaking up? Pen down the names of those who’s friendship and kinship in Christ you have buried, those whose friendships you have placed on hold, frozen in time because you’ve experienced something negative? Do you believe that God is an expert in reconciliation? Would you be willing to put yourself out on a limb to initiate friendship or rekindle a broken one?

Remember what Jesus said: “All those who are with me gather, and all those who are against me scatter,” (Matthew 12:30, Luke 11:23). We are not to think safety or self-preservation, but to stick in the community, in the thick of all that misunderstanding, all that hurt… and work towards a true reconciliation, sticking around for opportunities to know the truth about someone, to imitate Jesus’ accepting love, to forgive and start again. Self-preservation often dictates our decision to move away from Church: because my children will be or not be affected in this manner, for their preservation (and we are not talking about their Christian life and journey… but the preservation of their grades etc.), for the preservation of my marketing hours, for the preservation of my easy access to my car etc.

· New Morality: The life of members must be ONE with Christ, distinct, different, whole, belonging to God and, therefore, living differently. Holy is the description in the New Testament. They are not plaster like — so beatific, so holier-than-we, so unlike ordinary human beings. God expects us to approach and respond to our difficulties and challenges in a different way. Many of us cannot stop ourselves from quibbling with the thought of having to be with others in the church in order to grow in this new morality. Why? The church is imperfect and it may be better for me, for my children, to stay away from bad company, from all these insincere hypocrites. But surprisingly, God has assigned the Church as the primary place for imbibing God’s law and learning from brothers and sisters who obey the Lord, making decisions that at times, put them in a bad spot. In the church community, nobody has arrived… the inner moral changes take place over time as we stay in the same community…don’t run away at the first sight of someone who failed in obeying the Lord. To stay, is to trust the resurrection power of the Lord which alone makes possible the new life, new goals, new motivations… until we can will ONE will i.e. Christ’s. Old Hymn: Breathe on me Breath of God

1. Breathe on me, Breath of God, fill me with life anew, that I may love what thou dost love, and do what thou wouldst do.	2. Breathe on me, Breath of God, until my heart is pure, until with thee I will one will, to do and to endure.
3. Breathe on me, Breath of God, till I am wholly thine, till all this earthly part of me glows with thy fire divine.

· New Relationships: We submit ourselves to each other because of our identity in Christ. Our human insecurities experienced in the company of others cause us to resist being dominated by another. We press for our rights for fear that we would be short-changed. Yet, the way in which we are called to love is not the capricious, self-serving love of our time. The standard by which Christian love is shaped and energized is the self-giving love of Christ on the cross. So Paul is not talking about improving the way we tolerate these people in relationship with us. Rather he wants us to be rooted and established in love… to be filled to the measure of the fullness of God, to grasp how much we are loved by Christ, “you, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸ may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” This is not going to happen in a closet but in the church.

Someone says, "Where? I don't see him. What's he doing? Where do you see Jesus Christ at work in our society today? What kind of work is he doing?" The answer is, "He is doing exactly what he did in the days of his flesh." The only difference is that he is no longer doing it through one solitary, earthly, physical body. He is doing it now through a corporate, complex body known as the church, which exists around the world and permeates and penetrates every level of society. But it is the same exact ministry -- to the same race, under the same conditions, facing the same attitudes and the same problems as when he was here in the flesh. Now he does it through a different kind of body. We need badly to understand that concept, for that is the church.

· New Empowerment: Yes, we can stand firm immovable when we allow ourselves to be immersed in the Holy Spirit. "You don't make a pickle by taking a cucumber and sprinkling a little vinegar over it. You immerse it." --Harold J. Seymour. It is God that will make us one with Christ, to imbibe his values, to desire his goodness.

