Live Wisely
Ephesians, Riches in Christ
Part 9
Eph 5:14-18 NIV
"Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." 15 Be very careful, then, how you live-not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.
The apostle Paul is writing to the Christians in Ephesus here,
and he gives us clear instructions.
1. Wake Up and Live Wisely
Verse 14-15
"Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." Be very careful, then, how you live-not as unwise but as wise,
He tells the Christians here,
wake up, you sleepyheads.
If you’ve been asleep spiritually,
if you haven’t been paying attention to what’s going on in this world,
wake up, sleeper,
and start to live wisely,
because the days are evil.
This couldn’t apply more, to us today.
Most everyone agrees that we are living at a turning point in history.
The world today very different from the world even one generation ago.
If you’re 35 years old,
you’re living in a different world from what you grew up in.
In the U.S. from 1960 to 1991, while the population was increasing by 41%, violent crime increased 500%.
From 1965 to 1990,
the number of cases of juvenile violence each year tripled.
In 1972 12.9% of all pregnancies in the US were aborted. In 1996 31% of all pregnancies were aborted.
Today, suicide is one of the top 4 causes of death
for every age group between 10-44 years old.
In 1969, 10% of homes had a single parent. Today almost 30% of all homes have a single parent.
This is a different world,
and the changes keep coming.
Surveys indicate that the culture in America is redefining itself every five years.
How do we deal with this?
In the 12th chapter of 1 Chronicles, It tells about when David was becoming king of Israel,
and people from the 12 tribes of Israel
came to ally themselves with David, to make him their King.
Listen to what it says about some of them:
It says there were:
men of Simeon, warriors ready for battle-
men of Ephraim, brave warriors, men of Zebulun, experienced soldiers, men of Dan, ready for battle-
men of Asher, experienced soldiers –
but in vs. 32, "...men of Issachar, who understood the times and knew what Israel should do."
It helps to have a strong army,
but it helps even more to understand the times,
and know the right thing to do.
The leaders of our country are struggling with that right now.
We’ve got the strong army.
But do we know the right thing to do?
There’s a lot of argument about that.
Will invading Iraq really solve our problems,
or might it create more problems.
Do our leaders really understand the times?
Its pretty important.
If you don’t understand the times,
you can’t live wisely,
and you’re not going to have a clue how to deal with the changes in life
that are happening all around us,
constantly.
King David was successful,
and at least part of that success,
was because he had people around him
who understood the times
and knew what to do.
We tend to confuse understanding with knowledge.
If someone knows a lot,
we respect him.
We respect scientists, and doctors,
and others who know a lot.
But there’s a big difference in knowing a lot, and understanding the times.
If you understand the times then you know what to do.
A few years ago, Judge Robert Bork was being interviewed on "Face the Nation."
The interviewer mentioned a number of depressing current events that were going on,
from Whitewater to Paula Jones to O.J. Simpson, then he threw up his hands in despair and said, "I don’t understand what is going on, do you?"
Judge Bork responded, "Yes, We are on the edge of the decline of Western civilization."
Now whether or not you agree with that,
At the very least you need to recognize
there are huge changes going on in our society
and we need to try to understand the times.
Now I can’t teach you in 5 minutes
how to understand the times we live in,
but let me give you a quick start,
to get you thinking.
First of all,
I believe that we’re living in a time of great spiritual warfare.
In fact, we’re going to talk about that more next week in Ephesians 6
where it says that "...our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil..."
There are several areas in which this spiritual battle is being fought.
I just want to mention a couple.
The first is a battle
BETWEEN BELIEF and REJECTION OF A PERSONAL, LOVING GOD
You see,
Most people believe in God Surveys say 96% of people in the US
believe in God.
So if you go out and ask anybody on the street,
Do you believe in God?
there’s a 96% chance they’ll say yes.
In fact, its become almost unpatriotic today,
to not believe in God.
Everybody claims to believe.
But they don’t believe in a personal, loving God,
who knows everything about each of us,
and wants to have a personal relationship with us,
They don’t believe in a God who has a good plan for our lives,
who sent His own Son to die for us and pay for our sins,
and who expects us to live our lives for Him,
and obey Him,
with God as our number one priority.
