Wherefore, having put off falsehood, speak truth every one with his neighbour, because we are members one of another.
Ephesians 4 turns from teaching to daily life. The first thing it deals with is how Christians speak to one another. The command not to lie is old. The reason given here is new: believers belong to one body.
The word translated "lying" reaches further than spoken untruths. One writer ties it to the new self, quoting an older translation of the verse just before:
In verse 23 the apostle speaks of the new man these believers had put on. He tells us that "after God" it was "created in righteousness and true holiness," or, literally, holiness of the truth. So all falsehood is shut out. It can have no part in this new creation of God… "lying," or "falsehood," means everything that has the character and nature of falsehood. It is abstract: what has this quality, not just the act of lying. We should keep this in mind, because it may search many of us who would never be caught telling outright untruths. A look, a gesture, our manner, unclear speech, evasion, compliments and many other things can fall under this sense of lying.
One writer traces lying to both our nature and its first author.
Lying is natural to us all. Men are said to go astray from the womb, speaking lies (Ps. 58:3). And even believers are ready to forget, when they twist the truth, that they are only following the devil, who did not stand in the truth and who became the originator of falsehood (John 8:44). We should not lie to anyone. But when we are all members of one body, how horrible it is to bring in deception, and so bring corruption into the body of Christ.
Another writer adds what lying reveals about the person telling it:
Lying is both an instrument of selfishness and a confession of personal wretchedness. No happy spirit can ever be a false one. It is the instinctive refuge of a guilty conscience. So it should have no place in a heart that the precious blood of Jesus has cleansed from an evil conscience. Falsehood and faith stand in essential opposition. Faith feeds on truth, because it trusts in God; while it is the absence of that trust that gives a lie its power over the human soul.
Most people can give reasons for honesty. The reason given here is not one of them.
We are too apt to treat falsehood on the human basis of honour. Many a man would not lie on moral grounds. Another would be too proud to tell a lie. A godly man, with a certain fear of God before his eyes, would not lie, because it is a practical denial of God. It is as good as saying that God does not hear… But this is not enough for a Christian. It matters greatly for our souls that we walk well and righteously. But the motive, character and extent must be according to God too.
Another writer sets this reason against the reasoning of moral philosophy:
Moral philosophy never gave a reason anything like the one given here… Who can imagine falsehood from the lips of Him whose words were the words of God, and whose truth was the truth of God? One who walked in His spirit and showed His life could no more speak falsehood.
The final clause supplies the logic. Deceiving another believer turns out to be self-injury.
Nothing could be more horrible than one member of the body trying to deceive the others. No one could be guilty of such wickedness if he had any real sense of the oneness of that spiritual body… But who ever saw the parts of a man's body fighting each other in bitterness and anger? If I deceive the members of the body, I deceive myself. If I quarrel with them, I quarrel with myself. For though we are many members, the body is one, and we are all one body in Christ.
The verse does not only forbid. It says what to speak instead.
If we speak truth, we speak what is helpful, what builds up, refreshes and encourages, and what is good in the sight of God… We should speak truth at all times because we have put off the old man. But there is one more reason for it here: the close and living links that bind us to all the saints.
One writer points out where this command stands in the letter.
Have you noticed, in the letter that reveals the church more than any other, which is the first command? … And read carefully every word that follows to the end of the chapter. If all believers walked according to these commands, division would be impossible.
- Put off — falsehood belongs to the old self, now laid aside. It is our inborn habit, and it comes from the devil, the first liar.
- Put on — truth is the voice of the new self, created after God in righteousness and holiness of the truth.
- Wider than words — a look, a gesture, evasion or a hollow compliment can all carry the character of falsehood.
- Higher motive — honour, morals, even the fear of God: none of these is the reason given here. Membership in one body is.
- Body logic — deceive a fellow member and you deceive yourself. Speak the truth, and division becomes impossible.
Be angry, and do not sin; let not the sun set upon your wrath,
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
neither give room for the devil.
Paul has just told believers that anger itself is not always sin, but that it must not be carried into the night. This next line closes the door that anger leaves open, because the devil takes any room the flesh gives him.
