Walking in Righteousness - Speaking the Truth in Love. (Ephesians 4: 25)

This Podcast is part of a 10-year project to complete an in-depth, daily study of the entire Bible, chapter by chapter, verse by verse. 

Episode Notes:  Walking in Righteousness - Speaking the Truth in Love. (Ephesians 4: 25)

Saved by Grace, United in One Body.

 Earlier in this letter, Paul reminded us that it is: “By grace you have been saved through faith… it is the gift of God…” (Ephesians 2:8) We are saved by grace, not by our performance. And when we trust Christ, we become part of something bigger than ourselves — the Body of Christ. We are joined to one another. We belong to one another. We grow with one another. We serve one another. That’s why Paul said yesterday our purpose is “…to equip His people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up…” (Ephesians 4:12–13)

The Journey of Spiritual Growth.

 In yesterday's study, we were given three foundational principles:

1. Put off the old self

“…put off your former way of life…” (4:22)

Take off the old habits, the old attitudes, the old patterns of sin — like taking off an old coat.

 2. Renew your mind

“…be made new in the attitude of your minds…” (4:23)

Let Scripture reshape your thinking so you begin to think God’s thoughts rather than simply reacting to the world around you.

 3. Put on the new self

“…put on the new self, created to be like God…” (4:24)

Replace old vices with new virtues. Replace old habits with new patterns. Replace old ways of speaking with new ways of speaking.

 But now — beginning in verse 25 — Paul gets specific.

He gives us five concrete examples of what spiritual growth looks like in everyday life. And over the next five episodes, we’re going to take each one in turn. And the first one — the foundation of all the others — is this found in this single verse, verse 25…. Our single verse today…