They don’t believe in that kind of God.
The belief in that kind of God,
is getting more unpopular.
The kind of God most people believe in today,
is the kind of God that will tolerate anything
because tolerance is the new politically correct buzzword,
So they believe in a God that will tolerate anything
and would never hold anyone accountable.
And of course, God never really gets involved personally
in the lives of people.
He’s just sort of up there, watching us.
That’s the kind of God most people in our society believe in.
In fact, if you claim that Jesus is the only way to heaven,
you’re going to be accused of intolerance,
of being a right wing fundamentalist.
If you claim that God wants us to live holy lives,
and for example practice sex only within a marriage relationship,
like the Bible says,
again you’re accused of intolerance,
of being judgmental,
and being out of touch.
I know, because it just happened to me recently.
You see, we’re living in a time when a battle is being waged between belief and rejection of a personal, loving god.
If someone tells you they’re a Christian,
or they believe in God,
don’t assume they believe in a personal, loving god,
and don’t assume they have a relationship with God.
You need to understand the times,
There’s another battle going on today,
BETWEEN ABSOLUTE TRUTH and SITUATIONAL ETHICS
Our society would say, "There is no absolute truth. My truth can be different from you’re truth.
My morals can be different from your morals,
and as long as you don’t hurt anyone, its OK.
But the true believer knows that there is a way to know what’s right and wrong. There is an ultimate, unchanging standard,
against which we will be measured.
When John Quincy Adams was president of the U.S. he stood before Congress and held up two bushel baskets, one from New York and one from So. Carolina. He said, "The problem is, one of these baskets holds 68 cubic inches more than the other."
Then he held up two one pound weights, one from Maine and one from Massachusetts. He said, "The problem is, one weighs one ounce more than the other."
He said, "Gentlemen, we need a standard."
As a result, the House Weights and Measurement Committee was formed,
And today in Washington, D.C., there is an official set of scales so accurate that people aren’t allowed within ten feet of it because body temperature will affect its accuracy.
And so today, one pound is the same in Ohio as it is in Oklahoma. And a bushel is the same in Mississippi as it is in Montana,
because now we have a standard
by which we measure everything.
Its because Pres. Adams knew that the U.S. needed permanent standards that could be relied upon.
The same is true in our spiritual lives. We need a standard, and that standard is Jesus Christ.
When you look at Jesus you can hear God saying, "This is what I had in mind when I made you. I want you to be like Jesus."
In Acts 17:30 Paul says, God has overlooked the times when people did not know him, but now he commands all of them everywhere to turn away from their evil ways.
Next verse, 31 because God has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead."
It says God will judge the world, by Jesus.
If you want to know what the standard of judgment will be on Judgment Day, here it is.
The standard by which we will be judged is Jesus Christ.
God is going to compare us to Jesus because Jesus is the standard of right and wrong.
We need that standard,
because there’s a battle on about absolute truth.
So we need to understand the times, and when we understand,
like the men of Issachar,
we’ll also know what to do,
to change what’s going on in our world.
The problems in society are not really that complex.
We make them seem difficult,
because we point in all different directions.
People say, "Our problem is education." "Our problem is poverty." "Our problem is government." “Our problem is crooked corporate CEO’s.”
You can point 50 different directions.
Its like the man who went to see the doctor. He said, "Doc, I have something seriously wrong with me. When I push here it hurts. And when I push here it hurts. And when I push here it hurts."
The doctor said, "We need to take some x-rays." After the x-rays had been taken, the doctor came back in. The man asked, "Well, what did you find out?" "
The doctor said, "I found out you have a broken finger."
It seems like we have a whole bunch of different hurts and problems in our society,
but they all have the same source.
Our real problem is that we’ve wandered away from God.
When we turn to God with our whole hearts,
then healing will come to our land.
So the bible tells us in Ephesians 5:15,
wake up and live wisely,
Then in verse 16 it tells us,
2. MAKE THE MOST OF EVERY OPPORTUNITY.
Verse 16 says
making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.
In the days before modern harbors, a ship had to wait for the flood tide before it could make it to port.
The term for this situation in Latin was ob portu, (or off port)
that is, a ship waited off port for the moment when it could ride the tide into the harbor.
