Ephesians 5:8-14 - Walking in Light

Well, good morning, church.

Turn with me, if you will, to Ephesians chapter 5.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

Ephesians chapter 5.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

And today we will be looking at verses 8 through 14, which is all about walking in the light.

Our passage today, it's the final section where Paul reminds the Ephesians of the radical transformation that they have experienced, and the following radical life that transformation demands.

And so far, Paul explains the new life in terms of walking.

We should be walking in the truth.

We should be walking in love.

And as we will see today, we should be people who walk in the light.

Although I'm starting in verse eight, I want to remind us that we're actually picking up in the middle of Paul's thought since verse 3.

He has been talking about the habits of life that they should not be practicing, unloving behaviors, impurity, greed, vulgar speech, in reminding them that people who are characterized by such things, they do not have an inheritance from God.

Therefore, Paul says, do not be partners with them.

Don't be sinning with sinners, because that's not who you are anymore.

And that leads us to our passage today where Paul will now pick up this biblical concept of light and darkness.

This is a theme throughout all of Scripture.

Genesis 1 says that God separated the light from the darkness.

John 1.5 says, the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

1 John 1.5 says, This is the message that we have heard from him, and that we proclaim to you that God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all.

The Bible uses this concept because it's something that we can all as humans understand.

Scripture uses this metaphor to help us see this vast contrast between good and evil, truth and falsehood, sinners and saints.

And so darkness, it is the absence of light.

Scientifically, darkness makes us unable to see.

It induces sleep.

It makes us feel hidden.

Spiritually speaking, it's associated with evil, ignorance, isolation, and separation from God.

Darkness is the realm of Satan, it's the environment of sin, and it's the condition of this world.

Light, on the other hand, is illumination.

It provides vision, clarity, it has healing properties.

Just think of the sun and the light that the sun gives.

It boosts our mood, it boosts our vitamin D.

Light removes darkness.

In the Bible, light is associated with revelation, truth, purity, holiness.

And even more than this, light is a title for Jesus, our Savior, who is referred to as the light of this world.

So light and darkness are incompatible.

By nature, they are forces that cannot occupy the same space at the same time.

And what a powerful metaphor this is, which is why Paul will now use it to describe our salvation.

So after commanding us to walk in the truth, after commanding us to walk in love, Paul now picks up this biblical theme and says in verses eight and nine, 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.

So Paul wants us to understand that we are no longer darkness.

Notice how he phrases this.

He doesn't say you are no longer doing darkness.

He doesn't say that.

Not at all.

That's not what Paul says.

He is saying that you were darkness.

The core of your very being was evil.

You know, often we say things like, you know, my Uncle Joe, you know, he's such a good person.

Yes, he's beating his wife.

Yes, he's getting drunk every night.

Yes, he's writing bad checks, but he has a good heart.

And we talk like this all the time, but it's not good theology.

I understand that sentiment.

If you have a tender heart, you always see the best in people.

You always see the potential of a person.

You can even see aspects of their personality that are admirable and decent.

So we disconnect the bad behavior from the heart of the person.

But the Bible doesn't.

Scripture claims that by nature, by identity, by character, we are darkness.

That is why on judgment day, God doesn't throw people's sin into hell, he throws the sinner into hell.

So Paul reminds us here that we were once darkness.

You and I, and every Christian in this room, before Christ, we were dark people.

Ephesians 2 describes our condition this way: that we were sons of disobedience, following Satan, following the course of this world.

We were born separated from God in a fallen world.

We had a heart that said, I will do what I want to do.

I will be my own God, and my creator is not going to tell me how to live.

Our hearts craved independence and lawlessness.

Our minds were filled with sinful imaginations, strange perversions and evil thoughts.

And therefore we produced fruit of hatred, of selfishness, of retaliation, complaining hearts, having hands and feet that were swift to only pleasure ourselves.

And because we were darkness, we lived in the dark.