Transcript

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Hi folks, welcome to today's episode of the Bible Journey Daily Podcast. A project to work through the whole Bible, chapter by chapter, verse by verse. And today we're continuing our amazing journey through the amazing letter that Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus. The letter we call Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians. And today we're going to look at just one verse. And we're going to talk about what it means to be walking in righteousness and how that relates to speaking the truth in love. Now, some years ago when I was pastoring a church, people would occasionally approach me with suggestions about how we could improve the ministry of the church. And I always welcomed those general conversations. But sometimes people would come with a very different kind of request. They'd say, You need to preach about this, or you need to address this sort of behavior that's going on in our church. Usually they'd notice something, maybe in the wider culture, or occasionally even in someone else's life in the congregation. People often want preachers to be specific. Deal with specific sins, specific people, specific behaviors, even. And yes, some sins are more dangerous than others, more destructive, more spiritually corrosive. Some sins are more dangerous and corrosive to a family or society, which is why God gives special mention of them. But it does not state that those sins are any different in terms of our state before God or our need of salvation. So I've never been fully convinced that preaching should certainly not always be aimed at the handful of people who might be guilty of a particular issue. That's spend too much time focusing out on others rather than looking at how we might change yourself. But Paul takes a very different approach to all this. He doesn't begin here with a list of sins. He chooses to begin when helping this church here at Ephesus with getting them to think about their identity. Now early in the letter, you might remember that Paul reminded us that it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and it is a gift from God. That's the famous verse Ephesians 2, verse 8. We are saved by grace, not by our performance. And when we trust Christ, we become part of something bigger than ourselves, that thing being the body of Christ, the faith community, the church. In it we are joined to one another, we belong to one another, we grow with one another, and we're called to serve one another. And that's why Paul said yesterday, our purpose as community, as leaders, as Bible teachers, all our purpose is to equip his people, each of us, for works of service, build us up in our giftings so that the body of Christ itself might be built up. That's Ephesians 4, 12 and 13. Spiritual growth is not an individual project, it is, in a sense, a community project, and one of the key ways we grow is by speaking the truth in love. We heard that yesterday. In yesterday's study you will remember hopefully that we were given three foundational principles. Step one, to put off the old self, put off the former way of life, it says in verse 22. In chapter 4, verse 22. Take off the old habits, remove the old attitudes, the old patterns of sin, and he compares it to taking off an old quilt. Then renew your mind. Be made new in the attitude of your mind, it said in four verse 23. Let Scripture reshape your thinking so you begin to think God's thoughts rather than simply reacting to the world around you. And then the third step was to put on the new self. Put on the new self created to be like God, verse 24 says. Replace the old vices with new virtues, replace the old habits with new patterns, replace the old way of speaking with a new way of speaking. And now, today, beginning in verse 25, Paul will get specific. He will give us five concrete examples of what spiritual growth looks like in everyday life. And over our next five days, our next five episodes, we're going to take each one of those in turn. And the first one, the foundation of all the others, is found in this single verse we're looking at today, verse 25. So that's what we're going to look at today. That's the plan, that's the purpose. Welcome to today's episode of the Bible Journey Daily Podcast. Ephesians 4, verse 25. Therefore, each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. So stop lying, he says, and start telling the truth, and speak that truth in love. But Paul begins with the negative command of put off falsehood to stop lying. Lying is saying something contrary to the facts with the intent to deceive others. And Scripture says the devil is the father of lies. So when we lie, we are in fact imitating the wrong father. But Paul doesn't stop with that negative command. He immediately gives the positive side and he says, but speak truthfully to your neighbor. And then he gives the reason for because we are all members of one body. Truth matters, you see, because unity matters. Truth matters because relationships matter. And truth matters because the body of Christ cannot function if its members are deceiving one another. We cannot grow spiritually if we're not honest spiritually, and we cannot walk in righteousness if we're not walking in truth. But we need to understand not just why we lie, but also how the truth can actually set us free. But first, Paul said, put off falsehood. Now, before we rush past that opening part of the verse, I think we need to pause and recognize something, something that might make us feel a little bit uncomfortable. The truth of the matter is that most of us are far more guilty of speaking falsehood than perhaps we think. Not because we're going around telling outrageous lies every day, but because we shade the truth. We shade the truth, we hide it, we shave the truth, we take things off it, we spin the truth so it suits our purposes, or we shape the truth to make ourselves look better and maybe even make others look worse. So we don't always lie outright, but sometimes we tell partial truths, selective truths, or convenient truths, and the text tells us to put that sort of thing off. Take it off, strip it all away. But maybe before we're able to do that, it's helpful to understand perhaps why we lie. Do you know that psychologists tell us that the first characteristic to appear in children is anger? That comes very early, but the second is lying. A typical four-year-old stretches the truth, experts say about once every couple of hours, but by age six they are estimated to tell a falsehood roughly once every hour. And why? Well, perhaps it's because children learn by watching us. They might hear, for example, Mom phone work and say, I'm sick today when she isn't. They