I have received encouragement from others to occasionally post a Bible exposition in place of one of my talks. I love teaching the Bible and I'm excited to attempt this!
All the talks that I produce are designed to challenge the status quo and draw one deeper into his/her understanding of the Christian life. My approach to Bible exposition will be the same, and how often I do this type of talk will be determined by your response to the blogs. Sending e-mails to me or just checking "like" will help me to know.
All right then...... let's go.
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The book of Ephesians is a fascinating letter written by Paul the Apostle to the believers living in the town of Ephesus!
Some of its teaching:
…….puts to rest the false idea being taught by the error promoters of
Paul’s day-----that one can simply do enough good works to secure
salvation.
…….contains a beautiful encouragement for the readers to be filled with
the Spirit of God as they live and worship.
….…gives a better understanding of what the gift of pastor is for and
what a Pastor’s function is to the body of Christ.
All of this truth and much more is included in this small letter that was
written while Paul was sitting in prison because of his faith.
For our purposes today, I will be zooming in on an interesting statement made by the Apostle Paul in chapter five of this letter.
Ephesians 5:1 NLT
1. Imitate God, therefore, in everything you do, because you are His dear children.
The first word we will look at is imitate.
Right away this appears to be a strange, and maybe impossible, task for me to carry out. How in the world can I imitate God? Can I go out and create a new universe and planets? (A real God can do that you know.) Should I throw out a few lightning bolts or do a couple of God things just to make a statement? Am I supposed to make a few new stars and, while I am at it, bring down some fire from heaven while throwing out a few plagues here and there?
I'm pretty convinced that this is not what the Holy Spirit intended for this passage of Scripture to teach.
The word imitate means something a little different here than what we normally understand it to mean in English. Going to the meaning of the original language will help us to better grasp the understanding we need.
Imitate -- the Greek meaning of this verb has the primary idea of to begin
to be, that is, to grow into existence or into any state ......or simply, to be.
The intent of this word is for us to begin to act like who we really are in Christ. We are God’s children….we need to be resembling Him.
Any child, in the beginning, vaguely resembles a parent. Two arms…. two legs...... maybe a weirdly shaped head, but as the child grows and matures, it takes on more characteristics of the parent. Such is the idea here. As we mature in Christ, we should take on more of the traits that make us resemble Him.
At the end of this first verse it tells us that we are His dear children. If so, then the idea behind this whole statement would be for us to act like God's children, whatever that may look like to us.
Let us examine that thought for a minute……..
Some people are going to grasp the concept of imitating God differently from how some others may think that it should be. We would be wise to keep this in mind as we approach our brothers and sisters in Christ.
It is such a beautiful idea that we see this truth in so many ways, and it answers well to our individuality! Children may resemble a parent and still be so different from each other.
To me, this shows the wonder of the body of Christ and how we all have different gifts and functions within it. One may think that teaching is most important of all, while another feels that the personal sharing of the gospel is absolutely primary and should get most of our attention. Then, there is that believer who feels that worship is the most powerful part of everything, while another yet is totally dedicated to helping the poor and less fortunate.
Who is right among these people?
Aren’t all these things working within us to make us resemble (imitate) our Father? You bet they are! Even our questions, trials, and hunger for the Lord are all parts that work in us individually in order to bring us closer to imitating our Father.
Where we have to be cautious is that we don't fall into judging others from our own areas of giftedness and by our limited understanding of all the areas within the body of Christ.
The rest of this chapter gives us a differentiation between those who act like they are His children and those who act like they are not.
Let us look at verse two now:
Ephesians 5: 2 NLT
2 Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered Himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.
Okay, this is one way that God-imitating children act.
They live a life filled with love.
The Greek word "Live" means -- to live or pass one’s life.... to go,
proceed on one’s way......... To tread or walk about, generally to walk.
All of these meanings have the idea of conducting my life in a particular way....in this instance, living my life filled with love. This is more than just loving music, pizza, or another person.
The type of love recorded here is agapē.....the Greek word used to describe God's type of love. (There are several different words for “love” in the Greek language.)
This conflicts highly with anyone living in:
Fear.
Frustration.
Misery.
Doubt.
Anguish.
Irritation.
Greed.
Selfishness.
A good many dear, precious believers live encompassed with the misery associated around these things rather than living a life filled with God’s love.
