I'm going to be looking at both
of those passages that Brother David read because that, as he
said, that Colossians 3 passage is a parallel to Ephesians 6. There's a lot of the book of
Colossians. Paul writing to the believers
at a place called Colossae. There's a lot of that book, shorter
book, that's parallel to what he wrote to the believers at
Ephesus here in Ephesians. that we're coming into the last
chapter. And I really want to focus in on a certain phrase
here that we find in verse 6 of Ephesians chapter 6 where the
Apostle wrote, not with I service as men pleasers but as servants
of Christ. And here's the phrase I want to focus on this morning
in light of the commandments and the instructions that the
Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write here concerning children
and fathers and mothers and servants. And that phrase is doing the
will of God. And that's what I've entitled
the message. Doing the will of God. You know,
people all over the place, they say, well, I just want to do
the will of God. Well, what do you mean by that? What do you
think that's saying? That's an easy thing to say.
It's not always something that goes along with our desires or
our feelings. or our situation, but I do want
to deal with that. And the first thing I want to
show you, you know, when we talk about living the life of Christ,
Christian living, as we might say, living the Christian life,
there's several keys to that. I've preached messages and had
different outlines on that subject. One of them that I preached on
several months ago was what I call the three S's that the Christian
life is there's state, you gotta realize your state. That's our
state before, I'm sorry, I got it mixed up already. Standing
is number one. Our standing before God in Christ. How do I, as a sinner, A sinner
saved by grace. How do I stand before God in
Christ? Well, I stand forgiven of all
my sins. And what brought that about?
One thing. The blood of Christ. Nothing
else. Now, I've done a lot of crying,
a lot of repenting, a lot of sorrow, a lot of turning, and
a lot of changing my mind. I've done a lot of that in my
almost 70 years now. But none of that brought about
the forgiveness of my sins. None of it did. Just one person
and one act, for by His one offering, He hath perfected forever them
that are sanctified. Isn't that glorious? And the reason that that's so
powerful, it's because of who He is. He's God manifest in the
flesh, but that's our standing before God. I'm righteous in
God's sight. When I read these instructions,
these commandments about husbands and wives and fathers and mothers,
children, masters and servants, which today we would relegate
that to employees and employers. How we deal with, in these relationships
that we deal with it every day. I have failed a lot of times.
I've had some success now, but I've had some failures too. But
my failures didn't, as sin is not imputed to me because Christ
had it imputed to me, my failures didn't affect my standing before
God, and my successes have not enhanced my standing before God. It's Christ's righteousness,
imputed, alone. And then the next S is our state,
our state in this world. Now I know my standing before
God is secure, it never changes, but our state changes. The first
big change is we were brought from darkness into light, we
were born again by the Spirit. We started out in darkness, in
spiritual death and depravity, unbelief. But God, at a time
appointed by Him, brought us under the gospel, and gave us
life by the Spirit, gave us eyes to see, ears to hear, the gift
of faith, the gift of repentance, and that's our state before God.
As sinners, we're sinners, and we won't rise above that, got
news for you, but we're sinners saved by grace. We're sinners
who believe in Christ, who look to Christ, And that's our state. But then the third S is the word,
it's a big word, not big in letters, but big in life. It's called
struggle. Life's a struggle. Boy, you didn't
come here this morning to get down, did you? I'm not just trying to bring
you down. I'm just trying to be real. It's a struggle. I would
look back on my life and I would say, it's been a happy life. God has really blessed me so
many ways. And I've been so unthankful so
many times in so many ways. But life is a struggle. And it's
like Brother Gary Shepard said when he was standing on the shores
of the Atlantic over there where he lives, he said, you know,
the tide goes out, but it's coming back in. And that's what happens,
isn't it? So when we read passages like
this, he talks about, you know, he spoke of wives and husbands,
husbands and wives here, I dealt with that last week. How the
marriage between a man and a woman, and that's the only biblical
marriage there is, that's the only godly marriage is, one man,
one woman. And how they are to take their
proper roles in the family for the good of the family, the husband,
the head of the family, the wife, the helpmate. but not inequal
or unequal, but working together as a couple to be the success
of the family as blessed by God. And Paul wrote about that over
here in Colossians 3.18, but he didn't say much about it here,
did he? Somebody said, well, maybe the Colossians didn't have
much of a marriage problem as the Ephesians did. I don't know
about that. But he says, husbands, love your wives and be not bitter.
