Retro: Position / Condition, Eph, 3:20-21
Ephesians 3:20-21 · Vern Peterman · Apr 17, 2005
Ephesians & Colossians, No. 61
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/48262324208034

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

We're privileged this morning to behold the beauty of the Lord in His Word. We're heading into this passage here this morning, and you might be looking at it and say, well, wait a minute, Vern, I thought we'd covered this a while back. And what we're doing here is we're going retro, OK? What's behind it here? We're going back in time a little bit, and the reason is this. We looked here at Ephesians 3, 20 and 21. That was back in the end of January. But there's a point that we want to bring up here that's very appropriate for what we're about to embark on. And so that's why we want to take a look at this and some related passages.

I want you to get ready for the imperatives, OK? Now, let me correct your impressions here since we're going retro. That's not the imperials, OK? Not the singing imperials. When we talk about getting ready for the imperatives, it's not the Chrysler imperials.

When we talk about getting ready for the imperatives, it has to do with this. We're going to encounter these things called imperatives in the passages in front of us here. In English, we don't actually have a form called an imperative. What we do is this. We express something and we add something to it. either an extra word or something about our vocal emphasis in order to emphasize that it's an imperative, or maybe in our facial expressions even. Let's take it for example.

A little kid pretty soon gets the idea that this is a look that communicates something, okay? Especially if that look is accompanied by something like first name, middle name, last name. You know something's going to follow. and you better listen. Okay, along with that, the next thing that happens is imperative right now. Okay, that's the way it happens. So then if that gets accompanied with some extra loud vocal tone, so bold that say first name, middle name, that's the attention getter, last name imperative right now. Okay, then you know that's an imperative a kid catches on to that. Okay.

Well, in English, We have to add something to the word we say. A child will even ask, okay, do I have to? Now, let me tell you something. They learn not to ask that when they've seen this, okay? This has preceded it. They learn not to say, do I have to, okay? Yes, it's an imperative. You don't ask, okay? But if it's not clear, then they're free without repercussion to say, do I have to?

And yes, of course you do. But in the Greek, it's indicated in the form of the word itself. When Paul would write, and he'd put an imperative, he didn't have to put an underlying character underneath the word. The form of the word in the Greek communicated, yes, this is an imperative. It's a must. You must do it. So, when we get into Ephesians, starting about 425 into chapter 6, we're going to see imperatives that are carried over from the Greek into the English text. Sometimes they do a stronger and more firm job of carrying that idea over.

So let's take a peek. You have an extra large in your handout, the Ephesians 4, 25, and 32. By the way, the date that you have is because these were ready last Sunday morning before it snowed. And well, I won't comment on that. OK. So let's take a look at it. All right. So, here we go. This is Ephesians 4, 25-32. We've got places here where they're in blue underline. And so, let's start here.

It says, "...Speak the truth, each one to his neighbor." That's an imperative, okay? "...Be angry, believe it or not." Imperative, okay? "...But do not sin." Also imperative, okay? "...Do not let the sun go down in your anger." Those are all imperatives. "...Do not give the devil." These are not suggestions. These are not casual guidance. These are imperatives that come across in the Greek.

Here we have, in a little better than half a dozen verses, almost two dozen imperatives that pop up. We're going to see them again and again. So it's important that we know, what does he mean by that? Is Paul saying, first name, middle name, imperative, right now? We need to know that as we go through these. So we have a question before us here. Is Paul getting ready to lay down the law? He's saying, all right, you folks, you Ephesians, you're going to get it. And I'm going to lay it on thick and heavy. Get your helmets on. Is that what he's about to do?

If we see a string of imperatives like that, you might think, well, you know, what he's doing is he's tweaking the law. The law has some archaic stuff. We kind of got to dust it off and make it a Christian law. You've got to kind of Christianize it a little bit. Update it. It's a little antiquated. So update it a tad. These laws about eating worms and stuff like that, that just doesn't seem current. So we've got to get an updated law. Let's get something relevant.

You might think that that's what he's doing. Or maybe it's just sort of a Christian supplement. Just the extra that you needed. Teachers in some churches have even said, the law is your life. We must learn to love the law. After all, the idea is that the law is about honoring God and morality and your fellow man, right? Let's go ahead and really get into the law, some have taught. So, is that what it's about? Maybe it's down to this. Moses gave the Jewish law, Paul's about to give the Christian law. Is that it? Is that what he's about to do? Hold the horses, okay? Wait just a minute here.

