HOW HE LOVES US

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Ephesians 5:1-2 Morning.

My name is Daniel Duce. If I have not had the pleasure of meeting you yet, I'm one of the pastors here. I would ask that, if you have one, would you please open your Bible or mobile device and turn or scroll to the book of Ephesians, chapter five?

And if you're willing and able, please stand with me for the reading of God's Word. Today's reading comes from the letter of Paul to the Ephesians, chapter five. I'll be reading verses one and two. Hear the word of the Lord. Therefore be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated.

Let me pray.

Lord, I don't want to take for granted.

The gifts that it is just to be able to be here together, to gather in freedom and. In relative health, Lord. Health enough to be able to be here.

Thank you for your word.

I would ask that you would send your Holy Spirit now to speak to each one of us. As you know, we need to hear, Lord, encourage and.

And heal and convict.

And draw us to yourself and make us more like your son.

Incline our hearts to your testimonies, and open our eyes that we may behold wondrous things from your word. Unite our hearts, Lord, to fear your name. Satisfy us this morning with your loving kindness, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Allow us to bring you glory, Lord, and give us joy in Jesus name. Amen. Let me review a little bit.

We have been in the book of Ephesians for a while. Chapters one through three and chapters four through six are how Paul, arranges this book. It's it's split up into two halves. One through three is God's story. Four through six is what we do our response to God's story. Chapters one through three is what God has done, who we are because of what God has done in Christ Jesus.

And chapter three ends Paul prays for us. He prays that we would have strength in our inner being, that we would have strength to comprehend. We would know with our minds. We would know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, and that we would be filled with all the fullness of God. And then he hinges over to the second half, which is our response.

What we do in light of what God has done. And the hinge is therefore, therefore what? What does he say? Therefore walk worthy, walk worthy. Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called. And what does it mean to walk worthy? Well, he tells us in verse one through 16 of chapter four he says, walk in unity.

And in 17 through 32 he says, walk in holiness. Walk not like the Gentiles do. Walk not like you used to walk. Ephesians rather put off the old self and put on the new self. He says in verse 22, put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life, verse 24, and put on the new self created after the likeness of God, and true righteousness and holiness.

Being a Christian means that I must believe that I can get better. I can be better. Okay. This is not to earn God's love or to earn my salvation or anything like that. But I read these letters with these commands, and I got to believe that Paul gives me these commands so that I can be better. I must believe that to be transformed into the person that God calls me to be will be beneficial to me.

It will be good for me. It will be better for me. Yes. Yes. Why would he command it if it is not good for me?

I must believe also that this transformation is possible. It must be possible to be tenderhearted. When I was hardhearted and callous, it must be possible that I can stop being bitter and angry. And I can be a forgiving person, a patient person. Paul assumes, as does the entire storyline of the Bible, that God is the determining force behind all of this change.

God is he who causes the change. He is the change that transforms us into the people that we were always meant to be, that we were designed to be, that we were created to be. God is the cause, and godliness is the effect. Therefore, he says in the middle of chapter four, therefore verse 25, put away falsehood and speak only truth.

Quickly resolve your conflicts. Quickly restore your relationships when they're broken. Work hard. Work honestly. Be generous. Speak only to build others up. Speak only to give others grace. Put away all that is wicked and evil and malicious. Be kind. Tender hearted. Forgive. Paul is so beautifully blunt in these verses. Notice he doesn't say if anywhere in those verses.

I can hear the gentleness as he urges these Ephesian Christians as he he's commanding us. He is giving us strong exhortation. But there's this gentleness behind it. It's like he's praying as he's writing. Lord, I know you can do this in them. Put off, put on. Lord, I know you can do this. God is the cause. Godliness is the effect.

Seriously. I want you to look back. I want us to be like the Bereans. I don't want to just preach a bunch of stuff from the word and be saying something crazy. I want you guys to read with me. Do a word search in your in your Bible app. Nowhere in the entire book of Ephesians just Paul use the word if or unless.

There is no conditional clause in this letter.

He just says put this off, put this on. He says, put this away. Do this. Be this. That's it. He doesn't say if it's not too much trouble.

If it's a convenient time for you. He doesn't say unless you think it's too difficult or unless it's a bad time, or unless you don't think it's a good idea. He doesn't say if you grew up in a Christian home.

