1. "People love practical. You can tell it in everything from the courses people take in high school or college to YouTube videos. You can tell it on Amazon."

2. "Do you see that practical walk in love? But all the practicality isn't really that helpful if it's not rooted in doctrine."

3. "Merely calling yourself a Christian is not good evidence that you're heaven bound. None of us will live perfectly as Christians. But to give ourselves over to sin without shame and repentance, that is not the life of a Christian."

4. "An unavoidable part of holiness is avoiding."

5. "We remember our pre-Christian past not to recall it with fond relish, but to be freshly humbled at God's salvation of us and to be filled again with gratitude."

6. "One of the great lessons of early marriage is how to learn what pleases your spouse. And in order to do that, you need to listen to them. One of the great lessons of middle years of marriage is you need to learn what pleases your spouse by listening to them. One of the great lessons of later years of marriage is you need to learn what pleases your spouse by listening to them."

7. "If you in your own following of the Lord are not spending time listening to him, reading his word, it seems that the penny may not yet have quite fallen for you."

8. "How much worldly camouflage can we live in and still really be a Christian?"

9. "God uses His Word and Christians' lives to convince non-Christians of the sinfulness of their sins, and so He transforms them."

10. "We were spiritually asleep, we were spiritually dead, but God, being rich in mercy because of His great love, made us alive in Christ."

Observation Questions

1. In Ephesians 5:8, what contrast does Paul draw about the believers' former and present condition, and what command does he give based on this contrast?

2. According to Ephesians 5:9, what three characteristics describe "the fruit of light"?

3. What does Paul instruct believers to "try to discern" in Ephesians 5:10?

4. In Ephesians 5:11, what two-part instruction does Paul give regarding "the unfruitful works of darkness"?

5. What reason does Paul give in Ephesians 5:12 for why certain things should not be spoken of in a way that celebrates them?

6. According to the hymn or saying quoted in Ephesians 5:14, what three commands are given to the "sleeper," and what promise follows?

Interpretation Questions

1. Why does Paul describe believers as having been "darkness" rather than simply saying they were "in darkness"? What does this stronger language reveal about the nature of conversion?

2. How does the command to "try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord" (v. 10) suggest both confidence and humility in the Christian life? Why might Paul use the word "try"?

3. What is the relationship between "exposing" the works of darkness (v. 11) and the warning that it is "shameful even to speak" of secret sins (v. 12)? How can believers expose evil without celebrating or dwelling on it?

4. How does the imagery of light throughout this passage (vv. 8-14) connect to the call in Ephesians 5:1-2 to "be imitators of God" and "walk in love"?

5. What does the hymn in verse 14 ("Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you") teach about the nature of spiritual transformation and its ongoing implications for how Christians live?

Application Questions

1. The sermon emphasized that discernment requires studying God's Word. What specific step could you take this week to increase your time listening to God through Scripture, and how might this help you better understand what pleases Him in a current situation you face?

2. Paul warns against becoming "partners" with those who practice sin (v. 7). Are there relationships, entertainment choices, or work situations where you find yourself increasingly comfortable with attitudes or behaviors that dishonor God? What would it look like to create appropriate distance without abandoning people who need the gospel?

3. The "fruit of light" includes goodness, righteousness, and truth (v. 9). Which of these three qualities do you find most challenging to demonstrate consistently in your daily life—at home, at work, or in your free time—and why?

4. The sermon noted that warning others about sin is an act of love. Is there a fellow believer in your life who may need gentle, truthful correction? What fears or obstacles prevent you from speaking up, and how might the truth of this passage give you courage?

5. Verse 14 speaks of Christ shining on those who awake from spiritual sleep. How might remembering your own conversion—the darkness you were rescued from—change the way you interact with non-Christians this week, whether in conversation, patience, or prayer for their salvation?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Romans 12:1-2 — This passage marks a similar shift from doctrine to application in Paul's letters and calls believers to discern God's will through transformed minds.

2. Proverbs 4:14-19 — This wisdom passage contrasts the path of the righteous (like the light of dawn) with the way of the wicked (deep darkness), reinforcing the sermon's theme of walking in light.

3. 1 John 1:5-10 — John develops the theme of God as light and the implications for believers who must walk in light, confess sin, and experience fellowship with God.

4. Matthew 5:13-16 — Jesus teaches that His followers are the light of the world and calls them to let their light shine so others may see their good works and glorify the Father.

