"Take Off Old Clothes" on Ephesians 4:17-24 by Michelle Ellis – Nov. 17, 2024

As we’ve gone through this letter from Paul to the Christians who live in Ephesus, we’ve been learning to grasp together this grand vision that Paul has of the church being the mystery of God and the masterpiece of God. It’s the very fact that the church is made up of both Jews and Gentile, of both slaves and free people, of both male and female, of people from different cultures and races that are all united, not because they think the same, or look the same, or act the same, but only because God has made them all his children, and in doing so, He has made them one. That is the heart of this mystery, of the beauty and power of the work of God — the work of God making unity, making one new humanity where previously there was only difference and division.

Paul is writing to the Christians in one of the biggest and most diverse cities in the world of that time. They did not live in a world that had any kind of history of Christian values or sense of what those were. It’s always tricky to look back and know for sure just exactly what that culture was like or what kind of values they had because we are separated by so much time. But we do know that early Christians were navigating all kinds of messy situations that resulted from living in a world that was deeply impacted by their culture. This was a world where it was taken for granted that some lives that had more value, more worth than others based on gender, race and class, where slavery was very much part of their society and where slaves were regularly used like objects both for work and for sex, where worship to local gods could include drunkenness and orgies, where unwanted infants were abandoned and where a host of other practices like these were normal and accepted.

It’s in response to these things that Paul talks about the minds of the Gentiles being in darkness. Paul uses language about their consciences being seared. The word he uses here carries an image of what happens when there is a burn or an injury to the skin and when it heals, it has lost some of its sensitivity. It is as though they have scar tissue on their consciences so that they really aren’t able to tell anymore what’s good and what’s not. This is part of what makes their hearts hard. They don’t have the sensitivity any longer to feel the pain of the other. This phrase, a hardened heart, might bring your imagination back to Pharaoh, king of Egypt in the book of Exodus. Pharaoh, who enslaved the Israelite people, who used them for free labour, and whose dehumanizing ways of using these people even stretched to ordering the Hebrew midwives to kill the new born Jewish baby boys. There is a picture here in Ephesians 4:18-19 of a people who have lost the ability to feel the impact of the violations they are continually subjecting upon others, just like Pharaoh’s hard heart lost the ability to respond to others and respond to God the way he was made to. “They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.  Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed.”

Our world isn’t the same one as the Christians in Ephesus were living in, but I’m sure you can see ways that our own world is in darkness. Particularly in Paul’s description, we can hear the deceitful lure behind many abusive substances or sensations that offer relief or freedom, but then cruelly trap people in addictions in which what once did the job is no longer enough and will never be enough. It’s a heartbreaking picture of a people who have lost the ability to feel, who stumble around isolated in the darkness, never being able to find what they are looking for, dehumanizing others, being dehumanized themselves, and living in deep isolation.

But, Paul says, this isn’t how you were taught in Christ. Paul says this isn’t the way of Jesus, to be trapped, lost, and unfeeling, always needing more. Paul urges these new believers to be who they are in Christ, to walk in the way of Jesus.

In vs 22-24 “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.” The language that Paul uses for this has to do with clothing, with taking off old clothing and putting on new clothing. I’d like to sit together for a bit with this image and let it expand and grow.

Think for a moment about what you wear and why you wear it. You likely have a host of reasons that you choose what you wear on any particular day. Most of the time, what people wear makes sense for whatever context we think we are going to encounter. We put on snuggily, comfortable clothes when we’re sticking around at home. We put on winter clothes, hats, mittens and snow pants when we’re going out for winter adventures. We put on light, cool clothing when it’s warm outside. Paul talks about behaviour being like clothing. Just like we have good reasons for choosing the clothes we’re going to wear, we have good reasons for putting on particular behaviours in particular contexts too. When we sense we’re stepping into a battlefield, we may put on a hard exterior, we might be short, or rough or aggressive. When we’re fearful, we put on behaviours that are cautious, protective. When we feel known, loved and accepted, we may be warmer, softer in our behaviours, we might have a greater sense of humour, we might be more generous. The behaviours we put on whether they be hospitality, giving, listening, or whether they are being bitter or angry, or defensive, all have to do with the contexts we think we’re going to encounter, or what kind of emotional weather we think we’re going to face, whether we view other people as friends or foes.