Again, wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands. And so
he spoke of that, but I dealt with that last week. But here
he says, in Ephesians chapter six, he says, children, children
obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Can you imagine
that? Doing something because it's
right. That's a foreign concept in our
day, isn't it? Just do it because, why should
I do that? Because it's right. Well, who
says it's right? The standard of all right, God. He says it. This is right. Now what we're talking about
here is the will of God. The will of God. And the problem
is this. As sinners saved by grace, we
still have the flesh and it's sometimes the flesh will control
our wills to where our will is not in line with God's will.
You understand what I'm saying? What God wants me to do and tells
me to do. Now listen, when I say what God
wants me to do, I'm not talking about what God's trying to get
me to do. I'm gonna talk to you about this thing of the will
of God now. God's will is sovereign. Mark it down. And it's never
broken. But this is God's revealed will
by way of commandment for our everyday lives. And children,
obey your parents. Are there any times you don't
want to obey your parents? There are. I know from personal
experience. All of us do. But he says, in
the Lord. Now obviously, anything that
God says about the husband and the wife, the child and the parent,
the parent and the child, the employer and the employee, if
anybody who's in authority, such as the parents over the child,
tells that child or treats that child in a way that is ungodly,
against the revealed will of God. No child is to obey that. If a parent would tell, you know,
I remember coming up, you know, we would see these old movies
about these gangs in, like in the 1920s, and there was a woman
named Mal Barker. Y'all remember Mal Barker? Well,
she told her children to go out and kill people, rob banks. In that case, don't obey your
parents. Disobey. because God says, thou shalt
not steal, thou shalt not kill. So understand that. So when he
says, children, obey your parents in the Lord, because it's right. That's a healthy relationship. Honor, verse two, honor thy father
and thy mother, which is the first commandment with promise.
He's referring back to, as brother David said, back to the 10 commandments,
that commandment to honor your father and mother promise attached
to it and it was given actually to the people of Israel in the
land of Canaan. He said that your days may be
long in the land and here he says with promise verse 3 that
it may be well with thee that thou mayest live long on the
earth. Now this is what we call a maxim in the Bible just like
in the book of Proverbs. You have certain things where
we're told to do this in order to honor God to honor one another,
and there's a promise attached, but it's not always a written
law. There have been young people
who've obeyed their parents and died young. In other words, this
is not a guaranteed promise of long life to obedient children.
But now back in the old covenant, when that promise was given and
that promise was added to that commandment, that had a real
application because disobedient children were to be put to death. Now we're not just talking about
children who needed a spanking or needed to be set in the corner
every now and then. We're talking about absolute rebels. Give you
an example was old Eli. Remember his sons? I can't remember
their names. Anybody remember their names?
Was it Phineas or something like that? But anyway, I can't remember.
That's unusual for me not to remember. Houghnine, Phineas,
good, thank you, Frank. And they were rebellious. They
wanted to dishonor God. and enter into the tabernacle
and defile it, bring strange fire, and they were killed. And
Eli, and you know what he said, he said, it's the Lord, let him
do what he will. Now, I believe he said that with
a tear in his heart. I don't think he was being stoic
or anything like that. But that was a real promise in
the old covenant, because disobedient children were to be corporally
and capitally punished. But in our day, What it's talking
about is a quality of life. Children, obey your parents in
the Lord that it may be well with you and you may live long
on the earth. There's no guaranteed promise, but the life that you
live will be more, it'll be healthier. I'm not talking about physically,
but I'm talking about emotionally. And it'll be a very better quality
life. And especially, and this is the
main issue, this whole thing, especially in the gospel, Parents,
look here, he says verse four, they're dealing with fathers
here. You fathers, provoke not your children to wrath. In other
words, don't just do things to make them angry. That's what
he's talking about there. Now they're gonna get angry,
but don't you be the source of that anger. You just tell them
what they need to hear, not what they wanna hear. And sometimes
you tell them what they don't wanna hear and they'll get angry.
