So today we are back to studying together the book of Ephesians. So I invite you to turn in your Bibles or in your bulletins to Ephesians chapter four verses 17 through 32. Ephesians chapter four verses 17 through 32. This is the word of God. Now this I say and testify in the Lord. that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do. In the futility of their minds, they are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy, and practice every kind of impurity, but that is not the way you learned Christ, assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him as the truth is in Jesus. To put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life, and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on a new self created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. Be angry and do no sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil. Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with his own hands so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up as fits the occasion, that it might give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you that we have that privilege of being here together around your word, knowing and having the assurance that you speaks to us through your word. And not only that, but having the Holy Spirit in us to have understanding of your word. May you give us understanding of this portion of your scriptures. And more than that, may you minister to our lives through it. We thank you, all these things in Jesus' name, amen. So theology, which is the study of God, is meant to do more than just grow our understanding on the deep things of God. But it's meant to transform our lives. It's meant to change our hearts. change our worldview and grow our faith. So it's meant to do something spiritual in our lives that results in us bearing good fruits. That will end in us being moved to live lives that honor God. And this is the reason why Paul, when you look at his letters, dedicates the half of the letter, the first half at least, to focus in laying ground good theology. But as we have heard before, good theology will or should lead to good doxology, should move us to praise God, but also good theology or understanding God, as Paul does throughout, for example, the first part of the book of Ephesians, chapter one, two, and three, uses to teach us or remind us of these great spiritual blessings that are ours in Christ, should lead us to have a life transformed by the power of God. Therefore, he uses half of the letter, or the rest of the letter, to focus in exhorting us and challenging us so that those things that he taught us in the first half will have an application in our life. This is what you will think when you think about a sermon, and you come, you hear all the theological argument throughout the letter, and you hope that by the end, you are arriving to some application, something that you can take home. Not just something that you will go and do, but something that remind you how God is doing these things in your life. give you some direction. And this is what Paul is doing here. in Ephesians, especially when he turns to chapter four. He moved from this, here, this theological argument to this practical part of the book. And one of the signs of that is that he introduces this term that I think that is one of Paul's favorite terms throughout his letters, which is to walk, to walk. Therefore, walk, walk. And walk refers Therefore lives according to what you have heard, what Christ has done in your life. In a sense, when we think about the gospel, the gospel reminds us of who we are in Christ. When we read God's word, we are reminded of who we are in Christ, but also we are challenged to be what we are. And this is what we find in this part of his word. And today, and doing an outline a little bit different to how I used to do it. I mean, preachers, when we work in preparing a message, one of the things that we aim for is to have a clear outline, which is a guideline of the test, and we hope that that outline will help the audience. Sometimes the outline will be like Joe did last week, a question with three answers. or sometimes you will have three questions through the test, or sometimes you will see a common theme in all these three points. But today, I came up with an outline that is being a little bit different to what I have done before, and it's basically an outline that if you read it together, the whole outline, it gives you actually the main point of the test. So the outline is, do not dress or walk as the Gentiles, because Christ has given you new clothes and he has empowered you for a new walk. So if you read the whole outline, it's just one sentence, but it has three points. First, do not dress as the Gentiles because Christ has given you new clothes and he has empowered you for a new walk. And you see that I'm going back and forth with these two terms, dress or clothes, and walk. And it's because Paul is using, in a sense, two metaphors to describe the same thing, is describe the life of the believer. One way is through talking about dress, talking about what you wear, your clothes, or the other way is to talk about the way you walk. So first of all, let's look at do not dress or walk as the Gentiles. So Paul starts us by saying, no, no, now this I say and I testify in the Lord that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles. Something that I think that is clear from the beginning. Especially considering that Paul is writing this to Christians. These Christians in Ephesus. Therefore this is applicable to us as believers today. Is that there is a possibility that you can be a Christian and yet walk as a gentile. Because he is exhorting you not to walk as those who are Gentiles. Now, I