Ephesians 4:17-23 Bible Teaching

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Ephesians 4.17-
November 3rd 2019
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We mentioned at the start of chapter 4 that Paul’s letters typically start off with a teaching and then generally moves to application to the believer’s lives.

Our text for today is evidence of this as he directly tells them how to be as followers of Christ.

We ended last week with Paul telling the believers that they ought to

“Make an increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love.”

And now a full shift to more application – and these are some of my favorite passages in the New Testament to cite when people wonder how to mature in Christ, and learn to walk after the Spirit and really change and not after the flesh.

Because the rest of the chapter is so good I want to read to the end with you though we may not cover all these verses today.

Unlike some of the other parts of Ephesians it is my belief that these verses have direct application to the lives of believers today as Paul now writes:

17 This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,
18 Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:
19 Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
20 But ye have not so learned Christ;
21 If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:

22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;

23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;
24 And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
25 Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor: for we are members one of another.
26 Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath:
27 Neither give place to the devil.
28 Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth.
29 Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.
30 And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.
31 Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:
32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.

Okay back to verse 17, where Paul says:

17 This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,

Paul appeals to both his personal witness in the Lord Jesus Christ, by the authority given him, the following advice:

That the believers he was addressing as Christians, “henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind.”

Christian living has been compared to walking on a number of accounts and Paul is speaking to an audience (or audiences) who have come out of the world of Paganism or other forms of idolatry.

And his challenge is for them is that from that point forward that they refrain from walking (living) as other Gentiles live, which he summarizes as:

“In the vanity of their mind.”

The phrase is interesting because it best means “in the emptiness of their imagination.”

Paul touches on this empty mindset found in Gentiles in Romans 1 beginning at verse 21 and saying:

21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man (now who has done that? HMMM), and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.

This refers to idolatry, where empty heads suggest that God is similar to birds, or animals or men – all the thoughts of empty human imagination.

Paul says that these minds are present in the unregenerated minds of Gentiles, who before knowing the Lord in spirit and truth “walk after them.”

In some ways I see human life in general as sort of a circus or amusement park and every minute of everyday each of us choose (this day) whom we will seek, whom or what we will worship, and in the end, whom we will serve- ourselves (through the varied and constant offerings this world presents) or the living God.

Paul is telling his reader to not return to or pursue the “empty-imaginationed” folks of their former life pursue, in the vanity or emptiness of their mind.

Just two chapters back here in Ephesians we read where Paul said:

Ephesians 2:1 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

Peter wrote in 1st Peter 4:3 to Jews, saying

“For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked . . .

“in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries.”

At this point in Ephesians, Paul begins to also delineate “the walk that Gentiles walk” before Christ, which is in the emptiness of their minds, and he adds six more unique descriptions of them, saying (at verse 18):

Having . . .

“the understanding darkened,”
being “alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them,”
because of “the blindness of their heart:”
(and VERSE 19)

Who . . .
“being past feeling”
have given themselves over unto lasciviousness,
to work all uncleanness with greediness

These passages are pretty straightforward on the nature of all of us prior to knowing the Lord. I agree with them and therefore with the first T of the Calvinist Tulip known as Total Depravity.

But I do not see Total Depravity in the same way as a Calvinist but instead believe that without God calling to all through innumerable ways over the course of this life and the next, no human would ever seek to discover or find him.

But He does call to all – by His Spirit, by the Cosmos, by nature, by His Word, by the witness of believers, by and through blessing and tragedy, by and through suffering and joy – and in the end, all will eventually respond as every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is LORD.

Until the individual chooses to respond to the call on their life by the loving, living God, they remain reprobates – they can’t help it – its our nature. But He is good – and never gives up.

Having made us in his image and having given us freewill, most choose the carnival rides and attractions – until the light comes on in their heads and heart.

So, Paul describes the lives we all lived before Christ and the first three things he says to describe that state are related, saying that they

“the understanding darkened,”
being “alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them,”
because of “the blindness of their heart:”

Dark – alienation from the life of God by ignorance in them BECAUSE of the blindness of the Heart.

It’s all a picture of the state of a soul without God.

Paul puts the state succinctly beginning in 1st Corinthians 2:10 and speaking of

“the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” Says . . .

10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. (not the empty imaginations of Man) He goes on, saying:
11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.”

The opposite of this state of human existence – summarized as Life without God in and with us – is described in the first three things Paul says about the unregenerated Gentiles.

“the understanding darkened,”
being “alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them,”
because of “the blindness of their heart:”

In the last verses from 1st Corinthians, Paul said that believers have the MIND of Christ, which is a spirit led, illuminated mind that comprehends the things of God.

There is a tendency among evangelicalism to focus on the fact that some, much or all of this alienation from understanding is the result of sin.

And there is truth in this – accumulated sin or deep indulgence with sin and evil does have a tendency to deaden a person to the sway and influences of the Spirit behind the things of God.

That being said, it is often the very sin in us, when contrasted to the Light that God presents in the world, that causes a person to seek Him, to break, to be humble, and so I don’t normally take this approach that we find popular in other denominations and emphasize it.