The English word “opportunity” comes from that original meaning, of ob portu.
The crew of the ship had to be ready and waiting for that one opportunity,
when the tide was right,
because they knew if they missed it, they’d have to wait for another tide to come in.
Any Shakespeare fans here?
Shakespeare turned this meaning of opportunity dealing with tides and currents,
into one of his most famous passages, from the play Julius Caesar:
See if you remember this from school:
There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat;
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures.
To simplify that, he’s saying,
if you miss your chance,
you blew it.
You may not get another one.
So make the most of every opportunity.
Why do we need to make the most of every opportunity?
Because if we’re wise, we realize that
Our time on this earth is limited.
Psalm 39:4. "Show me, O Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life,"
Psalm 90:10
"The length of our days is 70 years - or 80, if we have the strength... they quickly pass, and we fly away,"
About a year ago People Magazine published an article titled "Dead Ahead" telling about a new clock that keeps track of how much time you have left to live.
It calculates an average life span of 75 years for men and 80 years for women.
So you program your sex and age into the clock, and from then on it will tell you how much time you have left. They sold the clock for $99.95.
but I’ll tell you what,
If they could make a clock that could tell that time accurately, they could sell it for a million dollars,
and have buyers waiting.
Now I didn’t buy one,
but according to their clock,
I have about 10,950 days left to live.
But wait a minute. I don’t have a guarantee of even one more day to live.
The Bible tells us not to count on tomorrow because tomorrow may not come for you or for me.
We just don’t know.
So our time on this earth is valuable because it is very limited.
James 4:13,14
“Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit’; whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.”
I saw an article recently titled, “If You Are 35, You Have 500 Days To Live.”
The article said that when you subtract the time you spend sleeping, working, tending to personal matters, eating, personal hygiene, traveling, doing chores, and add in other miscellaneous time stealers,
Then in the next 36 years you will have only 500 days to spend doing what you really want.
What are you going to do with your 500 days?
A poet puts it this way:
Just a tiny little minute
Only sixty seconds in it.
Forced upon me. Can’t refuse it.
Didn’t seek it, didn’t choose it,
I must suffer if I lose it,
Give account if I abuse it.
Just a tiny little minute,
But eternity is in it.
God did not give all of us the same amount of talent, or the same amount of wealth, but He has given each of us the same amount of time.
And of course,
we live in a very time conscious society.
We’ve all got our Palm Pilots,
and we want to be efficient with our time, right?
Try to squeeze in as much as we can.
It is interesting that when you study the Bible, you don’t find a lot of emphasis on saving time or managing time.
God never tells us we have to be great time managers, But we are called to be good opportunity managers.
It is not just the time, but also the timing. It is not just counting the minutes, hours, days, months and years, its making the minutes, hours, day, months and years count.
You can have your schedule packed,
24 hours a day,
but still miss doing the things that really count.
Tomorrow we will be given more hours, but we may never have the same opportunity again.
So what does it mean to make the most of every opportunity?
Lets look at a bible story.
Jesus went to the home of Mary and Martha. He sits down in the living room to teach, and Mary is sitting at His feet just soaking in every word.
Meanwhile, Martha was out in the kitchen fixing dinner.
Then Martha gets upset because Mary is not helping her with dinner. So Martha complains to Jesus,
Luke 10:40
"Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!" "Martha, Martha," the Lord answered, "You are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her".
Martha was so preoccupied with what she was doing that she didn’t realize that God was in her living room.
That’s the same mistake that you and I make every day.
We get so caught up in the here and now that we don’t deal with the eternal, the things that’ll last forever and ever.
Why do we miss opportunities?
Its usually because
we’re preoccupied and distracted by other things.
Richard Swenson, a medical doctor, wrote a book called “Margin”,
in which he discusses one of the major problems of our time – anxiety and stress.
He says that people are just plain overloaded.
He says first,
1. We’re overloaded with commitments.
We’ve committed ourselves to go here and there, to take part in this activity and that social function.
Pretty soon we don’t know whether we’re coming or going because we’ve overloaded ourselves with commitments.
2. We’re also overloaded with possessions,
He says. Our closets are full, our garages are overflowing. We’ve gone into debt to pay for all of these things that we "simply must have."