don't mean that a person that his whole life is reflecting the walk of a Gentile. Because you will see as you go through the test that Paul is talking about specific aspects or various aspects of the Christian's life. Therefore, there are moments and instance in some aspects in our lives where we might be walking as Gentiles. And therefore, the test is confronting or challenging us not to walk as Gentiles. Now, what is Gentiles? Gentiles is not referring only to those who were not part of the people of Israel. Here, Paul is talking about those who are non-believers. In other words, what Paul is saying, do not walk as those who do not know God or know Jesus as their savior. And now, what is this kind of walk? Paul says, walk as the Gentiles do. In the futility of their minds. In the futility of their minds. The futility of their minds could be also translated as the vanity of their minds. Or walking without a purpose in their minds. And it is clear that that's the walk of somebody who do not know God. We were all created for one purpose. which is to glorify God, to worship him, and enjoy his presence forever. But if a person does not know God, if the person does not have understanding of that purpose, that person creates different purposes in his life. And those purposes are defined here as vain or futile purposes. For example, if all you live for is for your career, or you live for is for probably raising a family, or all you live for is for fame, or accumulating riches and money. You are walking in the futile of your minds because you are not walking for the purpose God created you. And it's as simple as there are people in the world that they don't know or believe that God created them, therefore they don't know and they don't believe that God created them for a purpose. But what Paul continues to do in the following lines is that he's going deep into doing a diagnosis of the Gentiles' walk. He says they are darkened in their understanding. So the purpose of or the problem of the futile walk or futility in their minds is connected with understanding. It's a problem of understanding. Because the things that you do are the things that you think. Sometimes we say that we have done things that we didn't think about. We didn't think before doing those things and that's not true. Everything that we have done We have thought about it because it has come from our minds to our members and our members are just executing what has come through our minds. Maybe we haven't thought right before doing it. But the problem that Paul says that the Gentiles or those non-believers have is that their understanding is darkened. It's not clear. They don't have a clear understanding. There is no light in them. And for that reason, again, he goes deeper and deeper. He says, they are alienated from the life of God. If you were created to worship God, but you are not worshiping God, but worshiping yourself or worshiping other things, of course you are separated from God. You have alienated yourself from God. That is what creates that division between The person who is a non-believer and God. And then, Paul keeps going deeper into the problem. Why, you can ask, why? Why, he says, because of the ignorance of God. that is in them because of the ignorance that is in them. And this is not just lack of information or lack of being smart or not smart to understand that. We were created and God has put in every human being around the world in their conscience The law of God. This is why Gentiles act accordingly to the law of God. So that ignorance is no lack of information or lack of understanding or lack of intelligence to understand. We learn from Romans chapter one that Gentiles suppress and every human being suppress the truth that is revealed to them through creation and through the law of God planted in their hearts. But Paul goes deeper to that. Because the problem is not just here in our heads or in the heads of any human being, but is due to their hardness of heart. And here is the heart of the issue. The issue is a problem of the heart. and is now again the location of your brain and your heart, the muscle that pumps the blood throughout your being, is actually your soul. Your soul is hardened. Your soul is spiritually dead before you are a Christian. And therefore, because of that you have ignorance, because of that you have no understanding, and because of that you walk in the futility of your minds. Paul even continues to say this, they have become callous. And that's again in reference to what he himself has said in Romans chapter one. They suppress the truth, and therefore God gave them up into their sinful desires. And because they have become callous, they have given themselves up, and Paul described three things, sensuality, greed, and impurity. So you see, the diagnosis that Paul does is that he goes deep into the soul to prove that the problem of the gentile who live a futile life. given up into sensuality, greed, and impurity is the result of a hardened heart. It's the result of a darkened understanding. It's the result of the ignorance that is in them. Now Paul is again assessing those who are non-believers. But remember, Paul is not just talking about them. He is talking to us believers. He says, you must no longer walk as them. You must no longer walk as you used to walk at some point in your life. That's the exhortation. Here is where we move then to the second part. He says, first, do not dress or walk as the Gentiles. Second, because Christ has given you new clothes or a new garment. Paul tell us of three things that has happened as we get into communion or relationship with Christ. The first, he says, that is not the way you learned Christ. The subject of our understanding