I know many of you know my story and how God saved me. Every year at this time I am more mindful of the miracle of God’s mercy, love, and grace upon my life! When God found me, I was so lost! I was not looking for Him, yet He found me! God got my attention on July 12, 1991, after I stepped in front of a big old car in the middle of Business Rt. 1 (aka West Lincoln Hwy.). My graduating class in 1993 was just under 600, the population where I grew up is currently over 70,000, and the hospital I was taken to after I was hit by that big white car currently has 371 beds.
So, the fact that a woman from my father’s church who did not know me decided to pull over to pray for me could be viewed as a coincidence, but then to have the wife of the youth director of that same church assigned to my care is too much to ignore! Not to mention that eight months before my accident, my father had his accident that God used to get his attention by having his hand just about cut off, and shortly after receiving major surgery on his hand and recovering at home, two guys from a little church located not far from where I was hit by that big white car visited our little house to tell him about Jesus! At the same time my friend’s mom at whose home I ate almost all of my meals and spent almost all of my weekends sleeping in their home because my stepmother was so horrible to me while I was growing up, picked up a Bible and started reading it. So regardless of if I was at home or at my friend’s house, I was unable to escape from hearing about the God of the Bible and how He sent His Son to die for sinners like me! God orchestrated all of that so that on July 14th while confined to my bed with a major concussion in St. Mary’s Hospital, I was forced to listen to Darrell Adair, the youth director of my father’s little church, tell me about Jesus while my father sat on one side of my bed and Jackie on the other as they prayed for my soul… 33 years ago to the day! Four days after Darrell’s visit, I finally caved and surrendered my life to Jesus as my Lord and Savior!
So, to say that I am a bit overwhelmed by God’s grace is a bit of an understatement. God knows how my brain works, and it seems to me that ever year there is something new that I have not thought about since God saved my soul. I did not sit down to write my sermon manuscript until this past Friday which was the anniversary of the day I was hit by that big white car! That on the anniversary of one of the most important days of my life, I would be writing my sermon manuscript on Ephesians 5:1-2 is staggering to me! What is even more staggering is that the God I was running from not only chose me before the foundation of the world (1:3-4), but did so out of a great love for this lost sinner: “In love He predestined us to adoption as sons and daughters through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace… (vv. 5-6). This same God made me alive with Jesus on July 18th in the middle of my living room 33 years ago as a result of His rich mercy, great love, and sufficient grace (2:4-5), it is staggering to me!
From everything that you have read, studied, and heard from Ephesians so far, can you blame me for being overwhelmed by God’s undeserved goodness upon my life? Think about it, 33 years ago while Darrell shared the gospel with my younger 16-year-old rebellious self, that He already determined that He would so mold and shape that teenage kid laying in that hospital bed that 33 years later he would stand before his church family finally ready to preach on Ephesians 5:1-2 after 20 years of pastoral ministry!
Here is what I want to say very briefly before we get into these two verses so you can fully appreciate them. Ephesians 5:1-2 is inserted to make the point of how you can keep from grieving the Holy Spirit (4:30) and why you ought to reject, “the useless deeds of the darkness…”. You, Christian, are beloved by God and you must never forget that!
Imitate God Because He Loves You (v. 1)
Tim Keller described this verse in this way: “It’s like putting a radioactive isotope in the middle of your being, and the rays it sends out will shrink your tumors.”[1] Another way to state this verse is this way: “Because God cherishes you as His dear child, imitate Him instead of the sinful world.”
The word for “imitate” is the Greek word “mimētēs” from which we get the word mimic. Remember what Paul stated in 4:25-32? Get rid of falsehood, get rid of ungodly anger, get rid of coveting and taking what does not belong to you, and get rid of unwholesome talk. Kill it! Make war with it! Get rid of all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and slander! Kill it! Make war with it! Be killing sin or it will be killing you! How you get radical about your sin and how you guard yourself against grieving the Holy Spirit is by remembering who you are, a child of a holy God.
When you were dead in your sins, you imitated the life of the prince of the power of the air as the spiritually dead (2:1-3), but now you are alive with Christ and have been adopted as a son and as a daughter of the God you stood against. Now you are a “beloved” child of God. What does it mean to be a child of God? It means that you who were once dead are now alive with Christ (2:4-5), but that is not all that it means! It means that you who were once an enemy of God are now a friend of God, but it means so, so much more according to Romans 5, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life” (vv. 8-10). But wait, we are not just reconciled to God and saved by the Life of Christ, we are heirs with Christ:
So then, brothers and sisters, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh—for if you are living in accord with the flesh, you are going to die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons and daughters of God. For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons and daughters by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!” (Rom. 8:12-15)
To go from death to life is a miracle! To go from an enemy of God to friendship with God is amazing! But to be reconciled to God through the blood of Jesus and now stand before Him as a full-fledged and a legitimate child of a holy God is staggering! I am not the only one who thinks this way; the apostle John felt this way and wrote in his epistle: “See how great a love the Father has given us, that we would be called children of God; and in fact we are. For this reason the world does not know us: because it did not know Him” (1 John 3:1). Or as it is written in Ephesians 1:11-12, “In Him we also have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things in accordance with the plan of His will, to the end that we who were the first to hope in the Christ would be to the praise of His glory.”