And now we spend all our time maintaining them,
and cleaning them,
and worrying about what if someone steals it, or breaks it.
We are overloaded in the area of possessions.
3. Thirdly, we’re overloaded in our work.
We get up early, fight traffic, work long hours,
and fight for overtime,
or promotions,
because we have to if we’re going to pay for all those possessions that we’ve accumulated.
What’s the result of all this?
Because we’re overloaded with life,
A lot of us play the little game of, "I wish it were."
"I wish it were Friday," or
"I wish it were next week," or "I wish it were next month," or "next year."
A girl went to college, and she hated all the work,
But she told herself, "If I can ever get out of college and get married and have children, I know I’ll finally be able to enjoy life."
So she stuck with it. She went to classes every day and finally graduated from college.
Then she got married and had children, and discovered that children are a lot of work. So she told herself, "If I can just get these kids raised, then I’ll be able to relax and really enjoy life."
But about the time the kids were entering high school her husband said, "Hey hon, We don’t have enough money to send our kids to college. I guess you’ll have to get a job."
Well, she didn’t want to, but she knew they needed the money, so she went to work.
And she hated it. But she told herself, "If I can just get these kids out of college, and get all of the bills paid, then I can quit work and really enjoy life."
Finally, the last child graduated from college, and all the bills were paid.
So she walked into her employer’s office and said, "I quit." He said, "Oh, you don’t want to quit now. If you stay with us just another 8 years you’ll have a pension for the rest of your life."
She thought, "Well, I don’t want to work another 8 years, but there’s all that money there, and I really can’t turn down the opportunity."
So she worked for another 8 years. Finally, she and her husband retired at the same time. They sold their home and bought a little retirement cottage.
Then they sat down on the swing on their front porch and pulled out the family picture album and dreamed about the good old days.
Someone said, "Life is what happens to you while you’re making plans to do something else."
Have you been making the most of every opportunity that God sends your way?
Maybe its a friend who wants to talk, Maybe its the chance to help out someone in need,
Maybe it’s the opportunity to tell someone about Jesus, or invite them to church,
Maybe its making the most of opportunities to spend time with our children while they’re still at home?
After my junior year of college, at the Naval Academy,
I was taking a summer school class,
so I was there for 3 months without a whole lot to do.
A man I knew from my church in Annapolis named Bob Underhill
heard I was going to be around for the summer,
and he knew I liked to lift weights
and asked me if we could weight lift together.
He was a school teacher,
and had a flexible schedule during the summer.
So he came over to the Naval Academy 3 times a week,
for the whole summer, and we’d weight lift for an hour and a half.
I wasn’t sure at first why this man wanted to spend that much time with me,
but I eventually figured it out.
You see, as we were weight lifting,
our conversations always seemed to get onto spiritual topics,
and we had some great discussions.
You see, He was making a long term investment,
in me.
He was building my faith,
and sharing some of his wisdom with me,
and helping me figure out what it meant
to be a godly man.
He was willing to invest about 5 hours every week,
in a kid that that he’d never see again.
But I think if you asked him now,
he’d say that was a great investment.
And if you ask me,
it was a priceless investment.
He saw an opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life,
and he made the most of that opportunity.
How about you and me? How are we handling this precious gift of time that God has given us?
Are you overloaded?
Do you have a hard time just seeing past the problems you have with lack of time,
or do you focus on the opportunities God is opening up before you every day?
The apostle Paul tells us,
make the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.
Then in Verse 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.
That’s Paul’s third instruction for us ----
3. UNDERSTAND WHAT THE LORD’S WILL IS.
Everyone wants to know Gods will for them.
I’ve never met anybody who wasn’t at least a little interested in that.
But a lot of people look at that whole area
as kind of a dark cloud,
that once in a while they get a peek at Gods will,
but most of the time it’s a mystery.
Well Gods will is not always that difficult.
A lot of things we don’t have to wonder about.
Its spelled out for us.
There’s a bunch of things in the Bible where God comes out and says,
Hey, these are my will for you.
you don’t have to pray about these. These are definitely God’s will.”
In fact, 6 times in the New Testament the phrase, “this is God’s will” is used.
and I’ve put them on your outline.
