- Hello, everyone. For tonight's Bible study, we're going to be studying Ephesians chapter 5, verses 7 through 14, and continuing on the command and challenge for us to walk worthy of the gospel, to walk in the image of God, and tonight it's going to be to walk as children of light.

Before we take the time to dive into the study, let's take a moment to pray, ask for the Lord's blessing on our study. Our God, we thank you so much for your grace. Lord, each week we're grateful for the precious word that we receive. We recognize that throughout history, your saints have seen your word for what it is, that God, your word is a light unto our feet, and God, that as it dwells within us, as it produces in us the effect and the fruit that you desire, God, that you call us to shine this light.

I pray, Father God, that we would be walking then, walking according to your truth, that God, we would be able to apply in all the different facets of our lives, Lord. Thank you for this time of study and pray that God, again, thoroughly and deeply, you would continue to change us.

We thank you in Christ's name. Amen. Okay. So, if you would follow with me as I read chapter five, starting from verse one. It's good sometimes just to review the sections before us, because there's so much in there, but particularly today, because you recognize that the two paragraphs really flow one to another.

So, let's take a moment to read. It says, "Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love just as Christ also loved you and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a flagrant, fragrant aroma. But immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you as is proper among saints.

And there must be no filthiness and silly talk or coarse jesting which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks. For this you know with certainty, that no immoral or impure person or covetous man who is an idolater has an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things, the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

Therefore, do not be partakers with them." Verse eight, "For you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the world. Walk 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. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them.

For it is 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.'" Okay?

So as we recall, there were some really emphatic commands for us to abide by. And the way that I talked about them in the previous Bible studies are that these are broad categorical commands, right? And then underneath them were very specific applications. Whether it be the idea for us to walk worthy of the calling, and that was emphasized to us, then to walk in love, patience and humility, and pursuing unity.

What's more, to imitate God as children. Then again, to walk in love, and then also to make sure that we're putting off certain things that were of our former selves. Likewise, categorically tonight, he's going to challenge us, the scripture's going to challenge us to walk as children of light.

The way that I like to outline our passage today is in three sections. Okay? And sometimes the sections don't go as clearly, but what I observed were the commands for us to not partake, but to walk in the light. And then a repeated command, essentially saying the same thing, but giving a different rationale, saying don't partake, but rather expose it in the light.

And then verse 14, giving us a gospel call to wake up as the light of Christ shines. So as we take a look at our passage, I do want to highlight that there is such a flow of thought that continued from the beginning of chapter five into this section.

And you'll notice as I highlight these key terms where it says, therefore do this, or more specifically here, therefore don't do this, right? To not be partakers. And then it says for your formerly darkness. And what's more in verse nine, for the fruit of light consists of these. And then in verse 12, for it is disgraceful even to speak.

So what I observed and noticed within that portion was that within the context, there are commands and there are rationales. Okay? Commands and rationales. So by way of observation, I want to highlight those things. And let's first talk about the command. Okay? The command for us here is to not be partakers with them.

Previously he was talking about those who are immoral, impure, greedy, covetous, and idolatrous people. Previously he said, because for certain you know that the wrath of God is going to come. And all those who are disobedient are going to be judged by God. Right? That's the way that Apostle Paul framed last week's teaching or that section.

Okay? Here Apostle Paul reiterates and says, if you know these things, right? If you know that the wrath of God is coming, then make sure you're not partakers with them. Now by way of just looking up the idea of what does it mean to be a partaker? Does that mean just like avoid them?

Don't even walk near them? Should we go as far as maybe, you know, the Jews of old who are like, I'm not even going to walk near their city. Like what should we be thinking? Well, in terms of just a pure definition, it's talking about a partnership. It's talking about an associate who has essentially, if you think of an associate of a company, associate even as a individual who's working for the same sale, for the same cause or the purpose, that kind of idea.

But I want to highlight some other passages because you know that the scriptures actually talk about this quite a bit in terms of walking with the world, friendship with the world. There's so much to say. Now I'd like to highlight just two passages here. The first one comes from Psalm chapter one and it says this, "Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord and on his law he meditates day and night.

He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away." I want to ask you, when you think about do not be partakers with them, if you're thinking so long as I don't fulfill their actions, so long as I don't do exactly as they do, are you not partakers with them?