One writer traces this command back to the first murder, then widens it far past temper:
This instruction follows naturally from the one before. An angry man is only a tool of Satan. Cain, who killed his brother in his anger, belonged to that wicked one. But in a far wider sense the devil is behind all that stirs up the evil feelings and passions of the old nature.
The devil asks for little at first. One writer shows where that small yielding ends:
Many have agreed to go a mile with Satan who never intended to go two. So Satan leads poor creatures down into the depths of sin by a winding staircase. They never see the bottom they are heading for. First he presents something that stirs a few thoughts. These thoughts set the affections on fire. The heated affections cloud the understanding. Now Satan dares to show himself a little more, and boldly urges the person to do what he would once have refused outright. Give no place to Satan! Not an inch, not in his first suggestions. A beggar who is modest outside the door will command the house once he is let in.
So what opens the door? One writer answers by naming what Satan can reach in us and what he cannot:
This verse shows us that we ought not to open the door to Satan. If it is the flesh that is acting, then the wicked one can touch us; but he cannot touch the new man, he cannot entice it (1 John 5:18). If I give way to a thought which is not of God, then I give place to Satan; if I give way to anger, the enemy is there. We are then hindered in service, troubled in prayer; and that is no surprise.
Anger is the example here, but it is not the only door. One writer points to a disciple who fell through another one:
We are warned that by acting in the flesh, whether in anger or in any other way, we open the door for the devil. Peter, by his self-confidence, made room for the devil to lead him into a denial of the Lord.
There is no neutral option. Either we hand the matter over to God and stay quiet, or the enemy takes what we keep holding:
The Lord says, "Vengeance is mine." Rather leave room for the wrath of God (Romans 12), and "give no opportunity to the devil" (Ephesians 4). But if you do not leave room for God's wrath, you will give room to the devil. Shall we lose anything by being quiet and taking things patiently?
(Older translations use one phrase, "give place," in both verses. That is the wordplay here.)
Resistance has a named means. The same writer points to where the victory comes from:
The Christian should keep this truth always in mind, and here he is encouraged to resist the devil. We overcome him by standing firm in the faith (1 Peter 5:9). He works most powerfully as the accuser of God's people, after first leading them into sin. But by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony they will certainly prevail (Revelation 12:10-11).
The guard is to let nothing carry over to the next day. One writer tells of a long life lived under attack:
The Christian ends his day with a mind free from irritation. I once asked an aged Christian how he had been able to live so long, having been so often unjustly attacked. He replied that for forty-five years he had been able to leave everything with the Lord each day, in deep rest of mind. He did this despite the indignation often stirred in him by so much wickedness. This takes the opportunity away from the enemy, who has often taken advantage of an irritated spirit.
- The door. Anger held past sunset is the opening. The devil is behind all that stirs the passions of the old nature, and an angry man becomes his tool.
- The inch. He asks small and takes large. Let the beggar in and he commands the house, then leads you down a stair whose bottom you never see.
- The room. He cannot touch the new man. He works only where the flesh acts — through anger, or through self-confidence, as with Peter.
- The cost. Give him room and he hinders your service and troubles your prayer. The loss shows at once in daily Christian life.
- The remedy. Stand firm in the faith, and leave the matter with God each day. A mind at rest before nightfall takes the enemy's opportunity away.
Let the stealer steal no more, but rather let him toil, working what is honest with [his] hands, that he may have to distribute to him that has need.
One line about theft sits in a letter written to a thriving church, and it does more than tell a man to stop taking what is not his. It replaces the old habit with honest work, and gives that work a purpose the thief never had.
The ESV says "thief," but the term used covers more than that, and the warning went to a church that was doing well.
The word is not exactly "him who stole," but "the stealer." "Thief" would be too strong, and "he who stole" is too weak. The apostle was led to choose a term wide enough to take in every shade of such dishonesty. Do you think the caution needless? Beware, or your self-confidence and your slighting of any word God has written will trap you. The Spirit who inspired the letter clearly judged this warning necessary for all believers, not only for the Ephesians. Yet nowhere do we find a church more happy, flourishing, and blessed of God than the church in Ephesus.
The first readers came out of a world where taking was normal, and the command reaches further than burglary.