when we think about the gospel is Christ. Christ is the gospel. Christ empty himself, being God, to come to the world, to die on the cross, to pay for a ransom, to receive the punishment that we deserved so that his righteousness could be imputed to us and we could be declared as just, being justified. That's a short summary of what the gospel is about. Therefore, when Paul says, that is not the way you learn Christ. You learn Christ means you learn that Christ actually have to pay. so that you could be saved. You learn that Christ actually have to receive a punishment because of your sin, because of the way you were walking before, which was in ignorance, in futility, in the darkness of your heart, with your darkness of your understanding. Christ is the subject, is the content of the gospel. But it's not that, it's not only that, but it's also that We have heard him. Here is where we see our versions maybe not doing the best in the translation. When he says, assuming that you have heard about him, a better way to translate that is actually removing the word about. Assuming that you have heard him. And that makes a big difference. Because it's not just that we hear about this Jesus, but it's that we heard Jesus himself. And how did we hear Jesus himself? We heard Jesus when the gospel was preached to us. It was the Holy Spirit and Jesus himself who revealed himself in our hearts, giving us a new heart, therefore a new life in Christ. So we heard Jesus is speaking to us. As Paul heard Jesus on the road of Damascus, we might not have heard the voice of Jesus saying, Enrique, Enrique, why you persecute me? But Jesus spoke to my heart directly. Something that nobody have or could do. And not just that, the third thing is that we were taught in him. So this is not just a subject of something that we learned, but our faith in Jesus includes our union with Christ. We were taught in Christ. When we heard Jesus, and when we heard about him, or when we heard him speaking to us, and when we heard Christ, or about Christ, we heard him in the context of that faith that Christ has given us, bringing us to the cross in union with him. And here is very important, as the truth is in Jesus. Jesus is the truth. Remember, Gentiles walk in the futility of their minds. Their understanding is darkened. They live in ignorance because they don't know the truth. What they know is what the world has offered to them as the purpose of their lives. Or they have created their own purpose. but the wonder of grace and the great privilege that we have, those who are here who have put their faith in Christ is that Christ himself have revealed to you in a special way so that today you know the truth about everything in the world, why we are here and what is our destination. If you know Christ, you know the most important thing that you could ever or should ever know. Now here Paul move into reminding the Ephesians what that represents for their lives. And here is where sometimes these, especially these verses has been interpreted as here is where Paul is challenging us, where Paul is exhorting us to do this. But the problem with that is that actually does know what Paul is doing in verses 22 23 and 24. Because the words, especially when we talk about put off in verse 22, and put on, again Paul is using this illustration of putting on some new garments and putting off our old garments. The old garments means your old self and the new garments means the new self, the new person in Christ. Paul is not speaking in imperative. This is this verse in Greek, verse 22 and verse 23, that are translated as put off and put on are in Aorist, which is kind of a past tense. And they are actually in connection with what Paul himself says in Colossians. Chapter three, verses nine and 12. And I'll read it for you where you will see that Paul is using the same words here to describe something that already happened in the past. He says, do not lie to anyone, do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self, which is practices, and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. And verse 12 says, put on them as God chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. All I'm saying is that when you read Paul saying here, put off your old self and put on your own self, Paul is actually at this moment not exhorting you to do this, but reminding you what has happened as a result of what Christ have done. And look, our version actually does, they do a good job translating this. It says, first, that it's not the way, verse 20, that you learned Christ, assuming that you have hear about him or hear him and were taught in him as the truth is in him and then there is a comma to put off your old self which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires and to renew in the spirit of your minds and to put on the new self created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. In other words, what is the point here? The point here is that at this moment, Paul has now arrived to the challenge for you, to the illustration. Another way to see that is that you will see it in verse 25, Paul is starting saying, therefore. So it would not make sense for Paul to say, put off, I exhort you to put off, and to put on, and therefore put off, right? Grammatically, that does not make sense. Now, why is that important? Because of what I told you before. This point is because Christ has given you new clothes. Sometimes, the test has been understood as we are exhorting people, hey, put on your new clothes. Put off your old clothes, as if this is something that you can do on yourself. and that is no Christianity. Christianity is, and the gospel is, a message that talks to you about what Christ has done for you. The