But don't provoke them, that's the key. Don't just do that to
make them angry, but bring them up in the nurture and the admonition
of the Lord. Bring them up under the gospel,
under the word of God. Wherewith shall a young man cleanse
his way? By taking heed to the word of
God. And somebody asked me one time, said, well, what if they're
not one of God's elect? That's not your business. I'm
gonna get into that in just a minute. That's the secret will of God. Here's what I know about my children,
my grandchildren. And if they're God's elect, they're
gonna hear the gospel. And he's gonna bring them to
believe it. And if I have anything to do with it, they're gonna
be under the gospel. Now, sometimes we might not have things to do
with a lot of this stuff, but we might not have control. But
that's what we're gonna do. And I raised both, we raised
both of our boys under the gospel. Thank God that the Lord saved
them. He didn't, there was no guarantee. But he did. So he says, servants. Now, verse
five, servants be obedient to your masters. Masters and servants,
that sometimes raises a red flag today about slavery. Let me tell you something, folks.
The Bible never condoned forced slavery. Never. In fact, in Deuteronomy, you
know what forced slavery is called? Kidnapping. But the Bible recognized the
situation of the day, that there were masters and servants, and
it was like a job. And so we would interpret this
as being like, you all work for a company, you work for a person,
you've got a boss, or you may be the boss. And what he says
here, he says, servants, be obedient to them that are your masters
according to the flesh. So he's talking about in this
world now. In the spiritual world, we have one master, don't we?
And that's Christ. And he says, with fear and trembling.
That doesn't mean always being afraid, but it means with respect. Be respectful of the position.
You may not like the person, But be respectful of the position.
And he says, in singleness of your heart as unto Christ, not
with a divided heart, but as unto Christ. Do we serve Christ
with a divided heart? No. If we do, what does the Bible
say? A double-minded man? Nothing
good about it. Single eye to Christ. And what
he means here about bosses and employers, employees, is do your
job. and respect the fact, thank God
you have a job, and do your work the best you can do. He says,
verse six, not with eye service as men pleasers. That's kind
of like saying, we would equate that to saying, don't just do
it behind his, do it in front of him, but when his back's turned,
do something else. But as servants of Christ, you
see, that's how we're to think in these things of God's revealed
will. by way of command, doing the will of God, and how doing
it? Now, from the heart. That means willingly. That's
tough, isn't it? That's really where that struggle
comes in. It's like a story I heard about
mama bringing her little boy to the church service, and he
wouldn't sit still. He was all over the place. And
finally, she just read the law to him, laid it down, said, you
sit still, or you're going to whip him when you go home. And
so when they were on their way home, she asked him, said, well,
did you feel OK sitting still? He said, well, Mama, he said,
I was sitting still on the outside, but I was walking all over this
place on the inside. And that's what he's saying,
don't do that. Doing the will of God from the
heart. And from the heart means motivated by grace, love, and
gratitude. Now that's our state in this
world, and that's our struggle. I want to serve the Lord, don't
you? You want to do that, don't you? Sometimes it's so hard and
the biggest problem, the biggest impediment for me serving the
Lord is me. You see what I'm saying? Sometimes
y'all might get my way but not much. It's me. I'm the problem. And that's where
that struggle comes in. That's why we need the continuing
power of God. Not only to save us, but to keep
us. And thank God our standing before God doesn't change. Cause
man, we change, don't we? Oh, I change all the time. I
change every day. Sometimes I get up and I'm hurting
and I'm griping. And sometimes I get up and I
feel good. Sometimes things go my way. Sometimes they don't.
Most of the time they don't. But you know what? They're going
God's way. They sure are. And it's a struggle. He says
in verse 7, with goodwill doing service as to the Lord and not
to men. In other words, in any situation
where you have authority over you, whether it's a father, a
mother, husband, wife, employer, employee, when you serve, whatever
service you do, Think of it this way, I'm serving the Lord. What
if Jesus Christ came back today and he was your boss? How would
you serve then? You see, that's what he's saying.
Look over at that Colossians 3 passage. I want to show you
something here. He says basically the same thing,
but he's got a little addition here that the Holy Spirit inspired
him to write concerning servants and masters and all
of that. Verse 23, listen to this. And whatsoever
you do, do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men. Think about it that way. This
is a mindset, see. This is a thought process. This
is a way of thinking of things. I'm doing it unto the Lord. And
whatever I do, whatever this guy that's my boss or whatever,
the husband or the wife or whatever, the father, I'm doing it unto
the Lord for His glory and not unto men. And look at verse 24,
knowing that of the Lord you shall receive the reward of the
inheritance for you serve the Lord Christ. Now, you know, a
lot of people, when they see that word reward, they go crazy.
