Walk as Children of God Pt 2

And if you'd read verse 11 with me. Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous ones, and shout for joy all you who are upright in heart. And Father, I do praise you for the truth that when we confess our sins, you are always faithful and just to forgive. And Lord, you become our hiding place. And so, Lord, may our hearts be open before you. May we walk in the light,

which is exactly what we're talking about this morning. And Lord, may you continue to cleanse us from all sin. Give us ears to hear, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. And if you would open up in your Bibles to the book of Ephesians, chapter 5. Ephesians, chapter 5.

We come to part 2 in our series, Walk as Children of God, this morning. And as we come to part 2, the subheading is Walk, in the light. Last week, we discussed walking in love. This week, it's light. And so, as I was thinking about that theme this week, the theme of light, I thought about the importance of light. And so, I want to talk to you about a few of the things that light does for us.

Because light's pretty important to our lives. Probably more important even than we give it credit for. And so, I wrote down a handful of things that light does. The first thing that light does, and this is going to be groundbreaking to you, it's going to be mind-blowing. Light illuminates. I know you've probably never heard that before, but light illuminates.

It allows you to see, right? Like, when I'm preparing my message on first thing Sunday morning, my favorite thing to do is to sit out on my patio. Well, this time of year, it's not light yet. And so, I'm trying to look, because I'm trying to use as little light as possible, because you know what happens in Kansas when it's not 30 degrees outside. If you turn the light on outside, what does it draw?

It draws all the bugs. And so, I try to use as little light as possible while I'm doing that to draw as few bugs as possible. But the problem is, if I don't use light, I can't... I can't see, because light illuminates. It allows me to be able to see things. But not only does light illuminate, light also protects. You ever thought about that? Light's a protective source in our life.

Let me tell you a little bit of a story about myself. So, this has been quite a few years back now. I was living in my old house, and I was up late doing some work, and turned all the lights off, and I headed to bed. First of all, I went to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, did all the proper hygiene things I'm supposed to do, and turned the light off and got ready to go to bed and thought, I left my phone, which is my alarm clock and everything else, left it in the living room.

But I didn't want to turn all the lights on because I'm weird like that. And so, I walk out of my bathroom. Now, when you walked out of that bathroom, you had to make a quick right and then an immediate left because there was a wall that was right there. Well, I knew I needed to make a quick right and an immediate left, so I made a quick right, but not sharp enough.

And I made that quick left, really quick, and I ran into the corner of the wall right here, and it cut my head, and it cut my head open right here. And you know what would have protected me? Light. If my light had been on, I would have seen, hey, the wall's right there. Turn a little further to the right. So, light's a protective source in our life. But not only does light illuminate,

light protects, but light exposes. Light exposes things. It exposes issues, right? Sometimes it exposes that it's not as dangerous as you think that it is because sometimes shadows can look scary until you turn the light on. And you realize, oh, it's just a shadow. That was no big deal. That wasn't a problem. But light also exposes issues. When I used to work in construction,

the drywall finishers would come through and they would do all of their sanding. But before they said, we're done, you can start painting now, they would use a light. What they would do is they would shine that light on the wall. And what they would do when they shine that light on the wall is it would reveal any place where there was what we always called shotgun blast.

In other words, there was a bunch of little holes in the mud that they needed to sand a little bit, a little bit more. It would reveal places where there was a ridge that they needed to sand a little bit more. At least the good drywallers did this. And so you knew, hey, there was an issue there because the light would expose it. But not only does the light illuminate,

it protects, it exposes, but do you know that light is essential for life? Light is essential for life. As a matter of fact, one of the earliest processes you learn about in a science class is the process of photo light, photosynthesis. Because it uses light and moisture to convert into food for plants. It's a fascinating thing. If you've ever seen a plant that is in the shade

but near a source of light, have you ever noticed what that plant does? It will actually move to where it can get to the source of light. I, at one point in time, thought about going into turf management as a job and so I took some classes on this. And one of the things that they tell you is that shade is a stress on turf. Because without enough light, it can't produce food,

therefore it can't survive. Because light is essential for life. Well, we're told in John 8, verse 12, Jesus said, I am the light of the world. So that tells us that if we want light in our life, the first thing we must have is Jesus. Because he is the light of the world. John, earlier in his gospel, said that he was the light that brought life to men, right?

But it's interesting because Jesus also, in the Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew chapter 5, told us as disciples something as well. He also said, you are the light of the world. A city that sits on a hill cannot be hidden. No one takes their light and hides it under a basket, but they hold it up for all to see. And so as Jesus lives in you, as a disciple of him,

you also are the light of the world. You are the light of the world that is around you. And if that's who we are, then we need to understand how we should walk. And so as we look at this section in Ephesians chapter 5, we're going to look at three things. He's going to tell us who you are, he's going to tell us how to walk, and he's going to tell us to awake from sleep.

So chapter 5, starting in, let's start in verse 7 for context's sake. It says this, Therefore, do not be partakers with them. For you are for them, and you are for them. You were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. For the fruit of the light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth, trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord.

Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness. Instead, expose them. For it's disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light. For this reason it says, Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.

