We’ve been dealing with the subject of spring cleaning, and today, Lord willing, we will finish it—mostly because we have now officially entered Summer.
We saw that God is inviting us to our own personal show of trading spaces. You see, he wants inside of our lives—he wants to help us clean up and get rid of all the old junk. Verse 22 of Ephesians 4 tells us to put of the old self. The message puts it this way—“22Since, then, we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything--and I do mean everything--connected with that old way of life has to go. It’s rotten through and through. Get rid of it!” He wants to change your thinking about how you approach your life. And finally, he wants to give you a makeover, and give you the fullness of his abundant life—“created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.” But he doesn’t just want to do it with one aspect of our lives. He wants access to all of your life. It won’t do to just do part of your life, he wants it all.
The old junk has to go! The new way of living has to come in! And we do this by changing our thinking—transforming our minds with the help of the Holy Spirit!
You see, the great thing we don’t have to get rid of things by ourselves—we have the Holy Spirit—our own personal interior designer to help us.
He’s the one who comes to us and says, “Hey James. You know that little white lie that you told? That lying has to go. That has no business being here in the blueprints for your new life.” And you know what—it is by His power that we can do it.
2 Peter 1:3—“His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”
You see, Jesus isn’t letting us go into the process by ourselves, giving us a limited budget, a limited timetable, and limited manpower. We have God’s resources, God’s timetable and God’s power, all at work for us. So when the apostle Paul tells us to get rid of the old junk, it’s possible because God is the one working in us to do it! We can put on the new self, because it is God’s power at work in us. “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Last time, we saw how this affected the area of stealing in our lives, and how much that really does affect us—more so than we think. Today, we will continue in Ephesians 4. But before we do, let me tell you this story.
Lawyer Croaks
A guy phones a law firm and says, "I want to speak to my lawyer." The receptionist says, "I’m sorry, but your lawyer died last week." The next day the same guy phones the law firm and says, "I want to speak to my lawyer." Once again the receptionist replies, "I’m sorry, but your lawyer died last week." The next day the guy makes his regular call to the law firm and say, "I want to speak to my lawyer." "Excuse me sir," the receptionist says, "but this is third time I’ve had to tell you that your lawyer died last week. Why do you keep calling?" The guy replies, "Because I love hearing it!"
We are going to start today with the subject of unwholesome talk. We’ve already dealt with lying, but this is another subject.
29Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.
The word unwholesome means rotten, referring to rotten fruit or meat. How many of you are familiar with the television show “Fear Factor”? One of the challenges that they’ve had to do on that show was to eat rotten, infested cheese. Now, let me ask you a question. How many of you here this morning, would love to have that opportunity?
I didn’t think so. Yet we let that kind of stuff fly out of our mouth all of the time. James 3 tells us, “9With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness. 10Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be.” We let unwholesome, rotten talk come out of our mouths all the time.
Nehemiah 4
Opposition to the Rebuilding
1 When Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became angry and was greatly incensed. He ridiculed the Jews, 2 and in the presence of his associates and the army of Samaria, he said, "What are those feeble Jews doing? Will they restore their wall? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they finish in a day? Can they bring the stones back to life from those heaps of rubble-burned as they are?"
3 Tobiah the Ammonite, who was at his side, said, "What they are building-if even a fox climbed up on it, he would break down their wall of stones!"
In other words, they were saying things like, “You’re stupid! There’s no way you can do it! Even if you could, it would crumble in just a moment!”
And unwholesome speech doesn’t have to be just cursing. What about gossip? Let me ask you a rhetorical question. Have you ever heard any good gossip? Probably not.
Proverbs 26:20
Without wood a fire goes out; without gossip a quarrel dies down.
Romans 1 tells us about the most degrading, evil people in the world. Let’s look at Romans 1:29—“ Romans 1:29
They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity (That’s pretty bad, isn’t it?). They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice (That’s really bad, isn’t it?). They are gossips,--whoops! We have gossip included in this list!
Here’s the heart of the matter:
Luke 6:45
The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.
Instead of speaking evil, we need speak what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, (and the reason why is) that it may benefit those who listen.
Proverbs 16:21
The wise in heart are called discerning, and pleasant words promote instruction.
Proverbs 16:24
Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.
Ephesians 4:15 tells us to speak the truth in love. Why—because our words should benefit those who listen.
That flies in the face of all that we believe. We speak for our own benefit, not for the benefit of others. We want to make ourselves feel good, not others. We are extremely self-centered, and that is what needs to change. Instead of having words benefit us (by tearing down other people), we need to make sure they benefit those who hear it (by building them up).
