A Careful Walk in Evil Days

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons, or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

Walking Carefully in Evil Days

Well, we are in Ephesians 5, and I invite you to turn there. And I'd like you to consider, as you're turning there, how you came into the building as you walked in here. Because I presume everyone, except for the baby maybe, and I think everyone walked in here with your feet.

And as you came in here, were you paying attention to your feet, the way, the manner that you came in here? Not to trip on, I don't know, if there were any obstacles in the way, or you were looking out from the ceiling, if anything would crash on your head, or that kind of thing?

I don't think any of us put any thought to that. I even put that in my sermon, and I completely forgot about it, and just walked in here, just naturally forgetting about everything. But if we change the scenario a little bit, and imagine our church wasn't here in the room here, but it was in a jungle somewhere.

And you had to get there by way of crossing a suspension pedestrian kind of bridge, where you have the ropes and you just walk. And if you walked across that before, something like that, you know that's a little bit more of a challenge.

You have to give some thought to how you walk. If you just tried to walk naturally across that thing, you'd probably just stumble and you'd have a hard time. But there's something I'd like you to observe about these two scenarios, is that you don't need anyone to really tell you to walk carefully.

If you came into the building here today, you didn't need anyone to tell you to walk carefully as you came in here. You know, lest you fall or knock your head or stub your toe. And even with a suspension bridge, you wouldn't need anyone to tell you, because as soon as your toe first touches that thing, you know there's something that you have to pay a little bit more attention to.

But in the case here in our text, what I think frames the context of our text, Paul saw a danger that is facing Christians, a very real and potent danger that they don't necessarily see coming, that would cause them, or cause him anyway, to issue this warning of walk carefully.

I think that's what's in here in Ephesians 5. Let's read the passage. We're going to read verses 15 to 21. For that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

So Paul saw a danger that he refers to as evil days. He says to walk carefully and to make best use of the time, because the days are evil. And you can see the heart of Paul here, because we see it in the book of Acts when he talked to the elders of Ephesus.

And he warned them, he says he ceased not to warn them day and night with tears, because from their very midst, savage wolves would come in, not sparing the flock. And he warned them because that danger was there, and they didn't necessarily see it coming.

And we have an application here, and we do good to take heed to this text that we're in today, because every one of us in the Christian life, you can't just walk automatically, just like you came into the building here.

But there is very real danger that we're all exposed to, and of which Paul warns us here, that we do well to take heed to how we walk. He says the days are evil. I'd like just to spend a little time thinking about what he means by evil days.

Many people have divided up evil, the types of evil, into two categories. They speak of it as natural evil or moral evil. And you can see these kind of distinctions. What is meant by natural evil is those kind of things that aren't the result of bad actors in the world, you could say.

Things like tornadoes or sickness, the kind of things that bring calamity and destruction to our lives, things we have no control over. And so that's one kind of evil, but I think that's true, and we can't escape those things.

I don't think that's what Paul is warning us to be careful of. Another kind of evil is moral evil, and this would include not only the immorality we see in the world, in this society of ours that is without God, but there is an evil in our own flesh as well, and there is the evil of Satan.

But what I'd like you to notice, though, is that when Paul is talking about walking carefully because of these evil days, it's not as if by a careful walk we could somehow escape the moral evil of the world.

If you think about Jesus, who would walk carefully more so than anybody, did he escape the evil in the world? We know he didn't escape the natural evils of the world. He thirsted and hungered and faced all the things like every other human being does.

And the moral evil, well, he never did have the sinful nature like we do to contend with, but he faced the evil of the world as well. And we read about how Satan drove him into the wilderness to tempt him, and we see in the end how he was beaten by men and spit upon and eventually crucified.

He walked very carefully, Jesus did, and he didn't avoid that. So what I gather when I'm looking at this trying to figure out what is meant, what is Paul trying to get at when he says walk carefully and make the best use of the time because the days are evil?

The only thing left that I can think of is that the evil that we're supposed to be walking carefully trying to avoid is deception. Because if you think about it, deception is really the only tool that any bad actors in the world have against us.

