Abby Normal and the Gospel

...to be renewed in the spirit of your minds (Eph 4:23).

In "Young Frankenstein," the monster needs a new brain.  Dr. Frankenstein gives Igor specific instructions.  Steal the brain of the brilliant scientist Hans Delbrook.  But there's a problem.  Igor drops the jar containing Delbrooks' brain and grabs a substitute.  Abby somebody.  Abby Normal.  Paul reminds his Ephesian friends that when God saves us, He gives us a new mind.  A brain transplant.  As Jesus' followers, you are "to be renewed in the spirit of your minds" (v23).  He doesn't fix the one we have.  It's broken by sin.  We need a brand new mind.  

A mind transplant.

Wait just a dad blamed minute!  What in the name of Mel Brooks are you trying to say?  Like Frankenstein’s monster, we desperately need a new brain.  As a matter of fact, we're walking around with an Abby Normal mind before Jesus saves us.  My sin has jacked it up.  As long as I have a broken brain, nothing in my life will ever truly change.  The best I can hope for is short-term behavior modification.  I need a new mind but I can't give myself a brain transplant.  I don't know much about brain surgery and I certainly didn't stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.  But I do know that trying to insert new grey matter into my skull on my own is a bad idea.  A VERY bad idea.  I need outside intervention.  It just so happens that the One who made me is available and ready.  The Great Physician not only has the surgical skills to perform the procedure, He has just the mind to insert.

Paul tells us that a critical part of God's work in our lives is the renewal of our minds.  He uses the Greek verb ananeo'o here.  It means to make new or different, make young, revive or completely change for the better.  There's no use trying to repair my sinful, broken mind.  My Abby Normal mind.  I need a new one.  God needs to completely change it for the better.  The passive tense of the verb lets us know that I'm the patient, not the surgeon.  This is Jesus' work in my life.  I need outside help to have any chance of real internal change.  

A mind transplant.

Paul knows that a renewed mind is the only hope you and I have in following Jesus.  He knows that a renewed mind is central to God's work in our lives.  The apostle wrote the folks in Colossae to "put on the new self, which is being renewed (Gr. ananeo'o) in knowledge after the image of its Creator" (Col 3:10).  The divine mind transplant prevents falling back into the sin-filled and self-centered ways of society.  "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind" (Rom 12:2).  We need a new self.  We need a new mind.  

A mind transplant.

So is there anything we can do in this mind renewal process?  I'm so very glad you asked.  There's nothing quite like reading God's Word after the transplant.  Discover who Jesus is.  Discover what He's done.  Discover what He will do.  The Bible is the Big Story of God and His incredible mission of salvation and renewal.  Jesus didn't just come back to save you and me and give us new minds.  He's doing that with all of His creation.  There's a new heaven, a new earth and a new Jerusalem on the way.  We broke it all at the Fall.  Kinda like Igor broke the jar with Delbrooks' brain.  Only our first parents did it willfully.  Intentionally.  When they did, sin entire the universe and shattered God's creation.  It needs to be saved and renewed.  We need to be saved and renewed.

So when God renews our mind, when He gives us our needed brain transplant, who's brain do we get?  Don't worry.  Igor's not around to mess this up.  "We have the mind of Christ" (1Cor 2:16).  Not Hans Delbrook.  Not Abby Normal.  God gives us the very mind of His sinless Son.  Because of what He does on the inside, things change on the outside.

We need a mind transplant.

Get Naked

...to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires (Eph 4:22).

I had just finished working outside.  I was hot, sweaty and absolutely the filthiest I've ever been.  As I came in the house, my wife took one look at me and screamed, "Stop right there!  You're not coming in our clean house in those nasty clothes.  Before you take another step, drop'em!"  Ninety-nine times out of 100 when my wife asks me to get undressed, it's a good thing.  But today this was for my own good.  It was time to get naked.  It was time to take a shower and put on clean clothes.

Here in his letter to his Ephesian friends, Paul reminds them to make sure to take off their old sinful duds and never put them on again.  Once Jesus makes us new we must "to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires" (v22).  You can't simply pull on your new duds over your ratty old rags.  You've got to take them off.

