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Introduction
On a stiflingly hot and humid evening, 13th July 1977, an electrical storm formed over New York City. Two bolts of lightning in quick succession struck critical electrical power lines which had the knock-on effect of massively overloading the rest of the grid.
Staff at an electrical substation situated on the Hudson River reacted too slowly and failed to reduce the strain on the remaining working cables.
So other main power lines burned out one by one until at 9.27 pm the grid was fatally weakened and electricity for the entire city was down. Subway trains ground to a halt. Elevators stopped mid-flight. Fridges, freezers, air conditioning units, TVs - everything suddenly stopped working.
All the lights in New York City flickered and died. Manhattan, Staten Island, Queens, the Bronx, Brooklyn… Everywhere was suddenly pitch black. Within moments, looting broke out. Over 2,000 stores were pillaged as people almost immediately started smashing windows and ransacking shops, grabbing anything they could carry.
In the Bronx, a crowd forced their way into a Pontiac car showroom and drove off in single file with 50 brand new cars. It was a feeding frenzy.
There was not only looting. There was arson too. 700 stores in Brooklyn alone were set ablaze. Police had to use water cannon to protect firefighters who were trying to put out the flames. Soon, there was thick, acrid smoke hanging over the city. It was like a war zone or a scene from a film about the end of the world.
4,000 people were arrested that night, which is only a fraction of the number of offenders. Police officers were soon instructed to stop arresting people because cells were at capacity. The cost of all this ran to hundreds of millions of dollars.
You could not have a clearer illustration of what the Bible means when it talks about the deeds of darkness and living in the light, which just so happens to be what our passage in Ephesians is about today.
Here’s what it says:
Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people. Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving. For of this you can be sure: no immoral, impure or greedy person – such a person is an idolater – has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.
Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient. Therefore, do not be partners with them.
For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness but rather expose them.
It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible – and everything that is illuminated becomes a light. This is why it is said:
‘Wake up, sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.’
Prayer…
Imitating God
A few months ago, I attended the funeral of a family member. At the reception afterwards, not one but two strangers walked up to me and said, “You have to be Mike Lambert’s son.” I physically resemble him very strongly. And apparently, I unconsciously mirror some of his mannerisms too.
As this photo shows. We both tend to walk on ahead of a group with our hands in our pockets. In addition, my facial expressions are very much like his. And that’s not all. My body posture. My tone of voice. The way I drum my fingers on the steering wheel when stuck in traffic. And I could go on… No need for a DNA test.
Chapter 5 of Ephesians begins with the thought that, just as children often subconsciously imitate their earthly parents, so should we, as sons and daughters of God, consciously imitate our heavenly Father. In fact, the Greek word Paul uses is where we get our English word ‘mimic’ from.
“Follow God’s example as dearly loved children,” says v1. And the first thing Paul points to as what we ought to reflect is being full of love and being always ready to give of ourselves.
It’s not for nothing that imitating God starts with love. “God is love.” “God so loved the world that he gave…” Someone once said, “If I have all my theology right, but have not love, I have none of my theology right.”
In one of his books, Francis Chan writes about a Christian couple, friends of his, who have adopted a severely disabled child. It is a huge disruption to their family life. Everything has had to change. Every routine has been disrupted. It is hard work; it is time consuming, and at times heartbreaking. They have had to put all their dreams on hold; some dreams have had to die altogether.
But do you know what they say? “We don’t think about how much we will suffer if we take her in; we think only about how much she will suffer if we don’t.”
You might not be called to adopt a severely disabled child, but you are called to “live a life of love, as v2 says, just as Christ loved us.”
As Christian parents, Kathie and I tried to train our children to put into practice what Jesus said about loving our enemies as well as our friends. Once, our then eight-year-old son came home saying he had been bullied at school.
I was heartbroken to hear that but, once I had worked through my indignation and anger, I sat down with him and spoke about what Jesus said about loving people who aren’t very nice.
Then I took him to the sweet shop. I bought some nice sweets, gave him half of them to cheer him up a bit, and then suggested that he give the other half the next day to the kid who was picking on him at school. That kid was totally amazed and later became our son’s friend.
“Live a life of love, just as Christ loved us.”
Living in darkness
Verses 3 to 6 then list a number of behaviours and attitudes that belong to the dark side, and there they are on the screen for you. I’m not going to go into forensic detail about each one, but I want to say that one of them lies at the root of most of the others.
