Green Baggins

Ephesians 6:21-24

5/11/2008

Audio Version

One Peanuts cartoon shows Linus and Charlie Brown talking together, and they are talking about the Bible. Linus is talking about Paul’s letters, and he says that it always feels strange reading Paul’s letters, since it feels like he is reading someone else’s mail. It certainly does feel that way when we hear from Paul’s letters about people we don’t know very well, like this Tychicus. However, there are lessons we can learn from Tychicus, as well as from the final benediction. Final greetings often sum up the message of the whole letter. So we also will reflect on the message of Ephesians as a whole, now that we have gone through the entire letter.

Firstly, what do we learn from Tychicus? From the four other times his name is mentioned in the Bible, we learn these important facts: Tychicus was in Ephesus on one of Paul’s missionary journeys, and was quite possibly one of Paul’s first converts. Tychicus was from Ephesus itself, and was therefore known to the other believers in Ephesus. Secondly, Tychicus was one of two people Paul took with him on his third missionary journey (the other being Trophimus). Therefore, Tychicus was a fellow missionary with Paul. He went through the same trials that Paul went through. He was someone as close as a brother to Paul. He never abandoned Paul like John Mark did. Therefore, he earned Paul’s undying love and trust. Tychicus was almost certainly the one who carried this letter to the Ephesians, and might even have been involved in writing down what Paul wanted to say. Paul also sent Tychicus to relieve Timothy and Titus successively. So, Tychicus was a very versatile worker. Paul could send this jack of all trades anywhere to do anything. He was therefore a right hand man to Paul. No wonder Paul calls him “the dear brother and faithful servant.” I suspect that when Paul told the Ephesians that Tychicus will tell them everything, that that even includes some kind of explanation of what Paul meant in this letter. Certainly, it also included a description of how Paul was doing, and what Paul was doing. At the very least, encouragement was necessary, since the Ephesians had heard that Paul was in prison. They needed to know how Paul was doing in prison.

So, how do we evaluate Tychicus? Certainly, Tychicus was essential to Paul’s ministry. He was kind of quiet. He didn’t write anything that has his name on it, even though he may have been involved in writing Ephesians and Colossians. He was a courier for the Word of God. He carried the Word of God. This shows us that everyone has their part to play. If Tychicus had not done what God had called him to do, then the Ephesians Christians would never have heard from Paul. We would have lost this letter and Colossians, if not for Tychicus. Tychicus might not even have been aware of the fact that this was an inspired writing. And yet, he carried it. He did his small part for the kingdom of God. And we find out that it is not so small after all. In fact, there are no small, insignificant callings in the body of Christ. Take motherhood, for instance, appropriate on Mother’s Day. Many people today think that a career is much more important than being a mother. I would argue that Scripture states that a mother’s most important job is to be a mother. But it is not really a job, after all. It is a calling. If you are a mother, it is because God has called you to be a mother. You have God’s own blessing on your motherhood. You were meant to be a mother. It didn’t somehow happen by accident. You know, one of the Ten Commandments is about honoring parents, and if God wants parents and parenting honored, then so should we honor our parents, and we should also honor parenting itself. Let no one despise motherhood. Let no one value a career over motherhood if they are in fact mothers. But the example of Tychicus applies to all honorable callings. If God has called you to do a task, then it doesn’t matter how small or insignificant you think it is, it is not small or insignificant. If you are taking out the garbage,you should do that to the glory of God. If you go to school, you should do that to the glory of God. If you can find a way to help other Christians exercise their spiritual gifts, then that is certainly to the glory of God. In fact, it is in those small things that the glory of God is most important, because it s the small things that take up the majority of our lives. And God cares about how we do them.

Moving on to the benediction, we can see four words that help us summarize the message of Ephesians. Those four words are peace, love, faith and grace. We’ll start with grace. Paul took great pains in the first chapter and a half to talk about the fact that we are saved by grace. We cannot even take any credit for the faith which God gives us. Salvation is of God, and from God. Of course, we are to respond to this great gift of salvation by doing those good deeds which we were predestined to do. But God gets all the glory for our salvation. Then, in chapter 2, verse 11 through chapter 3, Paul tells us about the peace we have with God that leads to the peace we have with one another. He tells us how those two aspects of peace are related. Peace with God results in peace with fellow believers. Then in chapter 4 through the first part of chapter 6, we see how we are to love one another. We are to imitate God, seeking unity in the body of Christ, submitting as we ought to those in authority over us, and loving those committed to our care as Jesus Christ loves us. Then, in the armor passage, we are called to faith. In faith are we to stand against the devil and against his schemes. So, then we can see that these four words: grace, peace, love, and faith are a summary of what Paul wants to tell us in Ephesians. These words all operate in the context of the church, which is the one great theme of Ephesians. Ephesians is about the body of Christ. In a way, it is also fitting that we remember Pentecost in this final sermon on Ephesians, since it was on Pentecost that God established the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit in power with His church.

So, in considering grace, peace, love, and faith in the context of the church, we have to ask these very important questions: how important is the church to you? It was the early church father Cyprian of Carthage who once said that you cannot have God as your Father without having the church as your mother. John Calvin said the same thing. On Mother’s Day, do you remember that the church is your spiritual mother? Do you remember that it is the church that nurses you with spiritual milk? Do you remember that it is the church that eventually gives you spiritual meat from the Word of God? You might remember that the fifth commandment tells us to honor our father and our mother. Included in that commandment is the command to honor our spiritual Father, who is God Almighty, and to honor our spiritual mother, the church. It is not honoring to your spiritual mother to neglect the attendance of weekly worship, or any other opportunity to fellowship with God’s people and to learn from God’s Word. We should desire to come to every service or Bible study that the church offers. How about the evening worship service? That is a time when the church wants to feed you. Where is your hunger? If your children are not hungry, do you not begin to worry about their health? In the same way, if you do not hunger for the Word of God with every fiber of your spiritual being, then the church starts to worry about you. Come to the feast morning and night. There is no real reason why we all cannot come to the evening service, is there? Honor your spiritual mother church by coming whenever she offers food. She wants to bless you, not to burden you. She wants you to feel the blessing of beginning and ending the Lord’s Day in worship of God, and in hearing from Him. She wants you to grow as much as you can by eating all that you can. And by the way, there is no such thing as gluttony of eating the Word of God too much. You can never have too much.

You will hear about grace, peace, love, and faith in the church. You will hear about Jesus Christ as the answer to our spiritual problem of sin and spiritual death. You will hear about everything God has done in the pages of the Bible, the whole counsel of God. We should strive to want to hear the whole counsel of God.

So that is Paul’s message. God has given grace to us in order that we might have peace. As the letter began with grace and peace, so also does it end with grace and peace. This results in our love for God and our love for one another. And in this way, our faith grows and grows, as we hear about all the things that God has done for us. So Paul says farewell to us for a while, until we look at another one of his letters. But it is only the beginning for us to put into practice what Paul has told us, what God has told us through Paul.
 

