Walking Worthy of the Calling – Part II (7)

 

“…because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” Ephesians 4:18c – 19.

 

In verses 4:17 – 19 we see that those who do not know Christ are living in “futility,” “darkness,” “excluded from the life of God,” “ignorance,” “hardness of heart,” “callousness,” “sensuality,” and the “practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” While these words taken together paint a composite picture, each word and image also demands that we consider it on its own, for only when we understand each word and its image does the full composite texture come into play.

 

Note how verse 20 begins, “But you did not learn Christ in this way.” Well then, if we did not learn Christ in this way, but if we are nevertheless living in this way, then either we have forgotten what we were taught or we have a deficient foundation in Jesus Christ. Here is a warning, if we gloss over verses 17 – 19 and what follows, thinking that “this couldn’t possibly have any place in my life,” we not only ensure self-deception, we close ourselves off from the convicting and edifying work of the Holy Spirit in our souls.

 

Each of the words Paul uses in verses 17 – 19 have a deep Biblical context and if we think we can discover that context with a dictionary definition we are mistaken and will continue to be, for the most part, a people who are ten miles wide and a ¼ inch deep. Also, if we are reading these words without a sense of concern and warning, then it is quite possible that we are doing so because we see little, if any, distinction between the People of God and the culture of the world and its people. Can we please be clear about this, God’s People are to be holy for He is holy (1 Peter 1:13 – 16; 2 Cor. 6:14 – 7:1; Heb. 12:14; Matthew 5:8)? He who is ashamed of Biblical holiness is ashamed of the Biblical God.

 

What of this word “callous” in verse 19? Paul writes in 1 Timothy 4:2 of those who, “…by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron…” Since the context of 1 Timothy is apostasy and those who listen to “deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons,” this ought to warn us that callousness and having a seared conscience is something that we can find both within and without the professing church. The KJV translates the word for “callous” in Ephesians 4:19 as, “being past feeling”; when we are callous we do not feel, when we do not feel we are callous. When we are callous and do not feel we close ourselves off from God and most especially the conviction of the Holy Spirit. This ought to be a frightening warning.

 

As I hope we will see in this extended passage (Eph. 4:17 – 5:21), it is not only what we might think of as egregious sin that leads to this condition, sin as a way of life leads to this condition, adopting the ways of the world leads to this condition, sin that looks good (to our culture) leads to this condition…and for sure, justifying and making excuses for what is clearly sin leads to this condition. We are getting ahead of ourselves, but I do so want us to pay attention to God’s Word.

 

“and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” (Eph. 4:19).

 

What might “sensuality” look like? Impurity? Greediness? Are our images of these things Biblical images? If I asked a Sunday school class, “What are the seven capital, or cardinal, or deadly sins?” what am I likely to hear? Probably a lot of guessing because people generally don’t know them or think about them. They are thought of as capital sins because they lead to other sins. Let’s look at the list:

 

1.    Pride

2.    Avarice (greed)

3.    Envy

4.    Wrath (anger)

5.    Lust

6.    Gluttony

7.    Sloth

 

What do these sins look like in society? What do they look like in the professing church? Think about them carefully, do not brush them off. Which of these sins have we elevated to idols, which of them are ingrained in our culture, both within and without the professing church?

 

What does gluttony look like in our lives? In the way we think about food? In our eating habits? In our advertising? What might our various food channels and recipe books look like to the starving peoples of the world? To people within our own nation who go to bed hungry? Are we honoring God in the way we eat, in the way that food affects our bodies?

 

What about pride? How does pride affect our relationships? Our Gospel witness? The way we think about God, others, and ourselves? How does pride affect the decisions we make, the way we treat our spouses, family, friends, and coworkers? How does pride affect our spending habits, our use of the resources God has given us for His glory and the blessing of others?

 

What about wrath? There is anger all around us, and we tend to justify it, it has become our way of life. We pride ourselves on “rants.” We drink the poison of talking heads and have become, like them, brute beasts spewing evil, yes evil, from the abyss. There is anger in our schools, anger in government, anger in retail stores, anger on the streets and highways (think of the way we drive), anger in our churches. Anger poisoning our hearts, minds, and souls – and we often take pride in it! We are fools.

 

Can we not see that the Seven Deadly Sins are killing us as a nation, and as the professing church? Look at them carefully. Spiritually, psychologically, emotionally, physically, they are killing us – or better yet, we are using them to kill ourselves, to commit mass suicide.  

