Well, good morning to everyone.
If you would open your Bibles with me to Ephesians chapter
five, we'll continue our study there this morning. Before we
begin, let's bow before our Lord in prayer together. Our Father,
we thank you for this day that you've appointed where we can
meet together, meet with our brothers and sisters, worship
Have your word open to us to hear one more time of our Lord
Jesus Christ. And Father, I pray you'd bless
us this morning. Don't let us meet here without
your presence or we've met in vain. But Father, meet with us. Enable us to truly worship you
from the heart this morning. I pray that you would be our
teacher, that you would open your word to our hearts that
we might leave here this morning like the disciples of old, saying,
didn't our hearts burn within us as the word was opened to
us? Father, give us the faith to
believe, to believe on and to rest in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Let his name be exalted here this morning. And Father, what
we pray for ourselves, we pray for your people, wherever they
might meet together this morning. Father, in this dark day in which
we live, we pray you'd cause the glory of your son through
the preaching of your gospel to shine out in the land. Father, we thank you for our
children. We thank you for the gift that you've given to us
of these little ones. Father, we pray for them. We
pray that you'd keep them safe in this world. We pray especially
mercy for their souls. And Father, pray you'd make us
faithful to them, faithful to point them to Christ our Savior. And Father, we dare not sin against
thee in forgetting to pray for your people that are in times
of trouble, heartache, and sorrow. Father, we pray that you would
comfort their hearts with your presence. We pray that you'd
deliver them as soon as it could be thy will. But Father, until
that time, we pray a special portion of your presence Comfort
their heart while they're in the valley. Father, all these
things we ask and we give thanks to that name which is above every
name, the name of Christ our Savior, amen. I've titled our
lesson this morning Redeeming the Time. I took the title from
verse 16 where Paul says redeeming the time because the days are
evil. Anytime someone mentions we need
to redeem the time, spiritually speaking, this is immediately
what we all think about. Well, I need to quit wasting
so much time on earthly things. I need to spend all my time in
prayer and reading the word and study, listening to messages
on sermon audio. I'm wasting too much time on
the things of this world. I've got to spend more time on
those spiritual things. Now, certainly all those things,
reading God's word, spending time in prayer, listening to
messages. Those are very good things for
us to do, and I'm all for them. And a believer will do those
things. A believer will pray. A believer will have a need to
read God's word, because it's the children's bread. I was at
a meeting in another place some time ago, many years ago, Charles
Pennington was going to preach, and right before he got up to
preach, they sang this song about how believers ought to love the
Lord. Believers ought to believe the
Lord. Believers ought to pray. And by the time that song was
over, there's five or six verses to it, by the time that song
was over, Charlie was mad. Aaron, you were there, you and
I went, remember? I mean, he was mad. And I was glad Aaron
was with me, because I thought, we're gonna have to fist fight
our way out of this place. But he's right. Now, a believer
will pray. A believer does believe God.
A believer does trust Christ. A believer does have a desire
to read God's word. We ought to be doing those things.
But that doesn't mean that you can't enjoy other things of this
life. The NFL season kicks off today.
I'm gonna watch a football game today. Nothing wrong with that.
There's nothing wrong with reading some sappy romance novel or a
book or spending time on whatever hobby you like. God made these
things in this world for his children to enjoy. Those things
are only problematic when we become so obsessed with those
things that we do them And so to such an extent that we don't
have time for the public worship service, that we don't have time
to go to God in prayer. We don't have time for his word.
