Ephesians 5:11-14
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This sermon was preached by Rev. Chris Roberts during the morning service on Sunday, January 10, 2010
This week we are in Ephesians 5:11-14. For me, this has proven to be one of the most difficult passages to understand in Ephesians. The setting for this passage is fairly straightforward. Since at least chapter four Paul has been demonstrating the difference between the sons of disobedience and the children of light. And just so we’re clear, Christians are children of light. It’s not what we’re called to be, it’s not what we’re hoping to be – if you are born again through the blood of Jesus Christ, you are a child of light. The call, then, is to live as children of light.
So Paul wants us to see the difference in the life of the world and the life of God’s people. In chapter five he begins by calling for purity of thought, speech, and behavior, particularly regarding sexual immorality. We are to be pure, not doing or saying immoral, degrading things.
The world will try to deceive us, Paul says in Ephesians 5:6, fooling us into thinking sinful behavior is okay. With many empty words they will tell us why sin is not sin. But do not be deceived. Wrath comes upon them because of their sin. But you, child of light, though you were once in the darkness like they are, now you are in the light and you must live accordingly. The calling on you is given in verse 10: try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. We do not live for the world’s favor, we live to please our God.
So we come to our passage, Ephesians 5:11-14. As we read the passage, on the whole the pieces make sense, but follow the logic of the text and see if you can spot what gave me a hard time.
Ephesians 5:11-14
In this passage there are four things that gave me trouble. First, notice what Paul calls for Christians to do in verse 11: Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. We are to expose the wicked deeds of the world. But then he tells us in verse 12, For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. Wait a minute, Paul. Just one sentence ago you said for us to expose the world’s ways. Now you tell us it is shameful to speak of the things they do? How can we expose without speaking?
The second difficulty comes in the first part of verse 14, what some of your translations, such as the King James, have as the last part of verse 13. Part of the problem is a difference in translation. The ESV reads: for anything that becomes visible is light while the NIV, KJV and others read: for it is light that makes everything visible. On the surface, the NIV translation makes a lot more sense. The problem is, while the statement makes sense, it doesn’t seem to add anything to the passage. A further problem is that the ESV translation is closer to the Greek. Grammatically, the NIV translation is possible, but the ESV presents a more consistent rendering of the text. The NIV translation does not undo what the verse is teaching, I don’t want to shake anyone’s confidence in it, but I think the ESV is closer to what is found in the original language.
But if the ESV is correct, what in the world does it mean? for anything that becomes visible is light? We don’t think this way. Shine a light on a wall, we don’t say the wall is light. So what does Paul mean?
Third, how does the second half of verse 14 fit with what Paul just said? It seems to be an abrupt shift from comparing light and darkness to calling for sleepers to awaken. In its context, what does it mean and why does Paul say it here?
And fourth, in that same section Paul calls for the sleeper to awaken, the dead person to arise from the dead. How can something like this take place? How can a dead person make himself alive, how can someone asleep rouse himself?
Let us look at verses 11-12 and the first difficulty. As we noted, in verse 11 Paul says we are to expose the works of darkness but in verse 12 it is shameful to speak of the things unbelievers do in secret. So how are we to expose their works?
Part of the answer is given in verse 13 where Paul says, when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible. In short, Paul is telling us not to allow their deeds to remain in secret. Sons of disobedience are doing many things in the dark, performing many acts in secret. This does not mean they are trying to hide what they do, it means they are hiding the evil of what they do.
Take one of the hot issues of our day: homosexuality. Not too many years ago we could say they were doing this sin in secret, trying to hide from the eyes of men because they knew people did not accept their actions. Today, however, such sins are not just committed, they are flaunted in the public eye. The actions themselves are no longer done in secret, but society does hide the sin of the deed. Voices across our nation and around our world are arguing that homosexuality is natural, acceptable, and to oppose it is discrimination. We recall verse 6 where Paul said, Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. They are full of empty words and with their words they hide the sin of their actions.
So what is Paul telling Christians to avoid? What is the shameful speech he warns us of? Remember what Paul has already said about speech back in verses 3-4: But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. Keeping that in mind, here in verse 12 Paul warns us to avoid any speech which makes light of the sin of the world. They sin in secret and we whisper about it. We joke about their sin, or treat it as an item of casual conversation.
Paul does not want us to leave sin in shadows. We must not participate with the world in their works of darkness. That includes showing tacit approval by talking lightly about their sin. Do you explicitly or implicitly give approval to the sins of others? Do you allow their works to remain in darkness, their sin to stay hidden, accepting their justification for evil rather than exposing their disobedience? That, Paul says, is shameful.
What are we to do? We are to expose their works. We are to bring their deeds to light. Paul does not say we must not verbally address their wrongdoing. Rather, we must reveal that their actions are sin. This is the only loving thing we can do. It is not loving to ignore someone’s sins, for, as we saw in verse 6, it is because of these things that the wrath of God comes. Will we allow them to justify their sin, to hide wrongdoing in shadow, while on the road to the judgment of God?