Get naked.

Paul explains what you and I were taught if we learned the genuine Gospel, i.e. that we "were taught in Him" (Eph 4:21).  Our previous wardrobe was contaminated by "sensuality" and we "were greedy to practice every kind of impurity" (Eph 4:19).  Yeah, that's as disgusting as you think it is.  But there's a problem.  We pull these crappy clothes back on.  Once Christ gets ahold of us, He has a whole new wardrobe for us.  But before we get dressed in God's finest, we need to get out of our grimy, grubby gear.

The apostle tells us to "put off" those clothes and get rid of them.  He uses the Greek verb apotithemi, which means to throw off, get rid of, put away, cast off, lay down or be done with something.  It's a compound word literally meaning "throw" (-tithemi) "from" (apo-) or lop off.  It's how Dr. Luke describes hotheaded Pete whacking off Malchus’ right ear at Jesus' arrest (Lk 22:50).  Just before they stoned Steve, folks "laid down" (Gr. apotithemi) their jackets at the coat check table with Saul (Acts 7:58).  Paul uses the same term when he tells us to shed sinful behaviors (Rom 13:12).  Don't just take them off.  Throw them away.

Get naked.

Now that Jesus has done for you what you could never do for myself, you don't need a wardrobe "which belongs to your former manner of life" (v22).  The apostle uses the term anastrophe, that describes our way of life, conduct and behavior.  Paul didn't hide anything from the folks in Galatia who knew all about his "former life (Gr. anastrophe) in Judaism" (Gal 1:13).  He was transparent with other believers about where he was before Jesus mugged him outside of Damascus.  He had nothing to hide about who he was before.  He got naked.

So just how nasty and disgusting are these old clothes that we keep putting back on?  they are "corrupt with deceitful desires" (v22).  This is the Greek verb phtheiro (hmm, looks like we need to buy a vowel, doesn’t it?).  It means to defile, pervert, destroy, corrupt, ruin, waste or cause to become filthy.   It also describes to seduce and lead to moral destruction.  In John's spectacular vision of God's glorious end game, the huge crowd sang of God's bringing the pain on "the great prostitute who corrupted (Gr. phtheiro) the earth with her immorality" (Rev 19:2).  Paul warned the Corinthians that just as the satanic snake duped Eve, they need to be on red alert so not to be "led astray (Gr. phtheiro) from Jesus" (2Cor 11:3).

Paul wrote to the Colossians at the very same time he wrote to the Ephesians.  Because these believers faced very similar situations, the apostle gave very similar instruction.  Make sure to "put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator" (Col 3:9-10).  You can't put on your spectacular wardrobe without taking of those disgusting duds that are smeared with sin.  You're gonna have to get naked.  Drop your drawers.  Slip off your sin.  Only then can we "put on the new self" (Eph 4:24).  Only then can we put on Jesus.  But first we've gotta take off our filthy threads.  

Get naked.

Here's the good news about the Good News.  Paul is simply encouraging us to do what God has already done for us.  He's transformed us from the walking dead to "alive together with Christ" (Eph 2:4-5).  We didn't have to do a dad-gum thing.  He saved us through His grace (Eph 2:8-9).  There's no reason to brag about what we've done.  Because we're with Jesus and in Jesus, the Father sees us AS Jesus.  Smart dudes who tuck in their shirts call this "imputed righteousness."  That simply means that we get Jesus' goodness and He takes our badness in one of the most unfair deals the universe has seen.  The sinless Christ actually became our very own sin so that we could "become the righteousness of God" (2Cor 5:21).  When we place our trust in who Jesus is and what He's already done for us, He takes away our grungy gear and gives us a spectacular new wardrobe.  

Paul simply reminds us to stop pulling our cruddy clothes out of the hamper everyday and putting them on again.  Stop it.  We need Jesus and His righteousness each and every stinkin' day.  I've gotta get out of these filthy old duds.

  

Get naked.  

You Have Heard, Right?

...assuming that you have heard about Him and were taught in Him, as the truth is in Jesus (Eph 4:21).