 

The last one I’ll mention is avarice, greed. Our economy would implode if we stopped being greedy. We make most of our decisions with money and possessions as our arbiter. In other words, we have been conditioned to view life in terms of money and possessions, in terms of acquiring more and more and more. We do not evaluate life based on character, or virtue, or the way we serve God and others; our metrics are money, power, position, and possessions.

 

Take note, that with greed is covetousness and that covetousness is idolatry (Ephesians 5:5); and see the stark waring in this verse that such persons have no “inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.” Woe to those pastors and churches who explicitly teach greed and covetousness, and to those who implicitly endorse it; woe to those pastors and churches that never preach against the idolatry of covetousness and greed. Are we not an idolatrous people? Have we not supplanted with Cross with the Dollar Sign?

 

God is not interested in you possessing things or positions; God desires to possess you – at the end of your life this is all that will matter.

 

 

Walking Worthy of the Calling – Part II (6)

 

 

Continuing to consider “hardness of heart” as it is manifested in John Chapter 8:

 

“As He spoke these things, many came to believe in Him. So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, if you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free” (John 8:30 – 32).

 

What do you see in this passage? What are its key elements? Does this passage portray a person in a consummated relationship with Jesus Christ?

 

How do these people respond? Do they submit to the Word of Christ, accepting what He is saying, and rejoicing at the prospect of receiving and knowing the truth and experiencing freedom?

 

“They answered Him, We are Abraham’s descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, You will become free?”

 

“Jesus answered them, Truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are Abraham’s descendants; yet you seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you.”

 

The rest of the chapter portrays an escalating interchange between Jesus and “those Jews who believed in Him,” which culminates with the people picking up “stones to throw at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple.”

 

The people went from believing in Him (8:30) to attempting to murder Jesus (8:59)? Why? Because they hardened their hearts by rejecting Jesus’ offer of truth and freedom, and continued to harden them throughout the interchange with Jesus, resulting in their hearts turning to murder.

 

Note that when our hearts reject the Word of Christ and they turn to a spirit of murder, that Jesus Christ hides Himself and He no longer remains within the temple.

 

The people refused to accept God’s assessment of their condition. When the people believed in Him (v. 30) perhaps they expected Jesus to feel privileged that they were accepting Him. Perhaps the last thing they anticipated was Jesus calling into question their identity, which they took pride in, and their spiritual condition (slaves to sin).

 

As they reject Jesus’ assessment of their identity and spiritual condition, they attack Jesus, accusing Him of having a demon and then picking up stones to kill Him. When our hearts are hardened not only do we reject God’s Word and the Person of Jesus Christ, but we attack God and His Word.

 

Now then, these people are what the world and the church would call “good people.” They are gathered in the temple, They are listening to Jesus. Many of them may be known for doing good works, They may be the very people we would love to work alongside in our jobs, they may be great neighbors, One would think that they don’t get into trouble…and yet these very people are attempting murder in the temple. Why? Because of the hardness of their heart.

 

How do the good people around us react to Jesus Christ? What is the reality about appearances and hardness of heart?

 

When Christ and His Word confront us, we can either by His grace submit to Him, confessing our sins and repenting, and taking up our cross and following Jesus Christ; or we can harden our hearts, and harden them again, and again, and again. When we are wrapped in pride and self-righteousness and our own goodness, the danger is great – O how difficult it is to repudiate those false identities we have trusted in, how difficult it is to realize that our righteous deeds, in and of themselves, are disgusting filthy rags.

 

When Paul looked back at his own self-righteous life and considered that, “as to  the righteousness which is in the Law, [I was] found blameless,” he could say that he counted “them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith…” (Philippians 3:1 – 14).                        

 

One of the religious tragedies of our time are those pastors and churches whose goal is to make people feel good about themselves at the expense of not preaching repentance and confession of sin(s) and the Cross of Christ as our Way of Life. For what occurs in these environments of false teaching is a continuing hardening of hearts, for the more pleased we are with ourselves and our false identities, the more our hearts are hardened and the more we become like those religious people of John Chapter 8. Sadly this insidious evil is pervasive, and the temptation to give-in to it confronts us along our pilgrimage. How tragic that we would rather live in the prison of self-righteousness than in the freedom which Christ promises us.

