Taking Off Corrupt Speech to Put On Good Speech (2)

Continuing our meditations on Ephesians 4:29—Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers—why is man’s speech corrupt? The answer is obvious—because the mouth only speaks what is in the heart.

An ancient fable tells of a slave who took poison a little at a time until she became so full of it that just her breath would wither the flowers. That’s how some people’s speech is today. Many years ago, while working in the building trades as an electrician, I was on a “cherry picker” one day running conduit in the steel ceiling frame of a warehouse. Just a few yards over from me was a sheet metal working (a “tin knocker” we called them) who was also on a cherry picker installing some heating duct. There was so much fifth coming out of his mouth that it seemed he had a little blue could floating above him. I just couldn’t resist, so I yelled over to him, “Hey, I was just wondering, is that the same mouth you eat with?” While his buddies on the ground laughed, he answered a little sheepishly, “Yea, I guess it is.”

Jesus Himself said, “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh” (Matt. 12:34). Man speaks corruptly because he is corrupt. But Christ changes that.

Pastor, commentator, and conference speaker Warren Wiersbe points out this wonderful contrast: “It is interesting to trace the word mouth through the Book of Romans and see how Christ makes a difference in a man’s speech. The sinner’s mouth is ‘full of cursing and bitterness’ (Rom. 3:14); but when he trusts Christ, he gladly confesses with his mouth “Jesus Christ is Lord” (Rom. 10:9–10). As a condemned sinner, his mouth is stopped before the throne of God (Rom. 3:19); but as a believer, his mouth is opened to praise God (Rom. 15:6). Change the heart and you change the speech. Paul certainly knew the difference, for when he was an unsaved rabbi, he was ‘breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord’ (Acts 9:1). But when he trusted Christ, a change took place: ‘Behold, he prayeth’ (Acts 9:11). From ‘preying’ to ‘praying’ in one step of faith!”

What a truth! From profanity to praise, from threatening to thanksgiving, from vulgarity to virtue. The Christian’s speech must not be characterized by corrupt words. We must not allow it to can creep back into our lives. We are bombarded with this every day, and while outright vulgarity is usually not a temptation, off-color stories, crudeness, and other tendencies sometimes are.

Commentator William Hendrickson makes this point well: “Certain vile phrases or catch words, sometimes even profanity, all too common in the pre-conversion period of life, have the habit in unguarded moments to barge right in and to befoul the atmosphere. Think of Peter who, although a disciple of the Lord, ‘began to curse and to swear’ when he thought that his life was in danger (Matt. 26:74).”

Indeed, it’s those “unguarded moments” that trip us. Paul deals with other aspects of speech in Ephesians 5:4, which he calls “foolish talking” and “jesting.” He also gives a beautiful admonition in Colossians 4:6 that our speech should be “seasoned with salt.” What does that mean? As salt enhances the flavor of food, our speech is to enhance Christ and those around us. May we say, our words quite literally should “taste good.” May they never leave a “bad taste” in any one’s mouth. This leads to the positive emphasis, which we’ll examine next time.

Taking Off Corrupt Speech to Put On Good Speech (1)

Ephesians 4:29 declares, Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. Here is the fourth of five sins that can easily creep back into the Christian’s life. Again we consider the negative first: let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth.

Speech is one of the most distinctive features of a person. I often recall the four years my wife and I traveled the country in ministry in the early 1980s (we thankfully came to Meeker in 1986). It was fascinating to hear the different dialects and accents in various places. During one week of meetings, I met a professor of linguistics who shared with me some of the reasons for this phenomenon, one of which was actually climate. Because of the heat in the southern states, speech tends to slow down and be drawn out, while in the colder climate in the north, speech tends to be quicker and clipped. I still recall the unique speech in Sheboygan, Wisconsin; I chuckled the entire week I spent there as I heard one of the most unique dialects in American culture. I also love the Tennessee accent, and of course, you can spot a Texan after about three words. To this day I still listen to speech patterns and often guess where someone is from originally.

Indeed, language and speech is one of our most unique characteristics. We might also interject that this unique quality of humanity over animals is still a puzzle that the evolutionist can’t explain.

What we see in our text, then, reminds us of what James declares, that while men have tamed wild beasts, no one can tame the tongue; it can be tamed only by the Holy Spirit.

Communication translates logos, which means to speak intelligently, to articulate a message, to give a discourse. Logos is derived from lego, which originally (prior to the 5^th Century B.C.) denoted the “activity of collecting, carefully selecting, cataloguing in succession, and arranging together in an orderly sequence.” This developed into the meaning “to lay before, i.e., to relate, recount” and finally “to say, speak, i.e., to utter definite words, connected, and significant speech equal to discourse.” How important words are! They must be carefully selected, orderly, and connected. Words matter!

