Title: Don’t Drift—Be Directed
I’ve got to admit—I have ZERO interest in white water rafting.
Some people look at that and think, “That looks like fun.”
I look at it and think, “That looks like a bad decision” or “That looks like a fast lane to death.”
From what I understand, you show up and there’s a guide that’s the mountain version of a beach bum.
They give you a paddle and what seems 5 minutes of instruction, stuff like
Alright, if you fall out, try not to panic
IF you come back up to the surface, don’t bang your head on the rocks, and hopefully, we’ll see you
downstream.
?- Would you get on an airplane if the pre-flight instructions included,
“If by chance you get separated from the plane?”
Then everyone gets into an inflatable boat, to bump into sharp rocks on a river that’s moving ridiculously
fast.
And then the whole thing is built around this idea that someone is going to sit in the back of the raft and
just yell instructions at you. “Paddle!” “Stop!” “Lean left!”
And apparently, your survival depends on whether or not you do exactly what he says.
Now here’s what I find interesting—
Nobody gets in that raft and says, “You know what, I think I’ll just do my own thing.”
Because if you do that… you’re not going to make it very far - not very far in the raft at least
The only way through is to listen to the guide.
To trust that he knows the river better than you do.
To respond when he speaks—even when it doesn’t make immediate sense to you.
In other words—you don’t drift your way through white water.
You have to be directed.
I think you’ll find this morning that our verses are very similar to what I’m describing.
Because the life we’re living—it’s not calm water.
“The days are evil.”
There are real dangers with real currents pulling in the wrong direction.
And if you just drift—if you just react to whatever comes—you’re not going to end up where you should.
Walking with God as a Christian isn’t about drifting.
It’s about being directed.
We see the importance of being directed by God rather than drifting in this world in our verses.
Ephesians 5:15-21
* 15 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the best use of the time,
because the days are evil. 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.
* 18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, 19 addressing one
another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your
heart, 20 giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
The late Francis Schaffer wrote many books on how we should interact with western culture as Christians. –
In his book, How Then Shall We Live? he stated about American Christians,
“The basic problem of Christians in this country in the last generation has not been liberalism... but a
lack of total commitment to Christ.”.
What’s amazing about this true statement is that it was written 50 years ago in 1976.
It was true then that the basic problem of Christians in the US was a lack of total commitment to Christ.
I don’t need a poll to tell me that this is still true today.
All I need is to take stock of my own heart.
And I think you might also feel the same.
We struggle with drifting through life rather than allowing ourselves to take direction from God.
The first way we can shift from drifting to being directed is to -
1. BE WATCHING FOR OPPORTUNITIES TO GLORIFY GOD.
* 15 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the best use of the time,
because the days are evil.
This command can be stated as “Be strictly careful then about the life you lead”
It’s based on what’s been taught in this chapter.
It’s sort of a cumulation of how we should respond to the passages of the last few weeks.
As a result of our being told to be imitators of God, to walk in love, to take no part in the unfruitful deeds
of darkness but instead to expose them, we’re to be careful with the time we have.
We’re to live like watchmen, scanning the landscape carefully for signs of trouble or opportunity.
We’re to live with wisdom with the light of the Lord directing our path and the truth of the Lord shaping
our values.
Verse 16 provides the manner by which we’re to walk wisely.
* 16 making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.
We’re not told to spend our lives just avoiding sin and temptation, we’re called to invest our lives.
We’re to take advantage of every opportunity to glorify God that comes with these evil days.
Why? - Because this time period isn’t going to last forever.
The time we’re to use are not the minutes and hours - that term would be chronos.
We’re to make the best use of the kairos - the opportune times.
This is why the prison ministry that Benjamin, Mark, and Larry are involved with is called Kairos.
They’re challenging the inmates to make the most of the opportunity that they have in prison to come to
know and to walk with the Lord.
The explanation for why we need to have such vigilance is because the days are evil.
RC Sproul puts it this way, “Christians are called to live in a context of spiritual crisis. Evil is rampant in the
culture around us. As long as the kingdom of God is in conflict with the powers of darkness, it may be
said that the days are ‘evil’.”
When Josh preached on this passage recently, it was in respect to navigating our digital world.
This is a good illustration of the need for us to be looking carefully how we live, with wisdom in how we
look for opportunities to glorify God.
Most of us get on the internet with a purpose.
Maybe you’re checking messages, looking something up, or connecting with someone.
And there are some genuinely good opportunities there.
You can encourage someone publicly or privately.
You can share truth.
You can point people to Christ.
You can keep up with what our missionaries are doing and pray for them more intelligently.
You can even have gospel conversations that wouldn’t have happened otherwise.
There’s real opportunity there.
But at the same time, we all know the other side.
You don’t have to go looking for sin online—it comes looking for you.
Suggestions, ads, thumbnails, links… things designed to pull at your eyes, your mind, your desires.
Things that can slowly lead a person into distraction at best—and into patterns of sin and even addiction at
worst.