Instead I choose to see the ungenerated state of all of us as – natural – until a persons sees the value in receiving and/or accepting the light into their lives.

Therefore all – the law abiding, faithful accountant, the ardent atheist, the crack-whore – all are, to some extent or another, have had

“the understanding darkened,”
are “alienated from the life of God (through the ignorance that is in them),” and this is the result of

“the blindness of their heart:”

We are dealing with two words here in these descriptions that are interrelated – the “empty (vain) mind” and the “blindness of the Heart.”

Heart blind, mind hollow.
Mind full of Truth? A heart that sees.

Many times in scripture the writers personify the human heart, describing it as

“lowly and abundant”
“possessing treasures”
“having eyes”
“with an ability to think”

Jesus said, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.”

So we have “the cardia,” in scripture, assigned with the abilities of the human brain. This is not literal or actual – only the brain thinks – but it does help us contribute to the Greek concept of nous, translated MIND.

Where is the mind, where is it located? We often say it is synonymous with brain but in scripture this is not the case. The mind is represented there as a amalgamation of our heart, brain, senses, views, opinions. It might best be viewed as our soul.

Like it or not, the biblical premise is all who have not been born from above, born-again, abide in spiritual darkness, with their

“the understanding darkened,”
And are “alienated from the life of God (through the ignorance that is in them),” and this is the result of “the blindness of their soul.”

And as a result they are not capable of comprehending or experiencing “the life of God.”

But one correction. The king James says that this is “because of the blindness of their heart.” But a better translation is because of the “hardness” of their heart, or because of the hardness of their soul – of “their mind, will and emotion.”

And admittedly, this IS where sin can do some real damage to the soul of an individual because we can, as humans become SO hard in soul by the repeated exposure to sin that we can get “beyond feeling.”

In the end the scripture appears to be describing an actual war between the Light and the Dark, between the will of God for all and the will of Man for self.

And the battleground is all in the mind of the individual. I do not subscribe to a God who pulled a blanket of darkness over people. I think the heart of darkness has always been present in those made in His image. There has to be a capacity for it in creations made with an ability to choose.

For this reason I think we can see how it is the heart of the individual that, while certainly affected by sin and deprivations, chooses.

And so, we pray that the hearts will be liberated and unclogged and able to see the Light and receive it.

The urgency of the message is in the fact of what Paul describes next, saying in verse 19

“Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.”

Going back to Romans we read:

“Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves.”

I am committed to the idea that we are all accountable for our sin, whatever it may be, and that they are the product of our own hearts, and that for this reason we are answerable before our maker for what we pursue in the carnival of life, what we allow, what we make our God, what we worship.

Speaking of their end times, Paul wrote in 1st Timothy 4:1-3:

1 Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;
2 Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;
3 Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.

I cite these passage because they point out that our consciences can be seared, as with a hot iron, to the point that we move beyond feeling, and are no longer able or willing to see or receive the light.

The writer of Hebrews put it this way:

“But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”

Wholly hardened in sin. There is a total want of all emotion on moral subjects. I’ve been there – in my wandering years.
And can attest to the fact that this is, in my estimation, an accurate description of the state of the soul of a hardened sinner.

Feeling, emotion, fairness and consideration for others abandons ship, and leaves the person hard.

Notice how Paul puts it here, saying that they “have given themselves over.”

It may happen over time, like cooking a frog, or it may happen suddenly, but it will all happen voluntarily.

Because Romans 1 says that God gave them up does not mean there is no responsibility on our part. For it says

“Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts.”

That is a two way street. I might even go so far as to say that God respected the choices of their minds so much that He gave them up to their will and desires.

I do not find him and evil God for this but Good. Interestingly, Paul writes, speaking of the Gentiles

“Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.”

In this we have the two way street illustrated again – with Romans saying that God gave them up and Ephesians saying that the individual had “given themselves over.”

That is some serious giving up going on here. But it also lets us know that the odd are stacked in favor of the individual as God certainly fights for them first, and then they also have to give themselves up too – before becoming so hard that no light can enter therein.

I feel very badly for those who have hardened souls. I feel a responsibility to help them see that there is cause and reason to believe. I also am empathetic to sin hardening them to a point of no return – here.

But I remain hopeful that every knee will bow and every tongue confess Jesus as Lord and that God will not lose one soul to the darkness of human will and weakness.

So, Paul has told the believers to not walk the way the Gentiles walk. And at this point he says:

20 But . . . you . . . have not so learned Christ;

In other words, “You have been taught a different thing by Christ who lives in you.”

But then he adds (at verse 21)

21 If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:

This is a really interesting caveat as Paul first says, “But you, my reader, have not learned to walk this way through Christ who is in you, (that is) “IF SO BE THAT YOU HAVE HEARD HIM AND HAVE BEEN TAUGHT BY HIM . . . as the truth is in Jesus.

Some translators have said that what Paul is really saying here is not a question but is more a statement of support, translating it “Seeing you have heard him, and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus.”

I’m not sure if that is a legitimate twist in the Greek but Dodderidge, a Puritan who wrote an abridge New Testament, believes it so. Then building off this idea, and what a true believe has been taught by Jesus, Paul now enters into the “Put Offs” and the “Put Ons” of a Christians walk.