Oh, see there, if you don't do this, you're going to lose your
reward. Did you read that verse? What did it say? The reward of
what? Inheritance. That's right. Now what do you know about an
inheritance? It's not what you earn. It's what somebody else
has earned and gives to you, bequeaths to you. He's not talking
about earned rewards. He's not telling you to be a
mercenary. do this because you're gonna get rewarded out of it. There'll be rewards, but they're
the rewards of the inheritance. They're the rewards of God's
grace, which Christ has already earned for us. And my friend,
I'm gonna tell you something. There's no greater reward. There's
no better inheritance. Peter called it an inheritance
that's incorruptible and cannot fade away. That's the kind of
inheritance I want, how about you? We'll go back to Ephesians six. In verse nine he says, you masters.
Or look at verse eight rather. Knowing that whatsoever good
thing any man doeth, the same shall he receive of the Lord.
And that goes back to that reward of inheritance, whether he be
bond or free. You know, a lot of these servants,
you know why they were servants, because they were in debt. And
you know, that's why they had the law of the bond servant back
in the Old Testament. People got in debt to a person,
and they had to hire out to them and work for them. And the law
of bond slavery, you remember, it said they had to work seven
years, and then they could go out free. But if they loved their
master, the master treated them right. And they loved their master,
and it was like a job. And you want to stay with your
master, then you remember what they do? They bore the ear with
an awl. Somebody said in some cultures
they'd put a ring in that heir. And that was a sign that you
weren't working to pay a debt, you were working because you
loved the master. The debt has already paid. That's
what we are, we're bondservants of Christ. We wanna work for the Lord, I
don't mind saying that. We're not working for our salvation.
Our debt's paid, Jesus paid it all. We're gonna sing that song
in a few minutes. All the debt I owe, He paid it. My debt's
paid. I don't owe a thing to God's
law and justice. Christ paid it all. And I want
to serve Him. I want to love Him more. And
so He says, He says, neither is there respect
of persons with Him, Verse 9, he says, you masters do the same
things unto them, forbearing threatening, and knowing that
your master is also in heaven. In other words, don't browbeat
or threaten those who work for you, don't treat them unfairly,
because your master in heaven, if he gave you what you deserve,
you'd be in a mess. Is there respect of persons with
him? No. Why didn't God save me? Why did
God save you? It had nothing to do with any
respect of my person. You know there's only one answer
that the Bible gives to that? And for most people it's not
enough, but it is for me. Because it seemed good in His
sight. His sovereign grace. I will have
mercy on whom I will have mercy and I'll be gracious to whom
I will be gracious. But don't you thank God that
He does have mercy, that He is gracious. Let me just say a few words about
this doing the will of God and I'll close. The will of God. As I said before, you gotta make
a distinction between what we call, and I know a lot of theologians
don't like this, but I don't care. Because it seems right
to me. I read the Bible. There's a distinction
between what we can call the sovereign will of God, which
cannot be broken. God's will. The determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God. You read that? God who worketh
all things after the counsel of His own will. All things work together for
good. Now think about that before you quote it. I hear all kinds
of people quoting that verse, Romans 8.28, it's a good verse. All things work together for
good. All things? Oh, come on preacher, now some
things don't, no. All things work together for
good to them that love God, who are the called according to His
purpose. And what is His purpose? To glorify Himself in the salvation
of sinners through the Lord Jesus Christ. How can we say all things
work together for good? Well, because God's doing the
working. He's working them all together. His sovereign will. There's no crack in God's universe.
As I often say, he's not a cosmic chess player. He makes his move,
we make our counter move, and we'll see who wins in the end,
no. God, listen, Ephesians 1, we read that several months ago
when we started the book of Ephesians. Listen to this, Ephesians 1,
11, in whom also we obtained an inheritance being predestinated
according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after
the counsel of his own will. Listen to this, this is Old Testament.
