Good Morning! - 2010.08.04 - Ephesians 5:1-4 - Jesting

Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children; And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour.

But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints; Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. (Ephesians 5:1-4)

Our text today is not about being saved. It is about living the Christian life after we are saved. Francis Schaeffer reduced it to a book title: How Shall We Then Live? We are saved by the grace of God, minus-plus nothing. The conditions for receiving that grace are repentance (a change of mind that produces a change of behavior) and faith in the sufficiency and claims of the shed blood of Christ. We are not saved by works of any kind but we are saved by a faith that works and perseveres until death.

"Christian Sin?" We got it! What kind do you want? The way you pull this off is to make any prohibition against our favorite sin: "Legalism." Or, use the worn-out cliché: "Judge not lest ye be judged." Either one of these tactics will eliminate about half of the Bible and save you the trouble of mutilating it with a pair of scissors. Welcome to the world of Christian Pretense and Lazy Bible Reading.

In high school a lot of years ago, I belonged to the Thespian Club. Our wall poster consisted of a couple of masks like the ones above, depicting comedy and terror. We engaged in the world of pretense and imagination. The masks remind me of today's pretense in relating to the Christian faith.

Followers of modern Christianity assume there is hardly anything to it. Just put on a mask and present a façade of reality without changing the heart. No substance or commitment or moral restraint. "That was in the Old Testament and we're not under that now." The only problem with that is that the Old Testament moral law was never done away with. In the New Testament sin, continues and: Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law (1John 3:4).

We are not under the Jewish ceremonial law or the Jewish civil law that governed their nation. But we certainly are under the moral law except that we do not keep the Jewish Sabbath which was a covenant between God and Israel.

Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed. (Exodus 31:16-17) But we observe the Lord's Day that celebrates the resurrection of Christ.

The New Testament is full of commands of DO and DON'T DO. It certainly covers our speech—words that pass our lips. In both the Old and New Testaments we have had this problem: … With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us? (Psalm 12:4) We still have the age-old problem of managing our mouths.

Christians are to avoid: filthiness,… foolish talking, and jesting, which are not convenient. If you chase these words down in a Bible dictionary it amounts to coarse, suggestive, ribald, degrading talk that goes against ministering grace unto the hearer. "Convenient" means "proper or appropriate."

Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. (Ephesians 4:29-30)

Sorry to mess up your day like this, but if we belong to the Lord, our tongues belong to God and we ought to sound like we know and submit to the God of Heaven who made us and redeemed us. With a little practice you can mash your thumb with a hammer without letting out a string of four-letter words. Have a good, clean-talking day. Ω