We have a problem when we focus so much on those things that
we're not looking to the Savior, that we're not thinking of him,
that we're not worshiping him. Now Paul says redeeming the time. And that word has a few different
meanings. I'll give you two of them. First, it means to recover
from the power of another. or to ransom another. That's
what Christ has done for us. He's ransomed us from the power
of the law. He's delivered us from the power
of our sin. He's redeemed us. But second,
this word redeemed means to make wise, sacred use of. It means
to buy up for one's own use. Make wise, sacred use of. Now
that's what Paul's telling us to do. Make wise, sacred use. of the time that God has given
us here on this earth. And from our text this morning,
I wanna give you six ways that we can redeem the time in our
everyday lives to make wise, sacred use of the time that God's
given us. And the first one is this, walk
with some wisdom. Verse 15, Paul says, well, verse
14, he says, wherefore he saith, awake thou that sleepest, and
arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee life. Now see
then, that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming
the time, because the days are evil. Wherefore, be ye not unwise,
but understanding what the will of the Lord is. Now Paul says,
since God has wakened you, don't do this to waken yourself up
or give you spiritual life. Since God has wakened you, since
he already has given you spiritual life, see that you walk like
it. See that you walk like you got
some light. Walk circumspectly, Paul says, and the word means
accurately and diligently. Now, the only way any of us can
walk accurately is by diligently trusting Christ. That's the only
way we can walk accurately. Walking accurately is truly believing
Christ is my righteousness. My morality's not my righteousness.
My morality and my good works and my good Christian living
don't add to my righteousness. Christ is my righteousness. He's
all of it. And then walking like it. Acting
like it. Now how can I walk? How can I
conduct myself in such a way that I really believe Christ
is my righteousness? He's the righteousness of all
of his people. Well, I thought of this. walk, acting holier
than thou. I cannot be so judgmental and
harsh on people, remembering Christ is their righteousness
too, just like he's mine, just like he's mine. And if we're
wise, we'll trust Christ. I mean, if we're wise, we'll
trust Christ alone. And if we're a fool, we won't
trust Christ because we'll be trusting in something in ourself
in some way. So how does a believer walk as
wise, not as a fool? Well, I thought of a few examples.
First is by trusting your entire soul to Christ alone. In the
parable of the wise man and the foolish man that our Lord gave,
the wise man, he conducted himself with some wisdom, didn't he?
He built his house on a rock. He built his house on the solid
rock, Christ alone. He depended on Christ without
any of his works being added to it. Now that's wise, isn't
it? Because whatever is built on
Christ is gonna last. It'll last forever. It's already
stood, not just that it will stand up, it already has stood
up to the wrath of God against the sin of God's people. It'll
stand up to every danger, every toil, and every snare that we
face in this world. That's wise to build on Christ,
to trust him alone. Now if you're a fool, you're
gonna build your hope on the sinking sands of man's works.
And Lord in that parable taught us, that's foolish. You know,
if you build a sandcastle, you go to the beach and you build
a sandcastle, Later that day, the changing tides are gonna
wipe that thing away. Just the changing tides. It doesn't
even take a storm to wipe sand away, does it? Well, certainly
the storm of God's wrath is gonna destroy. Whatever it is that's
built on the sinking sands of man's works is gonna be destroyed.
So walk as wise by truly trusting your soul to Christ alone. Don't
just give lip service to it. Truly believe Christ. He's all
it takes. The second example I thought
of is this, the rich man that the Lord told us about in that
parable. I guess it was a parable. That
rich man said, I don't know, I've got so much wealth, my crops
are doing so good, I don't know what I'm going to do. He said,
I know what I'll do. I'll tear down my barns and build
bigger. And then I can tell my soul,
rest at ease. Soul, everything's good, because
I got bigger barns. The Lord called that man, thou
fool. Thou fool. It's foolish. to trust our souls and think
we have security because we got a bunch of earthly, physical,
material things. It's foolish because they're
all temporary. There's no safety in having things,
riches, things of this world, but there's safety in trusting
Christ. Your soul is safe trusting him. You know, a wise person
will work to provide a good living for himself, a good living for
their family. There's nothing wrong with having a good living
for your family. Go out and work hard and enjoy the fruits of
your labor. Solomon said nothing better in the world than that.