Anyone who communicates a message wants to know who they are talking to.  They want to know exactly who is on the other end.  They need to know their audience.  While the point of their message doesn't change, their approach will vary depending on the recipient.  In this verse, Paul hits the pause button on his letter to make sure he knows his audience.  He's been describing how unbelievers whom he calls "Gentiles" go through life with empty lives and hard hearts.  Before he goes on to encourage Ephesian believers in what following Jesus looks like, he stops to ensure his readers who are actual following Jesus: "assuming that you have heard about Him and were taught in Him, as the truth is in Jesus" (v21).  You have heard, right?  You were taught, weren't you?  You do know the truth, don't you? 

In many ways, Paul is flipping their spiritual scrapbook open to his three-year stay in Ephesus.  He rolled into the massive seaport during his second missionary tour.  Dr. Luke fills an entire chapter with several crazy accounts of those years (Acts 19).  Once he hits town, the apostle sets up shop in the synagogue and holds nothing back in telling folks about Christ.  Some Ephesian Jews come to believe that Jesus is the long-awaited Jewish Messiah.  But then unbelieving Jews boot him out, so he sets up shop down the street at Tyrannus Hall.  This opens the doors to not just Jews but Gentiles to hear the Gospel.  For the next two years, the Good News spreads throughout the city and the entire region.  Folks hear about Jesus.  Folks are taught about Jesus.  Folks learn the truth about Jesus.

Take a look at the phrase "you have heard about Him" (v21).  In the original text, Paul literally writes "you heard Him."  No preposition "about."  This is no secondhand communication.  This is NOT what REO Speedwagon sang about, "I heard it from a from a friend who, who heard it from a friend who..."  Get the idea?  Straight from the Savior's mouth.  Now come on, dude.  You expect me to believe I can actually hear Jesus?  Absolutely.  The apostle tells his readers that IF they've trusted in Jesus, they've heard Jesus.  Sure, it starts when you hear about Him.  Somebody who follows the risen Rabbi/Carpenter tells you about Him.  They tell you who He is.  They tell you what He's done.  While that's all well and good, hearing ABOUT Jesus is just info.  Data.  Facts.  It's not until we take Him at His word and place our trust in Him that we begin to truly hear Him.

Jesus is calling me to a whole lot more than knowing ABOUT Him.  He wants me to know Him.  Paul told the Philippians than anything less than knowing Jesus is a big steaming pile (Phil 4:8).  Jesus is calling me to a whole lot more than hearing ABOUT Him.  He wants to speak to me.  And His main method of speaking to me is through His Word.  You see, as a follower of Jesus, I believe the Bible is more than a collection of dusty old stories dating back thousands of years.  You might not buy the fact that God's Holy Spirit inspired the writing Scripture.  As as follower of Jesus, I do (2Tim 3:16-17).  And believers hold that this book is so much more than words on a page.  It's "living and active" (Heb 4:12).  His Word has the ability to do complicated and precise spiritual surgery on me.  His Word reveals who I really am.  A jacked up rebel who certainly doesn't deserve any good from God.  And His Word reveals who Jesus really is.  The sinless Son of God who lived the perfect life that I failed to live.  The spotless Lamb of God that died the death for my sin that I should have died.  

You and I hear Jesus when He calls out to us to be His (Rom 8:28-30; 1Cor 1:9).  He calls us from His overflowing grace (Gal 1:15).  He calls us using His Gospel (2Th 1:14).  When He calls, we respond (Jn 10:3).  And He'll never let us out of His loving kung fu grip (Jn 10:28).  That's what happens when you hear Him.  His call is like nothing else.  His Word changes everything.  God created the entire universe by simply speaking.  So when He calls you and me, crazy things happen.

You have heard, right?  You were taught, weren't you?  You do know the truth, don't you?