Well, as I mentioned, the first thing that he starts off by telling us is he starts off by telling us who we are. The segue verse there is verse 7 because he had told us to walk in love, which means to no longer walk in immorality, because the people that are walking in immorality have no place in the kingdom of heaven. As a matter of fact, that immorality is why God's judgment is going to come upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore, do not be partakers with them, which segues directly into who we are.

And to tell us who we are, he tells us first of all who we were. For you were formerly darkness. You were formerly darkness. Now, I want to point out the verbiage that he uses here. He did not say that you were in the darkness. He didn't say that you walked in darkness. He said that you were formerly darkness. In other words, before you came to know Jesus as your Lord and Savior,

darkness was not just what you were a part of. Darkness is what defined you. Because it was the very essence of your nature. Because our sin nature, apart from Christ, is utter darkness. Therefore, we were formerly darkness. It was the things that we did. It was the life that we lived. It was the nature that we had. We were formerly darkness. Because a life,

apart from Christ, is a life of darkness. But I want to point out one other thing that he says here about who we were. And that's the fact that he says, it's, it's, it's who you were formerly. Now, the day that you came to know Jesus as your Lord and Savior, the light shined. And you were no longer darkness. Because you were formerly darkness. I want to read this to you.

It's out of the Amplified Bible. It says, it is who you were, so do not become that again. I think the greatest thing that I will continue to preach to us as believers in Jesus Christ, because I think one of the greatest struggles that we have as believers in Jesus Christ is that all of the darkness that encapsulated our life, all of the darkness that we were living in, that's who we were. That's who you were formerly.

And I tell us that for two reasons. The first reason I tell us that is because God does not want us to live in the guilt of the past. And too many of us as believers in Jesus Christ, and I will continue to preach this because it continues to be the issue that we deal with, live in the guilt of the past. As a matter of fact, you can't enjoy who you are in Christ now because you won't let go of who you were before.

You continue to relive it. You continue to bring it back up. You continue to confess it. You continue to feel bad about it. And God is saying, that's not who you are anymore. That's who you were formerly. The best thing that you can do is let go. And the second reason why I tell us that is because sometimes as believers in Jesus Christ, we forget that that's who we were formerly

and it tends to be how we live currently. And that really is the rest of what he's going to talk to us about. It's who you were formerly. It should not be how you live currently. Because you were formerly darkness. And that brings us to the second thing that he tells us. But now you are light. But now you are light in the Lord. Again, in the same way that he says

you were darkness, not just in darkness, not just a part of the darkness, you were darkness. Now you are light. Not just in the light, even though you are in the light. You are light. Because the moment that you accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior, you became the light. Because light is what illuminated you. Again, I'd like to read this to you. It was from a commentary.

I can't remember which one. Oh no, it was Expositor's Bible Commentary. It says, The indication given to us is that the transformation is so complete that you are not just enlightened, but you are actually light itself. Because the transformation that took place in our lives was so complete. Yesterday I was able to go to the Choose Life presentation by Brian Hedweltz.

In English, it was just great. I've heard his testimony before. I've read one of his books. And it's just fascinating. If you don't know who he is, he was the former guitarist, or he is still the guitarist of a heavy metal band called Korn. And it probably means nothing to you, but if you grew up in my era, you knew exactly who that was. And he chronicled his life,

his life apart from Christ, and the absolute transition that took place in his life when he came to know Jesus as his Lord and Savior. And may I say, I may bring this up again when we talk about exposing the darkness, but the fascinating thing to me is that his conversion took place simply because he had a friend that invited him to church. He knew a guy that invited him to church. I think sometimes we discount what our witness can be in the most simple ways possible.

We think, oh, I've got to be able to give this great dissertation on the gospel. I need to have an amazing testimony. I need to have all that. No. Sometimes you just got to invite somebody to church. Sometimes you just have to be the light in somebody's life. Well, anyway, he goes through this whole thing and all of the drugs that he was on and he goes, and then I got saved.

He had one minor relapse, but after that, he's just been light. And at one point in time, he said there was this dark cloud over me because of depression. He said I had suicidal thoughts. I hated myself. The only time I didn't hate myself was when I was high. And then I started going, I hate myself when I'm not high. And when I'm high, I feel like a loser because I'm a drug addict.

I'm pretty sure my life is not worth anything. And he said, I can't explain what happened. He said, but it's like Jesus just poured all of this hope into me and all of this light into me and all of this life into me. And I've never been the same since. He goes, and I know it's real because I'm going on 19 years now and nothing has changed because all of that hope

and all of that life is still being poured into me by Jesus Christ. You see, that is a perfect picture of someone who was darkness, but now he's light because, the transformation is so complete that it now embodies who we are. And that's who you are, brothers and sisters in Christ. If you've come to Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you were darkness and now you're light.

Well, he goes on now to tell us how we should walk knowing that. He says, walk, middle of verse 8, as children of light. For the fruit of light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth. Trying to learn, what is pleasing to the Lord. And do not participate in unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead expose them. For it's disgraceful to speak, to even speak of the things

which are done by them in secret. But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light. We are to walk as children of light. Now again, the word walk means to habitually order your behavior. Your manner of life should be consistent with light. Because you are light. Therefore walk as the children of the light.