Well here in wisdom, right, the book of Psalms challenges us not to sit there underneath their counsel, not to stand there with them, and not to sit with them in scoffers. And there's like a progression as you walk and be a part of their whole mentality and worldview. Here's another interesting passage.

First Corinthians chapter five, verse nine through 11. "I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people. I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world or with the covetous and swindlers or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world." So one might say, well, Jesus dined with sinners.

Very true, right? Jesus ministered to the lost. Jesus was found to be talking with an adulterous woman. Jesus was found ministering together with former tax collectors. I mean, you think about individuals who are sinners, can you be in their proximity? The answer is yes, otherwise you would have to go out, right, into the wilderness or something.

But verse 11 says, "But actually I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person or covetous, an idolater or reviler or a drunkard or a swindler, not even to eat with such a one." So I want you to think about that.

We have to have a kind of growing understanding of what apostle Paul wants us to do. And there is this idea, it's first and foremost, he says, you understand where they're headed, right? That's exactly what he was previously saying. You have these individuals who are living by their desires, living by what they believe is right, living by their own greed, and what you know for certain is where they're headed and how God views that.

I don't want you condoning anything that is pertaining to what God disapproves of, what God is going to judge and pour His wrath on. And so I want you to also think about this. Yes, it's true, you can be in close proximity, but when you think about Christ, his intentionality for why he would be in proximity with individuals, it's very different from this generation.

What's more, when you think about this passage in 1 Corinthians 5, there is clearly this adamant, I guess, admonition that if you just simply walk with individuals who are so-called brothers who are supposed to be walking in the light, and yet you act and walk with them as though everything is okay, that is in fact not okay.

You can't give any kind of credence to their lifestyle if they're called a so-called brother. There has to be consequences, essentially. There has to be ramifications for the fact that they live in such a manner. Okay, now, one of the things, again, that I was trying to highlight for you earlier by showing you the therefores and the fores was that this passage was chock full of rationales.

The why. Why am I supposed to have that kind of clarity between me and the individuals of the world? Why am I supposed to have that kind of clear distinction? Are we supposed to be drawing lines and creating boundaries within the world between Christians and non-Christians? May I say from the beginning, whether we see it or not, there is already a massive divide between those who are called by Christ and those who are not.

Not in any kind of arrogant or self-righteous way. It is the state of spiritual reality, right? Here, rationale one, it says, "For you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the world." Here is a motivation as to why we're not supposed to be particulars with them. As a matter of fact, again, the passage is chock full of them and I numbered them here.

When you guys see a pattern or a list, I recommend that you take a moment to list all the things that are there. "For you were formerly darkness, but now you are light. For the fruit of light consists of all goodness, righteousness, and truth. For it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret.

For everything that becomes visible is light." What I'm going to do now is take those motivations and highlight them for you. Motivation number one, the dark to light transformation is your identity. The dark to light transformation is your identity. What do I mean by that? He tells you what you were formerly and what you are now.

The whole of that is your identity. When you look at your past and you're super discouraged, that is not the whole of your identity. Your identity includes everything about who you were and who you are now. It's not as though because we're emphasizing who we are now that everything about the past becomes completely, completely forgotten.

No, we remember the fallenness. We recall the pits from which Christ has saved us. All of that to us then is a powerful identity where we can say, "We are the transformed. We are the renewed." If you recall that contrast, we're supposed to actually, I guess, appreciate. The longer we live, we're supposed to be able to see in more grand picture, "Oh my goodness, look how far I was from God.

Look how deserving I was of His judgment. Look how utterly incapable, utterly impossible it was for me to attain to anything, to fix anything. Look how great His grace is." That kind of divide, we're supposed to appreciate more and more as we live. Why? Because that contrast shows to us a great, great powerful motivation as to why we need to be all the more walking in the light.

That contrast, he shows us by describing the fruit of righteousness, or sorry, fruit of light, which is righteousness. The fruit of light of righteousness. The way that he says it is, "The fruit of light consists of these, all goodness, righteousness, and truth." What are we saying here? What he's talking about is the various things that we want, greater good, greater righteousness in the world, greater adherence to truth.

All of these things come from being in the light. It doesn't come from just simply having positions of power. It doesn't come from using our intellect. It comes from being in the light of Christ. It comes from the Lord. One of the challenges I want to give to you is this, when we think about the things that we engage in, whether it be the context of our home, whether it be, let's say, difficult scenarios, let's say in marriage, whether it be situations and circumstances at work where it's all tricky and dicey, I want you to ask this question, "What am I trying to accomplish?