Paul reminds his Ephesian friends how they "were taught in Him" (v21).  He's recalling those wonderful days when he was with them and how they learned more and more about Jesus.  The apostle would have used the OT Scriptures to blow them away with prophecies, promises and pictures of Messiah thousands of years before He arrived on the scene.  While hearing ABOUT Jesus is certainly different than hearing Him, there is an element of learning in following Him.  Just before He headed home to heaven, Jesus Himself gave His posse marching orders to baptize everyone who would listen, "teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you" (Mt 28:19-20).  The more we learn about His character, the more we'll stand in awe and worship Him.  Take the command of the author of Hebrews to heart and lock your eyes on "Jesus, the Founder and Perfecter of our faith" (Heb 12:2).  The more we know, the more we love.

You have heard, right?  You were taught, weren't you?  You do know the truth, don't you?

The apostle doesn't want us to miss the fact that "the truth is in Jesus" (v21).  This part is a bit hard to swallow for many folks these days.  We live in a relativistic society.  Hey, you've got your truth and I've got my truth and it's all good.  Here's the straight scoop.  The truth, if you will.  Jesus isn't just one version of the truth.  He is Truth.  THE Truth.  Absolute Truth.  Unvarnished Truth.  100% Truth.  In a world of tolerance and acceptance, this kinda talk is seen as bigoted and narrow minded.  But the truth is (pun intended).  Jesus said so Himself.  "I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.  No one comes to the Father except through Me" (Jn 14:6).  Not A way, A truth and A life.  Not one of many.  Just one.  Henry Blackaby says, "Truth is a Person."  And His name is Jesus.  Jesus' best buddy John wants us to know that it's only through the truth of Jesus "that we may know Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ.  He is the true God and eternal life" (1Jn 5:21).

You have heard, right?  You were taught, weren't you?  You do know the truth, don't you?

Would love your thoughts on what you just read.  Post a comment below.

Are You Experienced?

But that is not the way you learned Christ! (Eph 4:20).

Fire up the Flux Capacitor and think back to those days in high school math.  Pick a class.  Any class.  It really doesn't matter.  Do you remember wondering what's the point.  Why am I learning this stuff?  When will I ever need to solve the Quadratic Equation in the real world?  I don't need to figure out the cosign but I might need to find someone to co-sign.  That's because knowledge means nothing until you put it into practice.  You need to roll up your sleeves and use what you learn.  You need experience.  

Paul looks back on what his Ephesian friends have learned about Jesus and compared it to how unbelievers flunked God's midterm.  "But that is not the way you learned Christ!" (v20).  As opposed to the Gentile outsiders, these folks have come to truly understand what it means to trust in Jesus by putting it into practice.  This isn't like some long lost lesson from Trig that seems tangent to real life.  You learn about Jesus by doing life with Him.  You learn about Jesus by trusting in who He says He is.  You learn about Jesus by trusting in what He's done.  You learn about Jesus from using His teaching.  You learn about Jesus by obeying His commands.  You learn about Jesus from experience.  

Are you experienced?

This itty bitty verse is chocked full of history and context.  Paul reminds the Ephesian believers of what went down during his three years there (Acts 20:31).  Three wild years.  Three VERY wild years.  Dr. Luke spends an entire chapter detailing those crazy days when God used the apostle turn the big city upside down (Acts 19).  After teaching local Jews that Jesus is their long-awaited Messiah, he got booted out of the Ephesian synagogue.  Paul leveraged that to his advantage and moved his lectures down the street to Tyrannus Hall.  That opened up the doors for non-Jews to hear about Jesus.  The Gospel was changing more than just the citizens of Ephesus but people from the entire region.  Paul didn't just teach, he performed miracles.  Even his shop rags were healing people!  There was the huge bonfire of magic books when Ephesian mystics turned their back on their demonic mojo and turned to Jesus.  Paul's three-year gig in the big port city ended with a huge riot and a wild scene at the outdoor amphitheater.  

For those who came to faith in Jesus during those days, it was quite an experience.  They discovered what it means to trust Jesus in the most trying of circumstances.  That's what Paul is talking about here.  He uses the the Greek verb manthano, which means to find out, discover, ascertain, learn by experience, understand, learn by use and practice.  The apostle reminds them how they truly found out what it means to follow Jesus.  He reminds them how they discovered how He would never fail them.  He reminds them how they learned about His teaching by using it and putting it into practice.  He reminds them that they learned from experience.