might hear their dad exaggerate a story to make himself look better. They watch adults twist the truth to avoid things like embarrassment or to avoid consequences or even to avoid responsibility. Children learn by looking at adults around them that truth is flexible and honesty is optional. Now psychologists have identified six major motivations behind adult lying. Let's quickly walk through them, not as a way to shame ourselves or to raise psychology up above scripture, but simply as a little bit of an insight into understanding ourselves. The first type of lies are the lies told to avoid hurting someone's feelings. These are the sort of polite lies in societies, the white lies, some call them. They say, I don't want to upset this person. We tell ourselves they're harmless, we tell ourselves they're compassionate, but scripture never divides lies into categories. A lie is a lie. Now sometimes we'll call it kindness when it is really cardless, a reluctance to speak the truth in love when we should speak the truth in love. Not to just barge in and point something out, but occasionally we're meant to tell people the truth in love, even when it is uncomfortable. Truth spoken in love is always a kinder and better thing for another person than a falsehood spoken out of fear. The second type of lie is a lie to conceal misdeeds and to or to avoid the consequences of our actions. These are the lies where we tell ourselves I don't want to get into trouble lies. And they're the oldest lies in the book. Literally, Adam blamed Eve, Eve blamed the serpent, and humanity has been blame shifting and dodging responsibility ever since. These lies are rooted in fear. Fear of exposure, fear of shame, and fear of consequences. The truth brings freedom, lies bring bondage. Then there are lies told to preserve our reputation. A recovering addict might hide their past. Now I'm not suggesting they should go out and tell people and strangers that, but those they're close to, those they're developing a romantic relationship should know about this issue in their past. A job applicant might hide gaps in their CV, a person might hide their financial struggles, their marriage problems, or even the mental health battles that they have had. These falsehoods are actually rooted in a feeling of shame. People lie because they feel rejection, they fear the judgment of others, and they lie because they fear being truly known by other people. But the gospel says you are already fully known and fully loved and fully accepted, and when you know that you no longer need to hide. Now there are lies that are issued to try and increase our status or just to simply impress others. These are the narcissistic lies. These are the lies we tell to make ourselves look more successful or even more spiritual, lies to make us look more intelligent or accomplished. These are lies ultimately rooted in pride. They are the lies that said, I need, I must be admired, I need to be noticed and I need to be praised. But Scripture says let others praise you and not your own mouth. That's Proverbs twenty seven verse two. Truth frees us from the exhausting burden of trying to maintain an image. Then fifth, there are lies to try and gain advantage over others or even harm others. These are the malicious lies. They are lies told perhaps to gain money or to gain influence or simply to gain power. These are the lies that can damage reputations, spread rumours, and are willing to manipulate situations to achieve the desired outcome. These lies are rooted in selfishness, and scripture is blunt about that. It tells us the devil is the father of lies. When we lie to harm others, we are imitating that father of lies, the wrong father. The father of lies rather than God our Father. Then finally there are lies of omission. They're all about controlling information. They are the lies where we don't say actually anything out and out false, we simply leave out the part that would change how people would view something or someone. Courts require witnesses to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, because they know a half truth can often be a whole lie. Let me illustrate this. There is a story I read of an event that occurred over a century ago. A night watchman was testified in court, was called to testify in court after a train struck a car at a crossing he was responsible for. He said he'd been waving his lantern to warn the driver that the train was coming. The standard way of doing it. And a warning was there so that the person would not try and cross the track. And the court believed the night watchman, and they blamed the motorist who hit the train. After the verdict, the watchman whispered to his friend, I was afraid they'd ask me if the lantern was actually lit. Now, of course, he hadn't lied outright, he'd simply left out one crucial detail, and it was the detail that mattered most. And this is the danger of omission. It is just deception dressed up as honesty. So there are different types of lies, but there are also different types of liars, and this is important also. But as well as different types of lies, there are different types of liars. There are pathological liars, people who lie compulsively and lack any remorse when they do so, people who manipulate others without guilt. Such people are often self-absorbed and socially underdeveloped. A strong awareness of God's presence and God's standards, as revealed in Scripture, can protect a person from drifting into this destructive pattern. But there are also impulsive or compulsive liars, people who lie almost as an automatic reflex. These are the people who've been shaped often by critical or abusive environments and have learned to lie for what they feel is just their survival. They are the people who ultimately trust, who ultimately struggle to trust others. Knowing we are loved, knowing we are accepted and safe in Christ can help break that cycle. And then there are also narcissistic liars. Liars who lie to gain attention or to lie to cover their shame. They often lie to maintain the image, to maintain an image, and this type of lying is often linked to addictive or destructive behaviors. But the gospel also dismantles this by grounding our identity not in performance but in the grace of God. But psychology, let's be clear, can only describe lying and liars, but only scripture ultimately can explain it. Because the Bible says we lie, we all lie because we are fallen. We lie because we have a sinful nature, and we lie because we fear the consequences of that. We lie because we want control and because we want approval, or because we want an advantage over people. But Paul writes here, and the text says, put all of that away, put away lying. Not because God wants to restrict