Do that. But do that while you trust Christ to provide. Go about
your daily activities. Doing, and I mean your dead level
best, take care of what God's given you. All with one eye on
Christ. He's coming back, looking for
him. That's being wise. And the third thing I thought
of is the parable of the wise and the foolish virgins. You
know, those virgins, they all looked the same on the outside,
didn't they? They all dressed alike. And you know the other
thing that they did alike? They both slumbered. While they're
waiting for the bridegroom to come, they both slumbered. What
made the wise? The wise virgins. They had their
lamps filled with oil. They're already filled with oil,
and that's a picture of the Holy Spirit, and I'm gonna talk more
about that here in just a second, being filled with the Holy Spirit.
The wise were filled with grace, that grace in the heart. The
flesh is still the flesh. The flesh is still weak, that's
why they slept while they were waiting for the bridegroom to
come, but they had grace in the heart. Now if you would walk
as wise, not as fools, walk knowing this, salvation is in the heart.
Salvation is a hard work. Salvation is something only God
can do for me. I need to be filled with the
spirit. Well, I can't fill myself. I need God to fill me. So walking
is wise, means to conduct yourself, living your life, seeking Christ. Always knowing that you're always
in need and asking God, God give me life. God keep me, God bless
me, God keep me from myself. That's walking is wise. And the
last example I thought of is Psalm 14, where David said, the
fool has said in his heart, there is no God. That's a fool, that's
a fool. Somebody claimed they're an atheist,
that's a fool. Everybody knows God is. But you
know, David's not really saying that, or they're saying that
there is no God. If you look at that this afternoon,
you'll see that those words, there is, is in italics. That's
been added by the translators What David actually wrote is,
the fool has said in his heart, no God, no. No God, I won't submit to your
righteousness. No God, I won't submit to salvation
being in Christ alone. I'm gonna contribute something
to this thing. No God, I won't submit to your sovereign, electing,
redeeming, regenerating grace. No, I won't. I won't bow to you
in that way. That's a fool. Walking as wise
is submitting to the Word of God. It's believing the Word
of God and submitting to it even when I don't understand it. Even
if it doesn't seem to match my personal experience, it's submitting
to God's Word and believing God's Word is true even if I can't
explain it, even if I don't see it. A wise person lives recognizing
God in all things. I mean, whatever it is that happens
Whatever happens, God did it. God did it. I might not like
it. I might see, you know, a wicked
person prospered by, but whatever it is that happens, God did it. And the wise person will rest
in that. And here's what else. If I'd
really know everything happens, God did it. I'm going to live
in prayer. Asking the Lord to take care
of me. Asking the Lord to provide for me. Asking the Lord to keep
me from myself that I don't do something that hurts so many
people. It's submitting to God's authority. God is. That's walking
is wise. That's redeeming the time. It's
living your life like you're supposed to live it. Going to
work, raising your family, doing all those things with one eye
on the Lord. All right, number two. Redeeming
the time is being filled with the Spirit. Verse 18, Paul says,
be not drunk with wine, wherein is success, but be filled with
the spirit. Now, this isn't teaching the
evils of alcohol. If you adults want to have a
drink of alcohol, that's perfectly fine. Eric's class is out here
this morning. Let me say something to our young
people. If you'll bear with an old man for a minute. Stay away
from it. Stay away from it. Don't touch
it. I mean, just don't even touch
it until you got a whole lot more maturity than you got now.
Alcohol will make you do stupid things. Alcohol will put your
life in danger. It will now. Just don't touch
it. Don't touch it. Now, that's good
advice. You ask any older person here,
that's good advice. But that's not what Paul's talking
about here. He's talking about the excessive use of anything,
of anything in this world. The excessive use of the things
of this world, just being obsessed with it, makes us drunk. You know, when you're drunk,
you don't see things like they really are, do you? You know,
a person is drunk on alcohol. They don't see things as they
are. They don't react to them correctly or quickly enough.