What does that mean? Well, it means it's going to produce fruit in my life. Notice what it says. For the fruit of light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth. Now, if you're reading an older New King James, it says for the fruit of the spirit. Because that's the way they translate that word there. Interesting, isn't it? That we can almost use those two words interchangeably.

Light and spirit. Because the Holy Spirit is the light that illuminates our lives. And so he tells us, the fruit of the spirit is these things. What's it look like to walk as children of light? Well, it's like to walk in the fruit of the light. What are those? Three things he mentions. Number one is goodness. Well, what's goodness? I'm glad you asked. Goodness is moral excellence.

I love that definition of that word. It is a moral excellence. It means that my life, as I walk in the light, will now exemplify moral excellence. You see, when I wasn't walking in the light, when I was darkness, moral excellence had nothing to do with my life, right? My life exemplified immorality. My life exemplified all of the immoral things that were talked about before.

Therefore, if I am to walk as a child of the light and the light is producing fruit in my life, I will walk in moral excellence. The second thing that he tells us that the light produces in our life is the light produces righteousness. Now, the definition of righteousness here is kind of interesting. It is integrity in our dealings both with God and man. Integrity in our dealings

both with God and man. It means that I'm always real with God and I always have integrity with the people that are around me. I always have integrity with the people that are around me. That word integrity is kind of an interesting word, isn't it? Something I feel like that's kind of missing in our culture today. Because in the culture, what is the prevailing feeling?

Well, the prevailing thought, the prevailing philosophy, the prevailing feeling is that you should do what makes you happy. It really doesn't matter who it hurts. You should do what makes you happy. Now, most people wouldn't use the qualifying phrase it doesn't matter who you hurt. But it's somewhat implied if you're only going to do what makes you happy. That's the prevailing thought right now.

You do you, right? You do what's right for you. But you see, that's the very opposite of righteousness because that's not integrity. Integrity says I will stand on what's right no matter what it costs me. No matter how anyone else views me. And I will be who I'm supposed to be when you're looking and I'll be who I'm supposed to be when you're not looking. Because there is righteousness in my life.

The third thing that it says that this light produces, what it looks like to walk as a child of light, is that it produces truth. Of course, the word truth can be defined as honesty, either the second word that they use to define truth, reality. In other words, just being real. I don't always like going to touristy places. Anybody with me on that? I like to go where the real things took place

because what happens when you go to a touristy place? Well, it's all smoke and mirrors, right? Everything is made to look perfect. Everything is made to look like it's supposed to look, right? Like you go to Colorado, and you go to one of the touristy places, and there's some rock in the middle, and you're like, oh, what a cool looking rock. How long has that rock been here?

Like, actually, that's a conglomeration of a bunch of concrete, and they plastered over it with some rock and then kind of painted it a little bit. That's not a real rock. And you're like, oh, well, that's not real. Then you go up in the mountains and you see a real rock, and you're like, ha, no way that's a bunch of concrete with plaster on the outside of it.

That is real. That is truth because it's reality. You see, what the light produces in us is truth because what the light produces in us is reality. It forces me to say, this is who I really am, warts and all, and this is what God is doing in me. It's the very thing that allows us to have deep fellowship because you know what will always prevent deep fellowship?

Dishonesty. It prevents our fellowship with God, and it prevents our fellowship with each other. That's what we read about in Psalm 32, right? David was hiding his sin. When he hid his sin from God, he couldn't have it, he didn't have any real fellowship with God. Why? Because he wasn't being honest with God. He wasn't being real with God. It wasn't until he finally said,

Lord, I have sinned. Lord, this is what's really going on. And then God said, now, now we're having fellowship because now it's real. And that's what the light produces in our life. We walk as children of light, and so we walk in goodness. We walk in righteousness. We walk in truth. And then we come to this next thing. I love it because, look at what it says in verse 10.

Trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Now, that word trying to learn, that phrase trying to learn means to test and approve what is pleasing to the Lord. Let me continue to define this for you. It means to recognize, to recognize as genuine after examination. To recognize as genuine after examination. And then Believer's Bible Commentary had this to say,

it is putting every thought, word, and action to the test to know that it's pleasing to the Lord. I love this because this is it. This is exactly what a walk with Jesus Christ is. A walk with Jesus Christ is trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Because as we live our lives, we become more illuminated by the Holy Spirit of God and we become more and more aware

of what is right and wrong in God's eyes. And we go, okay, I see that what I've been doing here is sin. It always starts off with the big stuff, right? The things that we all thought were going to be the hardest things to let go of. I don't know about you guys, but there were things that I was like, that's going to be what's hard to let go of. And then you started walking with Jesus Christ,

and you're like, actually, that wasn't very hard at all. Now the hard things to get rid of are the things that are in my heart that nobody else can see but me and Jesus, right? Those are the hard things to get rid of because they're so deeply ingrained in who I am. But we're trying to learn what is pleasing to God. And so maybe the first thing that God convicts you of

are those habits that are deadly. The drugs, the alcohol, the things like that. And you go, I know that's not good because I know that leads me away from Jesus. Let's get rid of that because I have tested it and I have, and I have proved that that is not something that Jesus wants me to do. But pretty soon, the Holy Spirit begins to put His finger on some things.