Even though God sees everything and he knows everything, for the sake of our conscience, we ran from the light.

Like Adam and Eve, we hid behind fig leaves.

We tried to hide our sin with created things, with money or self-righteousness, false identities, drugs or alcohol, distracting ourselves with entertainment.

We used every fig leaf out there to cover ourselves, to keep ourselves hidden in darkness.

We were sinners in denial.

And if you're tempted to say to yourself right now, well, you know what?

I really wasn't a bad guy.

You know, I grew up in a Christian home.

I was converted at a young age.

I never smoked, I never cursed, I never partied, you're deceiving yourself.

You were darkness.

No matter your background, your sin preference, or when you got converted, your self-righteousness is just as bad as the drug dealer or the prostitute.

We all were dark objects of God's wrath, and you will never fully appreciate the cross of Jesus Christ until you can first embrace that reality.

You know, there's a reason why most criminals perform crimes at night.

There's a reason when there's, you know, helicopter spotlights shining throughout a city, that those who are guilty of something they start running and jumping and hiding in dumpsters or running into the woods.

There's a reason we are told in Revelation that when Christ returns in his shining glory, that unbelievers on earth will be begging mountains to cover them because they hate the light.

They love the darkness and they refuse to come to the light because the light exposes darkness.

I remember in my addiction days when I was strung out on meth doing horrible things, I loved to sleep all day and go into town at night.

I felt hidden.

It was like the literal darkness kind of insulated me.

I felt like there was less of a chance of me getting caught or seen by people.

I didn't want people to know what I was up to.

There is a legit reasons wh why parents tell their children nothing good happens after midnight.

All of us were darkness.

We were dark people living in dark places.

But now, says Paul, you are light of the Lord.

How did this happen?

What changed?

How did we go from darkness to light?

Here's how.

You know, my bedroom, it doesn't look that bad when the lights are off, but but when I turn the lights on, I see dirty clothes on the floor, there's dust everywhere, there's moldy food on the dresser.

In the same way, Christ, he turned on the light inside of us, and our darkness was exposed.

We saw our true condition.

My life is a mess.

It's a train wreck.

I'm a sinner in desperate need of a savior.

And secondly, the light of Christ, it gave us vision.

The gospel became visible to us.

That is what light does.

It helps us see clearly.

And so Christ, He turned on the light and the blinders came off.

The light caused us to see God's word, to see Christ crucified, to see his sacrifice for us, to see the good news about the forgiveness of our sins.

And thirdly, the light of Christ brought healing.

Remember, light cannot coexist with darkness.

It pushes darkness out.

If I turned on a light in a dark room, the light always wins.

And so the light of Christ removes the oppressive, the tormenting darkness that dominated us.

The light pushes out the darkness.

So because of Christ's light, we are now enlightened to our sin.

We're now able to see the gospel, and we're free from darkness.

We are now children of the light.

Paul is looking at this church in Ephesus, saying, You are children of the light.

Yes, you were once darkness, living without the lights on, doing horrible dark deeds, but now you have been adopted into God's family.

You've been given a salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, and you have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of God, and you are now a legal and literal child of the light.

What happened, church, when you were saved?

Did you just add a little bit of Jesus to your life?

Did you just become a better person?

Did you just mature a little bit?

No.

Here's what happened: you were delivered from a dark, demonic wormhole.

You were, as Colossians 1.13 tells us, delivered from the domain of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of his beloved son.

That's what happened.

Church, do you believe this?

And you might object and say, Yeah, Jimmy, but I don't feel like it.

I still do bad things, I still sin, I still make mistakes.

Sounds good, Jimmy.

Like theology, it checks out, but I don't feel like a child of the light.

Well, thank God that your salvation and the reality of it is not based on your feelings.

You are not a child of the light because you earned it.

You are light because Jesus chased you down, even though you were running from him like a criminal, and he lit you up.