What fruit am I trying to grow?" Because we have this tendency to get so distracted with wanting a specific, I guess, outcome, a goal. Like we're anticipating a certain kind of circumstance that we would like to see. And sometimes it just gets us so, so distracted. One of the ways by which we can continue to test, "Are we walking in the light?" is by using this.

It's both a motivation and essentially a test for us. It's motivation because the only way to righteousness, as we were talking about this past Sunday, is the light. But what's more, to check to see if we are in the light, we should be asking, "What is it that I actually want to accomplish?" Now, I've said to myself before, I don't want to necessarily use my children too much as an example, but yesterday night I was just at home and little Emmett came up and he was trying to tell me, "Oh, Abba.

Yoshi and I, Heng and I, we were messing around and then his foot smacked my face and left my nose all runny." Now, Yoshi came running over and he was all scared. So he was like, "No, it's not true." And I was like, "What? What's not true? Your foot did it in his face?" He was like, "No.

He's just trying to get me in trouble. I didn't mean to." And he was defending himself. And he was coming at me. And I remember thinking, "Whoa, whoa, hold on. All Emmett said was that you guys were horsing around. You're not in trouble sometimes. You guys horse around and you guys get hurt.

Nobody's in trouble." And he's like, "No, but that's not what happened." And I was like, "What? Stop. Like, Emmett didn't say that you were a bad, bad man. He was just saying that your foot smacked you in the face, right? I mean, smacked him in the face." And he just kept coming at me like he's trying to defend himself.

And I was just like, "Stop." And I started giggling and laughing. I was like, "What are you doing? If your point is I shouldn't be in trouble, you're not in trouble. The reality is you're not in trouble." And I started laughing at him. And then all of a sudden he realized like, "Okay, why are you laughing?" And I just asked him, "What's the reality?

The reality is your foot smacked him in the face. Also the reality is you're not in trouble. What are you arguing about?" And then we just started laughing together because he was like, "Okay." But the fear, like the goal was I don't want to be in trouble. I don't deserve this, right?

The fear of, "Oh my goodness, my brother's going to tattle-tale and he's going to get me in trouble because he's going to lie," or something like that. The fear to try to preemptively protect himself caused him to argue with me pointlessly. And I wanted him to see that like, "Listen, think about what you're trying to accomplish.

You're just trying to accomplish like, 'I better know what happened.'" Like you weren't even listening to what I was saying. And so I realized sometimes even in like marriage conflict, even in like workplace scenario, if your goal is like, "You know, I just need to speak my piece." Like, if your goal is like, "I just want to make sure I get due credit for this." Like, think about the fruit.

Is the fruit goodness? Is the fruit more honesty? Is the fruit like better mutual understanding? Like, are you listening? Is the fruit more righteousness between the two of us? Like, is the fruits greater joy? Is the fruit like greater working together in harmony for the good of the company?

So that, you know, yes, we're going to try to, you know, sell more products and do good for the public too, right? Like whatever it may be, we want to provide good services, whatever it may be. Are you actually producing good? Or is the fruit actually destructive? Is the fruit just for yourself?

And that's why later on in verse 11, this passage says the deeds of darkness is not like heinously vile. You know what it says? The deeds of darkness is unfruitful. Like there's such vanity wrapped up in thinking like the world and pursuing the world's objectives. And so we have to ask, what kind of fruits are we producing with what we are engaging in?

What's more, motivation number three, why should we not partake in the darkness, but continue to walk in greater light is because the fruits of darkness is actually disgraceful. Okay. Meaning there's shame. Okay. Definitions wise, that the term for disgraceful is dishonorable, act indecent, completely inappropriate or used in another context in one of the first Timothy passage about elders looking for sword gain.

It's inappropriate, dishonest gain. Okay. And what I'd like to highlight here is the scriptures essentially tell you that the deeds of darkness is shameful. Okay. And the fact of the matter is I do believe scripture has challenged every single one of us. Now, when you are a Christian, you are exposed to the light and you have greater insight as to what things are actually appropriate.

When we are not in the light, we're like kids. We have no idea what's appropriate or not. You know, when little kids, they just come out there and they're like, Oh, look at my shirt. They just take off their shirt and expose themselves. And the parents are like, Oh no, you know, shame.