Even Satan himself, his tool is to deceive. He tried to harm Jesus in many ways, but he did not get through because Jesus held to the truth. And what Paul would have us be careful of is not to be deceived.

There's a great danger for us as Christians to be deceived in ways that we don't even see coming, and we have to be careful for that. And not only that, but I think there's many ways that Christians are coming from a state of deception into truth.

When we were first converted, we didn't instantly understand all truth, but truth dawned on us, and we started awaking out of the darkness into the light. Like we are children of light, but yet somehow we're still groggy learning the truth.

So we have to learn to walk carefully, attentively, to escape deceit because it is all around us in every place. So then if we want to walk carefully, if we are to walk carefully, like Paul is exhorting here, how would we go about doing it?

If you're thinking to yourself, well, how am I going to escape evil? How am I going to escape the deceit of evil? Well, the only way, well, there's a couple ways. Okay, where would we go? We'd go to the truth, right?

That's the obvious thing. And hold on to that thought because we're going to get there in the next verse after here. But one of the ways I'd just like you to stop and consider is to stop sinning. And you might be thinking, well, how does stopping to sin, how can that prevent me from being deceived?

Because isn't it the case that I'm deceived into believing some truth and therefore I sin? Well, that is true, but I just want you to notice that the reciprocal of that is also true. There's a way that in sinning, that thing actually makes you more prone to deceit.

We see this, for example, in Hebrews chapter 3 when he speaks there of exhorting one another daily, while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. Because sin has a kind of way of making us callous, our hearts callous that they don't see.

And that can in turn affect the mind. It's not only the mind that is darkened and therefore we sin, but the other way around too. And I wonder if you haven't found it true in your own lives too. I think of when I was a kid, I remember a couple of instances in particular.

One was when I was, we were in gym class, it was in track and field and we were running around the track. And I remember as these kids I was running with, we were going around, we were running around, and you're supposed to stay in your own lane, but I saw that they were veering out of their lanes and getting a shortcut ahead of me.

And I was in a dilemma, like, they're all doing it, should I do it too? And then the point I'm making is that sins which at first you know to be wrong, if you submit to them and you do those things, you not know to be wrong.

Eventually, over time, you don't feel those things to be wrong anymore. And don't we all have this experience? Certain things. Like the other example I was thinking of, when other kids in school would use the name of the Lord in a crude manner.

And that would really bother me until I started doing it myself, and then it didn't bother me so much after that. And that kind of pattern we read in the Bible can lead to a darkened understanding. And so that's one of the ways we have to be careful.

We have to stop sinning because that can itself lead to further deception. And there's a couple things I'd say about having to walk so as to avoid sin. In Proverbs 4, I think it is, it speaks, it says, Ponder the path of your feet and let all your ways be established.

Turn not to the left hand nor to the right. Remove your foot from evil, it says. So two things there is to consider, if you want to walk carefully, you consider your steps. Where are they standing? And sometimes you will find you are standing in sin and you need to stop and ask yourself, Where am I standing?

What are you doing? What are you doing here? And you need to remove your foot from evil. And the Lord always says He makes a way of escape for temptation. And sometimes those little lights that come into your mind, that give you a check and a pause, you need to take advantage of to escape those snares.

So ponder your feet. And it says also, ponder the path of your feet. To look, if you are considering a behavior or action, at those crossroads you look and you think, Well, where is this path going to take me?

And I'm sure you have found this as well, that many of the paths of sin that we at times walk down are not new paths but they are old paths and worn and familiar. So if we want to avoid this sin, we need to recognize where this path is taking me.

And say to yourself, I've seen this before and I know where it leads. And sin always leads to misery and I'm not going to take that path. Now, I think those things are involved in avoiding sin so as to avoid deception.

But the avoidance of sin I don't think is primarily Paul's main concern in our passage. And the reason I say so is, if we look at the text, he says, look carefully how you walk, not as unwise but as wise.

He says, making the best use of the time. And notice there, he doesn't say stop making the worst use of the time, but it's more positive, make the best use of the time. Now, here's what I make of that.