Remember that the early churches were made up of people just brought out of paganism, with all its horrors. Some of them were slaves, an oppressed and degraded class, and among them theft was common, with no guilt or shame attached to it. The exhortation also goes beyond open theft. In principle it condemns every kind of unfair advantage — the sort that even the fuller morality of our own day often condemns only weakly.
That principle lands on the ordinary workplace, where small dishonesty passes unnoticed.
For an employee to take small things from where he works is no less than stealing. Many do this without thinking, but a believer must take care never to take anything that does not belong to him.
Stopping is only half of it. The hands that once took must now work, and work at something honest.
Idleness is neither right nor safe. So the Spirit cheers and directs the man whose hands were once used in unworthy ways. So He opens a happy path where grace can prove its power, despite a dishonest nature and habit. Only the work must be good and honest. It is no use pleading that money gained dishonestly went to a kind or religious purpose! No job that goes against God's will is good for a Christian; he should give it up at once.
The verse names the goal of the work, and it is not survival. Kelly puts the contrast plainly in the same passage: the worldly man works in order to live; the Christian works in order to give.
People have often pointed to verse 28 as a display of the true energy of Christianity. The thief becomes a giver — and not only a giver out of his plenty, but one who works to earn the means of giving to others. What a wonderful transformation! Paul needed spiritual energy to stay up making tents for his own needs and for the needs of others — and he had not been a thief before his conversion. Only the Holy Spirit can produce active virtues and true devotion, the very opposite of what came before.
Commentators repeatedly note that the old rule against stealing would have been satisfied long before this verse is.
The thief is to become a worker and even a giver, for grace transforms. The law required the thief to pay back what he took, but grace makes him actively generous.
The same article puts the two principles side by side.
Law forbids evil; grace delights in doing good. Law is what God demands from man; grace is what God is in Himself.
The change asked for here mirrors what Christ Himself did, so the man once despised is handed the most honourable of errands.
That a man who once robbed others should become the willing and hardworking servant who hands out Christ's gifts to the needy — that would beautifully adorn the grace that saved him.
- Stop. The term covers every shade of dishonesty, and it went to a thriving church, so no believer is past needing it.
- Work. Idleness is neither right nor safe. The hands that once took must work, and work at something honest, because no kind use of the money excuses how it was gained.
- Give. Earning has a new aim. The world works to live; the Christian works to have something to hand to someone in need.
- Beyond. The law made a thief pay back what he took. Grace makes him generous, because law forbids evil while grace delights in doing good.
- Christ. The man who once robbed people now hands out Christ's gifts to the needy, and that is what grace looks like when it has done its work.
Let no corrupt word go out of your mouth, but if [there be] any good one for needful edification, that it may give grace to those that hear [it].
This verse puts a test on everything we say. The question is not just whether a word is clean, but whether it builds someone up and leaves grace with the person who hears it.
William Kelly reads the verse as covering a whole class of talk that most people would call harmless:
Throw worthless language away as you would throw away spoiled fruit. If such a word is on your tongue, let it go no further. Unclean talk we will find named and forbidden in the next chapter. Here I think the circle is wider. Many people would never speak or listen to dirty talk. Yet they often have to grieve over talk that does no good, and over those who approve it. It is better to say nothing than to speak when there is nothing good to build others up.
Darby asks which of two natures is doing the talking:
Here we see the contrast between the old self and the new. One or the other speaks: either it complains, or it gives thanks. The mature Christian would only speak to build others up. The new self, moved by the Spirit, will only take part in what builds up.
"As fits the occasion" adds a second filter after "good." A word can pass the first test and still fail the second:
The point is not only that corrupt talk stops. Positive good comes out — words that build up according to the need. Not only good language, but good for the occasion, and this assumes the Holy Spirit's power. We have often said things that were good in themselves but not needed at the time. I once saw a man give away food and medicines. The gifts were excellent, but he paid no attention to what the people receiving them actually needed.
Kelly draws the practical rule from the same clause: "The need measures the service, and love builds up instead of puffing up as knowledge does."
A. Pridham gives a test for what we say, and warns that talk which does not build up does harm:
Christian conversation calls for a constant remembrance that God is present. That memory holds back the outbursts of our sinful nature. Nothing that we cannot say with confidence in that presence is fit for the ears of one another. We would do well to remember that if our words do not edify, they are harmful. Whatever does not have the flavour of Christ has the flavour of the world. Talk like that does not strengthen God's building; it pulls it down.