transformation that has happened as a result of Christ's work on the cross. But here is where we turn, again, to the application. Remember the last part is, and has empowered you for a new walk. So first, do not dress as the Gentiles. Why? Because Christ has given you new clothes and then has empowered you for a new walk. And here is where we go to the therefore. The therefore is here for us the exhortation. It's the imperative. It's what we are called to be because of what we are. And there are five things that you can find here that you could see Paul telling you. You could see them by yourself clearly because they are listed very orderly. The first one is put off lives. and put on truth. Therefore, having put away any falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another." I think that this is very relevant to our time. Why? Because there is so much misinformation, misunderstanding, and confusion out there. It's very difficult for people these days to know what is the truth, what is right, what is wrong. This person is saying this and this other person is saying the opposite. I always wondered that even when I was back in Colombia when I see the two versions that I was hearing from the news and I was, I don't know what is the truth. And then you end doubting everything, right? But something we know as Christians is that this war is absolute. There is no confusion. There is sometimes challenges to understand all what we have written in here. But this war is not relative to the interpretation of one person or another. The word of God is absolute. But as Christians, all of us are challenged as well to be truthful. especially in a society as where we are, to make sure that we are not just trying to be truthful, but we are making sure that when we say something, we're saying the truth. Therefore, put away falsehood and let each other or each one speak the truth to his neighbor as we are members of one another. Second, put away anger and put on self-control. 26 says, be angry and do no sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil. This week, as I was driving home from the church, I called Sandra, and Sandra is out in the yard playing with Sam and David, and I could hear our dog Chase barking from the deck because there was this little girl in the back of the house bouncing the ball, and the dog is just barking and barking. And all of a sudden, I hear some noise of a man coming to my wife and saying something, and I couldn't hear well what. He was saying to her, but later Sandra said, well, our neighbor came and he said, you have to put away this dog or I call the police. And then Sandra said, oh, I apologize, let me put in our kids and then I will bring Chase in. And he said, yeah, you better do that or I call the police in 15 minutes. So Sandra told me that I'm driving home and I was really upset in the car because I was thinking this is the first interactions that we have with this neighbor in five years or six years that we have lived there. And he could have come to us and say, can you put away the dog? And Sandra would have said, yes, I'll do that right away, I'm sorry. But then I was upset and then I got there probably in five to ten minutes and I parked my car and I started to walk around the car like I'm looking for something but it's because the neighbor is there and I was waiting for him to come to me and tell me something. But he wasn't saying anything and actually I was more upset because I was thinking why he can say that to her but not to me. So I went into my house and I was kind of preparing my sermon. My sermon, not for you guys, but for him. But actually my sermon was, hey, you could have said this or that, but something I realized is that, well, okay, I have to go to pick up some groceries and I drove there. And something that I often do when I'm driving is I'm meditating on the sermon and I get to this point here, be angry and do not sin. And I remember that probably if I would have gone to this man and said what I wanted to say, which might be right, I would not have said it with the right words or with the right attitude. He says, do not let the sun go down on your anger and give opportunity to the devil. So I said, well God, I guess you are speaking to me through your word. All I want to say is that it doesn't mean that you should not be angry because we should be angry about things that are unrighteous in the world. The matter is how we respond to them. Do we respond to them according to God's word? Do we respond to them in prayer? Do we ask God to help us to do the right thing? All right, then we go to the third one, which is put off stealing and put on honest work. And for that, I'd like to read to you a list of things that Dr. Boyce lists about things or ways in which we can be stealing. He says, there are many ways that we can steal, of course. We steal from God when we fail to worship him as we ought or when we set our own interests before his legitimate interests. We steal from him when we fail to honor him by our own lives and fail to tell others of his love. We steal from an employer when we do not give the best work of which we are capable or when we waste time or consistently leave work early. If we are in business, we can still buy overcharging for what we make or for the service we render. We still, if we sell an inferior product, pretending it is better than it is, we still buy borrowing and not repaying. We steal by damaging others' reputation. And we steal from ourselves when we waste the time, talents, and resources God has entrusted us. But there is something important here that Paul is saying. It's not just about we being honest in our work. But this goes farther than that. He says, let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with