EPHESIANS OUTLINE # 27 of 35

Introduction (4:17 - 24)

A. Petrifying Heart

1, The word used for "hardened'' heart is a grim word.

a. It is porosia - comes from poros which meant a stone that is harder than marble.

b It came to have a medical meaning . It was used of the calcium that forms in the joints and paralyzes

the limbs mobility.

2 It finally came to mean the loss of all sensation - the heart becomes so hardened, so petrified it has no power to feel at all.

a. The terror of sin is its paralyzing effect. No person becomes a terrible sinner all at once.

b. At first they feel ill at ease when they sin they feel guilty - a sense of remorse and regret.

c. But if you continue to do the thing that you were taught and know to be wrong; there comes a time when you can do the most shameful things without any feeling at all

d. The conscience can become petrified.

B. Paul uses two phrases to describe their lifestyle.

1. He speaks of their shameless wantonness (aselgeia)

a. Plato defines It as impudence - Basil defines it as "the disposition of soul incapable of bearing the

pain of discipline.''

b The sad characteristic of the word aselgeia is this -

c. The bad person seeks to hide his sin - but the wanton person doesn't care if he shocks public opinion so long as he can gratify his desires

d. Sin can get such a grip on a person that they are lost to decency and shame.

e. A person can become such a slave to sexual desire they don't really care who knows about their affairs or even the fact that they are homosexuals.

2. The does all this in "the insatiable lust of his desires".

a. The Greek word is pleonexia which can be defined as:

b Arrogant greediness; love of possessing and the unlawful desire for the things to others.

c It is the irresistible desire to have no right to possess.

d It may issue in stealing something from someone else or may issue in sexual sin with someone Elsies mate.

C Paul saw these terrible things and the potential we all have to fall into their trap. He warns us to be careful.

1 He see people so hardened to sin that they have lost their sense of shame and decency.

2 The saw people so insatiable in their desires that they did not care whose innocence they destroyed so long as their desires were satisfied.

3 These are the sins of the Christ less world - or are they?

a. I wonder have they crept into the church.

b. Are we guilty of doing the things that are really the domain of the ungodly.

c Paul urges us to beware and to be done with that kind of life.

4. He says; put off your old way of life as you would an old suit of clothes - clothe yourself with the new life.

II. Things that are to be Banished from our New Life.

A. There must he no more falsehood (lying).

1 Why? We are members of the same body

2. We Can only be close and truly love people when they are genuine - if they are plastic and unreal and unreliable, there can be no real communion of hearts.

B. There must be no more uncontrolled anger.

1. Anger is not wrong in the Christian life it properly channeled.

2. But bad temper and irritability are without defense.

a. The right kind of anger is wholesome - the anger that reacts to injustice and impurity.

b. Without the blazing anger of a Wilberforce against the slave trade and horrible working conditions of

working people this world would be a much poorer place.

c. There were times. Jesus was angry. He was angry when they turned the house of prayer into a common flea market

d. He was angry when the religious leaders doctrines would not allow the healing of a suffering human

being simply because it came on the Sabbath day.

3. But anger that is selfish, sinful and willful is to be banished from our Christian lives,

4. But the selfless anger geared to the service of human beings is one of the great dynamic forces in our world.

C. The Thief must become an honest workman.

1. In the ancient world thieving was rampant - it was important that they earn their living honestly.

2. Note the reason for working as given by Paul.

a He did not say "go to work to support yourself or your family,"

b. He says, "go to work so that you will have something to give to those who are in need.'

c. Here is a totally new work ethic: that of working in order to give away

d. What a revolutionary new ideal for our daily labors.

3 Remember the Christian ideal is not that we work to amass things but in order that we can share them.

D. So we must banish from our lives; lawlessness and thievery and unbridled anger.

1. We must add on the other hand - kindness, compassion, and forgiveness (Eph 4:32)

and live a life of love (Eph 5-l)