You got to have some sense when we are outside of Christ, essentially when we're outside of even, especially even the Christian community. Sometimes I like to call it the, I'm buff in my own room syndrome. I've used this analogy a lot. When you are kind of confined to your own space in your own room, certain things seem so because of like scale so different.

When you're in your own room, you flex in front of that mirror. You look huge, right? When you're in front of your closet door and then your room is only like a 10 by 10 room and you just like flexing, you're like, Oh, I'm huge. Right? You go out into the world and you realize, you know what?

I'm actually below average. You're just a lot smaller than a lot of people. But if we're not exposed to the Christian community and what's more actually exposed to the light of Christ, our frame of reference is always off. Our scaling is all off. Right? And so what ends up happening is we don't know what's appropriate.

What's more scripture actually rebukes people through all generations because sometimes their reaction to shame is one of two things. One is to take their kind of guilt and shame radar and just be like pounded to the ground. But like, I'm not going to feel guilty about this. I'll do what I want.

Right? Like that's one reaction. The other reaction is to just keep hiding deeper and deeper into your hole because your shame just grows. Either way, it's not good. And here's an interesting passage from scripture from Jeremiah chapter six, verse 15, where it says, "Were they ashamed because of the abomination they have done?

They were not even ashamed at all. They did not even know how to blush. Therefore, they shall fall among those who fall. At the time that I punish them, they shall be cast down, says the Lord." It is actually a good thing to know appropriate shame. It is a good thing to know what is appropriate honor.

It's a good thing to know when to blush before God. And so I have to just kind of take a moment to say, whenever you feel shame, don't just always spurn that off as like, "Oh, it's because people are judgmental." Right? You have to take a moment to ask like, "Why is there shame?" And if shame is used for things that are tangibly real, truthful, honest, things were actually intended to grow, then you must actually respond appropriately to that with humility, with a learner spirit, with a desire to grow and mature.

Shame will cause us to actually move towards proper restraint, greater self-control. It typically leads us down thinking through the eyes, right? The eyes of those who are watching us. And it's actually helpful if we're thinking about the right way. Essentially, we're thinking about the eyes of God and we're thinking about the eyes of the people we love within the church community, within the family of God.

Right? So the other thing is, I think sometimes, because I'm a pastor, I do recognize that those two responses come out a lot. There are moments when some people, just because I'm a pastor, this just happened to the other day, because I'm a pastor, one of my neighbors just kind of started confessing like the stuff that they did.

When I see that, I mean, I don't want to be a source of shame for people, but in some sense, if they think that I am like a standard, like I'm thinking of an individual who holds holy standards and therefore they need to correct themselves in front of me, is that a bad thing?

I don't think so. I actually think that's a good thing. But on the flip side, if you look at me and you're just like, "Oh, I don't want to be around you because you just always make me feel super self-conscious." Well, there are deeper issues that I think we need to deal with.

So with that just being said, in terms of shame, it's not always something to be spurned. It can go bad. At the same time, we have to make sure we're responding to it appropriately. Number four motivation, which is the light of God is powerful. The light is absolutely powerful.

Look at what the scripture says, "But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. There is nothing hidden from the power of the word of God." Scripture talks about in Psalm 19, that essentially the revelation of God goes forth and it's like the sun, just hits everything.

And though yes, you may be trying to hide in the tunnel, even the tunnels, even the tunnels are affected by the warmth of the sun. The light of God, it shines and it affects and it's powerful. And so I want you to think, when we talk about conflict resolution in your home, in your family, some of the toughest things, sometimes we're arguing from hurt and darkness.

And what needs to happen in order to work this out is that there has to be the revelation and the light of God. Okay? So I want us to think through these things and think about those motivations. Why? Please take a moment to think with me here. It's not like, "Oh, you know, once in a while I'm tempted with evil, darkness.

Am I once in a while tempted with lust? No. Am I once in a while tempted with greed? No. I am very frequently inundated with, 'Want this, buy this. You don't have enough money. You should get, you know, you should, if you have money to buy this and this, you'd be so happy.'" Like that kind of temptation is all around us.

Whether it be selfishness, self-preservation, self-promotion, pride, all of these things are immoral because it's twisted. I shouldn't be a prideful man if I know who I am before God, who I was, now transformed to the newness, into the new life of Christ, right? All those things are perverse. For a man to constantly lust after more and more women, that's all perverse.