And the next thing He does is He touches your speech, right? And all of a sudden, because of things like Ephesians, maybe this is what's happened to you the last two weeks. As we talked about, let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth and let no dirty jokes proceed out of your mouth. You've gone, oh, oh, I didn't think about the fact that God doesn't like that.

I never thought about the fact that that's not pleasing to the Lord. And so now I'm going to hold up all of my speech, to the Lord and say, what is pleasing to you and what is not? And He begins to put His finger on the things that aren't. You go, okay, well, now I've changed my speech, but now your movie watching habits have to change because some of the things that you watch aren't what they should be any longer.

And all of a sudden you have tested and proved, nope, those things have to go now because those things aren't approved by God. See where I'm going here? This is a part of our process as believers in Jesus Christ. But the problem sometimes in the Western culture churches, we've just said, you know, I'm saved now and that's the important thing, right? I'll just,

all that other stuff, I think that's just legalism, right? All those things you're talking about, Ryan, that's just, that's just legalism. You're just trying to put me back under the law. No, I'm not trying to put you under the law. I'm trying to teach you what it is to be holy because holiness is God's desire for us. Walking in holiness is God's desire for us.

And so as we live our lives, are you holding things up to the test? Lord, is this approved in your eyes? Is what I'm doing, is what I'm saying approved in your eyes? Is what I'm viewing approved in your eyes? Is what I'm listening to approved in your eyes? Are my attitudes approved in your eyes? Is the way I'm treating my neighbor approved in your eyes? Because you see,

we can justify anything until we hold it up to Jesus. Until we ask him what he has to say about it. And then we have to follow what God's word says. But isn't it great that God is so patient with us that as we try to learn what is pleasing to God, that he continues to love us anyway. That he continues to be patient with us anyway. And he continues to say, hey, remember that one time I said that wasn't a good idea?

That's what I meant. That's not a good idea. But let's work through it together. And so, what does it look like to walk as children of light? Well, first of all, it means that light produces fruit in our lives. Second of all, it means that we learn what is pleasing to the Lord. But third, we have to not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness. Do not participate.

Instead, we should expose. So, let's break this down real quick, okay? He says, number one, do not participate. What does it mean to participate? It means to become a partaker in. If you're reading, again, the older New King James, it says, have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. It means to become a partaker with. To take part in. Don't participate

in the unfruitful works of darkness. And again, we hold up our lives to the light and we say, are there areas where I'm participating in the unfruitful works of darkness? You say, Ryan, I gave all that stuff up a long time ago. Did you? What kind of things do you approve in the lives of others? I was listening to John Corson on this and it was fascinating. Because I thought, man,

I don't know if that message would fly today. Let's find out, shall we? He was talking about some shows that had just come on TV. Now, the series that I'm listening to of his, I think came out in the mid-90s. I know old BC was president. And so, I know it was somewhere in the mid-90s that he was preaching on this. And he was talking about a network that had just come on TV

on everybody's local TV station and the shows that were going to be on that network. And he goes, I was appalled. About the shows that were going to come on. I know that we would probably be like, oh, those really aren't that big of a deal today. He said, but what got me more than anything is my Christian brothers and sisters that were looking forward to it.

He said, because if you don't realize this, when you don't expose the darkness, you participate in the darkness because you give it your stamp of approval. You remember what Paul said in Romans when he said, be careful you who judge and say that's wrong because you do the same thing. Even if it's just in your heart or mind. We approve those things by putting our stamp of approval on them.

Therefore, we participate in them. It's kind of an interesting thought. It got me. It really got me to thinking. He said, don't participate in them. Instead, well, and then I want to point out what he calls them. He calls them the unfruitful deeds of darkness. The unfruitful deeds. The deeds of darkness. In other words, they are deeds, works that don't produce any kind of good fruit in our life.

It's the junk food of our life, right? You ever been real hungry for a snack? Or you're just really hungry and there's nothing else around except a bag of chips. And you go, I mean, Doritos sound pretty good, right? So you grab the Doritos and start eating. One thing leads to another. You've eaten half a bag of Doritos, which isn't hard to do anymore because half the bags air anyway.

But I'm talking about half the bag that's actually still left, right? And so you eat that last half. The other half, the other half of the bag of Doritos and you go, I'm still hungry, but now my stomach feels bad. It was unfruitful what I just did. And that's the deeds of darkness, right? It sounds really good. It may taste really good in the moment, but it ultimately leaves you feeling bad

and still wanting something else. He says, do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness. Instead, we are to expose them. Expose them. Now, I want to point out what this word expose means because I know what's going through a lot of our minds right now. Yes, I can finally start posting all of my conspiracy theories with the backing of the Bible because it just said to expose

the deeds of darkness. I know, it's my ministry. It's what God's called me to expose all. I will put all of my conspiracy theories out there now. That's not actually what the word expose means. The word expose can also be translated reprove. So let me read the definition to you. The word expose means to reprove or rebuke for the purpose of confession or conviction.