Impurity, which Paul describes as ‘improper,’ leads to sexual immorality, obscenity, foolish talk, coarse joking and deception.
Let’s think about purity and impurity for a moment. What makes a precious metal - gold, for example - so valuable? What gives gold its worth? In other words, why will people spend enormous sums of money on gold bracelets, rings, and necklaces? Forty-three years ago, I proposed to Kathie and so I needed to buy a ring. I learned then pretty quickly that there are different grades of gold, or carats.
The carat system was devised in the 14th century to regulate the gold trade. Pure gold is 24 carats. That’s 100% pure gold. That’s what you’ll find in the vaults of the Bank of England or Fort Knox.
The gold you find in jeweller’s shops is usually mixed with copper or nickel and is generally 18 or 14 carats.
When I lived in France, I learned that anything less than 18 carats (75% gold) cannot be sold as “gold” there, whereas in the UK the proportion can go down to just 9 carats (which is only 37% gold)!
The more carats you have in your gold, the less money you have left in your pockets. My wedding ring, and Kathie’s, are 9 or 12 carats, because we were young and poor and in love.
The Bible says a lot about purity. It’s important to God. It’s why he said to the Israelites in the Old Testament to use only pure materials for the tabernacle and the temple.
In Exodus 25 God says, “Make an ark of acacia wood… You shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and out, and make a gold moulding around it… The buds and branches… shall all be of one piece of hammered pure gold. You shall also make seven lamps and set them up on it… Its wick trimmers and trays shall be of pure gold.”
And in Leviticus 22 God says, “When anyone offers a sacrifice to the Lord… it must be without defect or blemish.”
Why does God require perfection? Because he himself is pure, flawless, blameless, perfectly perfect, without defect, and supremely holy.
And since we are made in his image, we also value purity and quality. We appreciate it in jewellery, as we have seen. When someone has trouble breathing, we pump pure oxygen into their lungs, free from impurities in the air. We expect our holiday beaches to be spotless. Utility companies get heavily fined if what they pump into our homes does not meet established standards, because we demand pure drinking water.
But generally speaking, society doesn’t value purity at all.
In the workplace, integrity is not exactly the order of the day; lies, schemes, shady dealings, and worse. The media world—turn on your TV, you’ll see family entertainment shows proudly promoting sexual looseness, risky language, and “alternative” lifestyles. In the political sphere… need I elaborate?
In sports, fair play seems to belong to another era. Footballers feign injury, pull each other’s shirts, claim throw-ins they know aren’t theirs, or dive to deceive the referee. All to a chorus of choice obscenities sung from the stands.
Swearing and crude humour are so commonplace in the streets that we begin not to notice them.
But all this is, Paul says, ‘out of place’ for followers of Jesus. It’s inappropriate. It doesn’t really go with who we are. It’s like orange juice and toothpaste. It doesn’t go.
That list on the screen summed up everyday life in Ephesus in Paul’s day. But the Bible is a book that not only tells us what used to happen, it tells us what always happens. So that list also captures pretty accurately everyday life in the UK in our day too.
In the late eighties there was a very violent overnight storm in the south of England quite near to where we lived at the time. The next morning, people woke up to fallen trees everywhere. The TV news highlighted one huge old oak tree, centuries old, that was found blocking a major road.
It was one of many, but this one was different from most. A close inspection the following morning brought something to light. The trunk inside was completely rotten. It had been eaten away by small insects that had gnawed at its core for years.
The real problem was not the storm; that tree was on its way down from the day the first insect burrowed into the bark and made its home there.
So Paul says, in v7, “don’t partner with this stuff.” Don’t let the insects in. Don’t let yourself slowly go rotten from the inside.
The Bible is not forbidding, or even discouraging, interaction with unbelievers here by the way. Jesus befriended disreputable people and ate with them.
But listen, sinners loved him, not because he joined in and became like them; but because he loved them and then offered them a way out. So contact and conversation, yes. Collaboration and companionship, no.
Verses 5 and 6 speak of the certainty of judgement. “For of this you can be sure,” it says: “no immoral, impure or greedy person… has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient.”
It’s saying that everyone will give an account to God at the last judgement for the choices they have made. All of us. Unbelievers won’t have a place in heaven after a lifestyle like this; and believers won’t have a reward in heaven after a lifestyle like this.
Living in the light
So much for the dark side and what it does. What does living in the light look like?