Ephesians 6:17

4/20/2008

Audio Version

The citizens of Feldkirch, Austria, didn’t know what to do. Napoleon’s massive army was preparing to attack. Soldiers had been spotted on the heights above the little town, which was situated on the Austrian border. A council of citizens was hastily summoned to decide whether they should try to defend themselves or display the white flag of surrender. It happened to be Easter Sunday, and the people had gathered in the local church. The pastor rose and said, “Friends, we have been counting on our own strength, and apparently that has failed. As this is the day of our Lord’s resurrection, let us just ring the bells, have our services as usual, and leave the matter in His hands. We know only our weakness, and not the power of God to defend us.” The council accepted his plan and the church bells rang. The enemy, hearing the sudden peal of bells, concluded that the Austrian army had arrived during the night to defend the town. Before the service ended, the enemy broke camp and left. The hope of salvation is so powerful. It is a helmet for us in the time of trouble. It protected the people of Feldkirch, and it will protect us also.

Paul continues on in his description of the armor of God, coming now to the helmet. We have seen that every piece of armor is vitally important if the believer is to fight Satan properly. The helmet is no exception. After all, a helmet protects the head. Most people generally want to keep their heads. So, if that is so, then we must cling to salvation literally for dear life. Now, a helmet is a very easy piece of armor to understand. There really isn’t anything I need to explain about how a helmet works. It has always worked the same way through the history of mankind. It protects the head. The only thing remaining is to explain the term “salvation,” and then examine how it protects us. It does not somehow protect our logical mind. Ancient people did not think of their mind as being in their head, believe it or not. They believed that their “brain” was part of the chest. So, we should not be looking for some kind of mysterious way in which salvation protects our minds, although it certainly does do that. It is another part of the armor that is essential, because it protects an essential part of us.

Salvation means two things in the Bible. Firstly, salvation refers to that point in time when we come to faith in Jesus Christ. At that point in time, we are justified by God’s grace when He declares us not guilty, and also declares that we are heirs of the kingdom of God. This happens because Christ’s righteousness is reckoned to be ours. Furthermore, God adopts us as His children, and implants the Holy Spirit in us so that we will become more and more holy throughout life. So, our sins are all forgiven when we come to faith. In this sense, we will never be more saved than we are right now.

However, that is not the only way that the Bible uses the term salvation. We only have to go to 1 Thessalonians 5:8 to realize this: “But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.” The hope of salvation indicates something that we do not fully have yet, since no one hopes for what he already has. In this sense, the Bible means the whole Christian life from conversion all the way through life, through death, and including resurrection from the dead. That is something that we do not have, at least in its fullness. We must keep in mind these two definitions of salvation, because great confusion can happen if do not keep them distinct. For one thing, when we think of salvation as that point of time when we come to faith, we have to exclude all works of any kind from that salvation. In that salvation, works play no part whatsoever. However, in the broader sense, which includes our whole lives, our works do play a role. They are essential, as a matter of fact. So, are works necessary for salvation? No, in the first sense, yes in the second sense. If we include works in the first sense, then we have to do something to obtain favor with God. The Bible everywhere condemns such thinking. However, excluding works from the second sense would mean that it doesn’t matter what we do.

However, we must be even more careful, because we cannot say that our works are done in our own strength, nor can we say in any way that eternal life depends on them. Our good works earn rewards above and beyond salvation, but they only earn those rewards because of God’s grace. As one writer puts it, God crowns His own gifts to us. Ultimately, they are to be for God’s glory, and not our own. However, God has promised that He will reward us for those good works.

So, it is this understanding that helps protect us. How does it protect us? Well, for one thing, Satan is always seeking to attack our salvation. There are a myriad of ways he does this. He will seek to get us to be afraid that we have sinned our way out of salvation, or that because God has hidden Himself, He has abandoned us. Or, that we are just a little bit better than our neighbor. The answer to all these things is still to come back to the Gospel.

So what do you do when you have sinned, and you feel guilty about it, and are afraid that God has given you over to your sin? Maybe it is a sin that you have committed many times, and cannot seem to get over it. What do you do? You remember your helmet. Salvation is not something that you can take on and off. In that respect, actually, it is not like a helmet. However, when we remember that we are always at war, then the parallel becomes exact again, because as long as we are at war, we need to have our helmet on. I remember a scene from a war movie where a surgeon was not wearing his helmet. The commanding officer told him that he had to wear a helmet. The surgeon said that he couldn’t use his stethoscope if he wore his helmet. The general told him to cut two holes in his helmet so that he could. We like to put up excuses for not wearing this helmet in wartime, but the fact is that always having it on is the wisest course of action. So, back to our question, what do you do? Remembering your helmet means that you remember what Christ has done for you. You remember that you are now a temple of the Holy Spirit. You remember that God will always forgive a penitent heart. There are no exceptions to that. A penitent heart God will not despise, says the Psalmist. We need to come back to the Gospel. Our forgiveness once for all is dependent on what Jesus has done for us. When that happens, we are forgiven of all our sins past, present and future. However, that is not the only kind of forgiveness we need. That kind of forgiveness saves us from the wrath of God. However, when we sin as Christians, we incur God’s fatherly displeasure. That means that we need to ask forgiveness every day for our offenses. That is why we pray in the Lord’s Prayer “forgive us our debts.” That is, forgive us our sins, forgive us what we owe and cannot repay. After you have asked God for forgiveness, then you need to pray to the Lord for help and strength to resist that temptation better the next time it comes around. This is extremely important to remember, because victory on the battlefield of sin is a cumulative thing. The more battles you win by God’s help, the less that sin will have any hold over you. It is always an uphill battle, but there is increasing victory that you can have.

Now supposing your particular problem is not a particular sin, but rather that you doubt your salvation. This helmet is impervious to Satan’s attack. If you are in fact truly saved, then the helmet will not come off. Comfort for doubters can be found in the promises of God. Remember this, that if you have ever truly experienced the grace of God, you cannot lose it. God may be hidden from you right now, but that is only to make you seek Him more. It is never to make you doubt. Only Satan wants those doubts. God wants you to trust Him more. These promises will enable us to doubt our doubts. Salvation is not temporary. Salvation is permanent. The story is told of the great Englishman Oliver Cromwell on his deathbed. He asked the ministers there (John Owen and Thomas Goodwin, both renowned Puritans) if we could be sure of salvation. They responded by saying that if he had ever experienced true grace, then he could be sure that it had never left. On hearing that, Cromwell was happy, and he said that he had no fears then, for he knew that he had received grace before. Fortunately for us, grace is not dependent on our feelings. Just because we feel something wonderful doesn’t mean that it is grace. So also, just because we don’t feel wonderful doesn’t mean that grace is absent. Grace makes itself known in strange ways sometimes. Grace always makes us grow, and that is a hard thing for us to learn.

And so, whether our problem is a particular sin, or whether it is doubt, we need to put on our helmet of salvation, which is sure to protect us from Satan’s blows.
 