If you have all of your life all figured out, all your ducks in a row, if you're all cleaned up. He doesn't say if you don't have any issues, if you've never been abused, if you've never been sinned against, if you've never been wronged, if you've never been betrayed, if you've never been lied to or lied about. He doesn't say that.

If you think it's best, obey this. He doesn't say that.

He just says, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you. Verse 31, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. No friends, this is a command without a condition, without any exception. God in His word commands us. Be kind. Be tenderhearted.

Forgive one another.

This should bring us such hope. These words, these sentences, this letter, this book. It makes me realize. It forces me to realize if it is true, if it is authoritative, it forces me to realize and to believe that change is possible.

My background does not determine my future. Who I am today doesn't determine who I will be when God's done with me. My shameful sins struggle. All of the horrible things that have happened to me that have been done to me. The things that I have done. All of the ungodly things that I have seen that have been put before my eyes.

All of the things that I have spoken that have been spoken to me. They don't have a hold on me. They don't determine who I am to be in Christ.

Paul says, put that person away. Do this. Be this.

Put off that old self. Put on that new self. No. If. No. Unless. Put off and put on. God's commands always come with a promise to believe. Notice in verse 32 the command, be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, and the promise as God in Christ forgave you. If you have put your faith in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins, God has forgiven you.

This is the promise. This is the power. The Bible says that the gospel is the power of God. What God did for us in Christ is so powerful that it makes any and all and every change possible. God is the cause and godliness is the effect. Therefore, we come to chapter five. Be imitators of God and walk in love.

Here we go. Therefore be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. Be imitators of God. How do we know what it means to be imitators of God? Well, that's what the therefore is therefore, we look back to what Paul has written previously in this letter, specifically chapters one through three, where Paul describes all that God has done for us in Christ.

All the spiritual blessings that are now ours in Christ Jesus because of Jesus, because of God's grace, because of God's love, because of what God has done for us in the gospel, because of that. Therefore be imitators of God.

He also wants us to look back to what he has written in chapter four, verse two. For instance, walk worthy with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. Imitating God means walking in humility, walking in gentleness, walking with patience. It means bearing with one another in love.

Is this not how God has been toward us? He has put up with so much from me in my life. Still does.

So much rebellion and hard headedness and stubbornness. And I avoid obedience. I know what I'm supposed to do, and I just. I put it off.

I justify, I rationalize why I'll do that later. Yet he's been so patient toward me, so gentle, and there is no one more humble than our God, and there is no one more eager to maintain unity. He sent his Son for the sake of unity. He made peace by the blood of his cross.

Imitating God also means, verse 24, to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness, the likeness of God, the image of God to imitate God. What else does it look like to imitate God? How can we be imitators of God? Reflectors of God reflecting his image. Imaging him. This is what we were designed for.

This is what we were created to do. To image God, to reflect Him and His ways and his his attributes and his glory.

Paul tells us at the end of chapter four how to be imitators again. The list put away falsehood, speak only truth.

Be kind, compassionate. Forgive others. This is who God is.

This is what it is to imitate God. But how do we do this?

How is this even possible? Look at the list.

This sounds like an impossible task. List.

But remember, when God gives a command, he provides a promise and he provides the power. Verse one. Therefore, be imitators of God. As beloved children. I want you to note that word. Be that word. Be imitators of God. That word. It should be translated become.

The verb is an imperative. That means it's a command, and it's written in the present middle tense. Sorry for you, regular folks, the nerds. I'll appreciate when I parse Greek verbs. It is in the present middle tense. It is not in the active tense. If it was in the active tense, it would be be be imitators of God.

It is in the present middle tense. It should be translated. Become imitators of God or be for yourself. Imitators of God. Be for yourselves. Imitators of God. The same word is used back in verse 32. Become kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. This becoming, this is an ongoing process continuous, ongoing, persistent development in love.

In becoming imitators become imitators of God as beloved children. The command to imitate the love of God does not end there. That's not. There's not a period. There's a comma. Become imitators of God as beloved children. This seemingly impossible command comes with the promise and the necessary power, the promise and the power. How is it possible that we might become imitators of a God like ours?

How we cannot do it as slaves, or as servants, or as employees, or as earners, checking religious boxes? Put all this off and put all this on, and completing all of our religious tasks and the right religious way and the proper order, so that we can earn his approval and earn his favor and and win his love, deserve his love.

That's not how this works. We are not God's slaves. We are not his employees. With duties as assigned. We are. What does it say? His children.