Let's take a look. Paul wrote elsewhere that the law is a curse from which we've been redeemed. Christ redeemed us from the law. He writes in Galatians 3.13, as plainly as this, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law. How about that? The law is a curse. Now, notice he didn't say, except for the Ten Commandments, or except the one on tithing. We've got to have that one. Flat out, whole thing, full on, redeemed us from the curse of the law.

Paul compared the Mosaic Law to an overbearing slave tutor. Pedagogas. These were the slave tutors that would be given the commission, take that kid and teach him. Drill that stuff in. We want you to go to school, learn what he's learning, and pound it into his head. Haul him home and make sure he gets to his books. That's what they're going to push. Okay? He told the believers in Galatia, we're no longer under that tutor. Not just a little bit. Mostly not under. We're no longer under that tutor.

Isn't this wonderful? The laws of ministry of condemnation. How do you like that ministry? How would you like it if we have some deacons in charge of condemnation? We could get a group of elders, leaders of condemnation, shepherds of condemnation. How about that? Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Hmm, that doesn't seem to fit. How about this one?

The law is a ministry of death. Only a couple of verses after he says the law is a ministry of condemnation. Here's another ministry. How would you like to minister the law in the church? We have a ministry. You'll be delighted to be involved. It's a ministry of death. Volunteers? Indeed, under the law, there were a number of violations that brought the death penalty. Nothing in the law gave life. Nothing. Death, yes. Life, no. Not that. Paul wrote that we died in relationship to the law. Paul says that we who believe have died to the law. He told the church in Rome that. He told the church in Galatia that. Died in relationship to the law. Did the law end?

No. Did we end? No. We died in relationship to it. It's a separation. We don't cross paths with it anymore. When we died to Christ, we died completely in relationship to the law. Romans 7, 6. But now we have been released from the law. How about that? And having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. Folks, this isn't a percentage deal, is it? So let's remember. That may be easier for some of us than others, but let's try it. Remember when we went through Ephesians 2, 14 through 16, there were some verses that stood out to us here.

He himself, that's Christ, is our peace, who made both groups, the Jews and the Gentiles, into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing law by... Here is what Christ did on the cross, folks. We recognize easily that he died on the cross for our sins. Do we easily recognize that He died on the cross to put the law to death? By abolishing, that's putting out of commission, in His flesh the enmity which is, just so we know it clearly, the law of commandments contained in ordinances. Then, in verse 16, what does He do to further define that? Through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity, the law.

Bang! Done deal. 100%. We have, as we showed here, 613 laws all in one slide. Hope you got them memorized. Okay? 365 of them say don't. All right? Now, a lot of folks will say, well, those first 10, you really got to keep hold on those. Those we got to hold on to. The rest of them you can forget. But the first 10, you got to hold on to those. Somehow they figure you can pick and choose among the laws which one you're going to keep. We're going to hold on to this one and that one. They take them and place them upon the church.

But what needs to be recognized here, the law was given to and designed only for Israel. What about all the temple sacrifices? We've got to pitch that out of the way. The name Israel shows up numerous times, dozens of times in the law, because it applied to them. It also talked about the land. Put them out of the land. Do this. warnings about the things that would be in the land. It was for Israel. It was explicitly for them. The psalm says that he dealt with Israel like he has dealt with no other nation. This is it.

It's popular for Christian churches, for example, to preach tithing, to pick that one out. Ah, we've got to stick with that one. Or there's this one here, and I've cut off the name because my point is not to pick on names, but tithe if you love Jesus. can work.

In Deuteronomy, that passage is right between the list of prohibited foods and the laws of the sabbatical year. That's where you let your slaves go in the seventh year and let loose of all debts. So, if you want to preach tithing, make sure you don't have your bacon before you come and preach. If you want to have tithing, that's fine, but don't go out and have lobster for lunch. If you don't want to preach tithing, that's fine, but after six years, don't pay your mortgage.

Try that. You see, the thing is, in order to come up with laws that you pick and choose from, you've got to pick and choose completely arbitrarily. No, the intent was not to do that, was it? When Paul gives us imperatives, he is not telling us to try harder, to rededicate ourselves to the task. Look, we've just got to rehash these laws. and you just gotta really put yourself into it.