Ephesians 6:16

4/13/2008

Audio Version

The story is told of a teacher who wanted to prove to his class the law of the pendulum. The law of the pendulum states that if you release a pendulum, and it swings to the side, when it comes back it will never reach as high as its starting point. Gravity and air friction will slow it down. So the teacher demonstrated this with a small pendulum he had made for the class. Every time the pendulum came on the back swing, he marked the spot where it came up the highest. Every mark was a little bit lower than the previous mark. However, the lesson was not over. He had a much larger pendulum hanging from the middle of the science room. He asked the students whether they believed that the law of the pendulum was true. They all said yes. So he then got one of the students to stand next to a wall. He held the pendulum an inch from the student’s nose. He asked the student if the student believed that if the teacher let go of the pendulum, the student’s nose would not be in any danger. The student said that he believed that. However, he was sweating already. The teacher released the pendulum. On the back swing, the student simply couldn’t take it, and quickly got out of the way. The teacher then asked the room full of students whether this one student really believed the law of the pendulum. They all answered “NO!” And that was true. The student didn’t really believe it, did he? If he had, he wouldn’t have needed to get out of the way, since he was as safe where he was as he would be anywhere else in the room. What he lacked was faith. Faith would have shielded the student from that pendulum, because the student would have known that the pendulum couldn’t touch him. It looked like the pendulum could. However, the law of the pendulum said that the student was safe. This illustration comes from Ken Davis’s book How to Speak to Youth. Our faith needs to be the kind that will stand firm even when it looks like Satan is going to get us. To understand what Paul is saying here, we must understand what a shield was in Roman times, and how it was used.

There were two kinds of shields used in Roman times. First, there was the smallish round shield that was used in hand to hand combat. It was lighter, made of wood usually, and had a leather covering. That is not the kind of shield that Paul mentions here in the text. The shield that Paul is talking about was the long shield, rectangular in shape, although it bowed out in the middle. It also had a leather covering, and an iron point in the middle of the shield, pointing towards the enemy. That point had a purpose. It was not just for show. It was there so that direct attacks on the shield would be somewhat deflected, and therefore lose some of their force. This shield covered the whole person. The soldier could hide behind this shield and be safe from arrows, spears, or swords. Furthermore, this shield was usually drenched in water before battle, since arrows were often dipped in pitch and set aflame. Those arrows would then thud into the shield and be extinguished by the water-drenched leather. Or, they would bounce off the shield, fall into the ground, and be extinguished. Either way, this shield was an extremely effective piece of defensive armor.

However, there is one more aspect of this shield that is important for us to recognize. This shield worked the best when it went lock step with other soldiers’ shields. If a whole row of soldiers held their shields together, then hardly any arrow could attack, even from an angle. One shield all by itself could not defend from an arrow that comes from an oblique angle. But a whole row of shields could. Normally, the Roman army marched into battle with a protective wall of shields all around the outside of the square of solders. Those in the middle would hold their shields overhead. This would prevent arrows from getting at them from above. When this happened, the entire square (called a phalanx) could reach the scene of battle without loss of life from arrows. It allowed them to close with the enemy with their full numbers intact. This is the metaphor which Paul uses to convey what faith is like.

Faith is like a shield. Because it lays hold of Christ, faith covers us with the righteousness of Christ, which is immune to the attacks of Satan. Satan wants to accuse us as being not worthy of the kingdom of God. He would be right, if we didn’t have that shield. Our unprotected person would be completely open to Satan’s attacks in this regard. But our shield protects us. Now, we must be careful here. It is not faith as we exercise it, in and of itself, that protects us. Faith does not shield us because of the fact that we have it. It shields us because of the object of our faith. Faith lays hold of Christ. Faith opens up to Him. Faith is like a pair of tongs with which we take hold of something that would otherwise be too hot for us to hold with our bare hands. Faith is an empty hand reaching out to God’s fullness. In other words, faith is not a thing. It does not have a substance. Faith is always faith in something or someone. In the illustration, it was faith in a particular law of motion, the law of the pendulum. Notice, then, that faith needs to be in something that does not change. The law of the pendulum does not change. Of course, if the pendulum were to become unattached from the ceiling, then you would have cause to worry. However, the law of the pendulum stays the same, even in that situation, where you would certainly not be safe. But faith in God is not like that. God is not only unchanging, but also powerful enough to ensure that all things work together for good for those who love Him. God’s pendulum will never come undone from the ceiling of heaven. His purposes are unchanging and unchangeable. He is far more worthy of our faith and trust than anything or anyone in this world.

Do you therefore have this shield? Have you taken it up in the heat of battle? I should mention here that anyone’s faith, if it be a true faith, will be this kind of shield. Some people’s faith is stronger than other people’s faith. However, what is true about all faith is that it is a shield against Satan’s attacks. He will try to tell us that we are too sinful for God to forgive us. He will tell us that God didn’t really forgive us of all sin, and that we need to get our act together if we want God to forgive us. The problem with this kind of thinking is that we do need to get our act together! But not because we want God to forgive us. It is rather because God has already forgiven us. Getting our act together therefore is our response of gratitude to God for what He has done, and even there God has to help us to get our act together by giving us the Holy Spirit.

Secondly, do you think of your faith as joining up with your fellow Christian’s faith? Just as those shields need to work together for maximum protection, so also our faiths need to work together. We need to encourage one another, and love one another. If someone’s shield is drooping a little, we need to help them hold up that shield a little better. Of course, those soldiers who are closest to you are your own family. Are we taking pains to strengthen those shields? Are we using the catechisms with our children? Are we having them memorize Scripture? Are we reading through the Bible with them? Are we praying with them and for them? Similarly with regard to our spouses: are we encouraging our spouses in their spiritual walk, or do we cut them down? Do we encourage them to read more Scripture, and pray more? Are we honest with our doubts? Doubt is not the same as unbelief, we must understand. A doubt is something that can actually help us to understand our faith better. Doubts, of course, are never comfortable things. However, there is no Christian in the history of the world who has not had any doubts. Satan, of course, will try to turn that doubt into yet another arrow to shoot at you. But you must take the doubt to God, and ask Him to show you the way out of it. God is faithful, and He will do it.

Thirdly, when you think about your faith, do you primarily think about what is in you, or do you primarily think about Jesus Christ, the object of your faith? Robert Murray M’Cheyne, a great Scottish preacher once said these words, “For every one time you look into yourself, look ten times at Christ.” I am convinced that our faith would be a lot stronger if we would measure the strength of our faith not by how well we believe, but by how well Jesus saves, and by how much Jesus loves us, and by how faithful Jesus is as our great High Priest.

When we do these three things, actually taking up this shield, joining our faiths with other believers, and concentrating our faith on the object of our faith, Jesus Christ, then our shield will be strong, since it will have God’s own iron strength holding it all together for us. None of Satan’s arrows can pierce that shield. So take up that shield!