So Paul is concern here with the words Christians use, the speech that characterizes their lives. Specifically, he’s concerned that it not be corrupt (sapros), “rotten, putrid.” Originally this vivid word was used to describe rotten or spoiled food. Our Lord used it Matthew 13:48 to refer “bad” (rotten) fish that must be thrown away.

What must never characterize the Christian, then, is rotten, spoiled, decayed speech. Several modern translations miss the mark with “unwholesome,” which is not as strong as corrupt. And how corrupt, indeed, is the speech of man today! The vulgarity, profanity, suggestive, and down right filthy jokes and stories are all common to our society.

Some years ago I stopped at a one of the convenience stores right here in Meeker. When I came out of the store I heard two teenage girls, both about sixteen years old, swearing at one another. I heard four letter words coming from those girls that at one time would seldom be heard outside a marine barracks. Today such language is commonplace.

Further, have you ever considered how this corruption even appears in just the decibel volume of people’s speech? Whether it’s at a ballgame, a conference, a party, or even some restaurants, it’s an out of control cacophony. But the Christian’s speech is never to be out of control, never a clamor, never chaotic. We’ll continue next time.

Taking Off Stealing to Put On Laboring (3)

Concluding Paul’s challenge in Ephesians 4:28—Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth—having considered the negative consideration, we now see the positive.

First, notice that a man must labour, working with his hands. How amazing the Word of God is! In a single statement, Paul addresses issues that plague society 2,000 years later.

The “get rich quick” mentality—winning the lottery, the latest system for buying real-estate, the newest “pyramid scheme”—is not the mentality of the New Man. There’s certainly nothing wrong with riches, for it’s only “the LOVE of money [that] is the root of all evil” (I Tim. 6:10, emphasis added), not money itself. And it is, indeed, this love of money that drives the “get rich quick” mentality.

In contrast, the mentality of the New Man is that he “labors” and “works.” Labour is kopiao, which speaks of “exertion and toil,” “the process of becoming tired,” and the “consequent fatigue and exhaustion.” Peter used this word, for example, when he told the Lord that he and his companions “toiled” all night fishing and had caught nothing (Lk. 5.5). It’s also used of the duty of a pastor to study the Word of God: “Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honour, especially they who labour in the word and doctrine” (I Tim. 5:17). In contrast to today’s tendency to stay out of the “Pastor’s Study,” Paul makes it clear that the responsibility of a pastor is to exhaust himself in the study of the Word of God.

 Working (ergazomai) speaks of work in general, such as working “in a field (Matt. 21:28) or at a trade (Acts 18:3),” or even “to do business” (Matt. 26:16).” Not only are we working to the point of exhaustion, but we’re doing it systematically, doing it every day in our field, trade, or business.

At the very foundation of society is the necessity of work. Even before the fall, man was required to work (Gen. 2:15), which then became even more necessary, and much more difficult, after the fall (3:17-19). So foundational is work that Paul told the Thessalonians that “if any would not work, neither should he eat” (I Thess. 3:10). Every Jewish rabbi was taught a trade, for as the rabbis said, “If you do not teach your son a trade, you teach him to be a thief.” As always, Jesus is our model—He was carpenter. What a principle that is in our day when so many people have no work ethic, when many young people are not being taught how to work.

Indeed, the concepts of “entitlements” and “welfare” were creations of political Liberalism, which is by definition Socialism, “the redistribution of wealth.” There are certainly cases when people need help, such as I Corinthians 16:1-3, where the needs of people in the Jerusalem church were met by the Believers in the churches in Galatia, but the welfare system in our society is horribly abused. People who work support millions who can but won’t. Not only does Scripture declare it, but even common sense tells us that if a man can work, he works, or he does not eat. Biblical principles always have practical reasons.

Second, Paul says that a man’s labour must be good. A Christian must work at a job that is honest and God-honoring and cannot work anyplace where he must violate God’s commands. This would include anything from doing something dishonest to an employer who demands that a Christian working on Sunday was the rule instead of the exception.

