No More Futile Thinking

You know the power of your mind. You know the power of your thoughts. This passage is about the way you think, and it is essential teaching if you are to “live a life worthy of the calling you have received” (Eph. 4:1). 

The introductory line intends to call us to attention and to account. He is reflecting back upon the great calling that we have received. On the basis of that divine call he now gives testimony to the thought process and lifestyle that are to accompany that call: “So I tell you, and insist on it in the Lord”

He is writing to Gentiles. But he is not contrasting the believers in Jesus with Gentiles: “no longer live as the Gentiles do.” In other words, those who trust Jesus are not really Gentiles any longer but are part of the Covenant Community.

No More Futile Thinking:

"So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking." — Ephesians 4:17

The Mandate: Insist on it in the Lord. 

• Paul is approaching this carefully. He tells them this first, and then he insists on it. Paul is not being a dictator or taskmaster. He is calling them to faithfulness.
• But he is an Apostle. He could have said “Do this” simply on his own authority: “Because I say so!”
• Instead he added “in the Lord.” This is the proviso of power. If we can help people understand that their thinking and behavior must be conformed to Christ as Lord, then they will be self-monitoring. Christ is with them when they go to school or work. When they can no longer be accountable to us, they can still be accountable to Christ.

 Default thinking: No longer live…

• Upbringing: Family values. It is how they processed things before they knew Christ. They thought this way all their lives. 
• Socialization: Cultural values. It is how their family and friends processed life. Peer pressure shaped them.
• Education: Ethics. It is how their culture formally processed things. It was deliberate and logical.

Futile Thinking: In the futility of their thinking.

• This is “vain, depraved, perverse, frail” thinking. It is empty of truth. It is pointless. 
• Idolatry is what makes this way of life empty or futile. It worships a god that is not there, that is not living, that cannot help. 
  • Apostle Peter said that the believers had been delivered from “the empty way of life handed down to you by your ancestors” (I Peter 1:18).

Dark thinking: (v18-19).

• "They are darkened in their understanding" (it’s a dark place to live mentally).
• "and separated from the life of God." Fundamentally, they are living, walking, and thinking without God. Why?
• "because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts." They actually contributed to this condition. They hardened their hearts to the truth about God that was revealed to them. Everyone gets some light. 
• "Having lost all sensitivity." Hardening your hearts toward God is a dangerous business. You become insensitive to the “better angels of your nature.” 
• "They have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed." They ended up being both hedonistic and materialistic.

Live According to Jesus:

"That, however, is not the way of life you learned when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus." — Ephesians 4:20

Appreciate the Contrast: 

• What he just described is “not the way of life you learned” 

“Christ” and “Jesus.” Does Paul use them in a nuanced way here?

• The term “Christ” does not appear in Matthew, Mark, or Luke, and only four times in John. The term “Jesus” appears a thousand times in the gospels.
• The term “Christ” appears 400 times in Paul. He uses the term “Jesus” 200 times.
• “Christ” is his title: The Promised One, the Messiah. “Jesus” is the name the angel gave him, “for he shall save his people from their sins.” “Christ” is used more to refer to him as the eternal Son of God. “Jesus” is used more to refer to the Son of God in his incarnation. 

The truth that is in Jesus is about the love and humility of God who became flesh so that he might save us.

Put On and Put Off:

"You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness." — Ephesians 4:22-24

This is common language in Paul’s letters. So we should see this put on and put off as a key descriptor of the life we are to live in Christ.

Put off your old self.

• This is your former way of life—before you knew Christ. It is hopeful to think of it as a former way of life. It says that you have a new way of life now.
• That old self is corrupted by “its deceitful desires.” Our fleshly desires make lots of promises to us. They promise us increased knowledge—“you will be like gods, knowing good and evil.” They promise us fulfillment and happiness. They are deceitful in that they cannot deliver on any of those promises. We always buy the lie when we succumb to temptation. 

 Be made new in the attitude of your minds.

• This word ties into youthfulness. It’s like a new beginning comes with faith in Christ. Now you are being made new.
• How would you describe “the attitude of your minds?” What does that phrase mean to you?
• The newness, the new beginning, happens in the “attitude of your minds.” This is your mental framework. It is your worldview. It is includes all the things that are hard-wired as part of our conversion in Christ.

Put on the new self.

• Created to be like God
• In true righteousness and holiness.