These are the things we need to start with
when we think about God’s will in our lives.
You don’t have to pray about these
or doubt, wonder, question or study.
Because God comes out and tells us
that they’re His will.
1. Its God’s will that I have eternal life.
John 6:40 Jesus says,
My Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life.
How do you have eternal life?
Through being good? No. Through going to church? No. Through being baptized? No.
Through what?
Its in that verse.
Looking to the Son, and believing in Him.
That’s the starting point. If you haven’t settled that, you need to settle it.
Most of you have already done that.
2. It is God’s will that I live a pure, disciplined lifestyle.
I Thes. 4: 3 - 4
It is God’s will that you should be holy. That you should avoid sexual immorality and learn to control your body in a way that is holy.
It says here, Its Gods will that I live a pure, disciplined lifestyle.
What is He saying? Is God saying avoid sex? No - who do you think thought it up? God did.
Sex isn’t dirty. It’s holy.
And God wants us to keep it holy,
by keeping it within marriage.
That’s what he designed it for.
So God says I want you to live a pure and disciplined life, and control your own body in a way that’s holy.
And that’s talking about a lot more than just sex.
Its God’s will that I have self-control,
in all of my appetites,
in every area of my life,
That I don’t just give into anything I’d feel like at the moment, but that I have self-control in my life.
That’s God’s will.
3. It’s God’s will that I maintain an attitude of gratitude.
I Thessalonians 5:16 and 17
Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances for this is God’s will for you.
You want to know God’s will? Simple. Pray about everything.
Be joyful all of the time.
In everything give thanks.
You say, “you’ve got to be kidding.”
Give thanks for the problem I’m in right now?
It doesn’t say: give thanks for everything. It says in everything.
There’s a big difference.
Not For everything give thanks. Why would God want me to be thankful for cancer? Why would God want me to be thankful for crime?
: : : : for my financial problems?
It doesn’t say for everything give thanks.
It says, “in everything give thanks.”
Why? Because of then next verse:
we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him
God takes even our mistakes, even the problems that we bring on ourselves and He turns them around and He uses them for good.
Somehow He takes bad and brings good out of it, if we just have the right attitude and put Him in charge.
So what is God’s will?
In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God!
4. Its God’s will that I be a law abiding citizen.
I Peter 2:13, 16
Submit yourself for the Lord’s sake to every authority instituted among men.... For it is God’s will that by doing good you silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.
God says, “it’s My will that you be a good citizen.” Keep the law. Be an example. Be a testimony.
So that you don’t give critics anything to talk about.
5. Its God’s will that I bring others to Christ.
That I share my faith. That I tell others about what God’s done for me.
That I help other people to know the good news. and come to Jesus Christ
2 Peter 3:9
The Lord is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
What’s it saying here?
God doesn’t want anybody to die without Christ.
God does not anybody to go to hell. He wants His word shared. He said, “go into all the world.”
So what is God’s will? It is God’s will that I share my faith
with other people.
For some people, you’re the only Christian they’re ever going to know.
It’s God’s will that you share.
6. It is God’s will that I commit myself to God and other believers.
That I be committed not just to God,
but also committed to a group of other Christians. a family of believers; to a church.
2 Corinthians 8:5 (Paul is speaking here)
‘they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us, in keeping with God’s will.
You see, when you commit yourself to Christ,
you also commit to his church,
which is his body.
There is no such thing as lone ranger Christianity. “Just me and Jesus, we got a good thing going. We don’t need any other Christians.”
No.
God says you need to be committed to Him and to some other Christians who will encourage you and inspire you and pray for you and help you
In fact,
If you’re not in some kind of small group,
I’d encourage you to get into one.
Why?
Because its tough to develop close relationships with other Christians,
if you’re only involved on Sunday mornings.
And because it’s God’s will that you be committed to Him and to other Christians.
Let me close with one last verse.
This really summarizes what I’ve been saying this morning.
Romans 13:11-12 says, "The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light."
If you’ve been asleep at the wheel spiritually,
Its time to wake up.
We need to understand the times,
and understand that God put us here for a purpose,
We need to live wisely,
make the most of every opportunity,
and start living in God’s will.