5. Acts 26:12-18 — Paul recounts his Damascus road conversion, where Christ commissioned him to turn people from darkness to light, illustrating the transformation described in Ephesians 5:14.

Sermon Main Topics

I. Opening Illustration: The Value of Practical Wisdom

II. The Structure of Paul's Letters: Doctrine and Application

III. Discern What Is Pleasing to the Lord (Ephesians 5:10)

IV. Avoid Partnership with Darkness (Ephesians 5:7-8, 11)

V. Walk as Children of Light (Ephesians 5:8-9)

VI. Warn Others by Exposing Darkness (Ephesians 5:11-14)

VII. Concluding Call to Love God and Neighbor Through These Principles

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Detailed Sermon Outline

One memory that I have that is very old is from the 1960s.

I would have been probably six or seven. Anyone here six or seven? If you're six or seven, stand up.

Okay, I see one there, anymore? Yep, one there, anymore? Over here? Okay, there? Okay, yep.

Keep standing. Stick out your fists together like this. Just stick out your fists for a moment like this, put them together. This is what my grandmother taught me when I was six or seven. She said, this is how you tell which months have 31 days.

Where the knuckle is is 31, and then the next one doesn't, and then the next knuckle does. So January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August are right next to each other, so they both have 31 days. September, October, November, December. Can you ignore the last thing? You can sit down.

I would be embarrassed to tell you how many times I have recounted that when scheduling something.

Sitting at her table, there in her house, she taught me how to remember which months have 31 days. People love things that are practical like that.

Look at where you want to throw something or look at where you want to ride or where you want to drive. Always do the hardest thing first. Don't spend time making small decisions. Early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.

People love practical. You can tell it in everything from the courses people take in high school or college to YouTube videos. You can tell it on Amazon. I was looking yesterday for how-to books and best-selling books on everything from how to invest to very specific matters like how to get into top 20 universities or how to make your dog famous. And these are best-selling books.

You can tell throughout life as you learn how to study or how to lift or how to build better relationships. Here at church, even at 9:30, our course seminars, you find us providing work on counseling or marital issues or how to raise a family, how to parent. Oh, whenever I preach a series from the Proverbs, people love it. It's not because the sermons are so good. Proverbs is so good.

It's just so practical.

Well, in a very unusual occurrence, our church right now is studying in our morning sermons two of Paul's letters. Bobbi began last week with Philippians. I'm hoping to finish Ephesians in the next couple of months. You'll notice that in both of these letters, maybe more clearly in Ephesians, Paul tends to have a practical section in his letters, the application. He does that at the end or in the second half of his letters.

So doctrine in the first part, practical application in the second. You find another clear example of it in Romans chapter 12, verse 1, where the shift occurs in Romans. But let's notice this in Ephesians. Look back over Ephesians for a moment and I want you to see this clearly. You'll find this book beginning on page 976.

And the Bible's provided. It's a short letter, only six chapters. In chapter 1, Paul summarizes God's plans from eternity past. In chapter 2, he considers how God has graciously interrupted the Christian's life in regeneration, conversion, causing us to be born again. And then in chapter 2's second half, how God's plan is to build believers of different ethnic backgrounds together in order to show that our rebirth by His Spirit is more significant than our ethnicity by our first birth.

In chapter 3, it looks like Paul is about to switch the imperatives of practical Christian living, but he seems to distract himself there. In chapter 3, verse 1, the NIV represents it with that dash about making sure that they remember something of his own testimony of conversion. And then he prays from there at the end of chapter 3. By the way, if you're not used to looking at the Bibles, I should have said the chapter numbers are the large numbers, the verse numbers are the small numbers after that. But then in chapter 4 verse 1 you see Paul shift to the practical.

I, therefore, a prisoner of the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called. Some Christians love the first half of Paul's letters. They are all about the doctrine. Thank God for Christians that are all about the doctrine. Other Christians are all about the second half.

They want the practical application. Thank God for Christians that want practical application. Now, O Lord, give us wisdom to love each other, to help realize how much we need both, how wise the Spirit is in inspiring such letters as these. And the rest of this letter is then spelling out what Paul means by this worthy walking, this appropriate living.

