Holy
In
1- 4 – If you were raised with Christ – direct reference to baptism. As new Christians we should strive to focus in on heaven and the reward that is there.
1 Chronicles 16:11 Seek the
LORD and His strength; Seek His face evermore!
Isaiah 55:6 Seek the LORD while He may be found, Call upon
Him while He is near.
Mat. 6:33
Matthew 6:19 " Do
not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and
where thieves break in and steal; 20
"but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor
rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 "For where your treasure
is, there your heart will be also.
If
we remain focused on God and holy living we can know that we will be found in
the glory of Christ when he appears at His second coming.
5-7 Paul gives us a partial
list of what sins these Christians used to be involved in until they these sins
were removed when they were baptized.
Fornication – any type of sexual
relations outside the bondage of marriage
Uncleanness – means have impure
motives and thoughts because of a lustful heart
Passion – can be used in good
sense or a bad one – this one is obvious bad
Evil desire- you have a deep desire
to search out all evil things that God opposes
Covetousness – Greedy desire to have
more even if you have to sin to get it.
God
does not overlook these things people who have these sins will face his wrath.
8 - 11 Paul continues on
telling these Christians more things they must put off.
Anger,
wrath and malice are 3 deadly combinations. A person can become angry without
sinning, but anger left unchecked will cause a person to sin which can lead to
wrath, which the point when a person loses themselves and harms others. Then if
you through malice into this mixture then you have a person who fully enraged
with the intent to do harm to another person they do not like.
Paul
understood this type sin, Acts 9:1 Then Saul, still breathing
threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high
priest 2 and asked letters
from him to the synagogues of Damascus, so that if he found any who were of the
Way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
That is why he says,
Ephesians 4:26
"Be angry, and do not sin": do not let the sun go down on your
wrath, 27 nor give place to
the devil.
Blasphemy – to speak evil of others trying to damage there good name.
Filthy language – Saying foul words and talking about inappropriate things
Do not lie to one another – Lying is sin and can end you in hell Rev. 21:8
The reason why we should
not continue in these sins is because when we baptized we put away our old body
of sin (Rom. 6) and we became a new creature in Christ and we share the same
unity no matter what our gender or nationality is. Next Paul is going to tells
us what we should embrace as Christians so that we can be holy.
12 – 13 Once we become
Christians we are considered as God’s elect, his choose few. We are his holy
and beloved which means we must learn to be holy.
Tender mercies- This means we are to show tender and compassionate mercy to others just
as God has shown us.
Kindness- One cannot be a Christian and not be kind because the opposite is being
mean and spiteful.
Humility – Just a Jesus was humble before the Father we must be humble – Being
humble is required before you can receive God’s Grace, "God resists the
proud, But gives grace to the humble."James 4:6 The opposite of being humble is being
arrogant an prideful Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before a
fall.
Meekness – means to be gentile
Longsuffering – means to be a patient and or slow to react in vengeance. God is has the
same type of long suffering for us 2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count
slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish
but that all should come to repentance.
Bear with one another and
be forgiven of one another – Again this ties in with the idea of being
longsuffering and gentile. When someone repents we must forgive them just a
Christ forgave us.
14 – Love should be center of every Christians life because it is what binds
all these different things together. As Paul says in 1 Cor. 13 if you do not
have love you have nothing.
15 – The peace of God should dwell in us and we should have great peace knowing
that we have been called into that one body which is the church that Jesus will
save. So, we should be thankful
16 – 17 This shows the importance of studying God’s Word and allowing it to be our
guide. It also shows that we are sing praises to God with our voices and
nothing else. Verse 17 shows that we are to respect the authority of Jesus.
18 – 21 Paul give more detail on the relationship between a husband and wife in
Eph. 5:28 – 33. Wives are be submissive in accordance with God’s Word the
husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. Children are to obey
their parents and the Farther is not provoke their children causing them to
become discouraged.
22 – 4:1 No matter who you are or who is over you, you are to do all things in
sincerity so that God is glorified. Those who abused you in this life will have
to answer to God on the Day of Judgment.
4:2 – 5 We are to continue in prayer and thanksgiving. We should always pray for
opportunities to reach the lost. As we live our Christian lives we must
exercise wisdom when we are in the world so the people can see what a Christian
is supposed to be like. We need to redeem the time because the life on this
earth is short and we only have short time to win people to Christ. No matter
how much we want speak roughly to someone we must hold our tongue and think
before we speak so that we can teach the truth in loving way and not a harsh
way.
If we can learn put away
these sinful things and embrace these Holy things then we can truly call
ourselves Holy people of God. I want to close with what Paul said to the
Philippians Philippians 4:8 Finally,
brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things
are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things
are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything
praiseworthy -- meditate on these things.
9 The things which you learned and received and heard and saw
in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.