T. B. Baines points to Christ Himself as the pattern:
It is not enough for the believer to avoid corrupt talk. That kind of talk belongs to "the old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires." The believer has put on the new self, and Christ is its perfect pattern. Did Christ merely refrain from evil in His conversation? No; His words, like His life, gave grace to those who heard. And so will the words of one who is in communion with Christ.
W. T. P. Wolston shows what careless talk does to the Holy Spirit:
If we walk carelessly, letting corrupt talk come out of our mouth, we will by that very thing grieve the Holy Spirit. When that happens, in His infinite mercy He brings a cloud over us. He gives us a sense of our folly and sin, and our conscience gives us no rest. The normal work of the Spirit is to show us the beauty of Christ and fill our hearts with Him. But if we grieve Him, He must turn our attention to ourselves and our sin. That lasts until we confess and He restores us.
- Source. One of two natures does the talking. Old self or new self — the words show which is in charge at that moment.
- Supply. Grace to give out comes from grace taken in. Time with the Lord feeds the mouth that builds others up.
- Standard. Not just clean words, but good ones — and good for this need, this hearer, this moment. Silence beats a word that meets no need.
- Scope. Wider than dirty talk. The same net catches useless and unwholesome speech. Words that fail to build are pulling down.
- Sequel. Careless speech grieves the Spirit. He must then turn us to our own sin instead of the beauty of Christ, until we confess.
And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which ye have been sealed for [the] day of redemption.
Paul gives this command among plain instructions about speech and temper. He bases it not on fear of loss but on the seal the Spirit has already set on us — which raises two questions: what grieves Him, and what changes when we do?
The command only makes sense if the Spirit is someone with feelings. One writer draws that conclusion directly from the wording:
A reference to Ephesians 4:30 may be helpful — "And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed unto the day of redemption." The Holy Spirit is sometimes called the Third Person of the Trinity, but we must be careful to avoid any thought of inequality in the Godhead. The Holy Spirit is God — a blessed Person. We must not think of Him merely as an influence (great as His influence undoubtedly is) — one cannot grieve an influence!
The answer sits in the verses on either side. The list is unflattering, and much of it comes out of the mouth:
In what way can the Spirit be grieved? Every allowance of the flesh in the walk and ways of the believer grieves the Spirit. The verses around this passage show that we grieve the Spirit mostly through our tongues. The tongue lets out what is inside. So Scripture warns us against corrupt words from our mouths, and against bitterness, wrath, anger, shouting, evil speaking and malice. The believer must put these things far away. It is when we find the flesh in others that we so quickly find the flesh rising in ourselves.
Notice what Paul does not say. He never warns that grieving the Spirit could cost you your salvation. The seal is the reason for the warning, not the thing at risk:
Here we are exhorted on the settled ground of our being "sealed." He does not say, "Grieve not the Spirit, lest you be eternally lost." Such would not be in keeping with the true character of divine exhortation. We "are sealed," not as long as we behave ourselves, but "until the day of redemption." It is absolutely done, and this is the powerful reason why we are not to grieve the Holy Spirit.
(Mackintosh quotes an older Bible translation. The ESV reads "for the day of redemption.")
Redemption here still lies ahead. It is the day when Christ comes to set the body itself free. And the seal that reaches that day does not depend on us:
He comes to redeem the bodies of His saints, and redemption is never a question of human faithfulness, but of the power and grace of God. We have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of God "to the day of redemption" (Eph. 4:30). Every true believer is sealed with that great day in view. Our faithfulness, or lack of it, will greatly affect our place in the coming kingdom, but redemption lies on another plane altogether.
Grieving Him costs nothing eternal, but it costs something now. One writer turns the usual fear around: the misery of a believer out of fellowship proves the Spirit's loyalty, not His absence.
He will never withdraw Himself from the one sealed; that would be to falsify the whole truth of redemption. But when He is grieved, He does withdraw joy and power from the Christian's life. That lasts until the man confesses the fault and judges the state of mind that let the old nature act again. A Christian out of communion is wretched inside, even if he looks calm outside. The reason is not that the Spirit has abandoned him. It is that He will not abandon him, and so He must take away his happiness until the man returns to his Lord in broken confession.
