Gooding, David: 10 - Movement Three

But with those marks, I come in my last ten minutes. I'm going to talk through quarter past nine tonight, if you will allow me, but then it's the last night, and if you don't, well. We come to the third movement, and you might rightly complain why I have left such a little time for such a large part of the epistle. It's not altogether an accident, though I confess to grievous faults and weaknesses in that direction. Not altogether an accident because it was impossible from the start, wasn't it, that in eight sessions on Ephesians that we should get round to discussing in detail all the practical commandments and exaltations in the last three chapters. And moreover, you know, had I attempted to expound in detail all those detailed exhortations in those last chapters, important as they are, it would have led me into areas of family life where I could only have spoken from a kind of theoretical authority and without the authority that comes from deep practical experience. I must leave it to your elders and your Bible class leaders that are experienced in these things, that they teach you the practical implications of the faith. I wouldn't like you to think that I've proportioned things this way because I don't think they are important. They are vitally important. What I want to do is a very simple thing, however, with this final movement, and that is to point out in these chapters two of the basic principles upon which the believer now is expected to run his life. I have entitled this in my own thinking as the role of the new man. For in this epistle we have had God's purpose in creation. We have had God's purpose in the mes- ministry of the Messiah within history. Now we turn to man, new made, the new man, the newly created man, and what is to be his role and how he is to live. And I want to emphasize two principles that stand out in my thinking in these final chapters as underlying all the particular exhortations. The danger is, you see, that if we're not careful, we shall come to think of this practical part of the epistle somewhat like this. Now, in chapter three you had all the goodies. There are lovely things that God has done. Now, at last, now you'll have to try and be grateful and pull your socks up and behave. Do you remember that's how the p- perhaps your parents didn't mind it, and I've seen other parents try it. They want the children to behave very well tonight at dinner when the visitors come. So they think, well, now a good precaution and inducement might be to give them some goodies, some special goodies, large ice creams and other such things in the afternoon. And so the kids are saying, no, your mother is being so good as this, not normally, isn't it? Marvelous mother is being this afternoon. Oh, we now see she's got Mrs. Jones coming to dinner. Oh, I see. I suppose we shall have to be on our best behavior, and mum will say, oh, you but you had the ice cream this afternoon, you'll see. Now, please show a little gratitude and behave tonight. Doesn't always work, does it? And the kind of exhortation that says that in the first three chapters you've got all the wonderful things that God has done. Aren't they wonderful? Well now, try show, try and show a little gratitude and behave, man. That isn't quite good enough. Oh, it's true, isn't quite good enough. More to it than that. Therefore, you will hear Paul in these final chapters, not once but many times, asking us to behave in the light of the truth. And it's not merely truth in the sense of doctrine, it's truth in the sense of reality. Look here, says Paul, you can't behave that way. Why can't I behave that way? Because that is to make a mock of reality. If you go out on a dark night, you know, go staggering down the street without looking, when it's foggy and dark, you'll hit into a lamppost. A lamppost is a very real thing. You better know it's there. Take a torchman and look. You want to know how to walk home without getting some marvelous great bruises, you better investigate reality a bit and bring a bit of light to bear upon the realities of life. That's principle number one. Let's just briefly notice how it works. Chapter four and verse twenty five: wherefore putting away falsehoods, speak truth one with another. Why should I? Because we are members, one of another. That's the reality. Is it the reality? Sometimes we get annoyed with ourselves, don't we? Stupid. We don't often tell it to other folks, but now again we address ourselves in such terms. Stupid chap. Fancy doing that. We aren't normally being sane, take out a knife and cut our hand off. Some of us have been known by our words and behavior to wound fellow believers very seriously. Why do we do it? You wouldn't wound your own physical body like it, would you? You say, but my body's reality. Yes, if I were to put a knife in, I should feel it. Oh, the body of Christ not a reality? It's just a theory. Why must I speak truth with my neighbor? Because, my brother, this isn't a theory, it is a reality. Unseen though it is, the thing that unites you and your brother is the Holy Spirit himself. You are in Christ. The Holy Spirit dwells in you. To hurt your Christian