Ephesians 6:15

4/6/2008

Audio Version

In the time of ancient Rome, Rome was famous for many things. However, there were few things more famous that Rome’s military might. They were the only superpower of the world at that time. What made Rome’s armies so famous was the training, discipline, and equipment of the soldiers. Roman soldiers trained with weapons that were twice as heavy as the ones they actually used in battle. Roman soldiers were taken from the elite of Roman free citizens, and so they were well-motivated, since they were defending their own lands. Roman soldiers were famous for their discipline. They were afraid of nothing, since their drills were bloodless battles, and their battles were bloody drills. The Roman solder was a very formidable person. He also had excellent equipment, which enabled him to fight better. We have talked about some of this equipment already, with the breastplate. This week we look to the feet and the shoes. Oftentimes, we look at this passage and think that the shoes are light and feathery, so as to be quick. At least, I used to think this for a long time. However, this week I learned something different from R. Kent Hughes, retired pastor of a church in Wheaton.

The shoe of which Paul speaks is called the caliga, in Latin. It was a cleated shoe that had heavy leather soles with nails as the cleats. In fact, they were somewhat like football shoes today. These boots were then tied to the ankle and calves with straps. These were not running shoes, because Roman soldiers did not run. These shoes were designed to give heavy traction so that the feet would not slip in the time of battle. Most battle in Roman times was hand to hand combat. These shoes gave Roman soldiers a big advantage over their opponents, who, for the most part, did not have such good boots. If conditions were muddy, you can see how these shoes gave the Roman soldier an even greater advantage.

This gives us a clearer picture of how the Gospel helps us in our spiritual warfare. Let’s not forget that the context is that of warfare. We are fighting our own sin nature, and we are fighting Satan and his demons. Knowing the Gospel of peace helps us in the time of war. I never saw the irony before this week when I was studying this closely. As Harold Hoehner points out, the Gospel of peace helps us in war. There is profound truth there for us, if we are patient to see it. For, you see, human beings are always at war with someone. If we are at war with God, then we cannot be at war with Satan. Just as you cannot serve both as masters, so also you cannot be at war with both. So, in a sense, when we are presented with the good news of what Jesus has done for us, that is the peace that starts the war. As soon as we have peace with God, our war with Satan starts. But having peace with God gives us that stability we need so that we do not slip in our war with Satan. Any soldier who slipped in the time of battle was almost sure of being killed.

Furthermore, the Bible uses the image of being barefoot as being unready. 2 Samuel 15 describes David fleeing barefoot from his son Absalom. David had not been prepared for what his son was going to do. In contrast with that, we are to be ready. Paul describes this state of mind as being ready: “having the readiness.” It is being prepared. It is having those nails firmly nailed through the bottom of the boot. It is having those boots securely strapped to your ankles and legs so that they will not come off.

So what is this gospel that we are to have on our feet? Well, this gospel is the teaching concerning Jesus Christ in His Person and work. Listen again to what Isaiah said: “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, ‘Your God reigns.’” The God who reigns is Jesus Christ, who now has the Name that is above every name.

We spoke a bit about this Gospel last week when we heard about the breastplate. The breastplate protects us against those sword strokes of the enemy. The breastplate is our righteousness, both that imputed righteousness, and that imparted righteousness; that alien righteousness of Christ reckoned to us, and that personal righteousness that the Holy Spirit gives us by dwelling inside us. This Gospel is only possible because of Christ’s perfect life on earth, His death on the cross, and His resurrection from the dead. In theology, we speak of this salvation in two ways: salvation accomplished by Christ during His lifetime, and salvation applied to us in our lifetimes. That is the Gospel.

Do you have these shoes on your feet? If so, have you made sure that they are strapped to your feet securely? If not, then you will slip in the time of trouble, in the time of battle. But if you have these shoes, then you need to make sure that they are secure. This will keep you from slipping while you are under attack.

Now, Satan attacks us as a serpent. Serpents attack the legs and feet, because serpents are animals of the ground. He tries to get us to stumble and fall. He wants to lead us into muddy ground so that we start slipping and sliding. So, we need to make sure that we are well-grounded in the Gospel of peace. We need to seek peace with God at all costs, because peace with God enables us to fight properly our war against Satan. Jesus once said that if Satan is fighting against himself, then his kingdom cannot stand. Any nation that is divided becomes very ineffective. In our own history, we could see this in regard to Vietnam. The nation was divided about that war. As a result, we did not win that war. Similarly, if we belong to the house of God, we cannot be divided against God and expect to win any battles against Satan. If you have unconfessed sin in your life, by all means, take that to God, and confess your sin. Do not let those confessions lapse. Confess often to God your sin, and receive forgiveness.

Another way in which we can apply this truth is to realize that we can never go deeper than the Gospel. The Gospel is what grounds us, keeping us from slipping. When we learn more about the Christian faith, we are learning more about how the Bible shows us the Gospel. We never outgrow our need for the Gospel any more than we outgrow our need for peace with God. Is peace boring? I should hope not. Then neither is the Gospel boring. If we are bored with hearing the Gospel, then we need to check our boots to see if they are securely fastened. If we are bored with the Gospel, then we need to ask whether God is bored with the Gospel. Does God have a problem sending out the same old Bible all over the world, which tells us about the same old story? Then, by no means should we ever tire of hearing the Gospel, which has many different facets. The Gospel is like a wonderful work of art. There are many, many levels of understanding, when it comes to art. You can appreciate it as someone who is not used to art. But as a person learns more about art, one can notice more and more about that same piece of art. There is depth. Of course, there are people out there who take one look at a piece of art, and then think that they know all there is to know about it. Those people need to be helped along to see more and more. So it is with the Gospel. There is no limit to the Gospel. It always has more for us. Just when we might think that we know it all, something new comes along. I can tell you from personal experience that there are many very familiar passages that I have read many times. However, something that someone says, or something that I read gives me a whole new angle on that passage. I am constantly learning something new about the Gospel, both what it is, and how it applies. Therefore, do not grow weary of hearing about the same Gospel, for it is rich and deep, and you will continue to learn, if you have the desire. Therefore, cultivate that desire by reading the Scriptures and by reading good books about Scripture.

Last, but not least, this passage does tell us about missions. Are we ready to march for our King, and launch an attack on Satan’s kingdom by marching into his territory and doing battle with him? The Gospel of peace is portable. It can move, and it can march. These are not running shoes that we are talking about. But they are firm and steady boots. This is the peace that marches, the peace that fights, the peace that is militant. This is the peace we have with God with which we will march on the world, and reclaim this world from Satan and his demons. For God is our Warrior. He has conquered, and has made us to be more than conquerors. Amen.

Ephesians 6:14b

3/23/2008

Audio Version

Once upon a time, a woman went to an unusual store to buy something for her husband. Only she didn’t quite have enough money to purchase the item. But the store owner was kind, and knew how important this item was to her and her husband. And so, he set up interest-free payments on a monthly schedule so that she could take it home immediately. The woman gave it to her husband on his birthday. It was only a few days later that her husband wound up in the hospital, having been shot in the chest. She rushed to the emergency room to find out how he was doing. They assured her that he was doing fine, and that the damage was mostly bruises. You see, the item she had bought for her husband was a bulletproof vest. He was a police officer. That vest had saved his life. In the same way the breastplate of righteousness saves our lives from the bullets that Satan wants to shoot at us. We should not delay in putting on this vital piece of armor.