Exposing doesn't mean putting everybody's sins out on the internet for everybody to see. It doesn't mean telling everybody in the church everybody's sins for everybody to see. Exposing means confronting sin for the purpose of confession and conviction. It means confronting sin when it comes up, but with the... He says to expose it. So how do we expose sin? How do we reprove or rebuke sin

the way that we're supposed to? Well, I think there's two ways that it ends up happening. Number one, it ends up happening when you live a godly life in front of the world around you. When you live a life that is set apart unto God, it automatically becomes something that exposes the rest of the world. That's why oftentimes if you live a godly life, you will be mocked.

You will be mocked for it. It's not because what you're doing is that bad. It's not because they don't like what you're doing. It's because it reveals what they're doing. And when we live a godly life, when you live a life in the light, it exposes all of the other deeds of darkness around it. It's kind of like turning a flashlight on in the middle of a dark room.

You can't help but bring illumination to the room. And so how do we expose these deeds? How do we reprove? How do we rebuke these deeds? Well, first of all, just live a godly life. Live in those fruits of righteousness, those, or excuse me, those fruits of the light that we talked about, and it will reprove, it will rebuke, it will expose the deeds around it.

But it's not only by the life that we live, but it's also by the stands that we take. You see, brothers and sisters, we do need to understand something. In the world that we're living in today, you have to take a stand. You have to take a stand. Now, that stand should be taken in love, and I'm going to get to how we use our light properly in just a moment, but eventually we have to take a stand.

One of the scariest things that we can do in the world that we live in today is to take a stand because the moment that you take a stand, they just want to cancel you. They want to find everything that you've ever done wrong. I promise as I take a stand on things, there are people that don't like me for it. And I get nervous about it. I've shared this with you lots of times before.

The whole reason I never wanted to go online is because I know I make controversial statements on an almost weekly basis. And I am not, by nature, a controversial person. I'm a non-confrontational person who would just as soon sit back, you do you, I'll do me, let's not bother each other. My statement in life is always this. I don't have drama in my life until dramatic people come into my life.

Because I'm just not that kind of a person. I don't go out looking for trouble. I'm the person who stays at home and waits for trouble to leave so I don't ever have to deal with it. But there comes a point in time where I've been called to do something. I've been called to stand on the truth of God's word. And that means that I'm going to have to make a stand

on some things that are sometimes very difficult to make a stand on. And quite frankly, there's probably going to come a day where I'm going to get in bigger trouble for it. And I just have to decide that that's going to be okay. Because brothers and sisters, eventually we have to take a stand. You have to take a stand with your co-workers when they're the ones telling the dirty jokes.

And say, you know what, I don't want to hear that. I don't want to hear that go on around me. There comes a point in time when you have to take a stand when they're talking about things that are wrong. When they're sharing wrong theology and trying to pass it off as truth and say, you know what, nope, that's actually not true. That's actually not true at all.

I worked with a group of guys up in Kansas City and they were all talking about God's word. And so we were all having our conversation about God and one of them said, you know, I think when it comes right down to it, we're all talking about the same God. We're just giving Him different names. And I had a choice to make at that point in time. I had to make the choice of

am I going to make a stand and expose that darkness, which is called ecumenicalism. Am I going to expose that darkness or am I going to let it go? And to my shame, that time I let it go. And I always look back on that conversation. Bear in mind, this conversation happened 20 years ago. I look back on that conversation and go, I missed a moment. I missed a moment where I could have taken a stand.

I've not let that happen since. But I missed a moment where I took a stand. And with that group of guys, I did have to take a stand one time and say, no, we're not talking about the same God. We're talking about different people because the gods you guys are talking about, they're not real. There's a God of the Bible who says all of those gods are wrong. But eventually we have to make a stand on these things.

And yeah, it may land us in some hot water sometimes. It may hurt some friendships sometimes, but we have to make a stand because the things going on around us are wrong. But brothers and sisters, I need us to understand something. Sometimes the stand you have to take is not with the world around you. Sometimes the stand that you have to take is with your brothers and sisters in Christ.

Because when we see them living a life that violates the light that they are supposed to be walking in, we as brothers and sisters in Christ have to expose them. that. We have to reprove that. We have to rebuke that. And brothers and sisters, I need you to know something. If the world gets angry at you when you rebuke their sin, you should see what happens when you do it in the life of a believer. I've been unfriended. I've been blocked. All kinds of

things. Because I pointed out what somebody was doing was wrong. Eventually they come back around. But it's what happens. And that's what we're to do. We are to expose the darkness that is going on around us. Why? Because notice what he says. For it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret. Because the things that are done in secret that are sinful

are just that. They are so disgraceful. They're disgraceful. And they're dirty. And we don't... Need to hear about them all the time. This is where I know that our world has gotten is that the things that we used to view as disgraceful are now celebrated in public. You know why? It's not because society is getting... We always want to say society is getting worse. Myself