Are you experienced?

This kind of practical education can be either formal or informal.  Jewish leaders couldn't figure out how Jesus could teach so well "when He has never studied (Gr. manthano)" under one of the big name rabbis (Jn 7:15).  Jesus busted the Pharisees' highly educated chops by telling giving them homework.  "Go and learn (Gr. manthano) what this means, 'I desire mercy, and not sacrifice'" (Mt 9:13).  And Paul let the folks in Philippi know that experience has taught him that Jesus is all he needs no matter what's going on.  "I have learned (Gr. manthano) in whatever situation to be content" (Phil 4:11).  Learning by practical application.  Learning from experience.

What's your experience?  Have you taken what you know and believe about Jesus and put it to work in your daily life?  What do you know about Him?  Have you placed your trust in what you know?  Let's take just a moment and make sure we're talking about the Jesus that Paul's talking about.  Jesus is the one and only Son of God.  He's fully God.  100%.  He lived the perfect life of obedience to God's standard that we completely failed to live.  He died the death for our sin that we should have died.  He rose to a glorious new life that we in no way deserve.  And He's given each of His followers His Holy Spirit to empower us to live a life of obedience.  When we trust in who He is, what He's done and live in the power of His Spirit, we learn about Christ.  That's exactly what Jesus' brother James meant when he said that faith in Christ without actions isn't faith at all (James 2:17).  Put your faith to work.  Put your faith into practice.  Experience what it means to truly trust and follow Jesus.  The Ephesians did.  Why don't you?

Are you experienced?

Would love your thoughts on what you just read.  Feel free to add your comments below.  

Uncomfortably Numb

They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity (Eph 4:19).

I'm a real wimp.  I don't like pain.  Hate it.  Avoid it.  Let's face it, I would make a terrible masochist.  But here's the deal.  Pain is my friend.  Pain is a gift from God.  Pain is a good thing.  Through pain, God lets us know when something is wrong and we need to change.  When we can't feel pain, we're in BIG trouble.  That's the problem with diseases like leprosy and diabetes.  Numbness sets in and we don't know if we're bleeding or burning.  Paul warns us that when we become numb to the pain of our sin, we head down a slippery sewer of seediness and sexual perversion.  He tells the Ephesian church the hard truth about the hard hearts of unbelievers.  "They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity" (v19).  They become uncomfortably numb.

In the previous verse, the apostle has warned against developing a cardiac callous like the unbelievers who live all around them.  He goes on to let us know what happens when we "become callous" (v19).  Paul uses the Greek verb apalgeo, which means to lose all feeling, become insensitive, cease feeling pain, shame or grief.  It's the only time this term appears in the NT.  Think of this as an anesthetic for sin.  Sin causes pain.  God tries to get our attention by causing irritation and discomfort.  Out of His great love for us, He wants us to stop.  But we eventually become calloused.  We eventually become insensitive.  We eventually become unfeeling.  Like a needle full of novocaine given by the doctor, we go numb to our sin.  Uncomfortably numb. 

When he writes that they have "given themselves up" (v18), Paul makes it crystal clear that when we stop feeling pain from sin we do terrible things to ourselves.  There's no one else to blame.  Not the devil.  Not our so-called friends.  The one responsible for our sin is looking back at me when I shave in the morning.  No one pushed me.  No one shoved me.  No one dragged me.  I gave myself up.  That's what happens when I'm numb to my sin.  

This lets me know that I'm accountable for decision to accept or reject Jesus.  Paul's words here bring up the long running debate about destiny.  Predestination versus choice.  Calvinism versus Arminianism.  I realize that I'm not going to convince you if you're a committed member of one team or the other.  It sure seems obvious from what we read here that we're accountable for our decisions.  But wait just a cotton pickin' minute!  The apostle started this very letter with one, long, run-on sentence of how God chose us to be His back before time began (Eph 1:3-14).  So what is it?!?  (OK, I realize the answer I'm about to give is not going to sit well with folks on either team.  So everybody just take a deep breath and relax.)  It's both.  Yeah, you read that right.  Both.  Clearly there's evidence for both ideas all throughout the Bible.  Our God is a big God.  A VERY BIG God.  In this case, He's a "both/and" God.  He is completely sovereign and in charge of our destiny.  He clearly predestines and elects long before we were born.  But we're clearly accountable for whether we choose to worship Him.  He's a "both/and" God.  (Yeah, I was right.  I knew most of you wouldn't like that answer.)