We become imitators of God because we know that we are God's children. We become imitators of God because we know that we are loved. God has adopted us as children. If you are a Christian, we have a new father. We have a new family. We have a new identity as his children. He loves us as his children. We are loved children of a loving father.

This is antithetical to the idea that is pervasive in our culture that God is love. God loves everyone. We're all God's children. I hear this all the time. Friends, it's just. It's just not in the Bible. It's just not true.

It makes us feel good. It frees me from having to speak hard truth.

But if we really let that idea run its logical course all the way to the end, it's going to leave us feeling empty. It's going to leave us feeling unsafe. And it's going to leave us with a God who is unjust and not sovereign.

God is love. He is.

He is also just. We become children of God when he adopts us into his family. And this happens when we put our faith and our trust in Jesus and act accordingly. Behavior follows belief. It has to. Romans eight for if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons and daughters of God. First John three. See what kind of love the father has given to us, that we should be called children of God. And so we are. God is a loving father who loves his children. He embraces us in our weaknesses. He picks us up when we fall.

He corrects me and he steers me back on course. When I stray. He cheers me on. When I want to give up. When I failed, when I don't know how I'm going to move on. I don't know how to get through this next season. Help me. I depend on you.

I don't imitate the love of God so that God will love me. I strive to imitate the love of God because he already does.

Love is the command. Being loved by God is the power.

Therefore, become imitators of God as beloved children and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. Understanding God's love is foundational for us and our ability to love others, to even be able to receive love. We must understand that we are loved. I want this to land.

I want this to last and and remain with you. And so I'm going to try to illustrate this idea with a story. It's a story that Jesus told. It's called the parable of the Prodigal Son. In Luke 15, Jesus tells the story of a loving father. The father runs out to embrace his rebellious son. We often make this story about us.

Some it's familiar to most of us, but we usually make this about us. And there's nothing wrong with that. We internalize it, and we kind of insert ourself into the story as the prodigal. I think that's part of what the story is meant to do. But we miss the full beauty of the story when we just skip over the father.

And only focus on the son. Luke 1511 and he, that's Jesus. Jesus said, there was a man who had two sons, and the younger of them said to his father, father, give me the share of property that is coming to me. And he divided his property between them, the two sons. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living.

And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into the fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs eat, and no one gave him anything.

The younger son has asked for a nontraditional abnormal advance on his inheritance. This would have been a rejection of the father. The son no longer wants to walk with his father. He doesn't want to live in his father's house. He doesn't want to follow his father's rules. He doesn't want to be under his father's care or his father's love, or his father's teaching.

He is rejecting the family name altogether.

The son is also sabotaging his father's wealth, damaging the family business. This would have been roughly one third of all that his father owned.

The father must have known that it wasn't going to end well for the son, but he does it anyway. He lets his son choose and do what he wants to do.

And the result is predictable. The younger son wastes all of his money partying, living recklessly. That word is what prodigal means. It means reckless. It means extravagant. The son self-destructs, and then the economy weakens. The son becomes destitute. He is feeding pigs. He's so hungry that he's thinking about stealing the pig food.

He's in a bad way. This would have been scandalous and offensive to the original Jewish audience. Jews were considered unclean. A few things to notice in the story so far. This son, he is in desperate need.

His attempts to live life on his own have proven themselves completely insufficient.

No one seems to care about him or his circumstances. And in the middle of his hardship, he comes to his senses. We all finally come to our senses when we are lonely, when we are poor. When we are rejected. When we are helpless. When we're needy. This is called brokenness. We call this brokenness. Repentance is a gift from God, friends.

Repentance happens not only when Jesus Christ converts a sinner, but Martin Luther would say all of a Christian's life is one of repentance. Repentance is an ongoing experience for the believer. Jesus tells us to pray, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. When we are aware of our weaknesses and our sins, we recognize our failures and run to the father who can forgive us.

It reveals that God's love has gotten into me. It has penetrated my hard heart. Repentance. God is our father and he longs to heal us and to forgive us.

The world wants justice.

The world love stories about satisfied revenge, right?

But not God. God loves mercy. God desires mercy for his people. God chooses mercy of all the attributes to elevate, to lift high. He is a God of mercy. He chooses not to be executioner. He is the embracer. God embraces us. Verse 17. But when the son came to himself, he said, how many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread?