Third, and most important, Paul’s main thrust is that we work in order that we may have to give to him that needeth, that we can give to others. Oh, that Christians would see this! Humanism says we work to get; God says we work to give. This includes not only giving to our families, but it goes much further. It involves giving to God and giving to other Believers. It’s easy for Christians to be drawn into the world’s philosophy: “Let the insurance company take care of it,” or, “Let the government do it.” But such attitudes contribute not only to the decaying of our society but to Christianity. Instead of ministering to other believers, we shift the responsibility and thereby not only disobey God but also contribute to growing Socialism. Christians should be concerned about the needs and burdens of fellow Christians. If we see a need, we should do what we can to help meet that need. Sometimes it might not be much, but God will use it.

Taking Off Stealing to Put On Laboring (2)

Continuing Paul’s challenge in Ephesians 4:28—Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth—how often do we steal from God? There are two basic ways we do this.

We first steal money from Him. Unlike the Old Testament practice of “tithing” (ten percent), the New Testament nowhere speaks of it. In dramatic contrast, I Corinthians 16:2 declares that the basis of giving our financial support is: “Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come” (emphasis added).

While voluntary giving was practiced in the Old Testament (see Ex. 25:1-2; 35:5, 21; Prov. 3:9-10; 11:24), tithing was demanded because it was this that paid for the operation of Israel’s government. In fact, the prophet Malachi condemned the people for their failure to pay these “taxes” that supported the Levites who ran the nation. Tithing, then, had nothing to do with “giving,” which implies freewill offering, rather it was required payment.

Obviously, then, tithing is nowhere New Testament. Just as the Israelites gave “tithes” to support the Divinely ordained government under which they lived, we today are required to pay taxes (Rom. 13:6). While we are sometimes appalled at what our tax money pays for, we are to pay it anyway. As corrupt and perverted as the Roman Empire was, our Lord still commanded, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s” (Mk. 12:17).  So in I Corinthians 16:2, no longer is stewardship based upon demand; it’s based upon grace.

Briefly, such “grace giving” involves four things. First, realize that 100% belongs to God. He has entrusted us with all we possess and will hold us accountable for how we use it. Second, weigh how much you give against how much you keep for yourself. There is nothing wrong with buying things, but often we confuse needs, wants, and indulgences. Third, don’t “give to get.” Many today are teaching a philosophy of prosperity that says if you give to God, He will bless you materially. Old Testament Jews were promised material blessing, but no such promise is made to New Testament believers. Fourth, give as the Spirit urges you. This does not mean giving out of impulse or emotion, rather through prayer and Holy Spirit urging give as God has prospered.

I once read a book (by an unfortunately obscure author) in which the author told of a tract that came into his hands. On the cover of the tract was an illustration similar to a pie. A thin slice of the pie, which represented ten percent of it, was labeled, “10% for God.” The remainder of the pie was labeled, “90% for yourself.” In the author’s own words: “I simply cannot express the loathing in my heart to this legalistic and loveless lie. Nowhere are Christians taught that they can discharge their stewardship on such a basis. If I am God’s, then all that is put in my hands is God’s! Does it startle some of you to learn that God is going to make His stewards give an account of 100% of all that He gives them? I urge ministers and teachers to forsake Old Testament ground and start teaching New Testament doctrine relative to stewardship” (Edward Tracy, Babylon The Great Is Fallen, Is Fallen [published by the author in San Francisco, California, 1960], p. 81).

Dear Christian, God wants us to give as He has prospered us, to give according to the grace He has shown toward us.

A second area in which we steal from God is time. All our time belongs to God. Like everything else (money, possessions, children, etc.) God has made us stewards of time. In our study of Ephesians 5:15-17 we will learn that one of the characteristics of true wisdom is “redeeming time,” that is, using time wisely and advantageously. We are to use our time to glorify God. How unfaithful we are in their attendance to the local church, in our daily witness of Christ, and in our service to others. This is no more and no less than stealing from God!

Taking Off Stealing to Put On Laboring (1)

Ephesians 4:28 declares, Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. Here is the third of five sins that can easily creep back into the Christian’s life.

The negative consideration is found in the words, Let him that stole steal no more. The Greek behind both stole and steal is klepto (English, “kleptomania”) and “emphasizes the secrecy, craft, and cheating involved in the act of stealing” (in contrast, lestes “includes the element of violence”). In other words, it’s not armed robbery, rather burglary.

At first this might seem to be an odd admonition; after all, would a Christian secretly steal? Well, Paul’s admonition must again be viewed in light of the society of that day. As commentator Albert Barnes points out, “Theft, like lying, was, and is, almost a universal vice among the heathen . . . Hence as the Christian converts at Ephesus had been long addicted to it, there was danger that they would fall into it again.” William Barclay adds that theft was rampant in that day and most “common in two places, the docks and above all in the public baths. The public baths were the clubs of the time; and stealing the belongings of the bathers was one of the commonest crimes in any Greek city.”