his own hands. He says, so that he might have something to share with anyone in need. So the honest work is not just for ourself as the world will say, work hard so you progress in life, but as a believer you are called, if you work hard, if you do honest work, to see your brothers and sisters around who are in need and see if you can share with them as well. Here also, four, put off corrupt speaking and put on built up speaking. Verse 29, let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth, but only such as is good for building up, as it fits the occasion that it might give grace to those who hear. I think a way to test that is, you can ask yourself, is this building up? Is this building up this other person? Is this building up my brother and sister? What I'm saying? And that way you could know if you are actually speaking corruptly or not. That word corrupt here come from the Greek word means that sapros, which means rotten fruit. Basically when we speak corruptly, it's almost like a rotten fruit that we have in our mouths. And finally, lastly, is put off bitterness and put on kindness and forgiveness, verses 31 and 32. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving, one another. I think that this last one comes from the second exhortation that we have, which is put off anger and put off self-control. Because if you don't do what Paul says in verse 26, which is be angry and do no sin, the result of that is that eventually you're going to become bitter in your heart. which is like a cancer. And what is the solution or the cure for that cancer? Is forgiveness. So the only way that I could move on, looking at my neighbor and thinking that I could share the gospel with him afterwards, is that I could forgive what I felt was unjust in the way he treated my wife. Now, I think a third question that we could all ask is then how do you put off these old garments and put on these new garments? And I think that's a fair question because Paul is using a metaphor here. And then you might think, so is it about now I go and do a list of the things that I wanna do tomorrow and the things that I don't want to do tomorrow, and I make sure that I'm on target, fulfilling these commandments? Well, let me tell you, I don't think that that will work. I think that you will try it in the morning, and by the afternoon you will have forgotten what you have done. So there is where I like to go to what Paul says in Colossians, and also something that he says in Romans, because I think these two things will help us to see real fruit. Remember that Paul is not addressing behavior. Paul is addressing a problem of the heart. Problem is addressing a problem of the mind. So Paul says in Colossians chapter three verses one through four, if then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you will also appear with him in glory. So keep that in mind first. Set your minds on things that are above. But look at now also what Paul says in Romans chapter 13 verses 12 ahead. He said, the night is far gone, then the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light, Let us walk properly, as in the daytime, knowing orgies and drunkenness, knowing sexual immorality and sensuality, knowing quarreling and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and here is the key, and make no provision for the flesh. to gratify his desires. So it is not about you going out again and making sure that you are on target to fulfill these commands, but it's about the work that you do before that. And the work before that is that, first of all, you set your mind on heavenly things. And where do you find heavenly things? You don't look at the sky, but you look here to your word, the word of God. that you set your mind what the word of God is saying. That is why Christians are encouraged to be a Bible study every week, right? That is why Christians are encouraged to have a devotional life. That is why Christians are encouraged and exhorted to meditate and reflect on God's word daily. Because we are putting in our heads what the word of God says. But also what you saw in Romans is, make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires. So also make sure that you are aware what you are putting on in your mind. with all what you see, with all what you hear, are these things that are edifying you and are growing your soul and are preparing you so when you walk out your house, you are walking in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. So it's a matter of where your mind is being set. So to close, I just read to you a passage the three points together. Do not dress or walk as the Gentiles, because Christ has given you new clothes and has empowered you for a new walk. Let's pray. Dear God, we thank you for the work that you have done already on the cross for our salvation. And we thank you that you have given us new life, that you have dressed us with new clothes, that you have empowered us to live a new life, that you are not just commanding us in your word to do something that is impossible to us in our broken natures, but you are exhorting us to do something that you have already created in our hearts. You have given us the Holy Spirit. May this week as we walk, in our daily lives and we interact with our neighbors, with our friends and coworkers and roommates and classmates and people around us. May we walk in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. May you help us and give us the strength. And may you give us this love for your word that we will, as our brother Ross was saying, that we will enjoy to read your word that we will define it as the most delicious thing that we taste during the week. We pray all these things in Jesus' name, amen.