He lit you up, he pulled you out of the grave, he took you out of the cellar and brought you into the daylight.

We embrace this reality not by feelings but by faith.

By faith that Jesus' work accomplished this.

Faith that Jesus' sacrifice, it was sufficient.

Faith that God has adopted me into his family based on his will, not my effort.

And then and only then can we begin to walk as a child of the light.

Look at what Paul says next.

Walk as a children of the light.

So imagine for a moment if there's a soldier in the military that was convinced that he's not a soldier.

Even though he's part of the army, he's on base, he bears the badge, he has the credentials, he couldn't possibly be an effective soldier.

Why?

Because he's convinced he's not.

You see this a lot in adoption.

Kids are adopted into a loving family.

The family legally adopts them.

The child is hopefully treated as equal as any other of the biological children in the family.

But yet often the adopted child tells themselves, I don't really belong here.

I'm not actually part of this family.

And what happens?

They miss out, they isolate, they don't act like a son or a daughter, they act like a stranger because who you think you are dictates how you behave.

Our actions are reinforcing what we truly believe about ourselves.

In the same way, the enemy attacks our identity, he makes us question who we are in Christ, because that's the only thing he can do.

Think about it.

He can't stop the work that God is doing in and through you.

He can't blot your name out of the Lamb's book of life.

The only thing the enemy could possibly do is cause me to question my identity.

Are you sure that you're a child of the light?

Look at what you did yesterday.

Are you sure God loves you?

True Christians don't do that.

A child of the light?

Like, really?

It's the same voice we hear to Eve in the garden.

Did God really say?

It's what he did to Jesus in the wilderness.

If you are the Son of God, doubting God's word, questioning our identity.

Which is why Paul says, know that you're a child of the light, so that you can walk as a child of the light.

Stop embracing the lie that you're a pathetic loser, a wretched sinner, someone who God despises and looks down on.

If you are in Christ, God sees you now as a dearly loved child of the light.

Despite yesterday's sin, despite your lack of commitment to him, you are a child of holiness.

And nothing will change that reality because Jesus purchased you, and as Hebrews 7 tells us, he lives forever.

He lives forever to intercede on your behalf.

So what does it look like to walk in the light?

Well, Paul tells us, for the fruit of light is found in all that is good, right, and true.

And so do, think, say things that line up with goodness, righteousness, and purity.

Meditate on heavenly things, walk in the fruits of the Spirit, do things that honor the Lord.

Live a life of confession, repentance, loving the Lord your God and loving your neighbor as yourself.

It isn't complicated.

It's the opposite of darkness.

Darkness is ignorance, secrecy, deceit.

Light is all goodness, righteousness, and truth.

Now, just in case we forgot to give us some cultural context, the church in Ephesus was engulfed in a pagan society.

If you haven't discovered this yet, you will quickly realize that every decision you make in life is not laid out for you in the Bible.

So you can imagine these Christians in Ephesus in a very pagan society.

They're asking the question, uh, what can we do?

Can we go to a secular play?

Like, am I allowed to get a job as a bartender?

Am I allowed to listen to Tupac?

You know, it's like, can I attend a secular college?

Can I crack a 6-7 joke?

It's like, where's the line of goodness?

How do I know if what I'm doing is light or darkness?

So Paul tells us in verse 10: try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord.

Don't just do something because you feel like it's right.

Ask yourself, for me personally, is this something that will please the Lord?

Is this light or is this dark?

Will this honor God?

This is a wonderful way to live.

This is what it looks like, church, to be under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

In all that we do, in whatever we do, we are asking the question: is this something that is pleasing to God?

You know, biblical discernment is the spirit-empowered skill of using God's word to distinguish truth from error, good from evil.

The word discernment, derived from the Greek, it means to distinguish, to separate, to examine carefully in order to make good and godly decisions.

And so many of us, we just don't do this.

We get an idea, it pops in our head, and we pursue it.