When my life is filled with these wrong kinds of things, they tend to crowd out God's love living through me. I only have one life.... just one shot to do it as right as I possibly can.....why would I waste it living in the sadness of lesser things? Why would anyone choose to live a miserable existence outside of living in God’s love?
Even in the worst of circumstances, living in God’s love brings an amazing peace and comfort to one’s life. Saints throughout history testify to that even though they were persecuted and sometimes put to death.
Living in His love, in some way, would have the opposite effect of living in the world’s misery.
This makes sense. If we are growing toward imitating God, then one of the catalysts toward that would be living in His type of Love. The misery that the world produces is not included in God’s love. God’s love can produce more peace and joy within us than we can even dream of……….
But what is His type of love?
Should I bring up Jesus on the cross at this place to describe God’s love, or should I talk about when God opened up the earth and swallowed those wicked people at the foot of Mt. Sinai? Where is God’s love shown in that?
Consider this:
All of the plans that God made ever since Eve and Adam ate of the forbidden fruit were orchestrated to bring about the payment for sin through the Messiah's death and then the provision of salvation to be offered to everyone who would receive it. In the Scripture, it appears that if anything - at any time - looked in such a way that it would bring about a threat of stopping God’s plan from working, He made provision to remove the obstacles……and He usually did it very passionately.
Think of what we learn in this Old Testament passage:
Isaiah 9:6-7 NLT
6 For a Child is born to us, a Son is given to us. The government will rest on His shoulders. And He will be called: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 His government and its peace will never end. He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of His ancestor David for all eternity. The passionate commitment of the LORD of Heaven's Armies will make this happen!
The Lord was seriously committed to pull this thing off………and nobody should get in His way…….
Is this a God who intently loves humanity, or is it a God who enjoys hurting people?
There is no way that my finite mind can encompass all the understanding that I need to have in order to grasp everything that God does and the reasoning behind it. However, when God says that He loves us and that He is Love, then I must trust what He says and not entrust my attention to those things which I do not and cannot know.
This is called “faith”, and without it we cannot please God.
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So then, what do I know about God's love?
Check these verses out:
Exodus 34:6 NLT
6 The LORD passed in front of Moses, calling out, "Yahweh! The
LORD! The God of compassion and mercy! I am slow to anger and
filled with unfailing love and faithfulness.
Deuteronomy 5:10 NLT
10 But I lavish unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who
love Me and obey My commands.
Nehemiah 9:30 NLT
30 In Your love, You were patient with them for many years. You sent
Your Spirit, who warned them through the prophets. But still they
wouldn't listen! ......
Psalms 5:12 NLT
12 For You bless the godly, O LORD; You surround them with Your
shield of love.
Psalms 33:5 NLT
5 He loves whatever is just and good; the unfailing love of the LORD
fills the earth.
John 1:17 NLT
17 For the law was given through Moses, but God's unfailing love and
faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.
Romans 5:8 NLT
8 But God showed His great love for us by sending Christ to die for us
while we were still sinners.
(Interesting fact, in the Old Testament the words "unfailing love" are used 121 times to refer to God’s love.)
We are seeing God's love in all these verses displayed wonderfully. The God in the Old Testament was also a loving God to those that loved Him.
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In this passage that we are studying in Ephesians 5:1-2, we have a further qualifier when it comes to imitating God's example of love. We are to live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ.
So then, what is Christ's example?
Ephesians 5: 2 NLT
2 ...... He loved us and offered Himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.
Jesus gave His life for others. The phrase "a pleasing aroma to God" is a saying that illustrated God's pleasure on having received such a sacrifice.
When we live our lives in such a way that we are offering ourselves to others in love, then we have begun the walk of imitating God. In doing this, others begin to see the love of God through us.
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Now, let the Holy Spirit take us deeper into this subject.
Who is it that you are imitating?
Answer it truthfully to yourself…….and to the Lord.
If your answer is “God”, then you are especially blessed…..keep it up!
If you feel unsure of your answer, be encouraged because the Holy Spirit is working within you and will help you resemble the Father as you give yourself to Him!
Deep enough.
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Ephesians 5:1 NLT
1. Imitate God, therefore, in everything you do, because you are His dear children.
2 Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered Himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.
Humbly submitted in His love,
Dan
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