So what makes the difference?
It’s not whether you have internet access or not.
It’s how you walk when you’re there.
Some people get online and drift.
They click whatever comes up.
They follow whatever grabs their attention.
And before long, they’ve wasted time, fed their flesh, and walked away dull to the things of God.
But others get on and they’re careful.
They’re watching.
They’re intentional.
They recognize, “This is an opportunity.”
An opportunity to encourage.
An opportunity to learn.
An opportunity to speak truth.
An opportunity to glorify God.
And they also recognize the traps and they turn away.
The most basic ways that we should be watching for opportunities to glorify God is in dealing with trials and
temptations.
These are opportunities for both failure and victory.
When it comes to trials, it’s been said that the same heat from the sun that can melt wax can also harden
pottery.
Similarly, the difficulties we face can bring us to a place of surrender and trusting the Lord.
Or they can cause us to turn from the Lord, deciding that He must not be good or great enough to be
trusted.
Jesus’ own disciples were often brought to the brink of wondering if they could continue following Him.
Like the Apostle Peter, we often can find ourselves telling our Savior,
“Lord, to who else can we go? You have the words of eternal life.”
When it comes to temptations, these are no less opportunities to glorify God.
We can do so by bringing our hearts that are prone to wander and drinking from poisoned watering holes.
And we tell God, “Lord, my sinful heart needs transformation. My mind needs renewal.”
And with the hymn writer we agree.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here’s my heart; O take and seal it;
seal it for thy courts above.
Obedience is the primary way that we glorify Him by loving Him as our supreme desire.
This should override any excuse.
Too many people have justified continuing to struggle with alcohol because they think they’re being a light
in the bar.
And many addicts return to their lowest point because they make excuses about returning to their old
neighborhood or pursuing family relationships that drag them down.
Too many have struggled with what’s on their phones or computers when there’s help available through
filtering and accountability.
We should be watching for opportunities to glorify God.
And the first place we should be looking is on the battlefield of our hearts.
And trials and temptations are some of the most common places where we need to be directed by
God, not drifting with the current.
Next, we see more of how we can be directed by God rather than drifting, and with it I challenge you to -
2. TRADE DESTRUCTION FOR ETERNAL BLESSING.
* 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. 18 And do not get drunk with
wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, 19 addressing one another in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, 20 giving thanks always and
for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, 21 submitting to one another out
of reverence for Christ.
The 1 st opportunity to be directed into eternal blessing rather than drifting into destruction is to -
2A. TRADE FOOLISHNESS FOR UNDERSTANDING GOD’S WILL FOR YOU.
* 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.
This is a set of commands with a prohibition followed by an imperative.
A “Don’t do this” followed by “Do this instead.”
We see more specifically what’s it means to walk carefully with wisdom.
It means not being foolish in these evil days
Foolishness of this type is senseless living or without concern.
And it has been called “moral stupidity in action.”
What the Christian should specifically be concerned about is finding out what’s God’s will.
Last week, we learned about the importance of discerning what is pleasing to the Lord.
And this is more of that same type of instruction.
One writer says this about surrendering to God’s will for you -
“Everyone eventually surrenders to something or someone. If not to God, you will surrender to the
opinions or expectations of others, to money, to resentment, to fear, or to your own pride, lusts, or
ego. You were designed to worship God—and if you fail to worship him, you will create other things
to give your life to. You are free to choose what you surrender to, but you are not free from the
consequences of that choice.”
Surrendering to God’s will carries the greatest blessings that last for eternity.
The 2 nd opportunity to be directed into eternal blessing rather than drifting into destruction is to -
2B. TRADE A WASTED LIFE FOR THE BLESSING OF A LIFE UNDER GOD’S CONTROL.
* 18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, 19 addressing one
another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your
heart, 20 giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
We’re talking here about a misdirected life vs. Spirit-directed life
The clear distinction here is between living out-of-control or living under God’s control.
Verse 18 provides our second set of commands with a prohibition followed by an imperative.
* 18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit,
And I think this is what Paul is really intending to lead us to - being filled with the Spirit.
But he gets there with a contrast with what is prohibited - that being drunkenness or debauchery.
The term debauchery communicatees an escape that amounts to wasting one’s life.
The New Testament Commentary states,
“Both the wastefulness and the lack of self-control implied by this word are things which should not be seen
in the lives of those who have found in Christ the source and the way of wisdom.”
As usual, what we’re commanded to be about is far more valuable than what we’re prohibited from.
But the contrast with drunkenness and being filled with the Spirit goes beyond being an alternative.
As alcohol would control the drunken person, we’re to be under the control of the Holy Spirit.
The voice of the verb is passive, meaning that we do not do the action but are passive in the experience.
But it is still a command that we are responsible to obey.
This would be why the New English Bible states it - “let the Holy Spirit fill you”
So, we don’t fill ourselves—but we’re responsible to stay yielded to God and to seek to have Him fill us.
The tense of the verb is present imperative, meaning that it’s a command that we don’t obey once for all.