included sometimes. Society is not getting worse. We've stopped shining the light. I remember when same-sex marriage was... When that law was passed. And it was made the law of the land. That that's a legal thing. And when that took place... All I could think is... We can get as mad at the Obama administration as we want to. We can get as mad at the senators that we want to. And all these other people. We can get as mad at everybody as we

want to. But when it comes right down to it, church, we only had ourselves to blame. You know why? Because we stopped exposing the darkness. And those of us that were exposing the darkness sometimes did it so quietly that nobody noticed. Society is not getting worse. We've stopped shining the light. And so he says, expose them because the deeds that they do

are shameful even to be spoken of. And then he goes on. Hold on. I got to see where I put this in my notes. Yeah. Okay. I put that at the end. Okay. Perfect. So then in verse 13, it says, but all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light. That word visible is interesting because that word visible,

means to manifest for what it really is. To manifest for what it really is. So all things become manifest for what they really are when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light. In other words, when the light is shined on the darkness, then we see what's really going on behind the scenes. We see what it really is. And what it

really is, we see what it really is. And what it really is, we see what it really is. And what it really is, is sin. What it really is, is sin. Let me give you two different illustrations of this. One of them comes from my own life. So my wife runs a little online kind of side business on this website called Poshmark. She sells clothes. She goes to Goodwill, buys clothes, turns around,

cleans them up, does things, and then resells them on this site called Poshmark. And so for a long time, that was in our bedroom, right? She had this whole rack of clothes in there with some shoes on top of it. Well, one morning, there's like a street light to the moon or something shines in our room and it's really bright and it created this shadow, right? And so I wake up and I'm absolutely terrified because

I can't figure out what figure is standing over by the window. I'm absolutely terrified because I'm like, I don't know who's in our room. So we have a ceiling fan kind of like these, and they have a remote. And so we leave the fan going at night because I get hot. And so I reach over and I push the button that turns the light on, and the light comes on. And I would go, those are hunter boots up on top of a rack. No problem.

We're good. I'm going back to sleep, right? Because the light made it manifest. It manifests for what it really is. It wasn't a figure of someone in my room. It was a clothes rack with some shoes on top of it, right? Because the light makes manifest, the light makes visible what's really going on. But you know, there's another amazing story. It's from a guy's life named Peter

Marshall. I don't know who Peter Marshall was. Peter Marshall was the pastor of a huge church in Washington, D.C. in, I think, the early 30s. It might have been a little, might have been the 40s. There's a great movie put out about him. It's a man called Peter. It's just a fascinating movie because he was such a strong influence for God in a city that really needed it at that point in time.

Well, part of his testimony is he felt like he had drifted from God, and he was walking in the fog one night. And as he was walking in the fog, he came right to the edge of a cliff, and he couldn't see what was going on. He couldn't see that there was an edge of a cliff there that he was just about to walk off. And God parted the fog, and he could see. And he realized if he had taken any more steps,

he would have gone to his death. And at that point in time, he knew that God was making visible to him that the same thing was happening in his own walk with the Lord. If he kept wandering from God, the same thing would happen. You see, the light made manifest the reality of the danger that stood right in front of him. And when we expose the darkness, when the light exposes the

darkness, it gives the reality of how bad the sin really is. Because you know what happens to anybody that's living in darkness, believer and unbeliever alike? believe the same lie. It's really not that big of a deal. It's really not that big of a deal until the light exposes it and you go, whoa, that really is a big deal. Now, before I get to this last part, I want to talk to us about something because if we are to be those that expose,

we have to be the right kind of light, right? We must be the proper kind of light. Jesus in Matthew chapter five said, you are the light of the world. No one lights a candle and puts it under a basket, right? But he said, let your light so shine before men that they see your good works and they glorify your father who is in heaven. So we have to be the right kind of light.

I learned a lesson at one point in time about the fact that there are two different kinds of light. I used to always run at night because I had kids and I had to wait till they were put to bed and all that kind of good stuff. So I would run in the dark all the time. I actually really enjoyed it. I'm too old for that now. And the story I'm about to tell you is part of why I don't run in the dark

anymore. But when you're a runner, you realize there's two kinds of light. There's light that illuminates and there's light that blinds, right? So as you're running, there are streetlights and the streetlights are amazing because they light up an area so that you can see all of the pitfalls that are in front of you. They expose all of the danger and they allow you to see where you're

going. They're amazing. But there is a second type of light. They're called headlights. Now headlights may really help a driver, but they really hurt a runner because they blind you, right? They don't illuminate what's in front of you. And have you noticed, sidebar, have you noticed the new headlights that they have on cars now? It's like, are they x-ray machines? What's going on

here right now? I actually can't see for the next five minutes now because nope, those weren't your brights. Those were just your regular lights. What are the brights when they turn on? Can you see to Mars? I mean, how bright are these things? So anyway, so I'm running and somebody's got these LED lights and I'm like, oh my God, I can't see anything. And so I'm running and I'm on radio lane

and there's a place on radio lane where there's, really no like side of the road. There's like a ditch, right? And the edge of the asphalt, they just keep piling on. Have you ever noticed that? And sometimes the edge of the asphalt be like that, right? And so, so I'm running along and this car's coming towards me and I try to always wear bright reflective clothing, but you know, because of phones, people don't actually

look at the road anymore. And so this person is driving straight at me and I can't see anything because they're beaming me with their headlights and I keep creeping towards the edge of the road. It feels like they're creeping towards the edge of the road with me, right? And so I'm running along and I'm like, oh my gosh. And so I take one more step, only I hit just on the edge of the road.

