Dead men and women walking...

At the church where I serve we are spending our time together in a sermon series entitled identity. During this series, we are looking at a letter that is recorded for us in the New Testament of our Bibles called the book of Ephesians. And as we go through this series, our hope and our prayer is that God would enable us to see our true identity, the identity that He designed us to live in, so that we would live our day to day lives in light of our true identity.

This week, I would like for us to look at the next section of this letter that the Apostle Paul wrote to early followers of Jesus at the church at Ephesus, we are going to discover another timeless truth regarding our identity as a follower of Jesus that has the potential to change how we see our true identity, the identity that God designed us to live in, so that we would live our day to day lives in light of our true identity. So let’s discover this timeless truth together, beginning in Ephesians 2:1:

And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.

Paul begins this section of his letter to the members of the church at Ephesus by reminding them of a past reality in their lives: and you were dead. Now when Paul uses the word dead here, he is revealing the reality that there was a time in the past when the members of the church at Ephesus may have been physically alive, but in reality they were really dead.

 Notice that Paul does not say that they were sick; Paul does not say that they had the flu. Instead they were dead. There was a time when the members of the church at Ephesus were dead men and women walking.

Prior to being a pastor, I used to work in law enforcement. And in law enforcement, when a person is on death row, they are simply biding their time for their death sentence to be carried out. And in maximum security prisons where people who are on death row are housed, there is a saying that arose to describe the residents of death row. You see, when an inmate on death row was let out of his cell to make the final walk to his execution, the rest of the inmates would say “dead man walking”.

Paul’s point here is that there was a time when the members of the church at Ephesus were dead men and women walking. While they were not physically dead, they were under the sentence of death with no chance of escape. Because, dead people are dead, right? Dead people can do nothing to escape death, because they are dead.

Paul then explains that the reason why they were once dead was the result of their trespasses and sins. In other words, there was a time when the members of the church at Ephesus were dead men and women walking as a result of their selfishness and rebellion against God. Then, in verse two, we see Paul unpack for us exactly how the members of the church at Ephesus were dead man and women walking by revealing two specific ways that the members of the church at Ephesus lived out their lives in selfishness and rebellion against God.

First, Paul explained that the members of the church at Ephesus walked according to the course of this world. Now when Paul refers to the world here, he is referring to those things in the world that are hostile to God and place themselves in opposition to God and God’s kingdom. Paul’s point here is that there was a time when the members of the church at Ephesus chose to align themselves and live out their day to day lives according to the things in the world that were hostile to God and opposed God and God’s word.

Second, Paul explains that the members of the church at Ephesus walked according to the prince of the power of the air. Here Paul is referring to the devil, who is the archenemy of God. Paul’s point is that there was a time when the members of the church at Ephesus chose to align themselves and live out their day to day lives in a way that followed the influence of the devil to reject and rebel against the message and teachings of Jesus.

And as a result, there was a time when the members of the church at Ephesus were sons of disobedience that were following the footsteps of the “fatherly influences” of the world and the devil.  Paul then shifts the focus of his conversation and reveals a third way that the members of the church at Ephesus lived out their lives in selfishness and rebellion against God in verse 3:

 Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

Did you notice the shift that Paul makes here? Did you notice the change in the pronouns that Paul is using here? Did you notice that instead of you, it is we? You see, Paul did not see himself as being any better than the members of the church at Ephesus. Just like the members of the church at Ephesus there was a time when Paul chose to align himself and live out his day to day life according to those in the world that opposed God. There was a time when Paul chose to align himself and his day to day life in a way that was influenced by the devil to reject and rebel against the message and teachings of Jesus.

Paul then reveals a third way that Paul and members of the church at Ephesus lived out their lives in selfishness and rebellion against God when he states that we all too formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh. Now when Paul refers to the lusts of the flesh, this phrase literally means to be a slave of our physical passions.

And as a result of being enslaved by our physical passions, Paul and the members of the church at Ephesus were obligated to carry out the desires of their physical bodies and minds that were dominated by their selfishness and rebellion. Paul’s point here is that there was a time when he and the members of the church at Ephesus chose to live out their day to day lives according to their own selfish desires instead of God’s desires.

Paul then explains that as a result of choosing to live out their lives in selfishness and rebellion against God and the word of God by aligning themselves with the world, the devil, and their selfish and rebellious desires, he and the members of the church of Ephesus were objects of wrath. Now, I don’t know about you but that does not sound like a good thing, does it?

 

It is important to understand that God’s wrath is not a selfish passionate emotional response. It is not God blowing a head gasket, so to speak. Instead, it is God’s perfect justice resulting in a rightful response to the wrongdoing and injustice of others. God’s wrath is God’s right and just response to selfishness and rebellion.

Paul’s point here is that the as a result of the things that he and the members of the church at Ephesus had done out of their selfishness and rebellion that hurt God and others, they were dead men and women walking. There was a time when, while they were not physically dead, they were under the sentence of death with no chance of escape. Because, dead people are dead, right?

Paul then concludes verse 3 with a small but profound phrase, “even as the rest”. The rest here refers to the rest of mankind. Paul’s point is that every human being throughout history either is, or has been in a position where they are dead men and women walking. Every human being throughout history were dead men and women walking as a result of their selfishness and rebellion against God.

There was a time when every human being on the planet chose to align themselves and live out their day to day lives in a way that was influenced by the world around us that is opposed to God and God’s kingdom, the devil who is the archenemy of God, and their own selfish desires instead of following God’s desires. And out of that selfishness and rebellion, all humanity throughout history has done things that hurt God and others. That would be me, and that would be you. All of us have been dead men and women walking.

Now, you might be thinking to yourself, “Well Dave what a downer of a message. How discouraging,” And if Paul would have stopped there, this would be very discouraging. However, Paul does not stop there.

Instead, we see Paul uses two powerful words that begin to lead us into a timeless truth about our identity as a follower of Jesus in Ephesians 2:4. We will look at those two words tomorrow…