brother is to wound the body of Christ and hurt the Holy Spirit. Don't If you you start start ra- railing at your brethren, be careful what you say, because the Holy Spirit's in them, you know. And you could grieve the very Spirit with whom you're sealed to the day of redemption, and that is an exceedingly foolish thing to do, isn't it? And we do it, at least I do, all so often. And therefore, in order to behave in a practical way, I've got to ask myself, look here, old chap, face the truth. What do I really believe? Oh, say certain folks, yes, Jesus Christ, you know, is so loving, he doesn't mind young folks if they get a bit muddled up nowadays, you know, the fashions of the world have changed, and if sexually and so on they get a bit muddled up, well, I'm sure Jesus Christ wouldn't mind. Wouldn't he? Where did you get that idea from? What do you say, even the church nowadays, uh, uh, permits. Oh, does it really? But, says Paul, you open your eyes to reality, my men. You have not so learned Christ. The reality in Jesus. What he actually teaches on these things is vastly different from our permissive society and sometimes our permissive church teachers. Indeed, thus and thus will Paul plead with them? And exhort us similarly to plead with the unconverted. The sorry thing about our unconverted world is this, that men walk in the dark, unaware of the realities. They live as if there were no God. They live as though they had made themselves. And you might as well hit your head up against Gibraltar. Because it isn't real. The reality is there is a God. To live as though there weren't one is to live a lie. To be utterly unreal. Oh God, give us the grace to let Christ so shine upon us that we shall reflect his light, and being light in the Lord, shall cast a bit of reality around us in this dark world. You say, I can't live by those standards. Yes, you can. No, you say they're too high for me. No, they're not. Why aren't they? Well, well, well, you tell me. This new man that Paul talks of, he has been created after God. Is it real? Or is it only a little story? The new man is real, as real as the old man was. And it's not mere gratitude that would lead us to live like Christ. God has made provision, realistic provision. There is such a thing as the new man that God has created, and we all can live better than we do, my brothers and sisters, if one might speak for another. If only. Instead of when we sin saying, oh, well, you know, I, I couldn't really be expected to be any better than this. John could be. I must learn to get myself to face reality. There is a new man, and I, by God's grace, could put him on. The second principle that will run through all this is the principle of imitation. Please get what I mean. I'm not talking about imitations. That would be the opposite of reality, wouldn't it? I'm talking about the principle of imitation. How am I to live as a believer? I am to live on this principle that I am a new-made man, created after the image of God, and I am to learn to behave by imitating God and imitating Christ. Imitation is a tremendous way to go about things, isn't it? You'll see the boys up the back street. That chap's now going to play a golf, see, he's going to kick it. He's doing it, he's framing up his little youngster about six. He thinks he's Trevor Francis or something. He's doing it like he's seen Trevor Francis do it, see. Good for him. He does it many, many, many, many times like Trevor Francis do it. Well, that would be a football like Trevor Francis, wouldn't it? Here's a little girl, see, she's nursing the dolly, and she's giving me this bottle. Seen mother do it in reality, see, but now she's copying mother. Yes, because she's got mother's instinct anyway. Or she may be playing at it at the moment. Go on like that, if she not cares, she'll get married. Then she'll do it in reality. And you start imitating God, and you start imitating Christ. You don't get on too well at the beginning, do you? Go on, imitate. You'll find the divine nature inside proves a reality, and you'll become more like Christ. How has God behaved? Well, for Christ's sake, he forgave us. How you say that, no, no, now, wait a minute, no, no, no, I could never forgive that brother that. Oh, couldn't you? We'll have a go at imitation then. Have a go at imitating God. He's been able to do it. How did he do it with you, anyway? You say, ah, well, I would be a bit more help in the church, you know, but those in my church, they're funny and odd. Don't appreciate my ministry. Bit of ungrateful crowd. I see. Have you ever thought of imitating Christ in this matter? He, I tell you the way he lived. He looked at a very funny crowd, name was Martha, Mary, Lazarus, and David Gooding, and he looked at them. He said, they're a funny crowd to have to live for. Ah, but wait a minute, he says. I'll give myself for them as a sacrifice to God, because God, for some reason or other, wants them as his dwelling place. Well, I serve the Lord then. Goes and chooses such funny people as that. I'll, I'll serve him. And what it costs me to give myself to them, I shall in my heart of hearts be offering it to God as a sacrifice of a sweet smelling savor. And