Scripture has a second, similar-sounding command — "Do not quench the Spirit" (1 Thess. 5:19). The writers are careful to keep the two apart:
It is important to see that the exhortation does not refer to any conduct of the individual believer towards the Spirit who dwells in him; as, for instance, when it is said in Ephesians 4:30, "Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed unto the day of redemption." But it refers to anything that, whether by human arrangement or the like, would interfere with His operation in gift in the Church.
For the Christian, the test of conduct has shifted. It is no longer a law to break, but a Person to consider:
What answers to this glory of Christ is the presence of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us, and sealing us for the day of redemption, when we shall be like Him and bear His image. So grieving the Spirit, not breaking the law, becomes the other measure of right and wrong for us.
- A Person. You cannot grieve an influence. The One who seals you as God's own is God Himself, and your life touches Him.
- A Seal. It holds for the day of redemption, not for as long as you behave well. Your security is the reason for care, never the thing at risk.
- A Day. The seal reaches to the redemption of the body at Christ's coming, and rests on God's power, not on human faithfulness.
- The Grief. Bitterness, temper, shouting, cutting words — the tongue does most of the grieving.
- The Cost. When He is grieved, He withdraws joy and power, but never Himself. The misery proves He stays; confession brings the joy back.
Let all bitterness, and heat of passion, and wrath, and clamour, and injurious language, be removed from you, with all malice;
Paul has just told the Ephesians not to grieve the Holy Spirit. Now he names what grieves Him: six things that start in the heart and end on the tongue. The list runs from settled sourness to open abuse, and it closes with the root of them all — malice.
One writer traces how each item grows out of the one before it, from an inward mood to the words that carry it:
To take them one by one: "all bitterness," I think, means every form of the sharp, unsparing mood which drives souls away instead of winning them. It makes the most of the real or imagined faults of others. The "wrath and anger" that follow are the outburst of passion, and the more settled vindictive resentment, which indulged sourness gives rise to. "Clamour and evil speaking" are their matching counterparts in words. All of them flow from the deep-seated fountain of "all malice," which the verse condemns last.
The word behind "evil speaking" — the ESV renders it "slander" — is the same one used for speaking against God:
In Scripture this does not always refer to speaking evil of God, though today the word is used only in that sense. The same Greek word is translated 'railing' in 1 Timothy 6:4 and Jude 9, and 'evil speaking' in Ephesians 4:31. It could well be translated that way in other places too.
Verse 31 belongs with verse 30. These tempers wound the very Spirit who marks believers out as God's own:
In the first part of the chapter the call to a worthy walk flows from a great truth: believers together are the dwelling-place of the Holy Spirit. Here we are reminded that each of us is sealed by the Spirit. God has marked us out as His own in view of the day of redemption by giving us the Spirit. We are to beware of grieving the Holy Spirit by allowing bitterness, the heat of passion, wrath and noisy clamour, injurious language and malice.
A short temper is often explained away as weakness. One writer refuses that excuse:
Verse 31 speaks of the things that result from nursing bad feeling in the heart — bitterness, wrath, anger, clamour, and evil speaking, together with malice. These sinful attitudes and practices are to be judged without sparing, and firmly put away. There is no place for them among the saints of God. We must not allow ourselves the slightest excuse for such things breaking out. They come from sin, not from weakness.
The damage does not stop with the person who holds them:
Where such things as these are allowed — and to some extent they are found everywhere among saints — how can the comfort of the Spirit be known? Allowing such things paralyses all spiritual perception. We no longer see how serious it is to have given the flesh such a loose rein, and discord and division take the place of harmony.
One writer shows what each of these cannot survive beside, and then answers the question of method:
No one whose heart is fed on the love of Christ can think or speak with bitterness. Nor can we noisily seek our own if we stay mindful of the kind of calling we have. Malice dies out when faith is strong. Who can be malicious if he remembers how it was that, when we were enemies, God reconciled us to Himself? Still, all these things are contrary to the new man, and our conscience condemns them without hesitation. Even so, we do not escape them without effort. We are told to put them away. And if it is asked how we may best do this — the answer is, by practising the opposite virtues in the energy of the Spirit.