 

Let us remember, every day of our lives, that there are really only two kinds of people on the planet, those who are alive in Christ and those who are not. Let us also recall that we are here, in Christ, to bring His Light and Life to others – for “as the Father has sent Me, I also send you” (John 20:21).

 

Walking Worthy of the Calling – Part II (5)

 

      

 

“…because of the hardness of their heart.” (Eph. 4:19).

 

This can be a difficult thing to think about when we love and care about others but don’t understand that there are two types of people on the planet, those who are alive in Jesus Christ and those who continue to live in spiritual death. We all know people who are kind, benevolent, thoughtful toward others, practice moral and ethical principles, and have a sense of decency. Many of these people are more enjoyable to be around than the average professing Christian who is often undistinguishable from the world, unless they are distinguished by self-righteousness, religious sectarianism, and cultural and political identification – as opposed to being identified with the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ.

 

It is important to remind ourselves, that as God told Samuel, “Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart” (1Sam. 16:10). At the core of our being is the issue of whether Jesus Christ is the True and Living God and whether we need to confess our sins, repent of the way we are living, and trust in Jesus Christ for new life and salvation. This means that we not only repudiate the sins we have committed, we repudiate who we are without Jesus Christ and, by God’s grace, exchange our death for His life, His Nature for our nature, His glory for our shame – all by His enabling and mercy.

 

Now then, who is more likely to come to grips with this inner reality, a person whose sins are out in the open for all to see or a person who is living what appears to be an upright and moral life? A person who has hit rock bottom or a person who is enjoying much of what life has to offer? A person who is pleased with himself or a person who is enabled to see the depth of sin and the wickedness of his heart?

 

There is a passage in John Chapter 8 that may help us see how “hardness of heart” manifests itself within religion. The chapter begins with the woman caught in the act of adultery and Jesus saying, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first one to throw a stone at her.”

 

“When they [the accusers] heard this, they began to go out one by one, beginning with the older ones, and He was left alone, and the woman, where she was, in the center of the court.”

 

John then writes, “Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the Light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the Light of life…You judge according to the flesh [the way things appear]; I am not judging anyone. But even if I do judge, My judgement is true; for I am not alone in it, but I and the Father who sent Me.” (See also John 5:30).

 

In John 7:24 Jesus says, “Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment.”

 

Now let’s recall that the setting for this is the temple in Jerusalem (8:2). In a place that is supposed to be holy and a house of prayer, the scribes and Pharisees come with a woman (note the absence of the male adulterer) with murder in their hearts – in a place that should echo life the religious leaders are after death, both the death of the woman and the death of Jesus. We know from the Gospels that only the Roman government could issue and exercise the death penalty, therefore if Jesus adheres to the Law of Moses and says that she should die, they can go straight to the Roman authorities with an accusation against Jesus. In other words, they are accusing the woman so that they can accuse Jesus, they are using the woman and her anticipated death to destroy Jesus.

 

On the other hand, if Jesus says that she should not die, then they can accuse Him of not teaching and obeying the Law of Moses. On the one hand they can accuse Jesus to the Jewish people, on the other hand they can accuse Jesus to the Roman authorities.

 

Why are the scribes and Pharisees doing this? Because of the hardness of their heart. Do we see what hardness of heart can look like within us? It can lead us into wanting the death of others to achieve our own ends. It can lead us to using others to achieve our goals. It can seduce us into thinking that the end justifies the means.

 

Looking at verses 19 - 30 note the following:

 

“You neither know Me nor My Father; if you knew Me, you would know My Father also.”

 

“You will seek Me, and will die in your sin; where I am going you cannot come.”

 

“You are from below, I am from above, you are of this world, I am not of this world.”

 

“Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins.”

 

What do you think about Jesus’ words? If you were listening to Him in the temple on this particular day, and if you had been living a good religious life with the Pharisees, if you had observed the religious practices of that day, how might you have responded to Jesus? If you were looking pretty good on the outside of your life, what might you be feeling when hearing Jesus speak?

 

Note verse 30, “As He spoke these things, many came to believe in Him.”

 

But what does this mean? How long did this belief last? Is this an example of Matthew 13:4, or of 13:5, or of 13:7, or of 13:8?

 

We’ll pick this back up in the next post in this series, in the meantime you might want to read the rest of John Chapter 8 and ponder the trajectory of this passage.

 

How does the chapter begin? How does it end? What do you see?