Those temptations are all around us. Question for you. Do you feel like you have power, motivation, strength from the inside to fight those things? And then my question would be, were you able in certain moments of your temptation to express why? What rationale would you have to choose to walk in light?

Have you ever said, "You know what? That's not me anymore because I'm a redeemed person. I'm a transformed person." Right? Did you ever say, "You know what? The light is powerful. Even though in my tiny little room, I think I can get away with this. The light of God is powerful.

He sees all." Right? Like, has that powerful truth affected the way you face temptation? And again, these things are not just passing truths. These are things that are, I guess you could just say, they're real. These are real things. And so I want to challenge you. It's good for us to rehearse these great truths that stand for us as strength.

It's good for us to continue walking in the light. Okay? Now let's talk about this command. The command is a combination in verse 8 and verse 10. Right? The command is, "Walk as children of light." And then he adds, "Trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord." So the growth pattern, the maturity should be, you are walking as a child of God, imitating Him.

And because God is your source, because God is your strength, because God is your everything, you as His child, you're resembling that light, that glory. And in that, you're constantly trying to understand the heart of God and His will, what is pleasing to Him. If you recall, one of the things that we learned previously was a beautiful picture of when God is pleased by the aroma of self-sacrifice, because it resembles Him so much, because it truly shows the weight of His love.

Right? So you're growing in your ability to carry the burdens of the people around you, to sacrifice yourself, your energy, your time, your money, your resources, whatever it may be, the attention span so to speak. Right? Like all of that, sacrificing for the good of the people you love, that in God's eyes is very pleasing.

Here's a question to you. Do you understand and are you growing in your understanding and conviction that this pleases God? I have conviction to say like that right there, dishonoring to the Lord. I know it. Right? What's more, that right there, God loves that. Like, do you have a growing base of biblical understanding?

I want to highlight a passage for you. Scripture says, "This is the message we have heard from Him and announced to you that God is light and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

But if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us." I find that interesting that that passage goes together.

It pretty much reiterates the challenge, walk in the light, right? Because God Himself is light. The connection is really clear. Because God is, you have to walk appropriately. But within all that, we recognize that there is this element of, there should be a growing then recognition because the light's been turned on.

You should be able to see sin. Right? Like, that's what I'm talking about. Like, are you growing in your discernment? Not only that, but like that right there, like if it's on you, right? Like that right there is sin. That right there is sin. You should be growing in that capacity.

Here's another thing. I want to challenge you and ask this question to please take a moment to think about what is great faith. Right? So the question is to think about what is great faith. Now one of the things in terms of great faith that we think sometimes is where you have such courage, like, "Because I have faith, I'm going to stand tall.

Because I have faith, I'm going to move. Because I have faith, I'm going to do this crazy, you know, like monetary sacrifice and take the risks." Okay? Your faith is going to empower you to do that. Right? But in terms of the greatness of the faith, we don't have to overcomplicate it.

The greatness of the faith means that you understand God. Right? You understand His mind because you've been wanting to know His heart. There is this Latin term, "caram deo," which means "in the presence of God." When your awareness of God grows and you recognize what honors Him, what pleases Him, you know His tastes, you know His likes and dislikes basically.

And you're growing to know of conviction, these are the things that please God. Essentially your faith is becoming great. Right? You understand Him. And so let me ask you, like, you know, in the later passages when we study the next section, he's going to talk about the submissive spirit.

You understand that what pleases God is not this, like, "I'm a powerful man. You better recognize." No. That is not actually, like, impressive to God. What's very impressive to God is you know how to submit yourself. When for not necessarily, like, because it's the right thing to do, but because of the wisdom, because of the intentionality and sincerity and the wealth of love in your heart, when you're able to submit yourself, your preferences, your self-interest, He says, "That's precious." When He talks to the ladies and He's, and He doesn't talk to, what I mean is, in 1 Peter chapter 3, He speaks to the ladies and says, "You know, this humble, meek spirit is precious in the sight of God." Right?

Do you recognize that these things, there are so many parts of Scripture that tells us these are the things that God delights in? Are those your convictions? Okay? All right. So now, what I'd like to do is take a moment to pause and say, so far what we've seen is the command.