That's not what he's saying. He's not giving us some new set to add to, explain, illuminate, to replace the set of laws that we've got before. He's not giving us some guidelines and advice and provisos, suggestions, etc. These aren't vague goals and things that you should consider. They are imperatives. He's very specific about them.

But, they're not law. He's not trying to pump you up. Okay? That's not his point. So, then, I know what the conclusion is. We're not under law, we can do anything we want. Right? Absolutely anything. Doesn't matter. Anything is Christian now. No law. I can do anything I feel like doing, regardless of what the officer says. So, is that what he's saying?

Are the imperatives in Paul's letters then optional? Even though he wrote in these verbs of command, he wrote them as logical imperatives, he still wrote them as imperatives. They were a must. They're not just guidelines. They're not just something that you ought to consider, a viable alternative. Or as I've quoted here, Paul's personal favorites among a colorful spectrum of private lifestyle choices. That's not what he intends. He was not pitching the virtues of moral diversity. If we look at Romans 6, 1 and 2, he asks the question, being a logician that he is, what shall we say then?

Are we to continue in, and we put the brackets in here, and you have it on page four of your handout as well, the sin nature so that grace may increase? Should we continue in reliance in and dependence upon the sin nature so that grace may increase? May it never be. How shall we who died to, so you died not only to the law, but in relationship to the sin nature still live in it? Farther down in that same passage, for the sin nature shall not be master over you, for you are not under a law principle.

Notice this. This isn't just a statement of you're no longer under the Mosaic law, but you're not under anything that operates as a law principle. Not under the Mosaic law, not under somebody else's law, not under a law that somebody cooked up, not under the pastor's favorite list. None of those. You are not under a law principle, but, Allah, sharp contrast, under a grace principle, a principle of grace, a reigning principle as the believer. What then shall we actively sin because we are not under a law principle, but under a grace principle? May it never be.

That is not his intent. Now, having died to the Mosaic Law, or to a law principle, doesn't mean that we live in utter disregard for morals or for honoring God. But if we don't have the law, if we don't have some standard outside to say, you will conform to this specification, then what do we live by? How are we to live? Bear with me a minute.

OK, about that imperative, Paul wrote with imperatives, not as a moral imperative. And notice that the idea of a moral imperative is the force of law. You must do this. Failure to do so will mean that you are judged guilty and therefore worthy of the full penalty. That is what makes the law a ministry of death.

No, that's not what Paul's saying. Instead, he wrote a logical imperative, and those imperatives were, you have this position in Christ. Based on that position, this behavior, either stopping this behavior or starting that one, is the only logical conclusion based on your position. Period. That's the reason for the imperative. It's a logical imperative, not a moral imperative.

As a believer, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. If you want to feel condemned, go somewhere else. In Christ Jesus, it's not there. We can look at these passages here in Romans and 2 Corinthians if you'd like to pursue that a little further. Paul spent more than three chapters, as we've been going through Ephesians here, telling the believers about their position in Christ, the position that they have eternally in Christ and about their blessings. Paul started off, remember, with Ephesians 1-3? You've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. And then his pen just gushed as he told them about the blessings that they have, their position in Christ. He hasn't been giving them imperatives. He didn't start off, Hi, my name's Paul. Stop doing that! Okay? He didn't start off, Hi, Ephesians. Start doing this.

He began by telling them he would bless with every spiritual blessing, and his pen has not stopped. At this point, he finally starts dipping the pen and says, okay, now for some imperatives, now that they thoroughly understand their position in Christ.

He's said little about behavior so far. This, for example, was as close as we've gotten in Ephesians 4, 1-3, Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy. of the calling with which you've been called. And then he describes what that looks like. That's as close as we've gotten. It's his urging.

He's going to start using impurities. He's going to go beyond urges here pretty quick. So now we have a question before us. No more bears, but a question. How do we get from here to here? We have the believer's position. He's in the heavenlies. He is in Christ. The believer is overflowing with blessings. It is going to take forever for us to understand the depth and the width and the height of those blessings. We're going to be gasping for eternity as the Lord continues to unveil how he has graced us marvelously. A million years will not be enough to scratch the surface of the way he has blessed us. It's that profound. Alright, that's great.