The breastplate was a most important piece of armor, second only to that belt that kept your clothes from getting all tangled. However, after you have the truth clearly presented to you, you need something that will protect your heart. That is the very definition of something vital, isn’t it? The word vital means having to do with life itself. The heart is a most important organ in your body. It is essential. Without a heartbeat, a medical doctor will pronounce you dead. And, in this life, there are countless things that will assault your heart, countless things that will compete for your allegiance. As Jesus says, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Satan will constantly throw things at you to keep your heart from being in the right place, which is being the throne of Jesus, who then sits on the throne of your heart as King Jesus, Lord of your life. So we can see that it is important. There are two questions that we need to answer in order to know its place in our lives. The first question is this: “How do I put on this breastplate?” The second question is this: “How does it protect me?” Related to this second question is how do we use this breastplate.

So, taking these questions in order, we ask the question, “How do we put on this breastplate?” This is not a small question, since our call to worship from Isaiah tells us that God Himself wears this righteousness as a breastplate. In other words, we are seeking to put on God’s own armor. Any breastplate of righteousness that we put on is cut from the same metal as the breastplate that God wears when He goes to battle against His enemies. Of course, this is all metaphorical language, since the righteousness of God is not something distinct from who God is, whereas a breastplate is something distinct from the person wearing it. Righteousness is God’s obedience to His own law. You know, we often say that God can do anything. That is not true. God cannot sin. He cannot transgress the laws which He Himself made. That would be against His own character. So we say then that God is perfectly righteous.

That raises a most important problem. For we are not righteous. So, the question of how we put on this armor becomes nothing less than the question of the gospel itself. How can we be righteous in our lives? To begin to answer this question, we can say that there are two parts to the righteousness that we can have. First, there is the righteousness outside of ourselves that is reckoned to be ours. That would be the righteousness of Christ. Jesus came to earth, and was perfectly obedient to the law in every respect. The reason He did that was not just to take upon Himself the guilt of our sin. It was also so that we might be able to receive a perfect righteousness that answers to the law in every respect. So, it is in no way our righteousness. It is an “alien” righteousness, as Martin Luther would say. It is outside ourselves. When we come to faith in Christ, that “alien” righteousness becomes ours by God’s declaration. I wish to read to you the entire question and answer 60 from the Heidelberg Catechism, which addresses this very question in a very clear way: “How are you righteous before God?” Answer: Only by true faith in Jesus Christ: that is, although my conscience accuses me, that I have grievously sinned against all the commandments of God, and have never kept any of them, and am still prone always to all evil; yet God, without any merit of mine, of mere grace, grants and imputes to me the perfect satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ, as if I had never committed nor had any sins, and had myself accomplished all the obedience which Christ has fulfilled for me; if only I accept such benefit with a believing heart.” So, there you have it. It is as if I had done it, but I haven’t. Christ did. But I am reckoned to have done it, because, by faith, I lay hold of Christ’s righteousness. That is the first kind of righteousness which makes up this breastplate. By the way, this is called justification.

The second kind of righteousness that makes up this breastplate is our own righteousness. This is never perfect in this life. And it is something that God works in us. When we come to faith in Christ, not only are we justified by faith, and not by our own works, but the Holy Spirit also comes to live inside of us, and change us. When that happens, then we gradually become more and more righteous over the course of our lives. This process is gradual, and it is not always moving in an upwards direction. However, the trend line is in an upwards direction. This is an important point to remember. We should not become discouraged because there are certain times in our lives when we do not seem to be very righteous at all, and we fall into that same sin time after time after time. Then we come to doubt our salvation. We should not be discouraged. There is a reason why God leaves some sin in our lives to be gradually overcome. If we were perfect already, we would be tempted to take credit for it. Also, we would be tempted to rely on ourselves for our own righteousness, rather than relying on the Holy Spirit. You see, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, as Paul says. So, our own righteousness is always going to be imperfect in this life. That is no reason to stop fighting sin in our lives. It is no reason to give up. On the contrary, we are in a race to the finish line. Sometimes we run, sometimes we walk, sometimes we stumble. But we still keep going to that finish line. And God is waiting there for us to greet us at the finish line. He is not only cheering us on. He is helping us to get there. What a great and good God we serve! This righteousness is called sanctification. The word comes from a Latin root that means “holiness.” Holiness means being separate from the world. So, the process of sanctification means becoming more separate from the world, more like Christ every day. Of course, we do not mean separated from the world, as if we live in our own little enclave and never come into contact with people who are worldly. But it does mean that we do not behave like them because our hearts are different. We have the righteousness of Christ as a breastplate. And we have the righteousness that the Holy Spirit works in us. Those two things radically distinguish us from the world. The world has neither kind of righteousness. That is why the world will have a very rude awakening. So, again, our question has been this: how do we put on this breastplate? The answer is by faith. Again, as Heidelberg Catechism, question 60 says, just in the very beginning, “How are you righteous before God?” The answer starts out by saying “Only by true faith in Jesus Christ.” Faith is the instrument, the tongs, by which we lay hold of Christ’s righteousness. But faith is also the way in which God implants the Holy Spirit in our sanctification. Faith is our lifeline to God. By it God draws us to Himself. He uses our faith to make us more righteous. So faith is the answer to how we put on the breastplate.

The second main question we wanted to answer was this: how does this breastplate protect me? What good does it do? Why should I have it on? Well, Satan is known as the accuser of Christians. He is always accusing us of leaving the faith, or of having bad motives, or of sinning our way out of God’s grace. He accused Job of bad motives, and he did that to God’s face. What is important to know here is not only that our breastplate protects us (since the righteousness of Christ is not something that can be lost, nor is it imperfect), but also that God uses those accusations to defeat Satan’s own purpose. God turns the table on Satan. I would say, then, that the best thing that the breastplate does is to comfort us. For those who trust in Christ, we have protection for our very hearts. We have the breastplate of righteousness. So put it on by faith so that Satan’s accusations will bounce off like a bullet does against a bulletproof vest. He cannot pierce your heart, for your heart is in the hands of God. Indeed, Satan could no more pierce your heart than he could pierce God’s own heart, since your breastplate is of the same metal and manufacture as God’s own armor. So put it on by faith, and see what it will do.

Ephesians 6:14

3/9/2008

Audio Version

Pulpit and Bible Study Helps vol 16 number 5 tells this story: Dr. Clarence Bass, professor emeritus at Bethel Theological Seminary, early in his ministry preached in a church in Los Angeles. He thought he had done quite well as he stood at the door greeting people as they left the sanctuary. The remarks about his preaching were complimentary. That is, until a little old man commented, “You preached too long.” Dr. Bass wasn’t fazed by the remark, especially in light of the many positive comments. “You didn’t preach loud enough,” came another negative comment; it was from the same little old man. Dr. Bass thought it strange that the man had come through the line twice, but when the same man came through the line a third time and exclaimed, “You used too many big words” –this called for some explanation. Dr. Bass sought out a deacon who stood nearby and asked him, “Do you see that little old man over there? Who is he?” “Don’t pay any attention to him,” the deacon replied. “All he does is go around and repeat everything he hears.” The people were complementing the pastor there, but were not telling the truth. They were not sincere, and their remarks did not measure up to what was true of Dr. Bass’s sermon. This is a great illustration of why we need the belt of truth, as Paul tells us.