From chapter 4 verse 17, the ESV headline, the New Life, through chapter 5 verse 19, Paul lays out some general instructions about this new life of love that we are called to live now as Christians. He'll turn to some specific examples. Of this in our relationships, starting in chapter 5, verse 21. And then, so in 4:17-56, right before our passage for today, Paul has looked at some particular ways that this love should appear, like in our not giving ourselves up to sensuality or to empty words.

5:1-2 are really a good summary of what the letter of Ephesians tells us to do. Look there. You find it on page 978 in the Bible's provided.

Therefore be imitators of God as beloved children and walk in love as Christ loved us.

Friends, the whole Bible is written like this. Do you see that practical walk in love? But all the practicality isn't really that helpful if it's not rooted in doctrine. Because look at the specific way we're told to love as Christ loved us. If we don't know how Christ has loved us, we won't understand what we're being called to do in love here.

On the other hand, if we can write a dissertation on how Christ has loved us, and see no moral or ethical implications about how we are to love others, then something's misfired. Something's wrong. Do you see how even in this phrase, or these two phrases in verse 2, these are wed together. Walk in love as Christ loved us. Imitate God.

Walk in love. Live in love. That's really a summary. Here's our question for our sermon this morning: How can my love imitate God's?

How can my love imitate God's? How can we copy God's character?

Well, our passage this morning in chapter 5, verses 7 to 14, has some basic instructions that underlie what Paul has said before this, like from 4:25 up to our passage, and which Paul will work out in various specific situations throughout the remainder of this letter. This is how Paul was instructing these Christians so that they would be able to live together as those who were a part of the darkness of the old humanity, but now are light and a part of the new humanity. This is really a Proverbs-like summary of a few simple principles which underlie the Christian life and especially Christian love of God and neighbor. We'll find four of these principles in our passage. Let me try to articulate them for you in four simple words.

They are discern, avoid, walk, and warn. Discern, avoid, walk, and warn. I'm going to say that again. So maybe if you're not writing them down, you can still remember them. Discern, avoid, walk, and warn.

That's how we can imitate God's love. It's a good thing for you to pray for each morning. As you survey the day ahead, see something of the situations you'll be in, pray for the ability to discern, to avoid, to walk, and to warn. Let me read the passage to us now. Chapter 5 of Paul's letter to the Ephesians, beginning at verse 7.

Therefore do not become partners with them. For 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.

And try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord.

Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them, for it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you. Friend, are you struggling living the Christian life right now?

Let's pray that God used this refresher course in some basic principles of loving like God does to help you on your way today, to make things clearer, and to help you make the right choices.

How can my love imitate God's? We'll largely walk through our passage in order, but I want to begin down in verse 10 by pulling up for number one, discern. Discern, you see that in verse 10? Try to discern, that is to discover, to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. So in order for us to walk, to live, to go forward, to move, we have to know what we're doing, where we're going.

So it makes sense to notice this verse first. Verse 10, Try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. I love the way Paul puts that, what is pleasing to the Lord. I mean, this is what we're about as Christians, isn't it? Pleasing the Lord.

What a wonderful thing to be about. What a wonderful thing to get to be about. Pleasing the Lord. This fits with what Paul had said up in chapter 4, verse 1, about living in a manner worthy of the calling. And what a joyful thought to begin our weeks with, brothers and sisters, that we can please Him.

We desire to bring him pleasure. That's our motive. We desire not to grieve God. Paul, you remember, had warned about that back in chapter 4, verse 30, but we want to please him. We're not looking to find our own lifestyles to express ourselves.

We're looking to find his to express his character and live that way.

That desire is what burns at the heart of a Christian? I mean, how else do you think the early Christian martyrs, or the Baptists who were jailed in these colonies before the Revolution, or the enslaved Christians here in America and in the Caribbean, in South America, in the Arab nations, or the missionaries in the 20th century, like Jim Elliott, how else do you think all these Christians found the motivation to live as they did? It wasn't by being devoted to themselves and to their own lifestyle. It was from their ravenously desiring to consume themselves in living in such a way that would please the Lord. They lived to an audience of one, regardless of what others said about them.

They wanted to please the Lord. They wanted to live in a way that reflected his love, his character. It's interesting, too, that Paul needs to instruct these Christians to discover or find out or to discern what pleases the Lord. Friends, principles are very clear in Scripture, but sometimes the specific situation that we're in leaves us confused. Or at least uncertain.

So a particular word to this congregation: Fuller than most with people who desire to do good broadly and to expose the works of darkness broadly and to improve our society. Number one, thank you for your work.