What I do today What do I do tomorrow morning when the alarm clock goes off? Is it time to go to work or fix breakfast or get out in that traffic? That's the question. Bear with me. Okay. The law, is that the solution? Ah, that's it. I was reading just this last month.

One well-known Christian author said we've got to learn to love the law. And you know how they say it. They say, God gave us the law. God with about two or three A's and then a W before the D. And law has got four or five W's there with an H at the end. Law.

But that's not his point, is it? How about a motivational speaker? Let's get a motivational speaker in the mix. We're going retro here. Why not? Let's get a motivational speaker to get us jazzed up, okay? To pump you up, to get you ready to go. Okay, folks, we're going to get you in your Sunday mornings, we're going to pump you up so you can go out there just revved up and ready to do it.

Maybe that's the answer. Really gets you stirred. How about a great new program where we can get this thing out? I mean, we've got stuff we can put on the computer that'll just make your eyes dizzy, you know? Great new program, that's what it needs. No, maybe not. Colossians 3, 3 and 4, and we saw that, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory. Where's our life from, folks? Where's our life from?

In Philippians, we saw, this was a couple years ago admittedly, He speaks, he writes to the Philippians, he talks about having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ. How does the righteousness come? Righteousness comes because we try really hard. See if it's there yet, right? See if we've got any fruit showing up?

No. There's no straining our best efforts here to make it happen. How about the passage that we started off with, that Helmut read for us? Now, to him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. It is after he says that that he urges them to walk according to the calling which would have been called, and not until.

What are the imperatives there for? What are they supposed to do? The imperatives are there not to give us an outward standard to which we are to make every effort to conform, so that at the end of time God is going to call us before Him and say, how did you do with the standards I laid before you? No. The imperatives are there to describe what the life of Christ looks like In real life.

Flesh and blood believers. Christ in you. That's what the imperatives are there for. This is what it looks like when the life of Christ is in the believer. That's what he's describing. They describe the life of Christ in us in negative terms. Not this.

He's going to tell them, you who are stealing, and we'll see the reason why he does that. You know why he tells them that? They were doing it! You who are stealing, stop it! And he didn't just do that because he says, look, I'm laying down the law, you guys are going to get smashed pretty quick. He came in and said, that's not what the life of Christ looks like. That's why he said it.

They describe the life of Christ in the believer, and it's expressed in a variety of relationships. We're going to be spending A fair amount of time, because Paul does, talking about, for instance, relationships between husbands and wives. Why? He does. And he does so not in the sense of just some sort of general guidelines and guidance, but he lays out exactly what that's for and what that's about.

And it has to do with who we are in Christ. It has to do with the place that the wife and that the husband play as they live out the life of Christ. in the husband and in the wife. What does that look like between them? It's also going to deal with other relationships outside of that, even civic relationships.

And notice, just as we see at the end of that verse there, to the end that God is glorified, as we saw in chapter 3, this is all according to His eternal purpose. He doesn't say, look, I've got my eternal purposes, but let's get down to the law here. He says, no, these imperatives are consistent with that because the life of Christ lived out in you will serve my eternal purpose, and that is, I will be glorified, God says. Not by my best efforts, but by the life of Christ in you. Your life will be my life, He says. That's glorifying to God.

It'll be important to remember as we move ahead, because as we saw in that sample that you've got there in your first page, we're going to see imperatives left and right. And we need to remember, Paul's not shifting gears into a whole other realm and saying, OK, here's the law now that you've had a whole bunch of stuff on position. It is all based on the position that he's been explaining for three chapters here and not otherwise. Now, we want to take a look at some things side by side here, OK? And not that kind of side by side. No, no. OK.

Ephesians and Colossians side by side. We've been studying Ephesians and Colossians here. And we'll be looking at passages side by side together in the weeks ahead. What we'll see is that Ephesians and Colossians will, to a great extent, address identical or similar subjects.

But what we'll also find is that he often addresses the same thing from a slightly different perspective. Each book serves as a cross-commentary to the other, to give us additional insight, additional understanding that wouldn't come from just reading one. By studying both books in parallel, we'll get special insights from those. Here's an instance, and you have it on page 6 of your handout there.