The numbness to our pain and sin inevitably leads us to "sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity" (v18).  The result to our insensitivity isn't pretty.  It's like driving through the part of town dominated by strip clubs and X-rated movie theaters.  What you're about to read isn't for the faint of heart.  It's not the kind of discussion you'll hear in your grandmother's Sunday School class.  It's raw.  It's real.  The language in the original Greek is gritty and graphic.  We're going to see why the Playboys are under the bed.  We're going to see why skin flicks are available in every motel room.  We're going to see why porn is the most popular topic on the internet.  It's because we're uncomfortably numb.  We need talk about it.  Ready?  

Paul lets us know that uncomfortably numb unbelievers jump into "sensuality" (v18).  This is the Greek noun aselgeia.  It means unbridled lust and outrageous immorality.  Extreme debauchery.  Extravagant indecency.  With a thick cardiac callous and an unfeeling conscience, you're willing to do anything to feel anything.  And few things in our lives stimulate our senses like sex.  Our sin has completely corrupted the sexual intimacy of marriage, one of God's greatest gifts.   All throughout Scripture, God sounds the alarm when it comes to sex and lust.  In his letter to the Roman church, the apostle said we're to start living our lives in broad daylight of Jesus rather than skulking around in the dark "in sexual immorality and sensuality (Gr. aselgia)" (Rom 13:13).  Paul told his Corinthian friends that it breaks his heart that many folks who've heard about Jesus have not "repented of the impurity, sexual immorality, and sensuality (Gr. aselgia) that they have practiced" (2Cor 12:21).  

When I'm uncomfortably numb, I'll do anything to feel anything.  

This unbridled thirst for sex and porn isn't a one-time thing when we feel no pain from sin.  We become "greedy to practice every kind of impurity" (v18).  The original language here lets us know that the search for sexual pleasure becomes the overriding obsession.  We work harder at it than anything else in our lives.  We make time for it.  We rearrange our schedules for it.  It becomes an idol we worship.  Our libido becomes the god worshiped above all.  Sex becomes an addiction.  To paraphrase those great theologians, the Rolling Stones, we can't get no satisfaction.  We'll do anything for it because we're uncomfortably numb to sin.

The translators have used a bit of whitewash on the last part of this verse: "every kind of impurity" (v18).  A rough translation might be "all filth in exploitation."  Like a junkie willing to do anything to get a fix, we'll crawl through the sewer of sexual stimulation in order to feel something.  It's disgusting.  It's nasty.  And we don't even notice because we're uncomfortably numb.  Eugene Peterson pulls no punches in his paraphrase.  "Feeling no pain, they let themselves go into sexual obsession, addicted to every sort of perversion" (v18, The Message).  Numbness.  Sexual obsession.  Addiction.  Perversion.  We become slaves to our own lust and libido.

But Someone has come to set us free of all that.  Jesus left the luxury of the heavenly palace to come find us in seedy part of town.  He's willing to search every strip club, every porn shop and every skin flick theater to find us.  He's not coming to punish you.  He's not coming to shame you.  He's coming to save you.  He's coming to set you free from that disgusting steaming pile of sexual sin you can't seem to live without.  He comes because He loves you.  

Jesus wants you to feel again.  He wants you to feel peace.  He wants you to be know true and lasting satisfaction.  Christ wants you to know that He is everything we'll ever need.  Everything else is just a cheap imitation or counterfeit.  He died so that we could experience "life and have it abundantly" (Jn 10:10).  Christ is the only cure for the uncomfortably numb.

Cardiac Callouses

They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to the hardness of heart (Eph 4:18).