Number two, thank you for your willingness to continue even when you are sometimes practically working at cross purposes with other members of this very congregation, because you are at least intending to do something that pleases the Lord. And so many times, I trust, you in fact are. Thank God for how you give yourselves to be concerned with not just your own life and your own career, but the good of others, the improving of the lives of others from the way you to how you're researching a certain public policy question, to what you're doing in your own life or in writing a book. Praise the Lord for your desire to try to help others. That reflects the character of God.

That is a good thing. For those of you who are overachievers in this area, can I just urge you to notice the way it's translated here, I think appropriately, as try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Does that communicate to you any sense of humble reticence? Any caution for yourself?

Any patience with others who may disagree with you? On what you think is a clear implication of what must please the Lord. Well, the inspired Word of God here, the way it's translated, I think appropriately, says discern. That is, you're going to have to discover and find out. Principles are clear in Scripture.

Particular situations can be less certain. I think Paul here leaves space for Christians to come to differing conclusions. Our goal is the same, but the specifics vary. We try to discern. Brothers and sisters, one of the fall's effects is the confusion of evil and good, of light and darkness.

Isaiah 5:20 says, Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. Right before this verse in our passage, chapter 5, verse 6, Paul warned the Christians, Let no one deceive you with empty words.

Friends, we can be led astray. The right path is not always clear to us. And so again, I say we should be cautious ourselves, and we should be patient with others.

If you're here today and you're not a Christian, we're very glad you're here. I want to make sure you know you're always welcome here. Discernment is important in matters of truth. The Bible does not teach us that sincerity is enough. Now that's a shocking statement to many people today.

Many people today assume the highest of all moral virtues is sincerity, but the Bible never teaches that. In fact, the Bible is clear that you and I, by our own natures, can be sincerely wrong, and the sincerity in no way diminishes the error we make. That's why our work is so important in trying to discern. What pleases the Lord. So we want to learn what the Bible says.

That's why the Bibles that we have here, we would be happy for you to take with you. If you don't have a copy of the Word of God that you can read yourself, that you can understand, and you can read and understand this one, please take this copy with you when you go. It's a gift of our congregation to you. This will be the main way that we believe you'll come to understand what God wants us to know. You can talk to me or any of the pastors at the doors on the way out if you would like to try to understand more.

We would happily encourage you in how to study the Bible or even get someone to do it with you if you would like to help you understand and consider this. We Christians know that discernment is necessary for us as we try to follow Christ.

Friend, in your home or in your school, or at your job. What are the sins that seem especially hard for you to see? Not that they're so repulsive to you, but it's hard for you to discern them, to note them. What are those sins? What moral twilight seems to surround the place in which you spend your days?

Are there Christian friends you can talk with this about. That you can pray with him about the situation.

And then what about your free time?

Do you assume that that's time off from following Christ? That you don't need to worry about what pleases the Lord during your downtime? The main way we will always find out what pleases the Lord is by studying His Word.

One of the great marriages of, one of the great lessons of early marriage is how to learn what pleases your spouse. And in order to do that, you need to listen to them. One of the great lessons of middle years of marriage is you need to learn what pleases your spouse. By listening to them. One of the great lessons of later years of marriage is you need to learn what pleases your spouse by listening to them.

You can laugh at the obviousness of that, and yet if you in your own following of the Lord are not spending time listening to him, reading his word, it seems that the penny may not yet have quite fallen for you. Spend time reading God's Word. Studying God's Word. We as a congregation are trying to help you do that. Kids, that's why you have godly parents, so they can help you listen to your parents.

They want to help you understand what the Lord has said. That's why we have Sunday school classes. Friends, that's why we put on course seminars. That's why we have sermons like this one. That's why there's a bookstall there with books you can buy and read or down in the library that you can borrow, or that are given out at the beginning of the evening service.

That's why we encourage discipling relationships to crisscross this congregation like so many trade routes, as we try to do good to each other spiritually and so love each other as we should. All of this arises out of this primary command of Paul to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Let's move on then. Having discerned what pleases the Lord, we should then number two, avoid all that doesn't. Avoid all that doesn't.

It's one thing to recognize the trap. It's another thing to not put your foot in it. Paul actually says that a couple of times in these verses. Verse 7, look at verse 7. Therefore do not become partners with them.