Do not be partakers with them. Right? Don't partner with them for sure. But we also saw that it means a little bit more in the sense that when we look at systematic theology and realize there is a way in which we can behave where we operate, we follow their counsel, we take their worldview, and then we condone them and sit with them.

Right? And we don't want to do that. And what's more, He says, "Walk as children in light," and so we're being challenged and motivated to continue to resemble God in all things related to His truth and reality. Light typically means that there is now then an exposure, like that now that your eyes are open and things are illuminated so that you can distinguish.

That's where that is. Right? And that's what we should be growing in. Essentially, what He does is in verse 11 through 13, He repeats the same idea. And so we're going to take less time going over it. What He says is, "Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them." So here's the command.

Do not partake, but the second part of it is expose in the light. To expose is a really commonly used term in the Bible. It's used in lots of different scenarios, and it means to prove wrong, to refute, reprove, or correct. Okay? So there is this very instructive, like, "That's wrong.

This is right," kind of exposing. Okay? Now, I just want to give a challenge. Right? The unfruitful deeds of darkness, do we now become the police that essentially goes around and makes sure that we enforce the law? Well, I'm going to say yes and no. Okay? What I mean by yes and no is the law of God is of such weight, it has to be upheld.

You know, sometimes I realize, like, again, I'm no crazy veteran in ministry, but having been in ministry for a while, you know, there are just some people I don't want to tell them anything is wrong because they're just dear to you. You know, they themselves are soft and, like, you know, tender, and I just would feel bad if I said this and that kind of stuff.

And that's one challenge, right? It's like, "Ooh, the relational aspect of it, how is it sometimes going to challenge my desire to uphold the objective, universal, and everlasting standard of God?" Right? So, scripture gives us this challenge. Scripture says in Galatians chapter 6, "Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass or sin, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, each one looking to yourself so that you too will not be tempted.

Bear one another's burdens and thereby fulfill the law of Christ." You know, I realize sometimes as I'm learning through this kind of stuff, that passage challenges us to expose, right? But I hope we're not thinking, like, "We need to shame people." I'm not necessarily sure that that's exactly what it's getting at.

Because as we think about even, let's say, like, correction and teaching, Apostle Paul talks about instructing people like his children, right? When we think about even the magnitude of scripture in 2 Timothy chapter 3, verse 16, how it's all God-breathed, he says, "This is good for instruction, reproof, and so forth," right?

And essentially then, teaching and instruction has various forms, depending on context, depending on what it is, and all that kind of stuff. But clearly here in terms of the intent, the scriptures teaches us we need to make sure that we are in the business of restoring. What's more, the way that we're going about it, it's not so much like, "Ha!

Look at you! Look what you're doing under there!" Right? It's more like you're carrying the person's burden and thereby fulfilling the law. Right? Fulfilling the law of love. And that's what we want to be doing. I think for most people, this challenge is going to be kind of tough.

Because number one, for most people, they're already feeling kind of like, "You know this passage says, 'Look out for yourself because you could be tempted, right? You could sin too.'" I think for most people, they feel guilty of their own sins and they don't feel the right to go and rebuke somebody else.

I think that's the vast majority of people. And I want to give this challenge. We realize the scripture is challenging us. No, no, no. The weight of the Word of God is not predicated by your own track record as whether you're allowed to say it or not. Right? The scripture is not true because you've done well.

Right? The scripture is true because the scripture is true. And so what we have to do is do what this passage in Galatians is saying, is to be cautious. That we're not pointing a massive accusatory finger like, "Look at what you've been doing under there." Right? That's not the way that we should be doing things.

Or rather, we should be designed to restore. But I do want to ask, man, if we are going to be correcting and improving, it does require for us to at least have a working base. That we should have an understanding of wisdom and discernment from the scriptures. That even if we're going to correct, that correction comes with wisdom and understanding.

Right? I think the worst thing we can be doing is making people feel like, I don't know, not the worst thing, but another error that we could fall into is making people feel absolutely guilty and messing with the consciences of people because we weren't very well informed about the truth, about what the scripture has to say.

Okay. Lastly, in verse 14, it says, "For this reason," it says, "Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you." And Christ will shine on you. Now recognize that here when it says, "For this reason," this is a then conclusion statement. It's like, it should kind of be read as, "Therefore it says," right?

As opposed to, "For this reason," meaning that this is another one of the motivations, but rather this is an exhortation. This is a therefore conclusion. What needs to happen essentially is awake. Right? Wake up. But what I like to say is in this passage, I mean, what a highlight of the gospel truth.