Let me finish by a picture, which will show you what I mean by whole-heartedness. I have seen boys bathing in a river in the morning. One of them has just dipped his toes in the water, and he cries out, as he shivers, "Oh, it's so cold!" Another has gone in up to his ankles, and he also declares that it is fearfully chilly. But see! another runs to the bank, and takes a header. He rises all in a glow. All his blood is circulating, and he cries "Delicious! What a beautiful morning! I am all in a glow. The water is splendid!" That is the boy for enjoying a bath!

Let’s desire to move away from jsut paddling about in the shallows of religion, and just dipping our toes into it—we will stand shivering in the cold air of the world which we are afraid to leave. We must plunge into the river of life! How it would brace us! Be a Christian, out and out. Give yourself wholly to him who bought you with his blood. Plunge into the sacred flood by grace, and you will exclaim—

Oh, this is life! Oh, this is joy,
My God, to find thee so!
Thy face to see, thy voice to hear,
And all thy love to know."

May we thus walk in newness of life!

The Church & I: New Morality (Eph 4:17-5:20)

Snippet of Sermon by Rev Helen Hoe

1) Its the thoughts that count

With Verse 17, Paul turns to the Christian in relationship to an unbelieving world that we live in.

This reference to the distinction between Jews and Gentiles, it refers to anyone who is outside of Christ. Paul is saying that "You Christians must no longer live as they do in the futility of their minds." The place to start in living as a Christian is to recognize that you must think differently than the world does.

Notice that Paul does not start with actions. He is not like the Pharisees who moves in and picks on the outward. He starts with the fundamental: our thought-life, the mind.

Paul declares that the world's thinking is futile, i.e., empty. This is the vital appeal that he makes to Christians, "You must not adopt the world's philosophy of living, or follow the world's systems of value." Why? "Because people of the world lives in futility. "

The word for futility, in the original Greek, means "void of purpose or appropriateness," i.e., pointless. J.B Philips, in his modern paraphrase puts it accurately: "Do not live as the gentiles live. For they live blindfold in a world of illusion," (Ephesians 4:17b-18a J. B. Philips).

Again this relates to a truth that we find widespread throughout the Scriptures: Man is ignorant because there is a part of his being that does not function. It is his spiritual life. His spirit is blank, darkened, obscured. As a result, all his knowledge is broken, unrelated, incomplete.

In other words, you must not live like the Gentiles because you need not. In Christ, you have a different principle of living, a different way of thinking.

The Apostle Paul here uses a very helpful figure in these two phrases, "put off" and "put on." If you have a soiled garment, you put it off and put on something new. He is using that to illustrate what we must do in the realm of thought, and attitudes of life.

Also include in the putting away are "deceitful desires." It does not mean only sexual desire, although it does include that. We will get closer to the essential meaning of this word if we use the term urge. These deceitful urges are constantly coming to us as we react to various situations in which we find ourselves.

For instance there is the urge to fulfill yourself by indulging in retail therapy, that’s the urge to make yourself happy by owning things. Such an urge is deceitful, as the Word of God tells us, for man was never made to be satisfied with owning things. Yet who of us does not daily experience this kind of an urge? We flip through the pages of a magazine and see the beautiful gadgets and remarkable gimmicks, and we feel an urge, don’t we. That’s why my sister said she has stopped buying Her World already.

Each day we are faced a decision, how then should we live?

Illustration

A pastor shared a conversation he had with a church member. The church member came to his office to talk about a problem. He was a Christian man and his problem was this: He had gone into business with some other Christian men and the business, through circumstances that were not wholly his own fault, had failed and he had to go into bankruptcy. Now he was facing the urge within to accept a position that he had before the law, that is write off his debts and let his creditors suffer the loss. He was facing the urge to take advantage of that. All his friends were telling him it was the thing to do and even his wife agreed to this. But his heart was troubled. He wondered if he had the moral right, as a Christian, to do this and to ask his creditors to bear the loss. 2 of them prayed and went through the Scriptures together. It became clear that he did not have that right. The Word of God says, "Owe no man anything, but to love one another" (Romans 13:8 KJV), and "Prove things honest in the sight of all men," (Romans 12:17 KJV). As he faced that he was confronted with a definite choice -- to put off the urge to take the apparently easy way out at the price of the peace of God within the heart. As we talked, he made that choice. He said, "I see what I need to do. I will accept this obligation to pay back those men. Not one of them will lose a dime over this business. It will take me some time, but I am going to pay them back." At that his face brightened and he looked at me and said, "What a load has been lifted from my life. I know this is going to be hard to do, and even my wife is not going to accept this, but already I have a sense of peace over this whole matter, and that's worth it all."