Other side of that edge of the asphalt. And I rolled into someone's front yard. I can't believe I didn't damage myself. I can't believe I didn't injure myself, but I could not see anything. I couldn't see that there was a drop off there. I couldn't see where the edge of the road was. I couldn't see that there was a ditch. I've come to find out. I think I actually rolled into the yard

of somebody that lives here, but anyway, that's neither here nor there. So I roll into the front yard and I thought, man, that driver has, I think that's the funniest thing they've ever seen in their life. And so I dust myself off, pick myself up and I finished running home and I realized something. There's two kinds of light. There's light that illuminates. There's light that blinds. And brothers and sisters,

as believers in Jesus Christ, we must be careful not to be the light that blinds. You see, if I come at you all harsh and judgmental, if I come at you without a heart that is set on, on seeing you restored, that is set on seeing you confess and be convicted and, and ultimately come to faith in Jesus Christ, ultimately come to repentance, because my desire is to see you really walk with Jesus. That I become a light that blinds. Because now I'm just beaming in your eyes and you're not seeing Jesus. You're not seeing the truth. You're just mad at me. But if I come at you as a light that

illuminates, if I come at you in a spirit of love, in a spirit of humility, in a spirit that desires to see you restored, you may not always love that I expose your sin, but you do understand that I'm trying to be a light that illuminates and not a light that blinds. And brothers and sisters, if we are to reprove and rebuke, if we are to expose the darkness, we have to be the right kind of light. That means that we must have the light of Christ shining in us so that we can be the proper light for the people that are around us. Well, now he kind of brings it to a head with verse 14, where he tells us to awake from sleep.

He says, for this reason, it says, awake sleeper and arise from the dead in Christ, will shine on you. I believe that at the end of this section, it's sort of a reminder that this is a call to repentance. He gives this quotation. He says, as it says, again, in New King James, it says, as he says, but everybody points out the same thing. Can't really pin down one Old

Testament scripture that this is. It's probably a hymn that the early church would sing, but where it came from is less important than what it says. Because I want you to notice the first line. It says, awake. Sleeper. Isn't it fascinating what happens to us when we sleep? Sleep's a fascinating thing to me. Because it's like you reach this altered state of consciousness where like you're unaware of

anything that's going on around you, right? My youngest daughter had a friend spend the night last night. And I always go to bed a little bit early on Saturday nights if I can, because I have to get up so early. So I go to bed early. And once I fall asleep, I have no idea what's going on in the world around me usually. I'm not as good as I used to be. I'm getting a little bit older,

so I sleep a little. I'm getting a little bit lighter than I used to, but I can pretty well sleep through just about anything. And so I wake up. So this whole thing takes place in my house because I wake up this morning at five and I go to start making coffee and I hear voices. And I'm going, no one's ever awake in my house at this point in time. Who's up? So I walk over to the basement and I hear my

youngest daughter say, selfie time. And I'm like, oh, that's not good. You know why? Because in my altered state of consciousness, they say, oh, that's not good. And I'm like, oh, that's not good. They stayed up all night long. And I had no idea that they were up all night long. Why? Because I was asleep. I've learned this about myself. My house could get robbed in the middle of my, I

would have no idea. And quite frankly, it wouldn't really bother me that much because it'd be like, oh, well, stuff's gone. I was asleep the whole time. I guess that's okay. I got insurance. We'll cover it with that, right? Because I had no idea. And it's one thing to be asleep physically because we need it. But it's a whole other thing to be asleep spiritually.

Fortunately, what can happen to us, brothers and sisters in Christ, is the world is going on around us and we're asleep to it. We have no idea. You know, I'm just going to give all of my secrets away today, okay? So the other thing that I do in my sleep is I talk in my sleep, right? And perhaps you could hear the secrets that I keep when I'm talking in my sleep. I knew y'all would get that

song reference. Anyway, but the fascinating thing, my roommates in college would have conversations with me. I think they thought it was fun, right? And I guess I'd answer them. And I had no idea that it was taking place. Why? Because I was asleep. And brothers and sisters, when we're asleep spiritually, you know what happens? We do all kinds of things. We don't always realize it's

taking place because we're so spiritually asleep. And so when he says awake from sleep, this is a call to believers. It's a call to believers to wake up because you are walking in darkness. You are walking in darkness. You are walking in darkness. You are walking in darkness. You are asleep and you are walking in the darkness. You're walking in all of the things that he's

saying not to walk in. And it's time to wake up. It's time for the Holy Spirit to shake you and pull you out of the bed and say, it's time to wake up because you're walking in darkness. You don't even realize what you're doing. You don't even realize what you're saying. But brothers and sisters, it is time to wake up. And if you're here this morning and you're