Uh we see an opportunity and we take it.

We are compulsive, making decisions, giving no regard to God and what he may want for us, which gets us in trouble.

We must live in spiritual discernment because we do a really good job at deceiving ourselves.

We are experts in ignoring God, not taking our decisions to Him because I want to do what I want to do.

But we must, as disciples, mimic Jesus in saying, Lord, not my will, but yours be done.

Although the Bible doesn't give us every answer for every single decision that you will make in life, the Lord has given us his Holy Spirit, and He's given us wise counsel within the church that we might discern, especially in the gray areas, what is pleasing to the Lord.

Living in the light, it means that I can see now.

I'm no longer ignorant or blind.

I can see the world around me and how it's evil.

I can see how vulnerable I am.

So in whatever I do, in all that I do, I'm asking, is this something that will be satisfying to my Lord Jesus Christ?

So if we've been brought out of darkness, if we are now children of the light who are walking in the light, how do we now interact with darkness?

What does that look like?

Well, Paul tells us in verse 11, he says, take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.

So as Christians, here is our new relationship with darkness.

Number one, don't partake in darkness.

That is your new relationship with darkness.

Don't partake in it.

And number two, expose it.

So starting with the first, you are not to partake anymore in darkness.

It's foolish.

It's like a freed prisoner going back to prison.

It's like a healed blind man who wants to be blind again.

It's silly.

Plus, Paul says that the deeds of darkness, they're unfruitful, meaning they have no significance, no value in the kingdom of God.

We take a stand against darkness.

That's what we do.

Psalm 1.

Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked, or stand in the way that sinners take, or sit in the company of mockers.

Darkness is not good for us.

It has no real value and it hurts our Christian witness.

And it's something that we should avoid.

It will choke out our love for Jesus.

So as the world says, come join us.

Everybody's doing it.

Lie on your taxes, steal from your employer, engage in gossip, express yourself, have a good time, flaunt your success.

We abstain.

We abstain because we understand those things as darkness.

It's similar, we see parallels to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

We say, I will not bow down.

I will not join the world in defying God.

But we jud we but we also just don't abstain.

We also look at the verse we expose the deeds of darkness.

Now what does that mean?

Well, let's first establish what this doesn't mean.

It doesn't mean that we should be screaming at people in rage with protest signs.

It doesn't mean that we rudely and obnoxiously troll people who are living in darkness.

Sadly, many Christians do this and they misrepresent and they misapply this command.

This command is not an excuse for you to take out all of your anger and frustration.

It is a humble, gentle call to do what Jesus did.

To lovingly say to the woman at the well, hey, you have five husbands.

Allowing the Holy Spirit to convict and work.

To say, like John the Baptist, hey soldiers, you guys need to quit extorting people and bearing false witness.

Part of being a Christian is helping sinners see that their lifestyle or their life choices are against God.

Now, don't get me wrong, there is a time to call out evil boldly.

John the Baptist, he called the Pharisees a brood of vipers.

That's strong language.

Jesus called out the religious leaders harshly with his lengthy, woe to you, Pharisee speech.

I mean, he called them whitewash tombs.

But the majority of what Jesus did in exposing people's sin wasn't to crush them and say, I'm right, you're wrong, ha ha.

The goal of him calling out deeds of darkness was to lead them to the good news of grace, forgiveness, and new life.

There's a difference between calling out evil boldly and just being a jerk.

Know the difference.

The principle here is this call out deeds of darkness in a spirit-filled, evangelistic, gospel-filled manner.

We need to expose darkness because here's the reality: lost people don't know they're lost.

Spiritually blind people don't know that they're blind.

So this is an evangelistic tool.

It's a very loving thing to do.

People need to know that they are in rebellion against a holy God.

People need to know that they are breaking God's command.

People need to know that they are sinful and they are heading towards hell.

We shouldn't shy away from hard conversations.