us, but because lying ultimately will stunt our spiritual growth. Falsehoods between people damage and destroy relationships, because falsehood destroys trust. Falsehood fractures any sense of unity amongst us, our friendships, or our communities. Falsehood ties up the heart in having to live out that lie, and falsehood ultimately distances us from God. But truth, on the other hand, it brings freedom, clarity, healing, and unity. So this passage has told us to put on falsehood, but it immediately moves towards the positive command also, speaking truthfully to your neighbours. But before we explore that a bit further, we need to understand something essential. Truth is not merely about just avoiding lying, truthfulness is about becoming a kind of person. And John Gospel gives us a beautiful example of that type of person. Right in the beginning in John chapter 1, Jesus looks at a guy called Nathaniel and says, Behold, an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile. Meaning there's no deceit, there's no manipulation with this guy, no hidden agenda, no double speak, just integrity. Now, as a minister, a pastor, over the years I've noticed that the people who grow spiritually are the ones without guile. They are the honest ones. They are honest with God and they're honest about themselves, and they're honest with others about themselves. Peter calls this good character, Paul calls it truthfulness lived out, and Jesus calls it purity of heart, but they're all in fact the same things. Conversely, if you're constantly manipulating the truth, constantly dodging responsibility, constantly bending reality to suit yourself, your spiritual growth will stall. You cannot build a Christ-like life on a foundation of dishonesty. Truth is the soil in which spiritual maturity grows. Falsehood is just a rot that destroys things at its root. But as well as being an example of someone without guile, there is also a warning in the New Testament, in the Book of Acts, in fact, about the opposite of that, where we find a married couple called Anenaus and Sapphira. There is this dramatic story in Acts 5 that shows us how seriously God takes truthfulness. In it, Aeneas and Sapphira sell a piece of property and they brought part of the money to the apostles. That was a good, that was a perfectly acceptable thing to do. But they claimed that they'd brought and given all of the money. They lied about it. Not because they had to, but because they wanted to look good. They wanted admiration. They wanted spiritual prestige and the result of it. They probably also wanted to put people under pressure and a sense of condemnation that they hadn't done the same. And the result of that is they died on the spot. Now this, let me be clear, is not a pattern for church discipline. Don't let anyone say itself. It's a one-off example. It is meant, I believe, to stand as a sort of divine signpost to say that look, lying is not a small thing. It's not a small sin we can dismiss. Lying is a real spiritual cancer because lying destroys fellowships and lying grieves the Holy Spirit. So the story is not about money at all. It's about integrity. It's about God saying to his people, Do not try and build my church on falsehood. But the passage just doesn't stop at this don't lie. It is, as I said, telling us to speak truthfully to our neighbours in love. That's Ephesians 4.25. Now, this part of that verse is actually a quotation from Zechariah 8, verse 16. And in that original context that is being quoted here, neighbor actually means fellow believers. So this is saying truthfulness is not an option in and within the Christian community. It is absolutely essential, and we are told how we do it by simply speaking the truth in love. That is what lies at the heart of true Christian communication. But let me be clear, I said it yesterday, but I feel I need to say it again. Speaking the truth in love is not the same as giving people a piece of your mind. Some people think speaking the truth in love means marching up to someone and telling them exactly what's wrong with them. But Paul says the measure of truth telling is not that, it's this. Does it build the other person up? Is what you said motivated by love and is it for their good? Truth without love is just brutality, and love without truth is just sentimentality. But truth with love is a genuine form of pastoral Christian discipleship. And the word the text uses here for love is agapy. So it's not about emotion, it's not about preference, but it's simply a choice to seek the highest good of the other person by speaking the truth in love to them. So when it says speak the truth, it means speak what is true, yes, but also speak what is loving, speak what is helpful to that other person, speak what is Christ like. What would Christ say and do in this situation? There is a phrase that appears in the scripture. You've heard it before, it talks about the truth of the gospel. Some people still use a version of that expression today when they say, oh, that's the gospel truth. Well, Paul uses this phrase four times in Ephesians, one of them here. Why? Because the greatest truth we can speak is the truth of the gospel, the truth about Jesus. Speaking the truth in love is not even primarily about correcting people, it's about simply pointing people to Christ. It's about reminding one and another of who Jesus is, what he has done, and who we are in him, and how we should respond to that. The gospel is the ultimate truth because it is that that builds people up, heals them, restores them, and even unites them together with other believers. And truth matters in the body of Christ. It really matters. Paul reminds us several times that we are members of one another. When you trust in Jesus, you become part of a living organism, the body of Christ. Not part of an organization or corporation, a brand or a religious denomination, a body. And in a body, if one part lies to another part of the body, Then the whole body suffers. It is unable to function. If your eyes lie to your feet, well you'll fall over, won't you? If your nerves tell lies to your brain, well you'll burn yourself, for example. And if your heart lies to your lungs, well you're gonna collapse, friend. Lies damage the body, that's the metaphor here, but truth strengthens it. And then Paul adds the caveat, we also should not do this because we don't want to grieve the Holy Spirit. Lies grieve him. Lies harm the people because lies harm the people that God loves. Truth delights him because truth builds up the people he loves, the people he indwells. And this is the heart of this whole wider passage. We tell the truth ultimately because we belong to one another and we love one another and we belong to the Lord, and when we