The verse does not stand alone. It leads directly into kindness and forgiveness, and the standard for both is how God has already dealt with the reader:
As brought to God, I have learned what God is in His ways of grace... Did God come and clamour against you in justice? He sent His Son to give Himself for you, and has forgiven you. There is a man who wronged me. I am going to forgive him, as God forgave me — and, if I am near enough to God to do it, to show out what we have been learning as the joy of our souls.
- Root — Malice is the fountain. Inside it becomes bitterness, wrath and anger; out loud it becomes clamour and slander.
- Grief — These tempers wound the Spirit who sealed believers for the day of redemption. Verse 31 spells out verse 30.
- No excuse — They come from sin, not weakness. Judge them without sparing instead of explaining them away.
- Cost — Tolerated, they dull spiritual perception and turn harmony into discord and division.
- Cure — Effort is needed. Put them away by practising the opposite virtues, and forgive as God forgave you.
and be to one another kind, compassionate, forgiving one another, so as God also in Christ has forgiven you.
Paul has just told believers to stop the workings of the flesh. This verse names what should take their place — and the question it forces is not "how much should I forgive?" but "whose forgiveness am I copying?"
Dropping bad behaviour is only half of what this passage asks. Something positive has to take its place, and it comes from a source outside ourselves.
As with the earlier verses, it is not enough just to hold back the mind and workings of the flesh. There is the activity of good in Christ, and the Spirit both produces this in the Christian and calls for it. So the apostle adds, "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you." Clearly, then, it is a question of showing grace; and the pattern of it all is God in Christ, not the law — holy, just and good though the commandment is.
Elsewhere in Scripture our forgiving is what we ask God to match. Here the comparison runs the opposite way, and one writer names the change.
"Forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you." This is a change from the Lord's Prayer — the prayer Jesus taught. There God measures Himself by you: "forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors." Here it is quite the reverse; I am to measure myself by God: "forgiving, as God has forgiven you."
Older English Bibles read "for Christ's sake". The ESV reads "as God in Christ forgave you". Commentators say this wording keeps the move on God's side. It does not make Christ someone who talks a reluctant God into forgiving.
The verse does not say, as the older translation does, "as God for Christ's sake has forgiven you." It says, "as God in Christ." Here the apostle presents God in the riches of His grace. God acts from no motive outside Himself, so nothing has to talk Him into forgiving. He acts from His own heart. What He does simply shows what He is, as we see it in redemption. But he presents Him this way as our standard, and so he says, "Be imitators of God as beloved children."
Another writer adds why God forgives at all:
God has not forgiven us only because Christ pleads for us. God Himself is the blessed Author of the forgiving grace shown to us in the person of the Lord Jesus and in His unmatched sacrifice of love. God delights to forgive, as seen in the sending of His beloved Son.
A practical difficulty follows: what if the person who wronged me has not admitted anything? One writer separates the heart's attitude from the spoken word of pardon.
This does not mean we must always say out loud that we forgive those who have sinned against us. But in our own hearts we are always to be in a state of forgiveness. We are never to hold on inside to the sin of a brother. No matter how badly someone sins against us, before God we are to forgive at once. Then, when the one who did the wrong comes and says, "I repent" (Luke 17), we are to grant him forgiveness.
Forgiveness means giving up a claim. One writer says the argument does not stop there.
To forgive another's wrongs is not enough for a Christian. No doubt it is a giving up of self, and so the fruit of divine grace. But in Ephesians God wants us to imitate His own ways as they have shone out in Christ… What has God done? He has forgiven you in Christ; and you are called to do the same. But was that all? Was there not positive love, far beyond forgiveness? And what is the display of love? Not the law, but Christ.
- Received first. God forgave you in Christ before He asked anything of you. Every command here rests on something already done.
- Measured by Him. You are not setting the standard and asking God to meet it — He set it, and you copy it.
- Sourced in Himself. His forgiveness needed no persuading; it came from His own heart, shown in the gift of His Son.
- Held in the heart. Forgive in your heart at once, even if the wrong is never admitted. Speak the pardon when repentance comes.
- Carried further. Forgiving is where imitating God starts, not where it stops. The next step is love — the love Christ showed by giving Himself.