There are two main things that this passage means. The first is that there is a standard of truth that is outside of us, namely, the Word of God. I realize that Paul is going to talk about the Word later, describing it as a sword. However, that does not mean that what Paul says here about the Word is redundant. Here we learn about the power of truth. When Paul tells us about the sword, he is telling us that the Bible is our offensive weapon. Anyway, the Bible is our truth. That is the first thing. The second thing is that we must be truthful. Truth must characterize us. To get at these truths, and to show what truth does for us, we will look a little at the background of Paul’s statement here.

Paul was writing from prison in Rome at the time Ephesians was written. This means that he had a soldier guarding him at all times. Of course, such a soldier would not have been wearing all the armor of which Paul speaks here. However, he would have been wearing some of it. That probably sparked Paul into thinking about the Old Testament and its descriptions of armor, as we saw last week.

The description of armor here follows a natural order in which the armor would be put on. We learn something important from that: the belt goes on first. What did a belt do? Well, a belt kept all the clothes together. Normally, a Roman would be wearing a toga, or robe. It was a long, flowing garment that would get in the way of a solder in the middle of battle. So a belt would be used to hitch up that robe and tie it together so as to keep it out of the way. Oftentimes such a belt would also hold the sword. But in any case, the most important point about the metaphor is that the belt held everything together. Without the belt, all would be disjointed, uncoordinated, and chaotic. You had to have the belt. That had to go on first.

So it is in the Christian life. Truth is of paramount importance. It must go on first in our lives. We must know the truth about Jesus Christ. That is, we must know what the Bible says. There is no substitute for this. A bank once decided to have a seminary on how to tell true currency from counterfeit bills. What they did was have their tellers go to a place where they would handle thousands of bills, just counting and counting and counting those same bills. But by handling true bills that much, they were able to tell instantly when a bill was counterfeit. They had handled the truth so much that an error stuck out like a sore thumb. We need to be like that with the Word. We need to handle the Word of God so much that an error will be obvious to us. All of us, myself included, can definitely improve in that area. Furthermore, we are a confessional church, which means that we believe that the truths of Scripture are accurately summarized in the teachings of our church. That would mean the Heidelberg Catechism, the Belgic Confession, and the Canons of Dordt. Do you read those for yourselves? They make wonderful devotional reading. What is so important about them is that they summarize the Bible’s teachings on the most important things we need to know. Of course, these teachings are not infallible as the Bible is. However, those documents are a description of how we as Reformed people have agreed to read the Bible. This is our confession of faith.

The importance of knowing your Bible and knowing the church’s teachings can be seen in what happens when we do not know the truth. The Bible itself declares that if we do not know the truth, then we will be blown around by every wind of doctrine. The latest new fad in doctrine will have us hooked. Truth in the sense I have used it here of being the truth of the Word of God is contrasted with all forms of heresy. Heresy means false teaching. Anyone or any teaching which contradicts the Word of God is heresy. Any fancy dancy television evangelist who never tells you about sin and salvation, but instead talk about money and how much the Holy Spirit is telling him to tell you to give him money, such people will rope you in unless you are firmly grounded in the truth of Scripture. Why do churches have pastors? It is not so that the pastor does all the work of ministry. The Bible itself says that the pastor’s job is to equip the saints, which is everyone, for the work of ministry. A pastor’s job is to preach the whole counsel of God to the people so that they will know the truth themselves. My job is is to make myself unnecessary. At some point, we should all know the truth of Scripture so well that we are all firmly anchored in the Bible, and therefore safe from errors. We should all have that as one of our top priorities in life: that we should know the truth so well that any error will immediately be obvious to us, because we have handled the truth so much. The truth will have mastered us. And the truth will have set us free from man’s errors, and confirmed us into all truth.

Jesus is the best example of this. When Satan came to tempt Him, Satan misquoted from the Bible, trying to convince Jesus that He should short-circuit the cross, and avoid being a mediator for His people. Jesus opposed Satan’s errors in interpreting the Word of God. The way He did that was to put forward God’s truth. It is not enough merely to quote the Bible. Satan did that with far more skill than modern heretics do! What Jesus does is give the true interpretation that allows Scripture to interpret itself. Jesus knew that the Bible does not contradict itself. Satan was quoting one part of Scripture in such a way that another part of Scripture was denied. Jesus fixed that problem by opposing error with truth. The error of Satan was not in the words that he quoted, but in the way in which he made use of them, the way he twisted Scripture’s meaning. Jesus opposed this error with truth.

Oh, how little most Christians today desire this truth! Most Christians today want entertainment rather than truth, comfort rather than the hard work of obtaining that truth, a standard of living that makes us look good rather than the love of God’s truth. May that not be true of us, though I fear that many of us have these wrong priorities. Without the truth, our lives will be confused when it comes to battle. The long robes of wealth, social standing, ego and vanity will trip us up when we try to fight against the evil powers. The evil powers want us to have those nice long robes. But they do not want us to have that belt of truth that restrains those things, and keeps them in check, keeps them from becoming idols in our lives. Make that belt strong, wide and deep! Then it will be able to regulate our lives so that we can be nimble and agile in the fight against Satan and his army.

So, the first aspect of this truth that is so necessary is that we believe in the truth of the Word of God so that we are safe from errors. The second truth that we learn from this belt of truth is that our lives are to be characterized by the truth. This means that we are truthful, and not hypocrites. We are not to be like those people who said one thing to the pastor, but something entirely different to the little old man. This aspect of the truth is that which we experience in our personal relationships. Of course, the truth of God’s Word helps us here, too. I am merely distinguishing here between objective truth and subjective truth. Or, in other words, the truth that is outside of us, and the truth that is inside of us. Now, by “truth that is inside us” I do not mean some kind of inner light that glows all by itself. What I mean is the Holy Spirit working with the Word of God inside us. The Holy Spirit will guide us into all truth, Jesus tells us in the Gospel of John. The Word is on the outside, and the Holy Spirit makes that same Word live in us, ruling and directing our lives. Of course, that truth will have many positive effects in our lives. We will love God and our neighbor. We will tell the truth. We will visit the poor and the widow and the orphan. We will struggle against Satan and his temptations. But here in Paul, the main point is that we will be truth-tellers. Just as God’s Word is truth, so also are we truthful when that Word of God dwells in us. As Colossians 3:16 tells us: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” We will not be hypocrites. However, it is human nature to be hypocrites. As Mark Twain said, “We are all like the moon. We have a dark side that we don’t want anyone to see.” The moon, you see, is always turned with its face toward the earth. The moon turns just as the earth turns. This happens in such a way that we only see the same face of the moon toward us. However, we as Christians are not to be like the moon. Only truth indwelling us will cause us to cease to be hypocrites. Only God’s grace in changing us to be like the true Word, Jesus Christ, will change us. So, ultimately speaking, when Paul tells us to put on the belt of truth, what he is really saying is that we should believe the truth about Jesus Christ, and that Christ’s person and work is for us. Secondly, we should live that out in our lives in such a way that we become more like Jesus. These outward and inward truths are connected in such a way that we cannot have the one without the other. So, believe the truth, and do the truth! Put on that belt of truth!