Ephesians 5 goes on to set forth a vision of life for us that is, by contrast, like a strong, solid, healthy tree, with deep roots, growing and bearing fruit.
Here are the healthy elements listed in our passage, filtered out from the unhealthy ones. Hearts overflowing with love, not animosity or ill will. Thanksgiving on our lips, not grumbling and criticising. Goodness in our attitudes, not unkindness or bullying or nastiness. Righteousness in our moral stature, above reproach. And truth running through our values, not dishonesty and deceitfulness.
The workplace can be a hostile environment for living truthfully.
A Christian called Andrew Gibson, when he was young, worked as a clerk in the head office at the London department store, Selfridges. One day, when the owner Mr. Selfridge himself was there, the telephone rang and Andrew answered it. The caller asked to speak to Mr. Selfridge.
Andrew passed on the message and Selfridge replied, “Tell him I’m out.” Andrew held out the receiver to him with his hand over the mouthpiece and said, “You tell him you’re out!’ So Selfridge took the call, but he was furious with this office junior, this nobody talking to him like that.
But Andrew Gibson said to him afterwards, “Sir, if I can lie for you, I can lie to you.” From that moment onwards, Selfridge knew he could absolutely trust that man.
“Live as children of light… in all truth.”
On the other hand, someone I knew when I lived in Paris was once instructed by his bosses to defend a dossier that he knew involved false accounting in order to secure a contract. He said, “I’m not going to do that.” They said, “Why not? We want that contract.” He said, “This is morally wrong and, as a Christian, I am telling you I will have no part in it.” They told him to clear his desk by 5:00pm that day.
Living in the light can come at a cost, but the Bible says, “Those who honour me, I will honour.” That man eventually found better employment following that stand-off.
Outcomes – fruitful or fruitless
Verses 9-11 tell us that there are two very different outcomes we can expect from the virtues on the left and the vices on the right.
Verse 9: “The fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth.” Do you want a life with healthy spiritual growth, bearing good fruit like that?
Here’s what we mean by fruit… Pastor and evangelist Glen Scrivener did some research on life outcomes for one of his podcasts and he found that people who say that their faith is important to them tend to thrive. They have on average longer life, greater resistance to depression, better recovery from illness, quicker recovery from surgery, lower risk of suicide and lower rates of divorce than unbelievers.
“If the government were able to put the magic potion of faith into the water supply” he says, “it could deliver longer life and happier, healthier people.
So that’s fruitfulness on an individual level. What about in society generally?
Christians give more money to secular charities than secular people do, they give more time to secular charities than secular people do, they give more blood than secular people give; all these things have been demonstrated with studies. Faith helps people flourish more and it makes society better.”
“The fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth.”
Internationally, the picture is similar. Sociologist Robert Woodberry spent over ten years researching the effect of ‘conversionary’ that is to say evangelical, Bible-believing missionaries on the countries where they served.
Here’s what Woodberry found: “Areas where Protestant missionaries had a significant presence in the past are on average more economically developed today, with comparatively better health, lower infant mortality, lower corruption, greater literacy, higher educational attainment (especially for women), and more robust membership in non-governmental associations.”
Verse 11: “Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness.”
There’s a dark and shaded corner of our garden where sowing grass seeds is an annual waste of time. Nothing grows, nothing thrives, without sunlight. That’s why Paul talks about fruitless deeds of darkness.
Don’t look back at your life when your time has come only to see a wasteland of barren fruitlessness.
Jesus said it; “Let your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” That’s fruitfulness.
“Everything illuminated becomes a light” says v13. Our dark world needs Christians to shine more.
Ending
Our passage ends with what seems to be a popular saying in v14. Bible scholars think it may have been part of a worship song that was already known to the believers in Ephesus.
It doesn’t really matter; what matters is that Paul feels the need to say at this point, “Wake up!” Come on, sleepy heads! Have you been regressing and backsliding a bit? Get a grip! You’re resurrection people now.
What if there was a 24-hour power cut in Darlington? Would our town spiral down into lawlessness and anarchy like New York did?
Our world is spiritually dark, as Paul will point out in chapter 6, and we’ll get to that next month.
Once we were darkness, but now, we are light in the Lord. Is anyone slacking and letting their witness, which was once so vibrant, grow dim?
Let Christ, the light of the world, full of grace and truth, light up once again who you are in him and how you express it in your day-to-day life.
Sermon preached at King's Church Darlington, 19 April 2026.
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