walking in darkness, if you're hiding all of your things from Jesus, thinking that that's impossible, you're not walking in darkness. You're not walking in darkness. You're not walking in possibility. Then it's time to wake up because this is a call to believers. But not only is it a call to believers because we can be asleep by walking in darkness, but some of us are asleep

because we won't expose the darkness. We want to just be like, I'm asleep. I can't hear what all is going on out there. I don't know what all is happening in the world. Meanwhile, the world is in need of believers who will wake up and expose the darkness because they need to wake up. They need to know the truth because they need to hear that their life has value because they

need to hear that there's another way for them to deal with the feelings that they have other than to numb them with some other substance or another person. They need to know about Jesus. And if we don't wake up as the church, then more is going to go on because I don't know if you've noticed, but things haven't gotten a whole lot better since the whole same-sex marriage thing got passed. As a matter of fact, fast forward in about 2020 because the church won't wake up. And it's time for the church to

wake up and be the church and not just be the people that are judgmental and call out sin and be like, that's awful. I can't believe they do that. But be the church who will wake up and call out sin and say, you need Jesus. And it's time for us to wake up. It's time for us to awake from our sleep. I had to put one verse up there. You don't have to turn there. It's 1 John 1.6. You might

just write it off in the margin of your Bible. As 1 John 1.6 says this, if we say we have fellowship with him and we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But you know what he goes on to say? He goes on to say, but if we walk in the light as he is in the light, then the blood of Jesus Christ continually cleanses us from all sin. Because I want you to notice what he says here. He says,

awake sleeper and arise from the dead. And what will happen? And Christ will shine on you. He will shine on you by illuminating your life to an even greater degree. He will shine on you in a deeper relationship with him. And he will shine on you in approval because light begets more light. Awake from sleeper. Awake, oh sleeper, because it's time. It's time. Amen.

I'd like to invite the worship team up because this morning is communion. Sunday. This morning we celebrate the one place of hope that we have as believers in Jesus Christ. We celebrate the place of unity that we have as believers in Jesus Christ. The place of unity that we have with Jesus and the place of unity that we have with each other. And so inside of

here are a couple of cups. They're stacked on top of each other. The top cup has the juice, the bottom cup has the cracker. These are very, symbolic, but also powerful elements. Because Jesus on that last night of the feast took the bread and he broke it and he said, this is my body, which is broken for you. And we understand that while it doesn't really become the body of Jesus, that symbolism is so

powerful because we remember that by his stripes, we are healed. And then he took that cup. He said, this is a cup of the new covenant in my blood, which is for you. And again, while we understand it doesn't actually become the blood of Jesus, it is a powerful picture of the fact that the one thing that covers our sin is the blood of Jesus. And it's fascinating because the one thing that

we are told to do on a consistent basis. And as often as we do it, do it in remembrance of him is to remember the death of Christ. We're not told to, to remember anything else on as consistent of a basis as we are this, because every time we partake in this meal, we declare to the world, that we are the one hope that we have is that all of the things that we carry all of the sin, all of the guilt, all of the shame, all of the self-hatred, all of the self-loathing, all of the things that we carried, we brought to him at the cross and he bore it all in himself on the cross because in his own body on the tree, he bore all of our sin. And we realized that this is the declaration that all of my sin belongs to him.

Righteousness belongs to me. And so we're told to do this in a worthy manner. And as I've told, said lots and lots of times, a worthy manner means two things. Number one, if you're not a believer in Jesus Christ, then this isn't for you. Now that can change today because if you've been living your life in darkness, if you have been darkness, then today's the day for transformation. Today's the day to give your heart to Jesus.

And it's as simple as telling him, Lord, sinner, would you please become my savior? And the moment that you put that faith in him, you become brand new and you belong to him. But the second way that we make sure that we partake of this in a worthy manner is what it talks about in Psalm 32. David said, when I hid my sin, when I hid my sin from you, there was no vitality left in me. It's like a dry desert.

He said, but Lord, to you and you alone, I confess my sin. Because against you and you alone have I said. And once that sin was confessed, forgiveness came. And it's like he was filled afresh with that cleansing blood, with that cleansing work. And that's what we need to do as believers in Jesus Christ. So just a moment, the ushers will come down and they'll start handing out the elements.

And as they sing this last song, I just ask that you would allow the Holy Spirit to search your heart. Allow that light of the Holy Spirit to shine on you and see if there's not a way that you need to wake up. See if there's not an area of your life where you need to awaken. Tell it to Jesus and let your heart be made brand new again in him. Amen. I love you.

Would you bow with me? Father, we come to you and just thank you, Lord, for your blood that was shed for us, for your body that was broken for us. Lord, may we always remember. May we always remember the sacrifice that you made. And Lord, may we always keep our hearts clean before you. Father, we thank you and we praise you. In Jesus name. Amen. Let's partake. Would you bow with me

one last time? Father, be with us as we go out from here. May your Holy Spirit continue the work that your word has begun. And Lord, keep us close to you. In Jesus name. Amen. Be blessed.