Additionally, many believers then were slaves. Since slaves were often not well cared for, a lot of pilfering from the master went on. In fact, Paul wrote Titus and told him to admonish Christian slaves not to “purloin” (2:9-10). The Greek (nosphizomai) was applied by ancient Greek writers to the embezzlement of public treasures, and therefore means “to embezzle, keep back something which belongs to another.” This is the word used for Ananias and Sapphira when they “kept back part of the price” of what they sold after they said they would give it all. Some modern translations render it “pilfer” (NASB, RSV), but that doesn’t quite capture the original as well as “purloin,” “to appropriate wrongfully and often by a breach of trust” (Webster).

Citizens of that day, however, not just slaves, practiced petty theft because it was not wholly condemned by popular opinion. The attitude then was much like that of today that says, “Everybody does it,” or “It’s all right as long as you don’t get caught,” or, “They have plenty and won’t miss a little.”

Of course, we’re all aware of what blatant theft is. Our society is full of robbery, burglary, shop-lifting, embezzlement, and the like. In the mid 1990s, the U.S. Commerce Department reported some astounding figures concerning shoplifting. About four million people are caught shoplifting each year, but it is estimated that for every person caught, 35 go undetected. If the estimates are accurate it means that 140 million shoplifting incidents occur. The result is that shoplifting tends to raise prices. Additionally, thefts from hotels and motels reached 500 million dollars a year. Hotel managers count on one of every three guests stealing something. In a recent year, 4,600 Bibles were lifted from New York City hotel rooms.

Certainly no Christian would be guilty of these—or would he? Think a moment of things that few people define as stealing: employees pilfering items from the company, reporting more hours than were actually worked, “hiding” during working hours to avoid work, not paying a debt that is owed, an employer not paying someone fair wages, a false insurance claim, overestimating when bidding on the cost of a certain job, jacking up the price of a repair or service because the insurance company will pay for it, and keeping what a sales clerk overpays you in change. All of that is stealing!

We should also ask, “How often do we steal from God?” We’ll consider that next time.

Taking Off Unrighteous Vengeance to Put On Righteous Anger (2)

Considering again Ephesians 4:26-27—Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil—the New Testament speaks first of righteous anger.

Second, the New Testament also speaks of unrighteous anger. Paul adds another imperative, and sin not, which provide us with a check and a restraint, a test to show whether our anger is truly righteous. When is anger sin? Obviously, anger is sin when our anger is not directed at things that are sin against God. In short: Sinful anger is when our anger is motivated out of personal reasons, that is, when someone has offended us, not God.

How often is our anger selfish instead of Godly? How often do we get angry because we have been wronged instead of getting angry because God’s Word has been violated? Even if someone’s action is itself sinful, we also sin if our anger is motivated out of self, if it is motivated out of personal offense or “hurt feelings?”

And what horrendous destruction comes as a result of personally motivated anger! The story is told of a women who tried to defend her bad temper by saying to preacher Billy Sunday, “Although I blow up over the least little thing, it’s all over in a minute,” to which Sunday replied, “So is a shotgun blast! It’s over in seconds, too, but look at the terrible damage it can do.” Consider the results of so-called “crimes of passion,” where out of momentary anger someone is stabbed, shot, or just defamed by words.

The famous 1^st Century B.C. Roman poet Horace wrote, “Anger is momentary insanity” (Epistolae). How true! “Insanity” is a loss of mental capacity and reason, and that is what uncontrolled anger is. That is not how the Christian is to live. The Christian doesn’t go insane, doesn’t “get stupid,” doesn’t fly off the handle, doesn’t “lose it,” doesn’t get enraged over the least little thing. When there is anger, it is for the right reason and is controlled.

This leads us to the positive consideration, that is, the deeper motive, namely: let not the sun go down upon your wrath. The word wrath comes from the Greek parorgismos, meaning embitterment or personal resentment. even righteous anger can degenerate, so Paul added this admonition. Kept too long, even righteous anger against sin can turn into resentment toward the person. It, therefore, must be dealt with before the sun [goes] down; that is, don’t take it to bed with you, deal with it, get it resolved. Again, be angry at the sin but don’t resent the person. Why? Because when we have resentment for someone, we cannot then be of help to them. Yes, we get angry at their sin, but our goal should be to bring them back to what is right by being a witness to them.