For at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. People wonder, who's that them in verse 7? Well, it's the sons of disobedience from verse 6. So it is non-Christians, and particularly non-Christians who are living out their disobedience to God in the ways that Paul had been warning of: idolatry, covetousness, sexual immorality, crude joking, filthy or foolish talk, what Paul calls in verse 3, all impurity. Do not become partners with them, Paul says.

So we should be careful of our associations with those who give themselves to sin, especially if they call themselves Christians. Paul reminds these Ephesian Christians that they used to be like this. He says in verse 8, At one time, that is, before they were converted, They too were in moral darkness, but now Paul says, you, are light in the Lord. What a wonderful phrase. Throughout Scripture, light is associated with God and His ways.

So for example, in Proverbs 4:18 we read, the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day. The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.

Or a couple of chapters later in Proverbs 6:23 we read, the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light. So the light of God's teaching has now shined on us. And what's more, God's own Spirit has indwelt us. We can now be said in a sense to be light. So that light that we formerly learned from and were transformed by, that light we ourselves now get to bear.

We ourselves now get to shine this light. And then down in the first part of verse 11, Paul repeats this command to avoid the works of darkness. See that in verse 11, take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness. Paul is again telling them to avoid such sin, avoid joining others in their sins or even in making their sins possible. Now the people Paul would have in mind here are the pagan Gentiles in Ephesus who, like all pagan Gentiles in their folly, are separated from the life of God.

Do not join with them, he's warning them, for that path is not the way of God's grace, but the way of his wrath. I'm assuming there was a problem in the church at Ephesus. Some people may have been teaching that you could have an inheritance in the kingdom of God and live in these negative ways. But Paul here dismisses that out of hand. He calls such teachings up above empty there in verse 6.

He warns these young Christians against being deceived by them. That kind of teaching is dangerous. In our last study in Ephesians, we considered these severe words in verses 5 and 6. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous, that is an idolater, has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

Friends, since that study almost a month ago now, I hope that you've pondered these words carefully. No such person has any inheritance in the kingdom of God.

None. Merely calling yourself a Christian is not good evidence that you're heaven bound. None of us will live perfectly as Christians. But to give ourselves over to sin without shame and repentance, that is not the life of a Christian. Such unrepentant sin should separate these people from the church now.

It will separate them from the Kingdom of God forever. You choose one Lord or the other. That's why in verse 5 Paul called such people idolaters, not because they made literal idols, though many of them did, Ephesus was, remember, a center for idol-making. But because the greedy, the sexually lusting, are obsessed with gratifying themselves through having some possessions or some persons at the center of their existence, and so they're worshiping them and not God. They are idolaters.

But Paul is saying that God has changed Christians. We have now been made to be different. And that change has moral implications. That's what he's talking about at the beginning of verse 8 when he writes, For at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Paul loves these contrasts.

They were one thing, but now they're another. What's he talking about? He's talking about their conversion. They had turned 180 degrees. They had changed.

And he's saying to them specifically, this contrast with their past and what they're called to now is to remind them of the contrast that there is to be between their lifestyles now and those of their non-Christian friends around them. And to encourage them to persevere in faith and obedience even through difficulties. And they shouldn't make these difficulties worse for themselves by partnering with the disobedient or taking part in their unfruitful works. Friends, an unavoidable part of holiness is avoiding. An unavoidable part of holiness is avoiding.

We are to avoid sin throughout every area of our lives.

Brothers and sisters, if we are to imitate God and walk in love like His, then that means we must reject some ways of thinking and living. Discernment's work must proceed to our avoiding when we've come to see that something is wrong.

Paul begins this larger section up in 4:17 telling these young Gentile Christians what they must no longer do. Their following God now entailed them rejecting and avoiding patterns which they had been raised with and saw all around them. You remember what Paul said up in chapter 4, look at verse 22, that they were to put off your old self which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires.

So by means of reminding them what they had been taught, Paul reinforces the teaching and reminds them that the life, the self that they used to know, which desired wrong and hurtful things, must be stripped off and laid aside.

Brothers and sisters, I want to say this again, this avoiding is a necessary implication of the Christian gospel. We see it there fundamentally in the teaching of Jesus. Repent and believe, He says. Repent and believe. James and James chapter 2 explores what a belief is like that is not accompanied with repentance.

It is no true belief, James concludes. If these Ephesians were truly believers, they had done this. And they would continue to live differently from their former way of life. And no, they weren't just changing their behaviors, but they had put off their old self. Paul's images throughout this letter are strong.

