New Self in Christ: Ephesians 4:17-24

This passage is a reminder that the Bible is to be read and reflected on in context. It’s part of a longer portion in the CSB translation that we tend to use at Remembrance, subtitled, “Living the New Life”.  But by itself, it is mainly a discussion of what living the new life is not. Better parts came last week and will return next week. However, just having had to run upstairs to my screaming and crying grandkids, 2 and 5, who are generally great kids, and me pretty much losing it, it will probably be good for me, at least, to review the ways of the unbelieving world that I have come from and act back towards too often.

Verse 18, referring to the lives of the Gentiles, says, “They are darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them and because of the hardness of their hearts. Reading on, I am reminded of Romans 1:18-32. That passage is a powerful description of the consequences of the denying of the true God, who should be obvious to all simply through the incredible beauty, complexity, and diversity of the creation in which we live as a part. Verses 28-29 say, “And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God, God delivered them over to a corrupt mind so that they do what is not right. They are filled with all unrighteousness, evil, greed, and wickedness.” It goes on. The whole passage is worth reviewing. The passage begins, “For God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth…”

How powerful by contrast is John 3:16-17:  “For God loved the world this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” But how confirming is verse 18, “Anyone who believes in him is not condemned, but anyone who does not believe is condemned already.” Jews may think of Gentiles as those who are not of their way and especially of the bloodline of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But as the mystery of God’s will has been revealed to us in Christ Jesus, Gentiles in his eyes are those who have refused the blood sacrifice of Jesus on their behalf. To one, he is the God of love. To the other, he is the the God of wrath. And it doesn’t matter what we, in our own minds, think it ought to be. What is is what is, in the same way God is “I am who I am”.

Friends, I am thankful to be able to tell you that the Holy Spirit won the battle of the bedtime bedlam into which I fell. It ended well as I asked their forgiveness and we prayed for God’s peace in our lives and a great night away for their parents. I love when God helps me to take off the old self and “to put on the new self, the one created according to God’s likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth.” Ephesians 4:24. That’s the me I cry out to God to be. I thank him that, having chosen me as I chose him, he is merciful to me as I sometimes stumble along in my journey into eternity with him.