you know, the more it costs Christ to do it, the more fragrant was the sacrifice for God. Try imitating Christ, my brother. In the way he filled heaven with fragrant perfume by giving himself in the service of the likes of me. And you, husbands? But how dare I speak about that? And wives? But it's a clear case of imitation, isn't it? As Christ loved the church. Oh, what kindness, loving us and accepting us as we were, and giving us that sense that he'll never cast us out, secure in his love. But not just sloppy, missus, you know. Though he accepts us and gives us security, he's got his eye on the old pimples and blotches. Doesn't always mention them every breakfast time, but he's determined to get rid of the old blotches and blemishes. Good husband that he is. Acceptance as we were, he received us while we were yet sinners and will never cast us out, but he isn't content to see us remain sinners, I tell you he isn't. And he isn't going to have a bride of his turn up in heaven with blots and blemishes and pimples on. No, no. He's determined to live for us until he's got away the last wrinkle and the last blemish. That's love. Acceptance, not criticism that makes you feel that they're rejecting you. But first of all, acceptance. And then a devotedness of love that will not be content until it has us perfect. Oh, I can see you husbands and you wives have got your work cut out. To imitate Christ. I can begin to say is far from just sentimental. Kindness. And finally, we are to imitate him as a warrior in the battle. For this business of being the new man created of God brings with it the certainty. We are expected to join in the inevitable battle. When God made the first man and put him in the garden, Satan attacked him at that level. Apples and things, or fruit or whatever it was. Now we're the second man, aren't we? The new man, created after God. That'll mean a bigger battle. For the battlefield has shifted, you know, from the Garden of Eden. That was a very lowly battlefield. It has shifted to the very heavenly places. And since God has introduced his son there, and in Christ his people, and is determined to have this dwelling place for all eternity, and to have his people before him, the battle goes on in those heavenly places. You have to be aware of the dimension. It's a battle for men's souls, isn't it? And their heavenly destiny. And you see, if I'm not aware of it, I can get a tactical victory with my next door neighbor about the grass or the garden or the bonfire or something of the sort. You know how we do. A tactical battle with the businessman. I think I've won when it leaves my mouth shut, for I can't now talk to him the gospel, and Satan has actually one. And if I'm not careful inside the church, you'll lead me down a path, will Satan, in the word of God, until I become so unbalanced and begin to push my views. And I think I'm standing for the truth. I'm prepared to split an assembly wide open. What I think is the truth. And the very results ought to show me that this is no victory, my brother. This is a battle that Satan has won. What a responsibility to be the new man in Christ, created of God, and asked to join the sovereign Savior himself in the warfare in the heavens. These then are some of the basic principles, truth and reality, and the principle of imitation- imitating the divine persons that underlie our practical behavior as believers. Courage up. The war is going to be won. God help us not to lose too many battles between now and the final winning of the war. And I thank you for your great patience, tonight in particular, and on all those other nights. Thank you for the way you have sat so long. That's the hardest business of all, isn't it? The way you have cooperated, the sense of happiness that you have brought with you to these meetings. I fancy some of you were praying for the meetings and praying for the preacher. God bless you and reward you. And if you can spare the Christian charity, from time to time also pray still for me. Shall we pray? Oh, our Father, we thank thee for thy word. We thank thee for the delightful and wonderful things thou hast shown us therein. Thou art he that has wrought us for this self-same thing. Thou hast given us the earnest of thy spirit in our hearts. You make us long for eternity to be at home with the Lord, to see finally that great reality on which thou art already working, and all those lovely surprises that thou hast awaiting us in the ages yet to come. We thank thee for these meetings, for making the process of learning enjoyable and on times quite happy, if sometimes quite hard. Now, Lord, we pray that we may not mistake the enjoying of the learning from the blessedness of the doing. So strengthen our faith to grasp our reality. Nerve our endeavor by thy spirit, we pray, that we might fight the good fight, lay hold of life that is life indeed. To the end, that we might know what is the hope of our thy call, and by thy grace fulfill it. To the end that Christ even now might dwell in our heart, we be progressively filled unto all the fullness of God. With our thanksgivings now we ask thy parting blessing through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.