They're dramatic. So these Christians were to live out this change to the point of avoiding their old deceitful desires.

And that's what we must discern. That's why we must follow through our discerning with avoiding things which we formerly loved. We remember our pre-Christian past not to recall it with fond relish, but to be freshly humbled at God's salvation of us and to be filled again with gratitude.

So what about you? Who are your closest partners during the week?

At work.

Who do you end up talking about what's going on at the office with? You realize the closer you are to the one who's sinning, the more you will be tempted.

How were you tempted this past week to partner with sin's works of darkness?

Are there any decisions that you now need to reconsider as you're thinking about this strong call to avoid?

This pool stands here as a symbol of our separation from the world. Ashley's baptism last week, a baptism that we hope to have again in just a few weeks. These baptisms are a sign of the fact that we are separated from the world. Membership in this local church or in any Bible-believing local church, even going so far as to practice church discipline, is part of this avoiding and woe to any church which loses this vital, clearly marked, God-intended distinction from the world. Because this distinction is essential to our mission.

It's essential to our mission to help each other and to reach out with the truth to others. We gather here regularly to praise God for saving us as we've been doing this morning and making us a light to others so that, as we read from Jesus' words, they may see our good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

Friends, if we are headed home, like we read of in Pilgrim's Progress, we can't settle here and adopt the restless, deceptive, self-serving, God-rejecting ways of this world. We must work to avoid the unfruitful works of darkness.

Positively, Paul tells Christians number three, to walk. So discern, avoid, walk. Walk means live, right? You see this in verse 8. This is the most basic and the most general of these four commands.

You see why I took them in this order. I'm largely following the order of the text. Grab chapter 10, or verse 10, and put discern first because when you're looking at the path, you have to first know which is the right one to take. So you discern first and then second, you avoid. That means you don't put the foot over on the wrong one.

You don't start going that way. So you've got to understand and you don't put the wrong foot there. Oh, and then you have the basic command, walk. Go forward. Go in the right way.

Live. Love. And then we'll get to the fourth one, warn. Another part of that. But the basic command is here in this passage, Walk as children of light, for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true.

Paul had used this same command walk in just a few verses earlier in verse 2 when he exhorted the Ephesians to walk in love. This is an image Paul uses throughout Ephesians. If you look back in chapter 2, verse 2, Paul had referred to the sins in which you once walked. And then in verse 10 there in chapter 2, We are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. And then in chapter 4 verse 1, he urged these Christians to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you've been called.

And then in 4:17, you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do. And we just noted Paul's summary command in 52, Walk in love. And our passage next week begins verse 15, Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise. So, friends, children of light walk a certain way. We live distinctively.

We no longer belong to the darkness, we now belong to the light. And that means that we will live like it. Our lives will bear the fruit of light that we see listed out here in verse 9, All that is good and right and true. In that sense, the fruit of the light is very much like the fruit of the Spirit in us that Paul had written to the Galatians about earlier. Sometimes people think that fruit doesn't fit with light, but we understand what Paul means.

I think of his last words of David in 2 Samuel 234, He dawns on them like the morning light, like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning. Like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth. So it's the sun and rain together that conspire to make the earth fruitful. So does the light shining in us, watered by the Word. Goodness, righteousness, and truth are to characterize the lives of Christians.

And these are themselves, the fruit of having been bathed in the light of God's truth. And in turn, fruitful seeing... fruitful examples that we see in the lives of others. These are the characteristics that we as individuals and as a church have been created to manifest to all, including to the heavenly witnesses, of God's great work in Christ. So how do children of light live?

Well, we imitate God, as we see up in verse 1. And what does that mean?

We love both God and others. We have an eye to God in all that we're doing, to love Him and please Him, not grieving His Spirit, like we were warned about in chapter 4. Remember, Jesus had taught us in John 14 that to love God was to obey His commandments. Obeying His commandments is love. It is a voice of love.

Toward God. We have an eye to loving others as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us. So friends, come back tonight and join us in praying that God help us to live like this. We regularly rely on God publicly and together in our prayers, asking God to give us wisdom, to give us strength. We ask for His help and His power.