We’re commanded to be in the constant state of being open to the Holy Spirit filling us.
This implies that Christians are to keep themselves open and available to be constantly controlled and
directed by God through the indwelling Holy Spirit.
This is the experience of the Apostles in the Book of Acts as they were described as being filled afresh at
different times.
[Illus - Filling a Container with rocks and water]
?- How is it that a person is filled with the Spirit.
First, they have to be indwelt by the Holy Spirit, which takes place at a person’s salvation
From that point, the Christian should pursue being filled with the Spirit on a regular basis.
So, back to the question - How is a person filled with the Spirit?
When it comes to being filled with the Spirit, I like to think of a glass of water
A glass may have water up to the brim, but is it filled with water if it has other things in it?
No, there’s water up to the brim, but if it has a bunch of rocks in it, it’s not filled with water.
By removing the rocks, the glass is then able to be filled with the water.
In a similar way, the Christian is positioning him/herself to be filled with the Spirit when they remove the
rocks of unconfessed sin from their lives.
They may get to this point through conviction of their unconfessed sin.
Or they may regularly ask the Lord to show them their sin so that they can be filled afresh.
=> This is similar to David’s prayer in -
* Psalm 139:23–24 23 Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts!
24 And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!
[Reflection Question]
?- Do you see the need for regular confession and repentance in order to be filled/controlled by God’s Spirit?
?- So, how do we end up with rocks of sin filling us instead of the Spirit.
I’m afraid this comes through living in a sinful world and still residing in sinful flesh that attracts
temptation like a lightning rod.
Through drift or outright rebellion, we find ourselves sinning and getting filled with stuff besides God.
This will happen if we’re just doing what our sinful flesh desires.
Galatians talks about being filled with the Spirit in terms of “walking by the Spirit.”
* Galatians 5:16–17 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For
the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for
these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.
When we’re living submitted to the Lord and in repentance, we are controlled by God rather than our flesh.
When we do what our flesh wants to do, we drift away from or rebel against God - hence full of rocks.
When we confess our sin to God, acknowledge His forgiveness, and surrender our lives anew, we are able
to be filled with Spirit or walk by the Spirit
I’ve been asked a lot, what does it look like to be filled with the Spirit.
The fine details are difficult to explain because it’s the result of a relationship you and another person.
But I can say, when you’re filled with the Spirit,
you’re not easily offended or a jerk or moody or a cantankerous curmudgeon.
When filled with the Spirit, you’re not envious or lustful or prideful.
When we find these and any other sins in our hearts, we need to confess them and ask for God’s help.
The next statements actually describe how relationships among Christians might look when filled with the
Spirit.
Being filled with the Spirit affects how we encourage one another, our thankfulness, and our submission to
one another.
* 19 addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the
Lord with your heart, 20 giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our
Lord Jesus Christ, 21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
First, it results in worship from our hearts in a way that glorifies God and builds one another up.
Secondly, we see that the Holy Spirit’s filling would cause us to give thanks.
The circumstances that we’d be able give thanks in are the kicker here - always and for everything.
If you’re familiar with Acts 16, you know Paul as a good example of this command as he and Silas sang
praises to the Lord while chained in a Philippian jail.
?-How would being filled with the Holy Spirit enable a person to give thanks always and for everything?
I think C.L. Mitton describes it best when he writes -
“[giving thanks always and for everything] presupposes a deep underlying faith that God can produce
good out of even the most unpromising situation, and that thankfulness, therefore, can be felt because
of the confident hope that in some wonderful way God will make even disaster and suffering an occasion
for later blessing.”
* 21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Soon, we’ll look at how submission comes into family relationships.
But it’s interesting to note that this phrase, submitting to one another, means to voluntarily subject oneself
to another.
So, it’s not just about accepting when we become subject to another by circumstance or position.
It’s what we should be about when we’re filled with the Spirit.
And it’s a choice to put ourselves under fellow believers out of reverence for Christ.
The New Testament Commentary also states,
“There must be a willingness in the Christian fellowship to serve any, to learn from any, to be corrected by
any, regardless of age, sex, class, or any other division.”
Much more will be said about this after Easter.
“Here’s how you know if someone is Spirit-filled…”
They seek out worshiping with other Christians, building others up with eternal truth.
Their heart is thankful no matter the circumstance.
Their posture is humble and submissive.
Years ago, one of you was in the parking lot when someone drove up and asked
“Is this church spirit-filled?”
Sadly, I think the person was wondering if we get worked up into hooping, hollering, and other things that
people think is evidence of the Holy Spirit.
The Harvester replied very biblically, when He responded of the Holy Spirit, “He’s the one in charge!”
Here’s some good questions for us to check, are we a Spirit-filled church.
Do we worship together, speaking the truth to one another?
Are we marked by gratitude or complaint?
Do we voluntarily lower ourselves for the sake of serving one another?
The answer is “Yes, we are a Spirit-filled church” when we’re walking in repentance and submitted