So, seeing that they have heard Him and have been taught of Him, Paul adds

22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;

The word conversation here in the King James is not on point and should read,

“That you lay aside or renounce the conduct of the former or old man.”

The way he puts this implies that part of the responsibility of turning from the former ways lies in the hands of the individual.

Paul doesn’t say that the believer “should allow God to put off or renounce the conduct of the former man” but that “YOU” (and me) ought to lay aside that conduct.”

Of course, we are all empowered by God through the spirit by Christ to do it, but the point remains clear:

Believe must choose to allow Him to influence them, and this places the ball squarely in our court.

Because Paul in his actual letters to actual believers in actual places often writes advice to the church in this portion of his communications it seems that there was probably some sort of actual reason for Him to be giving this specific advice.

Perhaps a number of believers had like hogs, returned to the trough of their former lives and it concerned him.

But as to his advice itself the meaning is clear:

Make the choice to put off, lay aside, all the conduct that was once associated with your lives.

In that age and culture he probably meant things like their dress, and manners and speech and even diet, but he certainly meant their sin, worldly attitudes and depraved lifestyles. Which is why the full verse reads:

22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;

That line: “ the former conduct of the old man or woman, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts” seems to mean the former conduct of our life was corrupted by the lusts that deceived us – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, (to quote scripture).

This comment seems to be saying that that the “unrenewed man,” no matter how polished and refined, is not under the direction of Godly reason and sound sense, but is ultimately controlled by his passions and desires.

And the word lusts has a more limited meaning than the original word, which we presently assign to just one area of sensual appetites, but the original word describes any passion of the carnal fleshly heart and can include:

Intellectualism
Materialism
Sexual deviancy
Pride and arrogance
Abberance and lawlessness
Ego, carnality
Love of pleasures and all the rest

Paul, like Jesus, makes it clear that those pleasures are deceitful. They lead us astray and have the power to plunge people into hard ruin.

Perhaps more importantly, they are illusive and promise much more then they can deliver – especially in the eternal realms of reality. And then having laid out what to avoid, Paul adds a most important line:

23 And be “renewed” in the spirit of your mind.

We remember that earlier Paul said that the believers have the Mind of Christ.

We also recall that mind is different than brain in scripture, and that it most commonly speaks to the whole of a persons characteristics and views, including the heart.

Now Paul commend the renewing of it – this – such.

We remember that in Romans 12 Paul said at verses 1-2:

1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

We have some word smithing going on hear in the English

Not Conforming but Transforming.
Putting off and Putting On.

Paul repeats a similar putting off and on theme in Colossians 3, saying at verse 8:

8 But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth.
9 Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds;
10 And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him:
11 Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all.
12 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;
3 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.
15 And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.
16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
17 And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

So how does the Christian renew the mind that has been corrupted by sin and life in this world?

Remembering that the mind is a word representing the Heart, brain, will, drives, opinions, world view and emotions of an individual, how do we as Christians undertake a soul overhaul?

The word or term renew in the Greek is
an-ak-ah’-ee-no-sis and it has the same meaning as renovation.

When we renovate a house we restore the house to a solid state of repair, when we remodel a house, we actually change the shape and scope of the home.

Its important to see the word renew in this proper light. God created us and as such we were framed in His image.

That frame entered into disrepair and to be renewed or renovated is to be restored back to our original intended way.

We are NOT being remodeled, we are being renewed. Remodeling is the work of cults and other non-Christian views. The results of a remodel is we lose parts of the original creation – walls, and doors and ceilings and the like.

But to renew or renovate the soul of Shawn McCraney, the way Shawn McCraney is in the original remains!

Same person. Same template. Same DNA – just restored or renovated to the way Shawn should have been before being tweaked by philosophy, man, lust, sin and disease.

In this renewal, while the body is generally exempted, the MIND is renovated, and I would suggest that in order to restore or renew the contents of the mind, it must be replaced with truth – that original stuff with which to restore us.

And THAT comes by the hearing of the Word by the Spirit.

I have long described the hearing of the Word like scrubbing bubbles for the soul. When heard by the Spirit, it serves – above any other thing on earth – to renew the human soul, the mind, the will, the emotions, replacing the corrupt with the incorruptible.

When we get to the next chapter here in Ephesians, Paul says something that is bookended in a topic about marriage and appears to be a sideline about something else.

There he writes:

Eph 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;

And then he adds the following

26 That he (Christ) might sanctify and cleanse it (the Church) with the washing of water by the word,
27 That he (Christ) might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.
And then he returns to the topic of marriage and says
28 So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.

These short verses speak to the power of the Word in the life of a believer, saying that Christ sanctifies and cleanses the Church “with the washing of water by the word”

27 That he (Christ) might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.

This is the goal and focus of Paul to each individual believer, that their soul would also be renovated and without spot or wringle or of any such thing of the former man, but that it should be holy and without blemish.

All of it only possible in Christ through the Spirit, by the washing of the word, which renovates the soul.

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