We pray for Him to use that same power He did in bringing us new life in the first place. To preserve us and cause us to prosper in Him. The same power that we pray He will use to save you if you are sitting here today and you're not a Christian. We pray that God will help us to bear fruit in all the spheres of life at work and at home as all our words and actions and lives are characterized by that which is good and right and true. Our lives show the light that we have and indeed the light that we are in the Lord.

Maybe over lunch you can share with others how this congregation has helped you walk in the light. So that's Paul's third instruction on how we could imitate God and live in love. Discern, avoid, walk.

Our last duty of such God-imitation and such living in the love of God and neighbor is number four, to warn others, to expose the unfruitful works of darkness. Look there in our passage in chapter 5, at verse 11, look at the second half of verse 11, the last phrase there.

But instead expose them, for it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light. Part of their obligation to speak the truth in love, which Paul exhorted them to up in chapter 4 verse 15, is to expose the unfruitful works of darkness. So the they in verse 12, I think, is the same as the them in verse 7. The deeds of darkness is what the sons of disobedience naturally do.

And these deeds should be exposed to others, and especially to fellow members of the church. Some folks have asked me this week about what can seem like a contradiction in our text. How can you expose something without speaking about it? I mean, if it's shameful to speak about it, how then can you expose it? Well, I think to resolve this we simply need to understand that to expose something by the light would be the opposite of the kind of corrupting talk that Paul has forbidden up in chapter 4 verse 29.

The speaking Paul calls shameful here in verse 12 would be speech which celebrates the evil and obscures the moral truth about it. It would be to have pride in what should before God cause us only shame. Exposure on the other hand brings up and presents something in its true light. Reveals the truth about it and makes it obvious. So the opening of the errors is sufficient to show us the truth that we should avoid it.

So we, as Christians, speak of ungodliness differently than some of our non-Christian friends do. So when we read of a school shooting, We don't call it crazy, you know? No, it's evil. It's wicked. It's wrong.

Euthanasia, abortion, which can be intended for positive purposes, we see is wicked. Human image of God bearing, destroying acts. We speak of actions as God has taught us to view them. Hatred of persons is wrong.

My non-Christian friend, if you're with us in this language, this morally charged language, I'm delighted. And I would say that's consistent with the way God has made you in His image. And I would ask you to keep following the little string that that's part of and see why you have that moral language, what structure there is in your own world to help you understand what is right and what is wrong. So we should understand the truth ourselves and then explain it to others to warn them and protect them. And this involves understanding the evil of our past ways and ways of those still outside the church so that we will avoid such ways.

So part of my role as a pastor is to understand and expose to members of our congregation evil that is tempting members of our congregation. The first phrase in verse 14, it's not very clear in the ESV, could be translated, as the ESV has done here, anything that becomes visible is light. Perhaps referring to the sins exposed and becoming visible, verse 13, the NIV takes it similarly. Or the CSB translates it, what makes everything visible is light. Much like the Geneva Bible had translated it.

That second way is much simpler. There's no transformation suggested, just a revelation. Whichever way it should be read, it's true that that which is exposed becomes visible and light. So exposing sin doesn't make sin virtuous or right, but the opening of the error shows the truth about it, and that should show it for what it is so that we will avoid such dark ways and unfruitful works. So sin exposed repels the believer who formerly was, from up in verse 8, of the darkness, but now is a child of the light, characterized by the light.

God is light. And He is the light of our moral and ethical world. It is by its relationship to God that we understand everything, every person, every action. So not only should we ourselves refrain from anything sinful, but we should, verse 11, have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. So friend, watch your heart.

Don't let your heart be won over to sympathy with sin. Our lives are to expose the truth of what God is calling us to live like as humans. Our lives are to be the reproof, revealing the deeds of darkness for what they are. But this life of disobedience and darkness had ended for these young Christians that Paul was writing to. Their life had been shameful, whatever those things are that were done in darkness.

Paul doesn't even dignify by naming here unless they were the things he'd already mentioned earlier in chapters 4 and 5. I wonder when we talk about these things that are shameful, I wonder what you think about that.

If you're not a Christian, I wonder what you think the Bible calls you to repent of. If Jesus says basically in His teaching, Repent and believe. What do you understand that you need to repent of?

Why? The Bible story is that you are made by God to reflect His character. Every human being is made to do that. And every human being has rejected that. We rejected that in our first parent, Adam.

And we've rejected that ourselves. We've confirmed that rebellion in our own choices. I can know that the most important things about you without ever even meeting you. And you can know that about me without knowing me personally or individually. That's what the Bible describes as our basic situation as humans, made in God's image, but all having sinned against Him.