Colossians 4
6Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
Words are powerful. We all know the saying, stick and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. It’s not true. Words are powerful—they have the ability to break down. They have the power to build up. We need to make sure that the words coming out of our mouths are going to build up our brothers and sisters, that it may be for their benefit.
That brings us to the last section—the heart of the matter. 30And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
Here’s what we need to stop—all bitterness. All rage. All anger. All brawling. All slander. Every form of malice. All has to go.
Bitterness, or resentment, needs to go. How many of you have every eaten a sour patch kid, or some other kind of sour candy. What’s fun about those kinds of candy is the face that you make right after the sourness comes to the front. That’s how attractive bitterness is, but yet we hold onto it for dear life.
I know a family that holds onto bitterness and resentment. It is currently destroying them, dividing each member onto different sides, father against daughter, brother against brother—it’s almost like an episode of “Days of our Lives”. The only difference is, this is real, and this is sin.
Our rage needs to go. This speaks of a violent outburst of anger. This weekend there is a new movie out in the theaters. Maybe you’ve seen previews for it this week—the Hulk. You see, I remember this from the comic books—you don’t want to anger this guy named Bruce Banner. You don’t want to make him mad, because if you do, he explodes into the hulk and does all kinds of great damage.
Well, we don’t need to turn into the hulk to cause great damage. We do well enough, thank you very much. We have to let go of rage. Some people say, “Well, I just hold my emotions inside until I blow up—but once I blow up, it’s over.” Well, that’s nice. Hiroshima blew up once, and look at the lasting damage that caused. Rage needs to go.
Anger needs to go—remember, we looked at anger before. Here, the apostle Paul is telling us to let go of anger. Why? Because anger is an excuse for sin. Anger allows the devil a foothold.
We’ve been looking at temptation on Wednesday nights, and I said this past week that too often we tolerate temptation rather than deal with it. We are all too comfortable letting wrong images and words flash on the television screen rather than remove it all together. And then we wonder why we never get the victory over sin. We are too comfortable with temptation. We need to get rid of anger, because it will lead to bitterness and rage.
All brawlings—I don’t think I need to explain this one. This is literally fighting. Sometimes, though, we don’t need to use our fists to fight. We can punch hard enough with words. Ever hear of someone getting into a shouting match? They’ve got to go.
All slander—we looked at that this morning—that has to go.
Every form of malice—this is the catch-all. You see, malice can be translated wickedness, and it all has to go.
Instead, we are to “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”
You see, all of those feelings, emotions, and out-pourings in verse 31 are directed at others. Instead, we need to be kind and compassionate to them. Kind means to be suitable or fitting to meet a need. Compassionate means to be kindhearted, affectionate toward one another. Ultimately, we are to forgive as we have been forgiven.
Do you remember the parable of the man who owed the king a large debt? This man was about to be thrown into prison, but he asked the king for mercy, and the king forgave the debt. This same man went out and found someone who owed him a small debt and threw him in prison. When the king found out, he said, “I forgave you a huge debt, and yet you could not forgive someone else a small debt?” And the king threw that man into prison, until he could repay the debt.
The point is this—we have been forgiven so much. We ought to forgive as well.
The reason why—we grieve the Holy Spirit, who sealed us each until the day of redemption.
He lives within the Christian, and when the heart is filled with bitterness and anger, the Spirit grieves. Parents know just a little of this feeling when our children at home fight with each other. The Holy Spirit is happiest in an atmosphere of love, joy, and peace, for these are the “fruit of the Spirit” that He produces in our lives as we obey Him. The Holy Spirit cannot leave us, because He has sealed us until that day when Christ returns to take us home. We do not lose our salvation because of our sinful attitudes, but we certainly lose the joy of our salvation and the fullness of the Spirit’s blessing.
In other words, when you slander a fellow believer, you slander someone who has been sealed by the Holy Spirit—you slander the Holy Spirit. When you call a believer a moron, you are calling the Holy Spirit a moron. You see, God has chosen and sealed that person for eternal life—who are you to get angry or bitter with him?
Math Trouble
A little girl was failing math. Her mother enrolled her in Catholic school in the hopes to improve her math grades. During the first marking period, her mother noticed a dramatic improvement in her math studies. The girl would refuse playing with friends and eating dessert after dinner in order to study more. On report card day, her mother was astonished to see that her daughter got an A+ in math. She asked her daughter, “Why the sudden change of attitude about math -- do the nuns punish you?” The girl replied, “No, but when I saw the little man on the wall nailed to the plus sign, I knew that this school is very serious about math!”
Well, God is serious about making changes in our lives. He wants us to stop doing wrong. He wants us to change our thinking. He wants us to start doing right. I hope that it is your prayer to do just that.