If we go back to our picture of walking on this suspension bridge, and you know you have your own sins to deal with, as it were, as you're walking on this bridge, and you have to keep your balance. But there's also our fellow believers that are on that bridge too.

And all of them are prone to deception themselves. So, if you are on that bridge and you're crossing it, and the warning is there's deception about, or I guess in this case, there's a danger you might fall and slip and all that, make the best use of the time.

Well, what I would think of is that this involves helping your brothers, helping them also to avoid sin. But I would go further than that as well even, because if you want to make the very best use of the time, we would not just help them, our brothers, to escape sin, but we should help them likewise to do good as well.

You have this idea in Hebrews. Hebrews 10 .24. It speaks and it says, let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works. So, part of walking carefully and making best use of the time, because of these evil days, is that we would consider each other, not just considering how we might escape sin, how we might help them escape sin, help them out of the snares of deceit, but help them along also in their works of goodness.

That's interesting in Hebrews, that passage, because it's not just like you see somebody and you see a need and you take care of it. He says to actually study how to consider one another, to provoke them to love and good works.

Well, moving on then. So, what else is required to walk carefully so as to avoid this deceit? Well, we'll go back to that idea of, you must understand the truth. You need the truth if you want to fight lies, right?

Verse 17 says, Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. First thing I would say about that is, the will of the Lord, we need to understand where to look, because this isn't so obvious.

For some it may be the, well, I'd say they would spend a good amount of consideration and time seeking God's will in, well, I'd say as if it were kept secret and that it was hidden and that we must by various means to uncover and discern God's will, learn how to listen to God's voice in order that we can find out the decisions that He has made for us so that we can walk in those decisions as well.

And, well, I would say two things of that just in passing, without getting too much into that topic. First, that idea is not found in the Bible, that you must somehow find God's will in a sense that you must find out what job He wants you to take or who to marry or where to live, those kinds of things.

The idea that you must first find out what He has chosen for you so that you can then be in God's will and walk in that path. And I guess the terminology would be being in the center of God's will, something like that.

But the idea that you need that kind of revelation from God is nowhere taught in the Bible. That's one thing I would say. The second thing, let me go back and just elaborate on that just a little bit.

If it were true that we were supposed to be looking for, say, promptings and signs and confirmations, say, for example, who to marry, well, you think that would come up in a text like 1 Corinthians 7 when Paul is speaking to the believers there about the very issue of marriage, whether to get married, what kind of person to marry.

And he doesn't say anything there. I mean, that would be the perfect place for him to say, you know, quiet your heart and listen to what God is saying. But he uses regular means, regular kinds of wisdom.

He talks about the different things you should weigh. There's the cares you might have if you were married compared to if you were single, the different gifting God has given to different people. If you do marry, they have to be a Christian.

In the book of Proverbs, you find similar kind of things, finding the right kind of spouse. So it's good to seek God, seek God for wisdom, seek God to know his word, what he has said, and to seek to be able to put it together in such a way as to, if it's in the case of a spouse, find a faithful spouse, a wise spouse.

The other thing about the will of the Lord that I would say is that it's not, those kind of things are not what Paul is concerned with here in Ephesians. But what Paul is concerned with is walking in holiness, similar to the idea you have in 1 Thessalonians 4 .3.

For this is the will of God, your sanctification. And so sanctification comes through a proper understanding of the word of God. In John 17, Jesus was praying, saying, sanctify them by your truth, your word is truth.

So that truth is found in the word of God, God's revelation recorded in scripture. But it's not enough to know where to find it, we also must take time to read it. Now, there's different ways you can read the Bible.

One way to read it would be to read it slowly, going through the passages slowly, trying to figure out the connections and the meanings. And, oh, I'm sure we've all found it to be so. The one verse that you thought meant one thing turned out not to mean that at all, and not really anything to do with what the passage was about.

So we need to read it slowly and carefully and use the helps that God has given us. It's not just that we should expect that God would teach us directly apart from others, but God has given teachers as a gift to the church, it says in Ephesians.