This is the book of Isaiah. Isaiah 46 and verse nine. Remember
the former things of old. I'm God, there's none else. I'm
God, there's none like me, declaring the end from the beginning. Now,
what does that phrase mean? He declares the end from the
beginning. All right, let me give you an example. You know,
every one of us here know how the day started, don't we? You
know how it started, how you got up and did what you did and
got ready. Let me tell you what you don't
know. You don't know the end of the day. You don't know how
it's going to end up. God does. Why? Because he declared it.
He declares the end from the beginning. You can't do that,
I can't do that. I take it one step at a time.
This sovereign will of God, we basically only know it after
it happens. History. But he goes on here,
he says, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient
times, the things that are not yet done, saying, my counsel
shall stand. His counsel there is the SEL,
not the CIL, because the CIL means that he met with other
people. and determined. No, his counsel means it's the
product of his wisdom. He said, my counsel shall stand
and I'll do all my pleasure. I'll do all I wanna do. Can you
say that? I'm gonna do everything I wanna
do. What a foolish statement for a human being to make. He says, I'm gonna do all my
pleasure. And then he goes into another thing. He said, calling
a ravenous bird from the east. The man that executeth my counsel
from a far country. That's a reference to a historical
fact. Yeah, I've spoken it. I will
bring it to pass. I've purposed it. I will also
do it. That's the sovereign will of
God. One of my favorite passages of
scriptures out of Deuteronomy chapter 29, verse 29, Deuteronomy
29, 29. It's where Moses read the law
to the people of God. And the law is God's will. Here's what God says. You do
this, you don't do that. Now is He saying you do this
and don't do that in order to earn salvation? Absolutely not. That's not what He was saying
at all. And He had in that law threatenings
and promises. But it wasn't salvation. That
law was given to show them their sin and their need of grace in
Christ. But here's what it says at the
end of Moses reading the law. Deuteronomy 29, 29. The secret
things belong unto the Lord our God. You know there are things that
God has kept secret from us? You say, oh no, God tells us.
No, he doesn't tell us everything. Any of you know the day that
Christ is coming back? You don't know that, do you?
You see somebody walking out on the street, do you know if
that's one of God's elect or not? You don't know. You may say, well, they don't
give any evidence of it right now, because they don't know
Christ. But who knows, between that time
and their death, they may come to know the gospel. If you'd
have met Paul early on the road to Damascus, what would you have
said about him? If some of these high muckety-muck
religionists had walked in on David and Bathsheba, what would
they have said about him? Is that one of God's elect? You see what I'm saying? The
secret things belong unto the Lord. But he goes on. But those things which are revealed
belong to us. and to our children forever that
we may do all the words of this law. That's our responsibility. And I want to close with this
in John 637. I quote this verse so much, especially
on our television program, because it's such a teaching verse. John 637. And here's what I want
to close with, the revealed will of God in the Gospel. What is God's will for me in
salvation? The revealed will of God. My
friend, it's to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Rest in Him
for all salvation, for all righteousness. That's His revealed will. And
anybody who refuses is breaking the revealed will of God. Now
again, if they're one of God's chosen people, there will come
a time they won't break it anymore. He'll make them willing in the
day of His power. But listen to this, John 6 and
verse 37, Christ says, all that the Father giveth me shall come
to me. That's God's secret will. What's
secret about that? The all. Who are the all? I know a few of them, but I don't
know all of them. How about you? All that the Father
giveth me shall come to me. Who's gonna come to him? All
that the Father giveth him. That's election. And him that
cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. That's the revealed
will of God. If you come to Christ, somebody says, well, I don't
know if I'm one of those all. You're not to think like that.
You're to come to Him for salvation. He's your only hope of salvation. He's your only hope of forgiveness.
He's your only hope of righteousness. There's no other. Come to Him. And you know what happens when
you do? You find out you're one of that all. But listen to what Christ said
in the next verse, verse 30. For I came down from heaven not
to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me, following
the Father's will. And this is the Father's will
which hath sent me. Here's God's revealed will. That
of all which he hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should
raise it up again at the last day. And this is the will of
him that sent me, that everyone which seeth the sun, do you see
the sun with the eye of faith? the glory of his person, the
power of his finished work, and believeth on him, do you believe
on him, hath everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the
last day. Isn't that something? Now with
all that in mind, Wives, be subject to your husband.
Husbands, love your wife. Children, obey your parents.
Fathers, don't provoke each other. All of these things come into
play for the glory of God in Christ. All right.