lie, we all lose. Now I began this episode by saying that sometimes people feel we really need to get specific. People often want a short list of sins to avoid, a catalogue of behaviors to condemn, a set of rules to enforce. And that's nothing new. The Old Testament gave that, but they were gave were given as a way to point us to our need of salvation, not just give us a set of rules to follow. So this is nothing new. In fact, in the period between the Old and New Testament, hundreds of years before Christ came, Socrates stated and warned that young people should not go to the theatre because it would corrupt the youth of Athens, the very thing he would be accused of himself later. You see, human beings love lists. Lists and rules make us feel safe, they make things seem clear. Lists also feel manageable. We can manipulate them and do and cherry pick what we want. But the New Testament contains remarkably few lists. Jesus, when pressed on this, didn't give a new catalogue of rules. He gave two simple commandments. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and love your neighbour as yourself. And that was it, the whole thing. Everything else flows out of that. But if you want specifics, then this passage today in Ephesians can do that for you a little bit. Because Paul widens the guidance, but he only gives us a few additional statements about how those two commandments by Jesus might play out in real life. But there are only a few, and they are only principles, but they're beautifully simple. Stop lying, start telling the truth. Don't steal. Work so you can give. Let no corrupt communication come out of your mouth, put away bitterness, wrath, anger, clamour, and evil speaking. Instead be kind, be tenderhearted, and forgive one another. That's what's coming in the next verses of Ephesians 4, we'll be looking at over the next few days. God's list is really short, but it's really powerful, because the whole concept of spiritual growth is not, in fact, at all about rule keeping, it's simply about becoming a loving person. And the very first item on that list was today in today's verse. Never lie, because when you lie, you lose. Lying damages your character, it erodes your integrity, it weakens your conscience, it distorts your identity, and it stunts your spiritual growth. You cannot grow spiritually while building a life based on falsehoods. And lying doesn't just hurt you today, it hurts who you will become tomorrow, and it will hurt you in the future. Some people say, But I know people who lie all the time and get away with it. But do they? Do they really? Do they really, if you have a biblical worldview? You might remember a time you lied and seemed to benefit it, but that's the biggest lie of all, because Scripture tells us that we will all stand before the Lord one day. There are two judgments mentioned in the Bible. Now there's the great white throne judgment, the judgment of those who have never trusted in Christ, and that is a place of final accountability. But there is also what is called the judgment seat of Christ, and that is a place where believers will stand. Let me be clear, not to determine our salvation, that's been achieved, but to evaluate our faithfulness in the life we lived. And Jesus said some will rule over ten cities and some others five. So there will be a reward in a sense, and for some there will be a loss of reward, which means every false word spoken today is not just a loss today, but it is a loss later and a loss into eternity. Lies cost us now, lies will cost us then, and lies will affect us in the future. Let me give you a quick story, a parable, if you like, about losing through lying. E. J. Hardy, in his 1899 lecture at Trinity College, Dublin, told a story that has stayed with me since the first time I heard it and read it many decades ago. He talks of an older gentleman boarding a train that he was travelling on and placing his luggage on the seat beside him. It was clearly an attempt to keep others away and help the carriage remain a little less crowded, more private. A young man approached, peered through the door, and asked, Is that seat taken? The older man lied, and he said, Yes, a gentleman has reserved it, and he'll be back in a moment. The young man smiled and said, Well, there's no other seats. He picked up the luggage, put it on the rack, and he says, I'll just sit here till he returns. Now, of course, that older gentleman never appeared because he didn't exist. And as the train began to move, the young man suddenly jumped up, grabbed the luggage, took it, leaned out the window, and gently dropped it onto the platform. He must have missed his train, he said, I don't want him to lose his luggage as well. Our old man sat frozen, horrified, speechless even, his luggage was left behind on the platform. Now whether that story is true or not, I don't really know. The point though is unmistakable. When we lie, we lose, and we lose every time, and we lose without exception. We lose trust, we lose integrity, we lose the peace of God and peace with God, and we lose credibility. We lose that opportunity for spiritual growth, and one day, yes, we will even lose the reward that we might potentially could have had. My final word today. Well, the message in this single verse, Ephesians 4.25, is simple, but it is spiritually deep and profound. Put off falsehood, speak truthfully because we belong to one another and because we belong to the Lord. Truth builds up the body, lies break it, fracture it. Truth honors Christ, lies grieve the Holy Spirit. Truth strengthens our character, lies corrode our character to the very depths of our soul. So let us all try and be the people of truth. Not harsh truth, not weaponized truth, but truth spoken in love. Because when we speak the truth in love, we grow, we mature, we become more like Christ. And that is the whole purpose of what walking in righteousness is really about. So with that all said, thank you. Thank you, friends, for joining me today. I do trust I'll see you back here again tomorrow. Thank you indeed for joining me today. Now, in our next episode, we're going to continue Paul's list and we're going to look at the second of those specific examples that can help us achieve spiritual growth. Be angry, he says sometimes, but inner anger do not sin. Now that's fascinating, but that's also challenging, and I would say it's an often misunderstood and misrepresented command. But until then, may the Lord fill your heart with truth and flavor your words with love and help you live that life of integrity and prepare the ground for you in your spirit that we might come before this fascinating and challenging command to be angry but never to sin. Thanks for being with me today. Bye bye for now.