And so we should use the gifts that God has given. People who have studied and can help you, it's a great help to study and use commentaries and that kind of thing. Not relying solely on them, but using them in an appropriate way.

But I find it helpful for myself, and maybe you would find it to be so in your case too, not just to read the Bible slowly and meticulously, but it's also useful to read long portions and read quickly.

Not mindlessly, but rapidly. I think this has an advantage too because it aids the memory. You have more of the entire Bible close at hand to recall. If you're trying to sort out doctrine, whether this thing is true and that thing is false, it helps to be able to just say, oh, that sounds like a verse, and then you can maybe look it up in a concordance or in a Bible software, and it's helpful to have that kind of thing.

Fast reading also gives you a bird's eye view, a bigger idea of how the Bible fits together as a whole. Well, maybe some of these things are kind of obvious to us. Let me get to something that's maybe not quite as obvious.

But when we study the Bible for understanding, we mustn't stop with merely an intellectual understanding. So when you're consulting commentaries and you're trying to find out, for example, let's say in our text here it's saying, do not be drunk with wine, for that is debauchery.

Well, you could look it up. You could look for the understanding here, and the Hebrew dictionaries will tell you that debauchery is dissoluteness or prodigality or what is the other word they use? Profligacy.

Profligacy. And then if you're like me and you have to look up those words in an English dictionary, and you find it means something like an abandoned, unrestrained morality, well, you have a better idea of what is meant here by debauchery.

But it's not enough just to stop there and believe you have understood the text. There's a verse to consider that Paul said in Colossians 1 .9. In his prayer he said, he prayed that the saints would be filled with all wisdom and spiritual understanding.

What is this spiritual understanding? There's a sermon, or it was a discourse, I think, Jonathan Edwards, he spoke of a light that is given by God that is divine and supernatural. Here's what he said verbatim here.

He said, there is such a thing as a spiritual and divine light immediately imparted to the soul by God of a different nature from any that is obtained by natural means. And in that he used an illustration of honey, the way you can perhaps read in a book and know that honey is sweet, and you know it to be so, so in a sense you understand it.

But it's a different thing to taste the honey and to taste its sweetness. And when it comes to the Word of God and the will of God in particular, there's a knowledge you can have by the study of the words, but there is an understanding, I think an understanding that Paul was praying for when he talks about spiritual understanding, that not only knows what is being said, but enables you by the Spirit of God to see something of the truth of his will.

I remember hearing Paul Washer once, he spoke of a time when, if I remember right, I think it was a young girl who was under tremendous conviction of sin. And I don't remember what the particular issue was.

It may have been lying, I think. But she was completely beside herself and sobbing and in tears. And the Christians around her didn't know what to make of it because when they think of, you know, it's just a lie, almost as if, why are you so upset?

And they may have known it was wrong, but I ask you, who understood there that lying was wrong? And further to support this idea that this understanding doesn't come merely through the study of books, not through merely, I mean, even the study of the Word of God, though that is involved, it's not that alone.

Consider the words that are stated in Psalm 119. The psalmist there says, it is good for me that I have been afflicted that I might learn your statutes. You notice he doesn't say, it's good for me that I went to seminary and learned the grammatical historical method.

But it's good for me that I have been afflicted that I might learn. It's a kind of knowledge that doesn't come through our own effort alone through study. So I guess that's the point I'm trying to make.

Don't stop short when there's much more understanding that God would have for you. Much more understanding involved here if that we would walk carefully and avoid deception. And we're considering, let me just add this too, when we're considering the will of God, particularly we're talking about His will, what He wants from us.

Say this girl who was convicted of lying. Instead of, to Christians sometimes, they say to us, why are you so preoccupied with sin and guilt and condemnation? To them everything seems like prohibitions.

You can't do this, you can't do this. These rules to kind of dampen their joy. But all these things, these negative things, like do not lie, are just the flip side of some moral beauty such as truth and telling the truth.

So it's because, and this is the reason God hates evil, because He loves light, He loves truth, He loves life, and therefore He must hate things like abortion, and so must we. And then something about that dead girl, I'd like to say also.