They're drunk on alcohol. Well, if we're drunk on the things
of this world, we're so taken up. The things of this world
are so right here to us. that we don't see the spiritual
truth of things. If we're drunk on this world,
we don't see how temporary these things are. They're so temporary. I know telling that to younger
folks is, I know you can't understand it. You think you've got 100
years left, you know. Oh, it's gonna go so quickly
from your age to my age. It's gonna go so quickly. The
things of this world are only temporary. And when all you can
think about is getting more of them and enjoying more of them,
you're drunk on the things of this world. And Paul tells us
the danger to our soul of that. He said, don't be filled with
those things. He said, be filled with the spirit. Now notice here,
he says, be filled. He's not telling you, you got
to go out there and fill yourself with the spirit. He says, be
filled. Be filled with the spirit by
the work of God the Holy Spirit. Now again, people, it's very
prevalent in our day, think that being filled with the Spirit
means oh, now I can go out there and start healing folks. I can
start doing like you see people doing on TV. Just let me tell
you, 100% of the time that you see that in this world, it's
a fake. It's a fake. If somebody could
really do that, they'd go down here to King's Daughters this
afternoon and empty the place out. It's a fake. It's not true. Talking in tongues. People say
being filled with the Spirit is acting like you're under the
influence of alcohol, like you're in some drug-induced trance or
something. That's not the Holy Spirit of
God. It might be another spirit, but it's not the Holy Spirit
of God. Paul says be filled with the Spirit. Well, how do I do
that? It's by the preaching of the
word, by the preaching of Christ. I'll show you that, look back
at John chapter 15. I'm filled with the spirit, be filled with
the spirit through the preaching of Christ because the job of
the Holy Spirit is to reveal Christ to his people. That's
what the Savior tells us. John 15, look first at verse 26. But when the Comforter has come,
whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of
truth. The Holy Spirit is the Comforter.
The Savior says, I'll send him to you, which proceedeth from
the Father. Here's what he'll do. He shall
testify of me. That's the job of the Holy Spirit,
is to testify of Christ, is to tell us of Christ, point us to
Christ. Look at chapter 16, verse 12. I have yet many things to say
unto you, but you cannot bear them now. How be it when he,
the spirit of truth has come, he will guide you into all truth.
Now look at this, for he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever
he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will show you things
to come. He shall glorify me, for he shall receive of mine
and shall show it unto you. All things that the father hath
are mine, therefore, said I that he shall take of mine and show
it unto you. Now you see that, the Holy Spirit's
not gonna glorify himself. Isn't that what the Savior said?
He's not gonna glorify himself. He's not gonna enable you to
do miracles and do these wondrous things so that when people see
you, they're impressed with the Holy Spirit. That's not his job. The Savior said he's not gonna
glorify himself. He's not gonna speak in himself. He's gonna
point people to Christ. The job of the Holy Spirit is
to reveal Christ, so that people, sinners, God's people, are impressed
with Christ. The job of the Holy Spirit is
to reveal Christ to us, so we see Him so clearly, we're so
impressed with Him. We'll trust our entire soul to
Him. That's the job of the Holy Spirit. Now if you want to be filled
with the Holy Spirit, tell you what to do. be where Christ is
preached. Because that's where the Holy
Spirit operates. He takes the things of Christ and shows them
to you. So you'd be filled with the Spirit, be where Christ is
preached. The wise person seeking to redeem
the time makes as much use, takes as much opportunity to be in
the public worship service where Christ is preached as humanly
possible so that we're filled with the Holy Spirit. Because
a wise person knows this, if God doesn't fill me with the
Spirit, I'm empty and useless. So I want to avail myself to
the means that I might be filled with the Holy Spirit. That's
redeeming the time. All right, number three, redeem
the time by rejoicing in Christ. Back in our text, Ephesians 5,
verse 19. Speaking to yourselves in psalms
and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in
your heart to the Lord. And when Paul talks about singing
in your heart, you know what he's talking about is rejoicing. The believer has so much reason
to rejoice. And I think it's good to take
note of this. Paul says, sing in the heart.