Listen, we were the lost sheep that Jesus left the 99 to find (Luke 15:1-7)! We were the lost coin, that Jesus turns the house upside down to save and all of heaven rejoices over when you were found (Luke 15:8-10)! Christian, you were the prodigal son Jesus described in his parable who wallowed in the sloop and sludge who the Father compassionately runs to embrace and throws a party for and commands all of heaven: “Quickly bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet; and bring the fattened calf, slaughter it, and let’s eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found” (Luke 15:22-24).
So, as “beloved children” we are commanded to mimic our heavenly Father. What does that mean? Well, let me tell you what it does not mean: It does not mean to become what God is, for that is impossible. He alone is God and there is none like Him. God is eternal and has always existed; we are creatures made in His image. God is infinitely sovereign and self-sufficient; we are His image-bearing humans who are designed to find our satisfaction in Him. God is all-powerful (Omnipotent), while we are fragile. God is everywhere at once (Omnipresent), while we are finite and limited. God is all-knowing (Omniscient), while we are always learning. God is perfectly holy and is set apart from creation and alone is to be worshiped as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; He is the center of all things while we exist to worship Him. These characteristics that we cannot share with God are known as His incommunicable attributes.
God also has characteristics that we can demonstrate in a limited way; these are known as His communicable attributes. God’s communicable attributes include His justice, wisdom, faithfulness, mercy, goodness, compassion, forgiveness, and love. There is not one aspect of His character that He needs to improve upon. While we are called to exercise justice, wisdom, faithfulness, mercy, goodness, compassion, forgiveness, and love we are forever needing to get better at being just, exercising wisdom, practicing faithfulness, demonstrating mercy, being good, compassionate, forgiving, and loving.
God’s justice, wisdom, faithfulness, mercy, goodness, compassion, forgiveness, and love are all character traits we are commanded to imitate in a way that sets apart from the rest of the world. for this is what it means to, “walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called” (4:1). It also includes the, “good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them” (2:10). This is what Peter meant when he wrote, “As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written: ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy.’” (1 Pet. 1:14-16).
More specifically though, it is the love of God that resulted in our forgiveness that we are to mimic as God’s “beloved children.”
Walk in Love Because Jesus Redeemed You (v. 2)
Why mimic God in the way that He loves? Well it is the reason why you, Christian, are “beloved” by God. Your sins cost God the life of His Son on a cross as an, “offering and a sacrifice…”. The bruised and bleeding Christ, His torn flesh, His pierced hands and feet, His brow piercing crown of thorns, and his agonizing screams upon the cross as our curse is a testament to the horror and seriousness of our sin. As James Boice once said, “God’s forgiveness is not a mere overlooking of sin, as though he said, ‘Well, boys will be boys (or girls will be girls). We’ll overlook it for now; just don’t let it happen again.’ God takes sin with such seriousness that he deals with it fully at the cross, and it is on that basis—the death of Jesus—that we can know we are forgiven.”[2] I saw a quote from another pastor the other day that said, “On the cross, God looked at Christ and saw you. Now, He looks at you and sees Christ.”[3] This is why we are able to sing:
Come Thou fount of ev'ry blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy redeeming love[4]
What does the love of God look like that we experienced? It is kindness, it is compassion, it is the type of forgiveness that keeps no record of wrongs! Think about what the love of God has done for you! You who were once cursed and condemned, Jesus was condemned by being cursed: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us—for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a Tree.’” (Gal. 3:13). The apostle John defined it for us this way: “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
Christ’s death upon the cross for our sins was motivated by His love for us, and when He gave Himself up for us, He did so as an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma that pleased Him. As one commentator said, Jesus’ sacrifice upon the cross, “gave the perfume of grace and glory, the most pleasing aroma of sacrifice ever.”[5]
To “Walk in love, just as Christ also loved…” is one way to live a life that is pleasing to the One who called us to Himself through His Son. Love is the fuel and fire of worship; it is a love for God and a love for others. It is a love that makes Romans 12:1 possible: “Therefore I urge you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.” Amy Carmichael, the famous missionary who spent a lifetime in India and was influential in the outlawing of temple prostitution of children, said of love: “One can give without loving, but one cannot love without giving.”[6] A young woman who was considering the life of a missionary wrote a letter asking Carmaichael what missionary life was like, Carmaichael answered: “Missionary life is simply a chance to die.”
To love, “as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us…” is not to atone for the sins of others but to “walk in love” in a way that you die to yourself for glory of God and the good of others. It is the kind of love that flows out of the crucified life Paul talked about in Galatians 2:19-20, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” To love as Christ loved us is to give ourselves to others so that Christ may be formed in them (see Gal. 4:19).
To love as Christ loved is to walk in a way that serves to give to the One who gave Himself for you. To walk in love is to be devoted to one another (Rom. 12:10), to build up one another (Rom. 14:19; 1 Thes. 5:11), to serve one another (Gal. 5:13), to bear one another’s burdens (Gal. 6:2), to seek the good for one another (1 Thess. 5:15), to live in peace with one another (1 Thes. 5:13), to encourage one another to love and good deeds (Heb. 10:24), to confess our sins to one another (Jas. 5:16), to act in humility towards one another (1 Pet. 5:13), to walk in truth together (1 John 3:18), and so many other “one another’s”!
This is why we read in our Bible: “We love, because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19)”. We love because we are “beloved children.” We love because, “Christ also loved you…” Now, my dear brothers and sisters, we not only can love God and others, but love is also the evidence we are our indeed the children of God. Amen.