The Christian is called to live on a different basis. The decision you made depends very much on your thought life. Paul says in 2 Cor 2:5 “we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”---- to align our thoughts to that of what God approves. When we do that, we will discover there is an adequacy from God that sustains the inner life, in the midst of the problems and pressures and demands that are made upon us.

“To put off the old and put on the new”---seems easy, like changing clothes. Not exactly…

2) So what if I like the old garments

Illustration

A newly wed couple just tossed and turned during the wedding night. Finally they made a decision. They got up to change, they took off the new silky PJs that they bought for honeymoon and changed into those old nua nua tee shirt, wow so nice & comfy. Old clothes are super comfortable. We may think its so easy, and felt bad that we are still stuck with the old ways. The reality is this:…

a) First, recognize that there will be the pull of the old life on the Christian.

An article in the ST yesterday contains an interview with David Milch, the producer of a new HBO movie “Horse Play”, a drama on horse racing.  He used to be degenerate gambler, just like the character of the show and he honestly admits that the “itch” to do it will forever haunt him.  

Similarly, that old thought pattern, old lifestyle, you may be so used to it, and even quite like it. Know that you are not abnormal or a defeated Christian. Paul mentioned in 1:13 that we are sealed with the Holy Spirit with a view to our final salvation. So take heart, as we work out our salvation, we will arrive by God’s grace.  

b) Ya I not mature lor, so?

There is a whole list of behaviors mentioned in this part of the scripture: In your anger do not sin; Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you; Among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed…

The list goes on. If we understand these behaviors or exhortations as just a set of impersonal rules that we can keep or break with no consequences other than what happen to us, then we are oblivious to the fact that there are deep personal consequences in our relation with God.

Why should our sin grieve the HS? Because we worship a relational God.  The word “grieve” is a personal and relational verb. You can only grieve a close friend or a loved one. You can’t grieve a stranger you meet on the street. You can irritate a stranger and you can offend a casual acquaintance, but you can only grieve someone very close to you.

We tend to talk a lot about interpersonal problems, as if the greatest issue in life is how we relate to other people. But verse 30 reminds us that our primary relationship is always with God. And it is possible to grieve God’s Holy Spirit. On one hand, don’t feel defeated or that you are alone, press on. On the other hand, know that when you take sin lightly, when you live as though that was a matter of indifference, it is to wound God deeply. It’s not just rules.  

3) Choose the way you walk

Besides the phrase putting off and putting on, Paul used another word in the section 5:1-20 to signify our resolution to live differently---Walk.

Paul uses the word “walk” 6 times in this section of his letter. Everyone knows that a walk consists of two steps repeated over and over again. You never take more than two steps in walking, one leg forward then the other leg. But do that again and again and you are walking. This is an apt simile for how to live the Christian life. We are to be continually putting off the old and putting on the new. That is what Christian living is all about.

Look through many commentaries, they would divide this section into 3 parts:

a)      walk in love

b)      walk in the light

c)      walk with wisdom

Afraid I do not have enough time to unpack this, You may go through some of these commentaries to see what it entails. 

How do you put off the old life? How do you walk in love, walk in the light, walk with wisdom?