Why, then, must we not allow unrighteous anger? Because it will give place to the Devil. The Greek for give place exactly is another Present Imperative, a command. Give is didōmi, a common word found 416 times in the New Testament and means “to give of one’s own accord and with good will.” Luke records the words of our Lord when he said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). The idea, then, is to say, “Here you go. I’m happy to give this to you. Take it. All power to you.”

Place, then, is topos (English, “topography”), which when used literally refers to “any portion of space marked off from the surrounding territory,” such as a spot, space, or room. Used figuratively, it speaks of an “opportunity, power, [or] occasion for acting.”

Finally, the Devil is tō diabolō, which because of the definitive article (the) refers specifically to “Satan, the great accuser, the prince of the demons or fallen angels, who is the great opposer of God and seducer of men, against whose schemes we are commanded to be constantly on our guard” (Charles Hodge).

So Paul is telling us that nothing gives the Devil a quicker foothold in our lives than anger, and we must, therefore, never give him any space to work, any room to maneuver, any opportunity to take advantage of our anger. It’s a medical fact that anger blinds a person’s mind; it obliterates a person’s judgment and rational thinking so he will do things he would not normally do. When anger comes, it opens the door to Satan and gives him an opportunity to work, and nothing opens the door faster or wider. Again, we can look at society today and see the devastation that has been caused by anger running amuck with “crimes of passion,” “road rage,” and the like. It’s far more tragic when such anger is allowed into the life of the Christian and into the Body of Christ.

Taking Off Unrighteous Vengeance to Put On Righteous Anger (1)

In Ephesians 4:26-27, the Apostle Paul writes, Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil. Next to lying (v. 25), unrighteous anger is the most prevalent sin in human behavior. The human nature is, if nothing else, a volatile thing. There are those exceptional people who seem not to get angry no matter what. Most of us, however, have a breaking point. In my own younger days, I had a problem with anger, which God worked on through His Word. To understand anger, we must look at two things that are brought out in our text.

First, the New Testament speaks of righteous anger. There are those who believe and teach that spiritual behavior demands that we suppress all anger, that all anger is sin. As almost all commentators recognize, however, the text clearly does not say not to be angry at all. If Paul that’s what wanted to say, surely he would have just written, “Never get angry.” Rather, what he says is, “In your anger, don’t sin.” In fact, the clause be ye angry is a Present Imperative in the Greek, that is, a command to be continuously angry. That, of course, doesn’t mean we go through life always angry, rather there will be times throughout life that we are to get angry.

May we also interject that one reason for the teaching that we must never be angry is no doubt due to today’s “touchy-feely,” syrupy sentimentality and false love that comes from liberal teaching. It’s really nothing but a resurrection of the philosophy of the ancient Stoics (300 B.C.), who condemned all anger because they believed that man should live rationally and in harmony with nature, and we hear the same nonsense from the New Agers and mystics.

Such teaching must in the end conclude that we aren’t even to get angry at sin. We submit, however, that there’s something dreadfully wrong with any Christian who is not angered at the some one-and-a-half million babies that are slaughtered in their mother’s own womb every year in America. There’s something terribly awry with “Christian” leaders who are not righteously indignant with the compromises that are being made to the Gospel and the wholesale abandonment of absolute Truth. As beloved J. Vernon McGee puts it, “No believer can be neutral in the battle of truth.” Amen! Tragically, however, some believers are actually on the wrong side these days as they refuse to “earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3).

What, then, is Paul saying? He is telling us that there is an anger that is settled and right. Just as not all sex is sinful, but only the wrong kind (that which is outside of marriage), likewise only the wrong kind of anger is sinful.

So what kind of anger is right?—righteous anger. Simply put: Righteous anger is a settled state of mind in which there is an indignation and hatred of that which is offensive to and sinful against God and a desire for God’s justice. No, we do not seek revenge, for, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” (Rom. 12:19); rather we are commanded to a continuous, enduring anger against sin and look forward to God dealing with sin in His judgment. The Christian can, and should, get angry at immorality, ungodliness, apostasy, disobedience, unfaithfulness, rebellion, unyieldedness, and all other sin against God’s will and commands. While we certainly are to be concerned for the sinner, and will witness to him concerning coming wrath, at the same time we look forward to God’s judgment on those who reject His Word and blaspheme His name.

One Greek authority offers a tantalizing consideration. He says that it is quite possible that the thought here in our text is that our anger is actually “to be understood as participation in the anger of God.” In essence, then, “our” anger is not really ours, but God’s. What a challenge! Let us each ask ourselves, “Do I get angry at the same things at which God is angered?” All sin is sin against God, as David realized in Psalm 51:4—“Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight”—so sin should, indeed, anger us.