Sing from the heart. Don't sing to make a show of
your talents, because if you're doing that, you're singing to
make a show of your talent. Tell you what you're doing. You're
not worshiping. You're not pointing anybody to Christ. You're pointing
people to you. Paul says don't do that. Sing
from the heart. Sing in your heart and sing from your heart
when nobody else is around. Just sing to yourself. I've told
you all this before. I sing in the car, especially
on my way here. We started this, it was a chance
wise idea. We started when the girls were
very little. On the way to service, we'd sing choruses. We'd let
them pick choruses and we'd all sing choruses together. Well,
I still do that. I still do that. Sing choruses
and hymns and stuff. And buddy, I mean, I sing at
the top of my lungs. Because you want to know what?
When I'm in the car alone, that's when I sound the best. I mean,
when I'm alone, I sound like Harry Belafonte or something.
I mean, you know, I'm something else when I'm by myself. Sing,
just rejoicing, rejoicing, seeking God's blessing, you know. Sing. Because the joy in your heart,
a believer has joy. I know this world beats us down,
but the believer has joy, joy in Christ. Think about the joy
you have in his person. Think about the joy you have
in his glory. Just saying enjoy God's forgiven
your sin. He forgave your sin and the way
he did it is slaughtering his son in your place so he could
forgive your sin. Then I give you joy. Oh, sing, sing out. Rejoice, God's given you faith
in Christ. Everybody doesn't believe Christ.
But God's given you faith in Christ. Sing, rejoice. Rejoice
in the gospel. The gospel tells us about Christ. Always reminds us of Christ.
Always points us to Christ. And God's given us a place where
we got an easy drive to come here. Isn't that something? Rejoice. Rejoice that one day,
right soon, you're gonna see him face to face. Oh, rejoice. Now Paul says here, speaking
to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual psalms, I don't
think one of us here would be comfortable walking up to one
another and start singing. I don't think that we'd be very
comfortable. I don't think we'd be very comfortable
with somebody walking up to us and start singing to us either,
you know. But we can talk to one another. We can talk to one
another about the things that we both rejoice in. This is the
thing that's common to us. We can talk about being able
to rejoice together in Christ. What a Savior we have. What a
God we have. Oh, hadn't he blessed us? Hadn't
he? It's just unbelievable that of all the people on the face
of the earth, God would choose to bless you and me. We can talk
to one another about that here in the worship service, but also
out there in the world. You know, we get together. Lord
willing, it's Friday, the men are gonna get together for lunch. We'll talk about everything under
the sun, but I'll tell you one thing we're gonna talk about,
the scriptures. Oh, how God's blessed us, how
thankful we are. Talk to one another about the
scriptures. Talk to one another about the Lord. That's redeeming
the time that God's given. You know what I'm saying. It
doesn't have to mean that that's exclusively all you talk about, but it's
just a natural part It's a natural part of the conversation because
of what's in our heart. That's redeeming the time. You
know, we can, we can talk about the things of this world for
so long, everybody's going to run home and jump into bed and
pull the covers over their head and be so depressed, you ain't
going to come out, you know. Talk to one another about the Lord.
That'll help and encourage one another. Then fourthly, Paul says, redeem
the time by being thankful. Verse 20, giving thanks always
for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Now I tell you, a big, big, big
mark of a believer is being thankful. A person who knows that they
have everything that they have because God gave it to them,
even though they don't deserve it, how can that person not be
thankful? A believer's gonna be a thankful
person. You just think of all God's spiritual blessings to
us. I'll start there, because that's
the ones that are most important. Well, what are they? They're
every spiritual blessing. Paul told the church at Ephesus,
every spiritual blessing is ours. God's given it to us. And God's
so kind and so gracious, so understanding of our weakness, He made them
easy to find. He put them all in one place,
in Christ. He's given us everything. He's
given us election. He chose a people in Christ. He chose to save them even though
they never do one blessed thing to deserve it. He's made them
righteous by the obedience of Christ. He's made them holy by
the sacrifice of Christ. He's forgiven their sin. He's
given them eternal life that we can never lose like our father
Adam lost. And he's given us a promise to
keep us and be with us every step of the way. He said, when
you go through the waters, I'll be with you. When you go through
the fire, it won't burn you up, I'll be with you. And on top
of that, the Lord's given us everything we have in this life. Now you have to admit, you think
about the things that we have, the people of this congregation
have. God's made us rich. He's made us rich. None of us
are gonna be featured on that show as the lifestyles of the
rich and famous, but we're rich. We're rich. We really don't lack
a thing. Now how can that person not be
thankful? The Lord has given his people so much, so much. Paul says, be thankful, give
thanks always for all things. The believer has been so blessed
of God, we even have reason to give thanks in times of trial
and heartache. Now, I don't know. I'll just
speak for myself here. You see if this applies to you.