But Jimmy, what if it hurts the relationship?

Listen, be as gracious and tactful as you can.

But your goal in life is not to be liked by people.

Your goal in life is to honor God by making him and his ways known.

If I had an unbelieving friend who says, I'm going to have an abortion, I can honor God and say, Hey, do you understand that that's evil?

Friend, do you understand that you will be committing murder?

If an unbelieving friend says, Hey, I'm going to the bar this weekend and I'm going to sleep around with whoever I can find, I can say, hey, friend, I love you.

And I just want you to know that that's not God's design for you.

God invented sex to be honored in marriage between one man and one woman.

You are outside of the standard.

So we expose darkness because it's destroying souls.

And we care enough to speak up and uphold God's standard because we represent his kingdom.

But we don't stop there.

Okay, we don't stop there.

Although evangelism starts with exposing sin by revealing the law of God, it should lead us to the work of Christ.

Yes, God's law, it's meant to condemn, but it's also a tutor, a guide, as Galatians tells us, that should lead us to the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Savior.

So as we expose darkness, we must also give them the remedy, gospel hope.

We give them light, saving light.

The law of God, it brings us out of denial and it's it cuts us and it convicts us and it it's it's it's a terrible feeling.

But then we must give people the gospel bandages that will heal and comfort and save.

And that is exactly what Paul does next.

He says in verses 13 and 14, 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.

That is why we call out darkness, so that it might be exposed by the light.

This is why we emphasize sin and talk about depravity and hell.

People complain all the time.

They're like, I don't want to hear about that.

I just want to hear about God's love.

But you know nothing about God's love until you first understand something about the depths in the depravity of sin and darkness.

There is no transformation.

There is no new life.

There's no healing and deliverance until our darkness is first recognized and exposed.

Only then can we see ourselves for who we truly are and see Christ for who He truly is.

Only then can we confess and repent and have godly sorrow, which propels us to cling to the cross of Christ and shout, nothing in my hand I bring, but simply to the cross I cling.

So ever since Genesis 3, after the fall, we are people who hide from God.

We close our ears, we shut our eyes, we cover ourselves with man-made things, trying to cover the guilt of our sin.

We are people who live in a dark dungeon doing weird and twisted things, thinking we are hidden.

But there is hope.

Because in that dark dungeon, someone from the outside, someone from the light has come down.

And his name is Jesus Christ, the light of this world.

He has come and he's made a way, a way to be forgiven, set free, resurrected.

And we can either continue to hide ourselves from his light, we can keep running from his brightness, or we can come to him bare, fully seen and fully known, and be awoken from our slumber.

Therefore, it says, Awake, O sleeper, arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.

In John 8, verse 12, Jesus says, I am the light of this world.

John 8:12

Anyone who follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

Second Corinthians 4, 6 says, For God who said, Let the light shine out of darkness, made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God's glory displayed in the face of Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 60, verse 1 says, Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.

Isaiah 60:1

And so this phrase that Paul's using, wake up sleeper, it's believed to come from an ancient hymn or poem that would have been familiar to Paul's readers at the time.

And he uses it in two ways.

First, for believers who are spiritually lazy, they're distracted by the concerns of life, to wake back up and start walking in a manner worthy of their calling.

And it's used secondly for the unbelievers in the room, the fakers, to wake up from their unconverted condition and become alive in Christ.

So if you are here this morning and you've been living in darkness, you're utterly depressed, you're hopeless, you're feeling crushed by the weight of your sin.

You're exhausted from being a complete slave to your evil desires, and you feel the darkness closing in.

You show up here every Sunday with a big smile on your face.

You're putting on your best Christian facade, but in reality, in your mind and behind closed doors, you are trapped in darkness.

You're living in it.

And you're you're you're spinning your wheels with sin, guilt, shame.

Sin, guilt, shame.

And the voice of the enemy is getting louder and louder, saying to you, You cannot be loved.