Heart disease is a killer.  The health of that blood-pumping organ in our chest is critical to life.  It's the very same when it comes to our spiritual lives.  When we suffer heart failure, we're in BIG trouble.  Paul tells his buddies in Ephesus that cardiac callouses are fatal.  The apostle diagnoses outsiders ("Gentiles") who have failed to follow Jesus as suffering from this condition.  "They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to the hardness of heart" (v18).  Hard hearts keep us in the dark.  Hard hards keep us from spiritual knowledge.  Hard hearts keep us from God.

Cardiac callouses are a killer.

Paul desperately wants his Ephesian friends to keep their hearts tender and soft.  Tender to the needs of other believers.  Tender to those who haven't come to understand Jesus.  Tender to their own sin against God.  Let’s be honest, it's VERY easy to develop cardiac callouses if you've had your heart stomped on like a grape.  It's our natural reaction to stop putting our feelings and emotions out there to get punched repeatedly.  But Jesus asks us to do the same thing He did.  There's been no one who walked the earth that has known the rejection and betrayal like the radical Rabbi/Carpenter from Nazareth.  Flip back and read what the prophet Isaiah perfectly and painfully predicted what our Savior would experience (Is 53). Despised.  Rejected.  Wounded.  Crushed.  Beaten.  Stricken.  He never fought back.  He kept His heart tender and soft.  No cardiac callouses for Christ.

One symptom of a cardiac callous is the darkening of our perception of truth.  Paul uses the Greek word skotizo, which means to cover with darkness and deprive of light.  At it's most basic meaning, this term describes how a heavy shadow blocks light from someone or something.  This dark shadow results in a lack of spiritual awareness.  Without any light to guide the way, ungodliness and immorality will follow.  How bad can this darkness get?  Check out what the apostle said to the Romans about it (Rom 1:21-23).  Dark hearts lead to idiotic behavior.  Instead of worshiping God and His glory, unbelievers elevate His creation to divine status.  Without the light of God's Spirit to reveal His truth, we stumble around in the dark (1Cor 2:14).

The development of cardiac callouses also cut us off from THE Source of life.  We're "alienated from the life of God" (v18).  The word here is apollotrio'o.  It means to estrange, separate and make a stranger.  Just a couple of chapters ago, the apostle reminded his recipients that they used to be on the outside.  Before Jesus used Paul to tell others about who He was and what He's done, they were also separated from God.  "Remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, call 'the uncircumcision' by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands--remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated (Gr. apollotrio'o) from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world" (Eph 2:11-12).  But Christ specializes in taking folks like you and me who were far out and pulling us into His kingdom.  Without Him, we're on the outside looking in.  Our cardiac callouses keep us out. 

While our spiritual blindness and separation from God are a big problem, Paul says they are just a symptom of something more severe.  "Hardness of heart" (v18).  He uses the Greek word porosis, which means a lack of feeling or insensibility.  The great Greek doctor Hippocrates used this medical term when diagnosing the covering by a callous or thick growth of skin. It's from a root word that means a kind of stone.  Rock-hard hearts.  The Pharisees also suffered from these cardiac callouses (Mk 3:5).  In the previous verse, Paul first diagnoses unbelievers as having empty minds (Eph 4:17).  He continues by recognizing their hard hearts.  As a matter of fact, the cause of the rock in their head is due to the rock in their chest.  

There's only one cure.  There's only one treatment.  There's only one hope.  Jesus.  He's the ONLY one with the ability to heal their rock-hard hearts.  That's something God's been promising for a long, long time.  "I will give you a new heart, and a new Spirit I will put in you.  And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh." (Ezek 36:26-27).  The cure is NOT making our failing organs better.  The only answer is a heart transplant.  A HUGE part of His saving work in our lives is what seminary braniacs call regeneration.  That simply means a divine heart transplant.  He makes us new by giving us a new heart.  It's the ONLY cure for the cardiac callous.

Has your heart grown hard?  Have you gotten callous?  To the needs of others?  To your own sin?  Do you see your sarcasm as a spiritual gift?  If so, you probably need to see the Doctor.  He's the only one who can cure cardiac callouses!