It's probably impossible for us to truly give thanks for the
pain and the suffering that goes along with the trial. It's probably
hard for us to say, thank you, Lord, for filling me with this
pain, filling me with this sorrow, filling me for this heartache.
The hurts are bad. It's probably hard to give thanks for that. But I tell you what the believer
can give thanks for when God sends those things. We can thank
God he's given us grace sufficient for the trial that he sent. He
sent the severity of the trial and he sent grace that matches
it. Grace that's sufficient for it. We can give thanks when the
trial's over. We can give thanks that the Lord
taught us something about himself that we couldn't have learned
outside the furnace of trial. I can be thankful. The Lord sent
something to me. I'm not giving thanks for the
pain. That would be disingenuous, but
I'm thankful for this. I learned to trust the Lord more
because of it. He taught me more of himself and taught me to trust
him more. I can be thankful for that. A believer can be thankful
to know that whatever happens to me, that's the will of God
for me. It wasn't an accident. Aren't
you thankful to know God's running this show? The devil didn't do
it. The whims of men didn't do it.
It's not something that just randomly happened or floating
out there in the air. Whatever it is happens to me
is God's eternal will and purpose coming to pass. Now I'm thankful
to know that. This is God's will. This is God's
will. And I'm thankful to know this.
as painful as it might be for me, as difficult as it might
be for me, somehow God's gonna bring good out of this. I may
never see it, but God's gonna bring good out of that, I promise
you that, because that's what he said. I'm thankful for that,
thankful. Then number five, redeem the
time by being submissive. Paul says in verse 21, submitting
yourselves one to another in the fear of God. Now Paul says
live submitting, to each other. Think about what others need
before what you want. Put them, what their needs of
your wants, esteem other better than yourself. That's submitting
to one another. Give in. Just do what you have
to do. I mean, I don't care what you
have to do. Other than compromise the gospel. Do whatever you have
to do to keep the peace here. so we can worship together in
peace, because we can't worship together and we're fussing and
fighting. Whatever it is you gotta do to keep the peace, do
it. Believers submit to one another
because we know the value of peace, the value of the gospel. Way more valuable than what I
want, isn't it? And just like being thankful,
a believer should be able to submit to one another. We should
be able to do that. Because we've got experience
submitting to the Lord. Submitting ourselves to his righteousness. Just submit to one another. You
don't have to be the big important guy telling everybody how to
do everything all the time. Just submit. A person who is
not submissive doesn't show much evidence of grace in the heart.
Because like I said, a believer has experience in this matter
of submitting. Submitting to Christ. And then
lastly, Paul says, redeem the time by fearing God. At the end
of verse 21, he says, do this to one another in the fear of
God. Now fear is reverence. And the
best way I can think of to reverence God is to be afraid to trust
anything other than Christ alone. Now we should constantly fight
what this world tries to thrust upon us. Its ideas and its ways
are contrary to God. We have to fight against that.
Be afraid of doing things the world's way when it's against
God's way. Be afraid of that. And we have to constantly fight
the old man. I mean, you know, all of our
battles don't come without. The hardest ones come from within.
Constantly fight that old man. That old man is constantly trying
to get us to trust self. instead of trust Christ alone.
Now fight that for all your worth, because you're afraid to trust
your soul to anything other than Christ alone. And if the Lord
will enable us to do that, we'll live our lives redeeming the
time that God's given us. Hope that'll be helpful to you.
Lord bless you.