But I'm perishing here with hunger. I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants. And so he arose, and he came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him, and he felt compassion.

And he ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. But the father said to his servants, bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet, and bring the fattened calf, and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate.

For this my son was dead, and is alive again. He was lost and is found. And they began to celebrate the prodigal son knows that he has sinned. He knows that he sinned against his father, and he comes up with this plan to ask his father if he can just become his employee. Maybe his dad will find just enough mercy to hire him.

He knows he doesn't deserve his father's love. In fact, Jewish law allowed the elders of the city to stoned to death any rebellious son. Deuteronomy 21. If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and though they discipline him, he will not listen to them.

Then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of the city at the gate of the place where he lives. And they shall say to the elders of his city this hour, seven this our son is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey our voice. He is a glutton and a drunkard.

Then all of the many, then all of the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst. And all Israel shall hear and fear. For the prodigal son, even to be allowed to live and to get a job from his dad would be more than enough.

It's more than what he deserved.

This is the opposite of entitlement. This is brokenness. Entitlement is the opposite of brokenness. In fact, as my brokenness increases, my level of entitlement goes down.

And as my brokenness decreases, I begin to feel a little more entitled. You'll notice these dance together in this proportion, in your own life.

Our entitlement diminishes in proportion to our brokenness. The prodigal son has sinned. He has no advocate. He has no friends. He has no money. He has no merit. He has nothing to offer. Nothing in my hand I bring. He has nothing to bring to this encounter. He is unworthy. Verse 20 And the Son arose and came to his father.

But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. Remember? Prodigal means reckless. Extravagant. But the son is not the only one who's the prodigal in this story. The father is reckless and extravagant and shockingly compassionate with his son.

The father's love is scandalous in this story. It is more shocking than the rebellion of the son.

Completely unexpected. The son has his script ready, but the father doesn't even let him finish it. Did you notice that?

It's as if the father puts his hand to the mouth of his son, and he says, it's okay. It's okay now. You're going to be okay. It's all going to be okay. You're home. You're with me now. I love you. The son never even gets to the moment where he can ask his dad if he would hire him.

He can't even fall on his feet and beg for his father's mercy. He has it.

The son has no opportunity to earn anything or contribute anything or deserve anything.

The son is not given the chance to earn his way back. Instead, the father embraces his repentant son and kisses him. The father's compassion is running out. His love, his mercy, his forgiveness. The restoration. It's far more shocking than all of the wickedness and the evil that the son has done thus far in the story. The father is the one who initiates this restoration with the unworthy son.

Try to imagine the scene. Try to imagine the moment. Try to imagine the exchange of affection. And then put yourself in the story. Imagine our Lord Jesus receiving you. Embracing you. Running to you in the same way.

This is what it means to be the beloved children of God. When the son finally does get to speak and declare his unworthiness, the father doesn't even acknowledge it. No, he asks for the most elegant family robe to be brought in. To be wrapped around the sun. No shower. You don't need to clean yourself up.

Just like the righteousness of Christ. The robe of the righteousness of Christ. Covering all of our filth and our wounds and our sin.

And then a ring is put on his finger. This is the family seal. The family signet.

It's given to the son to remind him.

Who he is. His identity. He is not a slave. He is not a hired servant. He is a son.

The son is given shoes for his feet so that he can walk with his father, so that he can talk with his father. So the. He can carry out the orders that his father gives him. Do you think that the son would have been begrudging in any way to to carry out a task that his father asks him that next day?

And then the father kills the fattened calf, which was saved and used, usually for atonement.

Which is what this picture is a covering of sin.

This is a picture of what has really happened.

Verse two. Ephesians five and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. Christ's love for us, his death for us on the cross. Is the father running out to meet us?

The gospel is the father's embrace. This is good news for every lost son and rebellious daughter. Love is the command here. But being loved by God is the power. God's love for us guides us back when we stray off course. When we're discouraged. When we fail. When we're afraid. We run toward the embrace of the father. The love of God motivates us to love others.

It compels me. It propels me toward others.

We are loved by God. Only after we have been truly loved by God are we able to love God and to love others. We cannot love anyone. Friends, without knowing that God loves us, or else we're just using one another.

First John four in This is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another to walk in love means we must imitate God's love out of our identities. As God's beloved children. We love others as we have been loved by the father.

We have a father who loves us. Believe it. He has proven his love. Love is the command.

Being loved by God is the power.