In Ephesians 5, 18b-19, it starts off with, Be filled with the Spirit. What does he do when he writes to the Church of Colossae? He has a parallel passage, but he says, be filled with the Spirit in this way, let the word of Christ richly dwell within you. This is giving you an idea what being filled with the Spirit is about. And it makes a big difference too. The next one, he only says speaking to, in verse 19 of Ephesians, Now look at what the explanation that comes across in Colossians. With all wisdom, teaching and admonishing.

Now we have a better idea what that speaking means, don't we? See that? So we'll use each book to help us understand better the total picture of what Paul is wanting to communicate there. Sometimes one book will say more than the other, and your handout looks a little differently here, so that's why I said page 6, sort of. because I showed it all shrunk down here, and you have just a sampling of it.

Notice how much more he says about husbands and wives in Ephesians, which is the big massive text over here, versus Colossians. Same subject, much more to say here. So we're going to see those kinds of syncopations between the books. Generally speaking, more in Ephesians, but some exceptions.

We're going to keep remembering here as we go through it, Paul's imperatives are not a description of the desired end result that he wants us to make our best effort to achieve. That's not his behavioral specifications. Not something that is held out there externally that we're to try our very best to achieve. No. It is the description of what the power and the life and the righteousness from Christ look like in and through the believer. There is not here an empowerment to fulfill the law. What's our relationship to the law? Dead to it. No relationship to the law. The law has a relationship to unbelievers, but not to believers. Not in the church.

It is by God's doing, as we've seen here, that we have a position in Christ that's fixed, it's untouchable, it's irreversible, it's eternal in the heavenlies. We're seated there with Him. We have that position. He's been telling us for three chapters what we have there. We have a power as believers. It is entirely from God. It is the same power, as he mentioned in chapter one, which raised Christ from the dead. We have a person, the very person of Christ, living in and through us. He's the one who's going to live out the imperatives.

It's not ours to do. I mentioned before a particular project I had that was kind of a project from hell. It was back when I was an engineer, and the Lord had been doing various things to bring the message home, but in the middle of this project that was really, really awful, it became abundantly clear to me.

I remember sitting there in the vehicle on the site, and things were really uptight, and looking at Galatians 2.20, and I was saying, I can't live through this project anymore. It has to be Christ. He's got to live through it, because I'm done. And that was the only way. It's a realization and a recognition that the Lord in various ways will be teaching all of us, isn't it? Continuing to teach me, too.

Ever feel disappointed in your Christian life? Ever been there? Oh. Ever heard somebody say, oh, Christianity just doesn't work. I pride that Jesus stuff. It just doesn't work. Oh, terrible. I'm such a horrible Christian." Ever feel like that? What that does is that testifies that we depended upon ourselves. This is an amazing thing to think about. If we are disappointed in our lives as Christians, it is disappointment in ourselves. There is no disappointment in the Lord. He is always and entirely, completely adequate. It's when I try to do my best, put my very best effort forward, so that the Lord will be impressed with what I do. That's where the problem comes, doesn't it?

By God's doing we have, I'm not a Studebaker, we have a purpose. We have been blessed in that purpose. God has given us the power, and as he said in Ephesians chapter 1, it's the power of the resurrected Christ. We have the life and the righteousness of the person of Jesus Christ. That's his intent. He has given us this position. It's his doing, isn't it? He's given us the power of the resurrection. It's that maximum resurrection power. He's given us the very life of Christ. He has shared His glory with us.

Why? So that we can say, boy, look at how great a job I did? No. For the praise of His glory, that He might be glorified, as this verse underscores. That He might be glorified in the Church and in Jesus Christ forever and ever. Amen. Notice in this verse that we've taken to look at here, now to Him who is able, How much is he able?

What percentage? It's some number way over 100. It's his percentage that we're depending upon, not mine and his. He doesn't take up the slack. It's entirely his. He is able, 100%, to do beyond the way all that we ask or think, according to his power that works within us. that he is glorified.

Let's pray. Lord, as we look at this passage here, as we look at the passages before us here, we certainly want to see these imperatives and take them to heart, but recognizing that this is a description of your very life. It's a description of what your life does not look like. It's a description of what your righteousness does look like. Not that we're to seek to attain it on our own, because that would not glorify you.

But we are indeed the holy of holies, the one in whom you dwell. And it is your life, Lord, that is to be shown and to be lived. And we thank you for that. We thank you for what's been revealed already. We thank you for what's about to be revealed for us in the weeks and months ahead, should you wait that long.