1 leg forward that you can take is a step in confession. Confession is to bring it up out of the subconscious into the conscious and look at it and name it. If you don't name it, just quietly acknowledge that you are such, it has a strange power over you; it can go on forever. But if you look at it and verbalize it, you can put it away. That is why the Scriptures say, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness," (1 John 1:9).

Be filled with the holy spirit

A German pastor shared this illustration. He says that Christians are like a pond in the woods on which the leaves are constantly falling. These leaves fall one at a time, quietly, almost silently, upon the surface of the pond. The leaves are the manifestation of the old life. A little vanity, a little envy, a bit of prideful ambition, some unkindness, a sharp unlovely word spoken to another, a lie, some impurity, a bit of egotism; these are constantly falling upon the pond of our life. We don't think they are very important. We think they are trivialities, mere passing things. They sink to the bottom and are forgotten, but they are still there. That is the problem. They are still there. There they lie and rot, and soon, in the deep subconscious part of our life, there is a foulness, a rottenness that stops the flow of the water and stagnates the pool.

When a pool of water is quiet, though the bottom is very dirty and foul, it isn't very apparent. But let something agitate the water, let something bother us, some circumstance irritate us, and the water of our lives is troubled and the dirt at the bottom whirls up and clouds our minds, and confuses us, and we react in anxiety. But the Holy Spirit of God brings to our attention the things he is lifting up out of the bottom of our lives, dredging out the foulness. One by one these things are brought to our attention, and, if we name them, if we say, "Yes Lord, that is what I have done, that is what I do. Thank you for showing it to me," then we can put it away. Bit by bit it keeps coming up, all this foulness, until gradually the pool becomes clear again, sunlit, sparkling, and open. We have nothing left to hide. We don't try to cover over and pretend that we are something else. Then that pool, that pond that has been lying stagnant becomes a trickle of living water growing into a river at last that flows out in blessing to others.

Conclusion

The scripture text for this morning signifies Paul’s transition into the practical section of the letter. However in approaching this section of the letter (4:17-5:20), we must not, cannot forget the first 3 chapters, where Paul reminded us of the spiritual blessing we have in Christ, how we come alive in Him.

If we do not read this letter in totality, we end up seeing the Christian faith as a lot of rules & regulations, a lot of should’s and ought’s, but little joy.  The living and doing of the gospel is a command but it is also an invitation from the Father: You are a child of God, now take my hand and grow up as my child; You are a new person in Christ, come on, take steps of faith and blossom into that new person.

And the role of the HS is to open your eyes to hear God’s heart. The Holy Spirit is God’s empowering presence; He treats us with dignity and respects our freedom. There is no coercion or manipulation but instead God relates to us, offering us His grace.  

The result of that encounter is a life of love and deliberate intention to be and do all God requires.

Christian living cannot stem from trying to meet standards but responding to God’s grace in our obedience.

In his book “Practise Resurrection”,  Eugene Peterson mentioned Bernard of Clairvaux, a 12^th century Christian who wrote a paper called “On Loving God”.  In it, he described the 4 degrees of love.

1.      In the 1st degree, “loving one’s self for one’s own sake”; we try to handle things on our own. But life gets too complicated and throws too much at us that we do not know what to do with. So we sooner or later find ourselves out of our depth. We turn to God for help.

2.      This brings us to a 2nd degree: “Loving God for one’s sake”. We turn to God for what God can do for us. We pray, we search the scriptures. This stage can last a long time. But gradually as we get acquainted with the ways of God, our immature self-centered pre-occupation recedes and we begin to recognize and understand God as he is, not as we imagined him to be, and we are attracted to what we are finding: God’s essential goodness.

3.      We are now well on our way into the 3rd stage “the love of God for God’s sake”. We love not what we can get out of God but for who God is. It is Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus; It is Isaiah in the temple saying, ‘here am I. Send me’.

4.      The 4^th stage is now only a few steps away: “loving one’s self for God’s sake”. God’s love makes more of us, and we find our own human wholeness affirmed in the love of God.