Likely, the people that Paul is writing this letter to have good reasons for the ‘old self’ that they were wearing. Likely the behaviours of the old self that they put on made sense in terms of how they understood their world. Some wouldn’t think twice about treating others like second class citizens because in their world, that’s simply how it was — there were first and second class people, people who’s lives mattered more than others. There were people who could be used and discarded without a second thought. The behaviours that they wore made sense given how they understood their context.

Perhaps you too have behaviours you put on because of how you understand the world. Maybe you have felt the need for some pretty hard, protective clothing. Maybe you have put on behaviours that protect you from other people? Can you ask the Holy Spirit to show you behaviours that you put on that may be shaped by a darkened, callous understanding of this world, of yourself, or of God? Ways that you act, things that you do to yourself and others that flow out of a view of the world that God does not share?

But from the very beginning of this letter, Paul has been driving home that God is revealing a mystery that has been kept hidden since the beginning of time. The mystery is that He is calling together a new humanity, the first-born of whom is Jesus. In this new humanity there is no Jew or Gentile, no male or female, no slave or free, not in the sense that we aren’t different from each other, because we are! We are male, female, Canadian, American, Russian, Ukrainian, gay, straight, rich, poor, Indigneous, Settler, vaxxer, anti-vaxxer, NDP, Conservative, Liberal. But none of these things are the basis for first class citizens in the kingdom of God, none of these things form a boundary for who is in and who is out. None of these things has the power to separate us from the love God that calls us to have for each other or to separate us from the love of God Himself. We are all are loved children of God, we are all in Christ, we are all temples of the Holy Spirit, we are all called together in unity to reflect God’s glory here on earth through our unity, even in our differences. This is very different from what the Ephesians knew and understood to be true. This is very different from what our world understands to be true.

This is where Paul urges them to “be transformed by the renewing of your minds.” Paul isn’t talking about learning a bunch of facts when he says this. He’s talking about allowing their thoughts to be shaped by the Holy Spirit who has the vision to see beyond what we can see or know or understand. He is talking about the work of the Holy Spirit who births in us desires for things to be the way they were created to be, where each human life matters and is given deep dignity, where people who are vastly different from one another are made together into a new family, where we can shed behaviours and ways of being that harm ourselves and harm each other, and instead where we bear pain with one another, where we rejoice with each other to such an extent that others even begin to know who God is through the witness of our love across so many boundaries.

Just like it makes sense to wear shorts and a t-shirt on a day when it’s warm and the sun is out, it makes sense to put on gentleness, humility, patience, when the people around you aren’t your enemies, but sisters and brothers in Christ, temples of the Holy Spirit, who are growing more and more into the image of Christ. It makes sense to tell the truth when Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. It makes sense to be honest when you are safe and loved by God no matter what. It makes sense to invite people into your life and your home who are different from you when God’s work is building a new family, where each one has an honoured place.

I want to name though, that these things are difficult to do when we live with competing stories in our world and in our hearts about how things really are. And many of these behaviours take deep trust. Many times we look out and what seems to make most sense is to bundle up and to prepare ourselves for the worst, to put on all our protective and distancing behaviours because the weather is looking like it might be pretty nasty. God’s people are the ones that have been given the vision through the renewing of our minds in the Holy Spirit to know what’s coming and to begin acting now like the sun is coming out even though it might still look pretty stormy. This takes trust and patience, and it can be vulnerable work.

In the early church, when people came to be baptized, they would take off the old clothes they were wearing, be immersed in the waters of baptism and then when they came out, they would be given new clothes to wear. This was to remind themselves of this very picture in the text we read today. When we come to Christ, we take off the old self, we invite the Holy Spirit to renew our minds, renew our imaginations, renew our hearts and then we put on the new self, with new practices and behaviours that flow out of the new image for how things are that the Holy Spirit gives to us. Just like we get dressed every day, again every day we have this decision before us about which behaviours to put on, and which to take off because they don’t fit any more. Each new day we make the choice again to follow Jesus, we make the choice again about what behaviours we are going to wear.