There's kind of a, I mean the Bible speaks of a repentance, it speaks about a sorrow that's not unto repentance. Because a person can, even having a convicted conscience, still not truly understand in the way I'm talking about, if it doesn't lead to repentance.

But a person who has a godly sorrow, and maybe it was the case with this girl, I don't know, but the godly sorrow that leads to repentance is something because not just your conscience is just at work in you, the conscience that everyone is given by God to every man, it's not just the conscience that is particularly gnawing on you and telling you that that's absolutely wrong.

But there's a godly sorrow, and an understanding that comes with an appreciation for the moral beauty of God. So all these laws, they're not just commands given to us, but they're a window to see into the moral nature of God.

God is a spirit, that's what we heard here this morning. God is a moral being, and much of his beauty lies in his moral beauty. And so we come wanting to seek to understand the Lord with a desire to seek not just what's right and wrong, but to seek the moral beauty of God.

And that's something that has to be given directly by God. It's both a gift of God, it's something we seek for, and it's a great treasure. Now we're reading through the book of Psalms in our scripture readings, and I find that before the sermon, and I find the timing good because I have quite a number of verses from Psalm 19.

You don't have to turn there, I just want you to hear them because they're just kind of in random order. But listen to these verses from Psalm 119. When we're thinking about the law of the Lord, the will of the Lord, well we have the law of Christ.

Here the psalmist is speaking what he had there, the law of the Lord, and sometimes it's speaking of God's will is recorded in his commandments. Sometimes it's referring to the word of God more generally.

But as I read these, I want you to pay particular attention just to the one fact of the treasure that the psalmist found there. He didn't see just a list that he may know what is right and what is wrong, and that he may do it.

But they were actually something that he thirsted and longed for, like they were, it doesn't say just some kind of treasure, but immense. Without talking about it more, just listen to the words. These are just random here, I mean random order.

But I love your law. I rejoice at your word as one who finds great treasure. Therefore I love your commandments more than gold. Yes, than fine gold. The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver.

I have rejoiced in the way of your testimonies as much as in all riches. Oh, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day. Or how about this one? Seven times a day I praise you because of your righteous judgments.

Now when I read this, and when you read this, do you not get the sense that we're missing out on something? I wonder if we are stopping too short with just an intellectual understanding and going on with that, thinking that we have mastered that and there's nothing more there.

When there's treasure, he says, treasure greater than silver and gold, greater than all riches. How about this one? At midnight I will arise to give thanks unto thee because of thy righteous judgments.

Now this idea of missing out on something and you think about what is possible for the Christian, what treasure is there for us to be had in this Christian life? It's time for our Spurgeon quote. Because Spurgeon spoke of an experience of a Christian that is of greater difference from one Christian to the next than that of the Christian to the unbeliever.

And he's not speaking just of in that world to come. Paul is not just speaking Colossians that you'd be filled with wisdom and spiritual understanding in the world to come. But he wants that for us now.

That is for us to seek and to obtain now in this present world. I don't think those prayers were vain and I don't think the search for this is in vain either. So Spurgeon, the difference between one who is a believer and one who is not is not as great as the difference between one who is a believer and one who is a believer living up to his privileges.

So if we want to understand the will of the Lord, let us seek it as if it were treasure. Secondly, not just seek it. I'm not saying giving up on the deep study and figuring out what it says, but go beyond.

Seek it like treasure and seek it from God. This can be only given by God. The psalmist here in Psalm 119 who is seeing these things, they didn't just come upon him because God just laid them upon him, but listen to how he sought to God these things in prayer.

Here's a number of other verses from Psalm 119. Blessed are you, O Lord, teach me your statutes. He's praying to God. He's asking for understanding. Open my eyes that I may see wondrous things from your law.

Teach me, O Lord, the way of your statutes, and I shall keep it to the end. Give me understanding, and I shall keep your law. Indeed, I shall observe it with my whole heart. The earth, O Lord, is full of your mercy.

Teach me your statutes. Teach me good judgment and knowledge, for I believe your commandments. You are good and do good. Teach me your statutes. Your hands have made me and fashioned me. Give me understanding that I may learn your commandments.

