Download LIVING AS CHILDREN OF LIGHT Ephesians 5:1

LIVING AS CHILDREN OF LIGHT
Ephesians 5:1-20
Maybe you remember the TV commercial that showed a little boy driving his little pedal
car down the sidewalk, wearing his father’s hat, and doing all the things he had seen his father do
as he drove his car. As the commercial ends, the little boy turns into the sidewalk leading to his
house just as his father pulls into the driveway. The father comes over to the boy, squats down
beside him, and the boy says to him, "It’s been a tough day."
Such things are reminders of what we already know: children quite naturally imitate their
parents. That’s how they learn in their early years – their patterns of speech and behavior; how
they feel about things that surround them; how they react to the things that happen. This puts a
good sized responsibility on us who are parents or grandparents. Our little ones will grow up to
be very much like us! They will imitate good things, like the way we feel about and interact with
God. And, if the studies about the perpetuation of things like child abuse and alcoholism from
generation to generation are any indication, they will imitate us also in things that are not so
good.
Such considerations surely make it all the more important that we listen to and follow the
urging of Paul to look to our heavenly Father: "Be imitators of God – and live a life of love."
That is parentage that we will not want to deny or turn away from. That happens
occasionally in the human experience – sometimes it is youngsters escaping from a bad and
abusive childhood by turning away from their parents to other adults, for good or bad; sometimes
it is a self-willed youngster rejecting parental guidelines and discipline and just running away.
But Paul urges us, as dearly loved children of a heavenly Father, to be imitators of our heavenly
Father and learn to live a life of love. He showed his love for us in sending his Son to "love us
and give himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God". He can we not love and
respect and want to please and build our lives around such a Father?
We surely should not deny him as our Father by turning away from him into a way of life
that is incompatible with life in his family. Paul singled out sexual immorality, impurity, and
greed as such behaviors. and warned that the one who gives himself over to their influence so
that they become a lifestyle "has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God." These are
hard words – but he explains the truth of them by saying that such a person is an idolater. He
rejects the life of love to which the Father’s example leads and "worships" his own desires,
giving them priority in his life.
All of us, also as Christians, must acknowledge that temptations to immorality and
impurity and greed do confront us – and there are times when we fail and fall and let the sinful
inclination become a sinful act. But we have a Father in heaven who loves and forgives. He
calls us to repentance, to keep such attitudes and actions from hardening into a persistent
lifestyle, and to put us again on the track along which we are learning from his example of love
to live a life of conscious love and helpfulness and service.
Paul warned that sexual immorality and impurity are destructive of life in the kingdom of
our Lord. The interesting thing for us to reckon with in our society today is that there is no
"sexual immorality" or "impurity". The whole concept has been removed and replaced with
euphemisms. Teenagers involved in sexual intercourse are not "immoral" and "impure" – they
are just being "sexually active." Some kinds of sex are not "really sex." The promiscuous are
not "fornicating" or "committing adultery" – they are just "filling sexual needs." Those involved
in homosexual perversions are "looking for their sexual identity." In matters of sexuality the
moral categories of right and wrong have generally been removed. Now morality is determined
by whether or not you are practicing "safe sex." But Paul says we are not to "let anyone deceive
us with empty words." Calling sin by a name that lessens our seeing it as sin, if anything, only
makes it more of a deadly threat.
Paul included greed – a focus on money and the things it can buy – as an outlook that
denies heavenly parentage and is idolatrous. Paul was echoing Jesus’ own "You cannot serve
God and money". It’s a hard message for us affluent American Christians to hear. Our society
approves and encourages covetousness and greed in so many ways. Our whole commercial
system with its advertising is designed to make people want what they do not have – and to reach
out to get it. It’s not called "greed." It’s called "getting ahead" or "raising your standard of
living." But Paul’s words and Jesus' words take us beyond euphemisms to call focusing a life on
things "idolatry." So he urges us, "Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such
things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient."
We need to hear Paul's warning: "No immoral, impure, or greedy person has any
inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God." More than that, we need to know that one of
the fruits of the Holy Spirit living in us is self-control. It is possible, as we live under the Spirit's
power as children of the heavenly Father, to bring our bodies under his control so we will learn
to imitate God as his beloved children and "live as children of light". Then, Paul said, "The fruit
of the light in us will consist in all goodness, righteousness and truth."
Light exposes – it reveals things that need to be confessed and corrected under God’s
forgiving love. Light also illuminates – revealing the Way of the Lord. Paul said it very simply,
"Find out what pleases the Lord." Obviously, what pleases this heavenly Lord, who gave
himself into suffering and death to restore us to a living relationship with him, is anything that
will build and display that relationship.
"Be filled with the Spirit," wrote Paul – instead of getting drunk on wine (or on anything
else that may provide a temporary, artificial "high" or escape).
Such things are deceitful, for
when they take control and become addictions they invariably drag a person down into
debauchery. Being filled with the Spirit, however, is God’s own gift of "living high" – living
with a quality of assurance because of the love of Christ, living with enthusiasm and satisfaction
because your are in the service of your Lord Jesus Christ.
How may we work at being filled with the Spirit? First, it's a matter of remembering that
Jesus said that the Father loves to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him – and remembering
that Jesus said that the Spirit’s work is to testify to him, making him personally meaningful in
our lives. So being filled with the Spirit begins with looking to Jesus and all he did for us! This
leads to rejoicing in him as our Savior! And that leads to committing ourselves willingly to him
as Lord in careful and prayerful discipleship! Throughout the process he will see to it that we
have his Spirit in us to empower us and to exalt us.
But it all begins with asking him
expectantly!
Paul wrote here about the importance of music in the Christian life. As we are filled with
the Spirit, "singing and making music in our hearts to the Lord" is a most natural expression. In
a way, it’s too bad that we live in the electronic age. Our children – and we – get so accustomed
to listening to others sing for us that we often don’t learn the joy of singing ourselves. That has
to be one of the reasons why some just sit through the liturgical songs and hymns in church
without joining in the singing.
Living in this electronic age, we have to recognize that the music that surrounds us will
have as much influence on our lives as almost anything. It can encourage higher quality of living
with melodies and harmonies and rhythms and lyrics – or it can appeal just to baser qualities
with just a driving beat and degrading words. "Be careful how you live," then, surely applies also
to the kind of music we make a part of our lives – and the lives of our children. A key is to
choosing the music that we and they listen to is to ask ourselves: "Does it help me make music
in my heart to the Lord?"
Finally, Paul wrote: "Give thanks for everything." As you imitate your Father’s love and
walk in the light of Christ you realize more and more that every good gift and every perfect
endowment comes down from above, from the Father of lights – and that he is present in and at
work in also difficult circumstances. A "Thank You" spoken and lived is the only proper
response – even when "it's been a tough day."
Then, by God’s grace, we won’t have to be fearful of the fact that our children will
imitate us. Instead, we will continually invite them to join us in imitating God.