If you begin to work through that, that may explain a lot of the situations you're facing in your life right now or that you're seeing in the world around you.

But the wonderful news is that God sent His only Son to take on flesh and to live a fully human life, and to die on the cross as a sacrifice for the sins of all of us who would ever turn and trust in Him, and that He raised Him from the dead, and Christ ascended and presented the sacrifice to His heavenly Father, and it was accepted. And He calls all of us now to turn from our sins and trust in Him. And His sacrifice, to take the gift that He offers sinners of His goodness, of His truth, of His righteousness for our very own. His perfect righteousness can be credited to us if we'll trust Him. What can that mean for you to trust Christ in such a life-altering way?

Well, that's what almost all of the people sitting here would love to help you figure out. We're still working out the implications in our own lives, but beginning that journey is the most wonderful thing that can happen in your life. And we would love to help you do that. You can talk to any of the pastors at the door, or you don't even have to wait to get to us, you can talk to just about any of the people you're sitting around. And if it's another visitor, just refer them on to somebody else.

We would love to help you understand what it means to come to be reconciled to this God? Christian friends, who do you know that's in darkness?

We can better love our neighbors in explaining, even persuading them, that evils are, in fact, evil. How can we argue with our own hearts when they want to justify something that we should be heeding Scripture's warning about. Learn in the work you do on your own heart how you can also speak to your neighbor persuasively. Be careful not to indulge in those things that we warn about. How much worldly camouflage can we live in and still really be a Christian?

One more thing. You realize that this command to warn others is part of loving them. This command to warn is part of the loving obligations that we've undertaken with each other in our church covenant. Remember that phrase that we use, Entreat one another when occasion may require? We're pledging to warn each other, just as Paul tells us to here.

Maybe you should notice that again when we take the Lord's Supper in a couple of weeks. Notice that phrase, that we try to help each other not be deceived. That's one of the reasons our church's commitment to expositional preaching is so important, so that we will not shy away from topics just because they could be unpopular or easily misunderstood or misrepresented. So friends, pray for your preachers here to have clear understandings and honesty and plain dealing in our words to you. And pray that our elders will lead us well in difficult matters of trying to correct those members who are refusing to repent of a loved sin.

Because one way that we particularly are called to imitate God and walk in love is not only to discern and avoid and walk ourselves, but to warn others.

We should conclude. You see how all this relates to love.

Do you remember how Jesus summarized the Law? We read it several times a year in our morning service together from Mark 12. He summarized the Law, To love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. That's a summary of all the law, he said. So you see how these simple commands here fit into that love.

In order to love like that, you will have to discern what is right.

In order to love like that, you will need to be committed to avoid that which is wrong yourself. You'll need to be committed to walk in the way of truth.

And you'll need to be committed to, out of love for others, warn them. Oh, don't do that. Don't try that. Oh, I tried that. I thought that.

We once were darkness, but now we are light. Paul cites here in verse 14 what we assume was a well-known hymn. Therefore it says, Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you. What does Paul mean by this? It's a vivid recounting of the great change that has taken place.

It's poetry about conversion, about them moving from darkness to light, as Paul had said up in verse 8. This is the light that enlightens. So what we want to see in others is what we've experienced first ourselves. We were spiritually asleep, we were, as Paul said earlier in Ephesians, spiritually dead, but God, being rich in mercy because of His great love, made us alive in Christ. Friend, do you remember when God did this in your own life?

Of course, Paul himself could remember all this from his own experience. He remembered Christ shining on him. It was recounted in Acts 9, verse 3. As he went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. By recalling these words, Paul is stirring the Christians to action, to live and to love as God does.

And as He would call them to. Now Christ shines His light on their lives. God uses His Word and Christians' lives to convince non-Christians of the sinfulness of their sins, and so He transforms them. And by citing these words in verse 14, Paul was reminding these Christians of their conversion of the fact that God has rescued Christians in Christ. He has saved us to a life of discerning and avoiding, of walking and warning, all done in love to God and imitating His love of us in loving others.

Let's pray.

Lord God, we pray that yout would teach us these basic moves of the Christian life.

Lord, we pray that yout would teach each one of us convincingly what it means to discern the truth and to avoid the wrong and to walk in love. And to warn others. Help us to do this, this day and this week. We ask in Jesus' name, Amen.