Deal with your servant according to your mercy and teach me your statutes. I am your servant. Give me understanding that I may know your testimonies. Let my cry come before you, O Lord. Give me understanding according to your word.

I am a stranger in the earth. Do not hide your commandments from me. The righteousness of your testimony is everlasting. Give me understanding, and I shall live. So the idea is, that I'm getting across here about understanding, is that nothing more than what Jesus taught.

Seek, ask, knock, and you will receive. Moving on then, verse 18. And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit. To be filled with the Spirit, what does this mean?

First I'll make some general observations, and then give a definition that I found. First observation. Every true believer already has the Spirit. Upon your conversion, upon faith, the Spirit was given to you and will be with you forever.

This isn't the idea of being filled with the Spirit, of obtaining the Spirit that you never once had. Second observation is that the idea of filling has to do with influence and control. We have other instances in the Bible when people were filled with various things, such as the disciples were filled with fear.

And what happens when someone is filled with fear? You can see it. When they're filled with fear, not just have fear, but filled with it, it has taken control of them. It is affecting their judgments.

It's affecting their body, their pulse, everything. Another example, filled with rage. Now if someone is filled with rage, you can almost picture the veins starting to bulge in the neck, and then just wanting to kill something, controlled and influenced by rage.

So I think that gives us kind of an idea. Being filled with the Spirit has to do with being under the control of and influence of the Holy Spirit. Third observation, that the Bible speaks of the filling of the Spirit in two kinds of ways.

And you can see this just by observing the way it's talked about. In the book of Acts, we have many instances when the filling of the Spirit is accompanied by signs and wonders. A mighty outpouring of the Spirit in which the power of God is displayed for all to see.

It's when saints, they believed and were filled with the Holy Spirit. And also it says they're filled and, and then it goes on to say they spoke the word of God with boldness. They were filled with the Spirit and they all speak in other languages.

They were filled with the Spirit. Paul in one case, he makes a proclamation and a curse upon a false prophet whereupon he fell blind after it. So that's one of the kinds that we see filling of the Spirit.

And it was, I would add this too, that it was always temporary. And it did not, does not necessarily involve an increase in one's holiness or sanctification. But there's also another kind of filling of the Spirit.

And this was also we find in the Bible. And you see in some cases, for example, when you read about Barnabas, Barnabas was an example. The description of him is he was a good man. I think in his case it says he was full of the Holy Spirit and faith.

Now this seems to be, this is filling of the Spirit also, but of a little bit different nature, isn't it? It's something that seems to be more of his, having to do with his ongoing walk. Not that he was filled with the Spirit on Tuesday and did some miraculous feat.

But that's what he was known for, a man, a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit. We read of the fruit of the Spirit, that it is these products of righteousness and holiness and love and joy and peace and things of that nature.

So when we come to our passage, we're talking about Paul's command here. He says, well, let's look at it.

He says,.

Be filled with the Spirit, do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Now, does that seem to be to you, does that seem the kind of filling of that extraordinary temporary type that we saw at first, or more the ongoing holy kind of fruit of the Spirit that is produced in us through a life of faith and obedience?

Well, I think it's the latter one. That was observation four. That was observation three. My fourth observation is that we mustn't think of being filled with the Spirit as just another one of the duties among Christians.

I mean, we read a lot, this thing here, he says, Look carefully how you walk. Make the best use of the time.

That's two.

Don't be foolish. Understand what the will is, will of the Lord is. Don't get drunk with wine. We're adding him up here, and he goes on to talking about these other things. Being filled with the Spirit is not number eight, but everything we do as Christians must be in the Spirit.

Otherwise, it's of no value whatsoever. We walk. We are in the Spirit. We are to walk in the Spirit. Sometimes we walk according to the flesh, and there's no third alternative. If it's not of the Spirit, it's of the flesh, and must be denied.

So fifth observation, Though it says we are to be filled with the Spirit, we must not expect, as some do, perfect perfection, a perfect holiness. There is only one perfect man, and it's not us. I've got another Spurgeon quote here.