You cannot be fixed.

There is no hope for you.

You're too far gone.

Stay in the dungeon.

That's where you belong.

Listen to God's word this morning.

Awake.

Wake up.

Stop sleeping in a bed of lies.

This world is passing by.

Life is short.

Wake up.

Jesus Christ, He's come into this dark world.

He made a way for sinners to be ignited, to come alive.

He didn't come to call the righteous.

He came to save a sinner like you.

And so let the light of Christ burn away your sinful desires and ignite your passion for God.

Let his light shine on you.

Yes, it's painful.

Yes, it exposes reality, but it is life, it is freedom, it is salvation.

And by the way, God already knows what you're doing and he already knows what you're thinking.

It's not a surprise to him.

So come, come to Jesus and let his healing light lead you to confession.

God is saying the same thing he said to Adam after he sinned.

Where are you?

Where are you?

God isn't asking that question because he can't find you.

He's the all-knowing God.

God asked, Where are you in Genesis 3:9, not out of ignorance, but to prompt Adam to recognize his own transgression, his own guilt and his separation from God, that Adam might come and confess, so that God might clothe him, providing atonement, covering his nakedness through the foreknowledge of Christ's sacrifice.

Genesis 3:9

The sinner is locked in a deep slumber.

He hears not when God calls.

He has no sense of danger.

He is not stirred when he hears about the beauty and the glories of God.

He's in his bed, he's loathing in misery.

And in a sick way, he's finding pleasure in his doom.

And the house is burning down.

Which is why Paul says, awake.

Literally, it means rouse yourself up because pardoning grace, resurrecting power, new life is at hand.

The Son of righteousness has come into this world.

He has provided a way out of darkness.

Surrender yourself to him.

Lay yourself bare before him.

And Christ shall give thee light properly.

Christ shall dawn upon thee.

So proclamation church.

The implications of this passage are evident.

First, remember your spiritual history.

Remember where you came from.

You were darkness in every sense.

Don't forget that.

Don't become entitled, thinking too highly of yourself.

Remember where you came from and allow it to kill your pride and give you a greater appreciation towards the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Secondly, embrace your new identity.

You are a child of the light.

Let me ask you a question.

Do you confess with your mouth, and do you believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord?

Seriously, answer that question to yourself.

If so, then this is who you are: a child of the light.

Not a wretched sinner, not a dumb idiot, not a victim who's been given a bad lot.

You are a child of the light, destined for glory.

Embrace that identity.

Third, walk in the light.

Walk in it.

Most of our misery and our spiritual depression exists because we're still trying to live in the darkness.

Even as Christians, why is it that we resist things like accountability or meaningful membership or uh the pastor or mentor speaking, asking me hard questions and speaking into my life?

Why do we avoid those environments?

Because we still have that bent.

I want to live in darkness, and I don't want anyone calling me out on it.

Repent this morning.

Live in the light, walk in the light that the Lord already knows.

Bring your sin to the light and start walking in joyful obedience.

And fourth, avoid darkness and expose it.

Stay away from darkness.

Don't be so gullible and easily influenced by peer pressure.

And don't be afraid to lovingly call out darkness when you see it.

Sure, it might ruffle the relationship, it might offend, but it's what we're called to do.

It's God honoring and it's a loving thing to do.

And lastly, if you are in a dark place this morning, awake from your slumber in Jesus' name.

Whether you are an unbeliever living in darkness, or whether you're a believer and you've fallen back into darkness, the call is the same.

Awake, sleeper.

Rise from the dead.

The alarm is going off and you're late.

Stop just laying there, hitting the snooze button.

Get up, rise up, and let the light of Christ shine on you.

Stop playing hide and seek with God.

He already knows where you're hiding.

You've spent enough time in the dungeon, hiding in secret, wasting your time with sin.

Awake, O sleeper, and let the light of Christ shine on you this morning.

Let's pray.