Like Apostle Paul is challenging us. Look, you know, you know the difference. You've been taught the gospel. You know the difference between darkness and light. The darkness is subject to wrath. The darkness is characterized by blindness. The darkness is characterized by vanity and fruitlessness. It's absolutely empty. But you know the light.

The light of God produces righteousness. The light of God is powerful. The light of God illuminates and makes you wise. Wake up and see. What a challenge. This passage actually is a quotation, a rendering of the Old Testament passage in Isaiah chapter 60. And this passage reads like this, "Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.

For behold, darkness will cover the earth and the deep darkness the people, but the Lord will rise upon you and his glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising. Lift up your eyes, round about and see. They all gather together.

They come to you. Your sons will come from afar and your daughters will be carried in the arms. Then you will see and be radiant and your heart will thrill and rejoice because the abundance of the sea will be turned to you. The wealth of the nations will come to you." To me, that's a great, great picture of the gospel call.

When we're calling people to the light, yes, by nature of the circumstance, the light is going to expose people's sin. But we also recognize by being in the light, of course there's shame that like, "Oh my goodness, I was this dirty," right? There's this initial reaction. But the picture here is joy.

That by being in the light, when we walk in the light of God, there is this, like all the stuff here is thoughts of radiance, glory, abundance, because that's what the Lord provides. For us, this was such a convicting passage. In John chapter three, it says, "This is a judgment that the light has come into the world.

The men love the darkness rather than the light for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the light so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought of God." If you noticed, in the previous passage, the section of our verse, excuse me, why did I not have it all of a sudden?

Okay, here we go. When you look at this passage here, in verse 13, it reads a little funny, right? But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light. For everything that becomes visible is light. It's like, wait, what? I get the idea that everything becomes visible when they're exposed to the light because that's what we should be doing.

We're essentially shining the light, the light of Christ, with his truth, with his reality, with what he's given to us as this is actually the way things are. The lies that we've been told where your sins are inconsequential doesn't hurt anybody, right? No one actually is affected by that stuff.

No, that's not true. All those things are a lie, right? If you're going to work hard and you fight for things and all this kind of stuff, you're going to be happy here. All that is a lie, right? Imagine this. If you had both all the money in the world, all the liberties, and the power to protect your liberties, and what's more, you had a generation where essentially there was like, I guess you could say, a social utopia, right?

To think you would be happy and at peace is an absolute lie. We learn that without Christ, knowledge without Christ, miracles without Christ, I don't know, like an amazing government without Christ, whatever it may be, anything without Christ, money without Christ, possession without Christ, the scripture has already told us, saints before us already told us, King Solomon said, "You know what?

Your life doesn't even consist of your possessions." You could have all the pleasures in the world, all the reputation, the people's respect, still so empty is what King Solomon said. Okay, talk about this because when we live by those truths, we're shining light. We're shining reality, right? And what's really interesting, it says for everything that becomes visible then, it is light.

So now going back to that John chapter three passage, notice what he says, that as we practice the truth and come to the light, our deeds becomes manifest, becomes really, really clear that those deeds are wrought of God. And brothers and sisters, that is a powerful thing. When we seek to abide by the truth of God, both the light is shining upon us and what's more we are shining, that the faith that God has given us is bearing its fruit.

And then us, we're indicating and revealing that the mighty power of God is working within us. And so I just want to give this challenge again. Today, in this passage, there were many motivations, but essentially when I say motivations, those are propositional faith truths. This is who you are.

This is what righteousness is. This is what light produces. This is what darkness produces. Those are all propositional truths of faith. I pray that you hold onto those things dearly, that they become powerful motivators for you to not only resist temptation, but walk in righteousness. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you so much for your word, God.

Truly, Lord. God, it would be devastating for us if we're not able to study your word. Why? Because we would be lost, because we wouldn't be able to see, because we'd be in darkness. I pray, Lord, that right now, again, as we are in somewhat of an incredibly strange time of unrest, division, anger, injustices, all these things, Lord, I pray, Father God, that we would cling all the more to your truth.

Grant to us wisdom, understanding, discretion. Grant to us, Father God, greater faith, that God, we would not operate and react simply by what we see, but Lord, we would walk by what you have already told us. We thank you, it's in Christ, and we pray. Amen.