All too often this is exactly what we do. One reason for this is it allows us to ignore our own sins. If we downplay the wrong we see around us, we can downplay our own wrongdoing. But in this we sabotage one of the ways God has given us to expose sin. In Matthew 5:14 Jesus says that you are the light of the world. There is a real sense in which God expects your life, your actions, your behavior to be the means of exposing wickedness. If you take a glass window and smear it with mud and tar it will not be a very useful window. But if a person grows up in a world where all windows are covered with mud and tar, they won’t think anything of it. But if you show them a window that is clean and clear, they will marvel that such things exist and wonder why they were willing to put up with a filthy window. You are the clean window in a world of filth. Your life is to be an example to the world of the glory and grace of God. When your life is set next to a life of sin and depravity, you are not supposed to look like them. Instead, your life is to display the glory of a life with God. One of the greatest obstacles to the spread of the gospel is Christians whose lives are as filthy as people in the world.
The second way we are to bring sin out of shadow is through Scripture. How do I know your selfish greed is inexcusable? God has already declared it so. How do I know you should not be sleeping with your girlfriend? The judge of all the earth has said so. The world is quick to accuse us of being judgmental when we raise standards of right and wrong, but we are not the ones judging when we repeat what the righteous judge has already established. So we use Scripture as our light into the darkness. We use it to expose sin in our own lives, and we use it to reveal the sins of the world.
In the end the result is that the world’s wickedness does not remain secret. We are not shamefully whispering secret things in the darkness, we are exposing ungodliness, unbelief, and unrighteousness, dragging them into the light.
So we come to the second difficulty, found in verse 14. I am going to spare you considerations of Greek grammar and simply say that I think the ESV translation here is correct. But what does it mean? How is something made light when it becomes visible?
In this case, meaning is found by what happens when we expose the sins of the world. People sin in secret in order to justify themselves. They deceive themselves about their actions, claiming evil is good, and thus claiming that they themselves are good. “I am basically a good person” is one of the greatest lies of the world. Apart from Christ, there are no good people.
When you expose the sins of the world, shining light on the works of darkness, making the works visible, making it evident that these things are sin, that in itself reveals something about the lives of people carrying out those actions. How do their wicked deeds become light when you expose them? It does not mean wickedness becomes goodness. It means the deeds themselves shine light on an ugly reality: the person committing this sin is not good. He has deceived himself into thinking his actions are just but he can no longer hide the truth. His actions are shown to be sin and because of that he is shown to be a sinner. You have exposed his sin and his sin shines as a light onto his life revealing that he is fallen and in need of a savior.
This helps to answer my third difficulty. Why does Paul say what he does at the end of verse 14? There he quotes what was probably an early Christian hymn that drew from Isaiah 60:1 and other Old Testament passages. He says, Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Having just revealed the sinfulness of man, he moves on to give them hope. Throughout Ephesians we have seen that sinners are dead in their sins. Once again we look back at Ephesians 2:1-2 where Paul plainly says, you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked. You were dead. And those no walking in darkness are dead. But God has given the solution to our sin, the answer to our deadness. It is found in Jesus Christ.
Having revealed that people are sinful even if they try to hide their sins, Paul now gives the answer to their sins. He says awake! Turn from your sin, and turn to Christ! He will shine on you, he will dispel the darkness, he will bring forgiveness, and he will lead you in paths of righteousness. This is a reminder to the Ephesians that they are not righteous because of their deeds. They were once just like the unbeliever, sons of disobedience, children of wrath, walking in darkness and facing judgment. But God sent Christ to give light and life.
Finally, our fourth difficulty. In that section Paul calls for the sleeper to awaken, the dead person to rise from the dead. But how can someone wake himself from sleep? And the greater difficulty, how can a man raise himself from the dead?
The answer is he cannot. But in our own experience we are accustomed to speak to people in this way. This morning when it was time for my girls to get out of bed we did not expect them to rise at the right time. Someone had to go in and rouse them. But what do we say? “Wake up! Wake up! It’s time to get up!” We are calling for them to rouse themselves but we are the ones doing the rousing. We are waking them up, we are disturbing their slumber.
Consider also Jesus and Lazarus. In John 11:43 when Jesus stood before the tomb of Lazarus he did not wait for Lazarus to raise himself. He did not expect the dead to fix themselves. Instead he called out with a voice of power and authority, the voice that spoke creation into existence, Lazarus, come out! At his call the dead can do nothing but obey. Lazarus, still in his grave cloths, came forth. Not because he was able to gather the strength to walk out but because the sovereign God of all the universe called him from death to life.
A final example that relates more closely to our passage. In John 3:7 Jesus said to Nicodemus, you must be born again. How can I do this? How can I be born again? We are told in 1 Peter 1:3, according to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again… So this is not a work I do, this is a work God does.
For the Christian, this is a source of hope. You are called to be a light in the darkness, shining in the world. But you are not responsible for how others respond to the light. We will never persuade a single soul into Heaven. That is God’s work, not ours. And for the unbeliever there is this reminder that no work of yours will save you. Nothing you do will bring you to life. Only the mercy and power of God can make a dead man live. Have faith in Jesus Christ, not in your own deeds, for when your deeds are brought to light they will not be pure and clear and good but stained and filthy and sin. Christ is your only source of hope, your only source of life. Turn to him.