Ephesians 6:10-13

3/2/2008

Audio Version

Craig Larson says this: “Recently National Geographic ran an article about the Alaskan bull moose. The males of the species battle for dominance during the fall breeding season, literally going head-to-head with antlers crunching together as they collide. Often the antlers, their only weapon are broken. That ensures defeat. The heftiest moose, with the largest and strongest antlers, triumphs. Therefore, the battle fought in the fall is really won during the summer, when the moose eat continually. The one that consumes the best diet for growing antlers and gaining weight will be the heavyweight in the fight. Those that eat inadequately sport weaker antlers and less bulk. There is a lesson here for us. Spiritual battles await. Satan will choose a season to attack. Will we be victorious, or will we fall? Much depends on what we do now–before the wars begin. The bull-moose principle: Enduring faith, strength, and wisdom for trials are best developed before they’re needed.” And that is what Paul is saying to us. We need to put on the full armor of God before we go into battle. It does no good to be putting on armor in the middle of a fight. “Excuse me, will you wait a minute while I put on my armor?” is not a thing to which any enemy would pay attention. He would cut you down as you stand there. Armor or no armor, our enemies are attacking us. Will we be ready? Will we put on the full armor of God?

Verse 10 is a summary of the armor of God. The armor of God is strong. That is why Paul exhorts us to become strong in the Lord. We can see this very clearly by looking at Isaiah 59, where Paul got the idea of the armor of God: “Then the Lord saw it, and it displeased Him that there was no justice. He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor; therefore His own arm brough salvation for Him; and His own righteousness, it sustained Him. For He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head; He put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak.” You see then what is so great about the armor of God: God Himself wears it! Of course, Isaiah is speaking metaphorically about what is true of God Himself. God Himself is righteous, and accomplishes the salvation of His people. What is interesting is the conclusion of that passage in Isaiah: “’The Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,’ says the Lord.” In other words, we see the armor of God in its full brilliance in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ was the righteous One in a pre-eminent manner. He also brings salvation in His person and work. So, when Paul tells us to put on the armor of God, what he is telling us to do is to put on Christ Himself. That is, exercising faith in Christ, we become like Him.

But why do we need this armor? Because Satan is a schemer. He is crafty and sly. He was crafty and sly even in the Garden of Eden. Just think of how much he has learned since then! He has had several thousand years to study human nature, and its weak points. He knows exactly how to attack us, when to attack us, where to attack us. He has many schemes and methods of temptation. What does Satan want? He wants to pull us down with him. He knows that his days are numbered. Ever since the Resurrection of Christ, Satan has known that he is beaten. However, he would want as many souls to go with him into hell as possible. Yes, Satan would want us to sin as much as possible. However, that is not his goal. His goal is to draw people down into hell with him. He would even try to drag down the elect with him. Let’s remind ourselves that Satan is much more powerful than we are, spiritually speaking. As Luther says, “On earth is not his equal.” However, Satan is no equal to God. It always bears reminding ourselves that God has infinitely more power than Satan has. Satan would want nothing more than to keep you from recognizing this. Satan loves that bumper sticker that says that God votes for you, Satan votes against you, and you cast the tie-breaking vote. He loves it when people think that he is the equal of God. So, though he is no equal of God, he is still more powerful than we are. That means that we need to have the right Man on our side. We need to have Jesus to fight our battles. It is He who has conquered Satan, sin, and death, that we might be more than conquerors.

In verse 12, Paul tells us about the nature of this struggle. This is important, because all too often we think that our battle is with people. Our battle is not with people. Our battle is a spiritual battle against Satan and against the demons that scheme to try to get us to fall. At this point, many people will laugh at us. They think that Christians are crazy to be thinking about fighting Satan. Oftentimes, that is because they don’t believe he exists. Or, if he does, he is a relatively harmless practical jokester. It is the height of folly to think so. In fact, people who think in this way have proven that they are in the very grip of Satan himself. There is a battle going on, and everyone is a soldier. The question is this: in whose army do you serve? There is no neutral ground here. You are either for God and against Satan, or for Satan and against God.

The second thing to know about the nature of this contest is that it is hand to hand combat, or wrestling, as Paul puts it. We do not engage in this battle from a long ways away. We are up close and personal with our spiritual adversaries. It is hand to hand combat. Let no one think that he is above fighting, above the fray, and that fighting is not dignified. Sometimes fighting is required. It is definitely required in the Christian life.

The third thing we need to know about this battle is that it is on the broadest possible front. Paul gives us a clue when he says “this present darkness” in verse 12, and “the day of evil” in verse 13. The Jews thought about time as having two ages. The first age goes from the creation up to the time when the Messiah came. Then the new age would start and the old age would finish. Paul took that idea and modified it just a bit. Paul knew that Christ was the Messiah. Therefore the new age had arrived. However, the old age had not gone away yet. So Paul thinks of this as being two ages that overlap. The old age will not completely perish until Christ comes back the second time. In the meantime, these two ages which overlap are also fighting each other. The old age is the age of Satan and the demons. The new age is that of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit dwelling in the midst of the church. These two ages are continually fighting. Of course, they have really been fighting ever since the Garden of Eden. As Augustine puts it, there are two kingdoms always fighting each other, two seeds, two religions. And we are a part of that fight. Paul then tells us to stand against these attacks.

The fourth thing that we need to know, then, is that our conflict is mostly defensive. There is one piece of armor that Paul is going to tell us about that is an offensive weapon. That is the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God. However, all the other pieces of armor are defensive. Christ has done all the conquering. We extend that conquering by using the Sword of the Word of God to bring people home to Christ. However, the majority of our fighting as individuals is defensive. It means we are defending against the attacks of Satan and his demons. And it is true. We will get chances to share the Gospel with unbelievers. But most of our days are spent in resisting temptations to sin and to falling away. That leads us to the fifth and final thing.

The fifth and final thing we need to know about this conflict is that we need to stand and fight. In other words, we cannot run and hide. You will notice that God does not give us any armor for our backs. This fact was noticed by John Bunyan, in his book Pilgrim’s Progress. In that part where Christian fights the devil, who is named Apollyon, the Destroyer, Christian thought about going back when he saw just how terrifying his opponent was. But then he remembered that he had no armor for his back. If he retreated, then he knew that Apollyon would have the advantage. So he resolved to go forward and fight. He knew that his chance of survival depended on using the armor of God in the way that God meant for him to use it. God means for us to stand and fight, not run and hide. And it doesn’t matter what age you are, you are still a solder called to stand and fight this spiritual battle. Of course, there will be some times in life when this battle is a bit fiercer than at other times. Still, there will always be spiritual battles to fight. We are not part of the church victorious until we pass into glory. In death itself, what would have been our greatest spiritual defeat has been turned by God into our greatest spiritual victory, for it is then that we are rid of sin entirely. So, stand and fight.