The Ministry of Empty Walks

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds (Eph 4:17).

There's a classic bit of comedy from the guys at Monty Python's Flying Circus called "The Ministry of Silly Walks."  John Cleese plays a British bureaucrat who oversees the development of all sorts of stupid and ridiculous forms of walking.  Not that our buddy Paul ever watched an episode of Python, but here he discourages us from what could be called "The Ministry of Empty Walks."  "Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds" (v17).  Stop walking around like Gentiles.  Start walking with a purpose.  A holy purpose.

Walk toward Jesus.  Walk like Jesus.

The apostle reminds the folks in Ephesus to stop living and acting like they did before Jesus got ahold of them.  Stop walking like Gentiles.  Hmm.  Walk like a Gentile.  Kinda sounds like a Bangles' tune, doesn't it?  (Yeah, I know.  My love of '80s rock is showing.)  Paul uses the Greek verb peripateo, compound word that means "around" (peri-) "walking" (-pateo).  While it certainly describes someone out walking around or moving about, this term also illustrates how to live life.  Earlier in this letter, Paul reminds his readers how they were once the walking dead before Jesus changed them (Eph 2:1-2).  A little bit later, he encourages them to "walk in a manner" consistent with their call to a new life in Christ (Eph 4:1).  Over in the companion letter of Colossians, he writes that a worthy walk pleases Jesus, bears fruit and deepens our relationship with God (Col 1:10).  And one of Christ's closest friends, John the Apostle, simply says that if we say we follow Jesus then we should walk like Jesus (1Jn 2:6).  Stop this ridiculous Ministry of Empty Walks.

Walk toward Jesus.  Walk like Jesus.

Just who are these Gentiles that we’re to stop walking like?  So glad you asked.  It's the Greek word ethnos.  The term has a couple of different meanings.  Lots of times, it talks about an ethnic group, nationality or a particular people.  It's the largest unit into which you could divide people of the world on the basis of their socio-political community.  But it also can mean either non-Jews or non-believers.  In other words, outsiders.  The cool thing is that Christ came to turn outsiders into insiders.  That's the consistent message of the Old Testament as it predicts what the Messiah will do once He makes the scene (2Sam 22:50; Ps 18:49; 69:9; 117:1; Dt 32:43; Is 11:10).  As a matter of fact, when Paul flips through all of these OT verses as he writes to the Romans, he uses ethnos (Rom 15:10-11).  

Paul is writing to his Ephesian friends, many of whom are non-Jews who have placed their faith in Jesus.  The Gospel has invited "both Jews and Greeks" (Acts 19:10, 17) to become insiders.  Jesus has come to turn outsiders into insiders.  Let's be VERY clear about who these outsiders-turned-insiders are.  They are you and me.  Chances are, you’re not a Jew.  If it wasn’t for what Jesus has done to take from outsider to insider, I would still be stumbling around on the outside looking in.  And once we do come inside Christ's kingdom, we need to stop living and walking around like Gentiles.  We need stop living and walking around like outsiders.  

Walk toward Jesus.  Walk like Jesus.

So what does it look like to walk like a Gentile?  How do we know when we're doing walking that way?  The apostle says that happens when folks are walking "in the futility of their minds" (v17).  "Futility" is the Greek term mataiotes.  It describes vanity, depravity, perversity, nonsense, emptiness, purposeless, something devoid of truth and appropriateness and lacking content.  It’s meaningless.  Empty.  A complete waste of time.  Walking toward anything but Jesus is walking toward sin.  Stop walking toward sin that's certain to tear you apart (Eph 2:2-3).  Not only is that perverse but in the end it's empty.  Outsiders walk without meaning.  Without purpose.  Don't walk empty.  That’s why it’s the Ministry of Empty Walks.

Walk with purpose.  Walk toward Jesus.  

Now that we've placed our trust in who Jesus is and what He's done for us, we're no longer outsiders.  He's brought us inside.  So now it's time to stop walking without any purpose.  It's time to stop walking empty.  We no longer serve the Ministry of Empty Walks.

Walk with purpose.  Walk toward Jesus.