Ephesians 6:5-9

2/17/2008

Audio Version

A retired friend became interested in the construction of an addition to a shopping mall. Observing the activity regularly, he was especially impressed by the conscientious operator of a large piece of equipment. The day finally came when my friend had a chance to tell this man how much he’d enjoyed watching his scrupulous work. Looking astonished, the operator replied, “You’re not the supervisor?” It’s a funny story. But isn’t it just the way of the world to work hard when people are looking, but to slack off when there is no one watching. They like to please people’s eyes. Paul here tells us that we are not to do such things. We are to work as unto the Lord. We might think that this passage does not apply to us, since it is talking about slaves and masters. None of us have slaves, and none of us are slaves. However, slavery is not really the main issue of this passage, as many writers have noted. What is the point? The point is that we should work as unto the Lord.

Paul starts off by addressing the slave. Of course, that is remarkable in itself, just as we saw two weeks ago that Paul addressed children. He also addressed women. This elevates the importance of such people. There are no second-class citizens in the kingdom of God.

In the first century, slaves constituted a major part of the population. Probably about a third of the population were slaves. But when Paul mentions slavery, we should not think that all slavery was like what the African Americans experienced in the last century (although even there, there were many kind masters). Slaves could be medical doctors, teachers, administrators, counselors, baby-sitters, and yes, also the more grunt work type as well. Slavery was not necessarily viewed as a bad thing in those days. It was often the only way to avoid further financial difficulties. Actually, many people purposefully sold themselves into slavery to a high-ranking person in order to better his social status. Slaves could always save up enough money to buy themselves out of slavery. So, we should not think of American slavery when reading about slavery in the ancient world. There were undoubtedly many masters who abused their slaves. However, the majority probably did not suffer. What I want us to see is that the situation of slaves in the first century is actually much more like our modern employer-employee relationship. As the story told in the beginning illustrates, we are subject to the same temptations that first-century slaves were. We too are tempted to work hard when people are looking. We too are tempted to work with something less than our whole hearts in it. We too are tempted to work only for ourselves, failing to see that it is for God that we should work.

Paul tells the slaves to obey their earthly masters. This is the third example of what Paul means in chapter 5, verse 21, when he says “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” First, he gives an example of wives submitting to their husbands, then children submitting to their parents, and finally slaves submitting to their masters. Obviously, there are differences in what these three submissions look like. But they are all examples of Paul’s summary in 5:21.

In this verse, respect and fear are easily understood. Paul means “without sass.” It means acknowledging that the employer has the authority to tell you what to do, and you do it. Interestingly, these same words are used for how we respect and fear God. There are limits to such fear and respect. We do fear God more than man, and so we must never go in with a shady business deal our employer wants to do. Instead, we should obey God. But most of the time, that is not necessary. Most of the time, we do best simply to do cheerfully what our employer wants us to do. I realize that many, if not most of us are farmers, neither having employees nor being employees. However, the attitude that Paul commands still holds good for farmers as well. After all, is not God our ultimate employer? Notice that verse 6 says that obeying our employer is obeying God. It is the will of God for us to obey our employers. Traditionally, Reformed folk have said that this is part of the fifth commandment. To obey our parents implies that we are to obey all authorities that are over us, whether it be our employer, or the government, or our parents, or God Himself. So, we are to obey with fear and with respect. That is the first way we are to obey.

Note carefully the next way in which we are to obey. “With sincerity of heart” means without guile, or deception. James Boice uses the origin of the word “sincerity” to illustrate its meaning. In old times, a dishonest potter might pour some wax into any cracks his pottery might have. If someone didn’t look closely at the pottery, they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a pot that didn’t have any cracks, as opposed to a pot that had cracks filled in with wax. So, eventually the more truthful and honest potters would advertise their wares as being “without wax.” The Latin for that is “sine cera.” Sine means “without,” and “cera” means wax. Sinecera is the root for “sincere.” Sincerity of heart, therefore, means without guile, without an attempt to deceive. If we are in our right minds, we will recognize that it does not benefit us, even in a bad way, to try to deceive Jesus Christ. There is no way to do it. Christ reads everything that goes on in our hearts. So, what Paul is telling us is that we should obey our earthly masters, our employers, as we obey Christ, not attempting to deceive, but working honestly.

Verse 6 is well translated by the NIV. Literally, the text says “don’t be an eye-pleaser.” Don’t work for show. Don’t work hard only when the supervisor is watching you. Work hard at all times, doing what you were commanded to do. And, if you are your own boss, work with the knowledge that God is watching you always. And that is not just a warning. When God is watching you, and you are doing what God wants you to do, then you should know that God is watching you with pleasure. He loves to see His children doing what is right. As verse 8 says, we should “know that the Lord will reward everyone for whatever good he does, whether he is slave or free.”

Verse 7 tells us that there are rewards for what we do. Let us be careful here. We do not get eternal life because of what we do. Paul is talking about additional rewards on top of eternal life. What this tells us is that it is not wrong to work for a reward. The question is, for which reward are you working? Are you working for the temporary, monetary reward that perishes when you die? Or are you working for eternal rewards that will never fade away or perish? What is your motivation for working? Is it to have your kingdom here on earth? Or is it to build an investment for the future life?

Verse 9 is a short word addressed to employers, or masters. Some of us might very well have people serving under us. How do we treat them? We should be treating them with kindness, not with harshness. Paul says “treat them in the same way.” What same way? Is Paul saying that employers ought to reverse positions and become the employees? Well, no. Paul is giving us a form of the Golden rule: as you would want yourself to be treated, so also should you treat others. If you would want an employer to treat you with kindness and understanding, then you should do that for your employee. The reason for this is that both you and your employee have a higher master, namely, God Himself. The opposite of that is threatening, as Paul says. We should not threaten our employees. They should have job security as long as they are doing their job. They shouldn’t always feel “under the gun.” See, God has no favoritism. When Judgment Day comes, God is not going to give you a pass just because you were the master, and someone else was the employee. He will judge each person on the same standard.

That raises the most important question, doesn’t it? If the standard is perfection according to God’s law, how can you, the employee of God, measure up to that standard? Well, we obviously cannot. We fail on the job. Our job is to love God with our heart, soul, strength and mind, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. We have not done that. And no amount of apologizing or trying to make up for it is going to work. Instead, we need to trust in the one great Employee, the one who put Himself under the yoke of slavery to sin. That is, Jesus took on the yoke of our heavy slavery, that heavy guilt that belonged to us. He lifted it right off from us, so that we would not have to carry it. Now, you see, we can have Jesus as our taskmaster. And Jesus tells us that His burden is light, His yoke is easy. We can only have one master. Either our master is Satan, who is an impossible taskmaster. In this life, he might give you pleasures that are sinful. But he will own your soul. And then he will deliver you up to God’s wrath at the end of time. That is one option. But the other option is to have God as your master. It might be harder here in this life. But in the next life, you will see with unclouded vision just how much He really loves us.