Be ye therefore imitators of God, as beloved children,
Here the letter turns from what God has done for us to how His children should live. The standard is one short line: copy God. How can anyone do that, and what keeps such a call from crushing us?
The verse does not stand alone. It looks back to the end of chapter 4, where God has already acted towards us in kindness.
The "therefore" of the first verse connects this portion with the last verse of the preceding chapter. God has acted towards us in kindness and grace, and now we should act towards one another as God has acted towards us. So we are urged to be imitators of God "as dear children". We are not to try to imitate God to become children, but because we are children. Walking as "dear" children implies a walk governed by affection. A servant may obey correctly because the law requires it, but a child should obey out of love. We are not servants but sons.
Reverse that order and it falls apart. Copying God to earn something from Him is a mistake, not a weaker kind of devotion.
God becomes the pattern of our imitation the moment we accept, by faith, the gracious declaration of His love to us in Christ. To aim at that likeness while still knowing nothing of His free forgiveness of our sins is nothing but proud folly from a darkened mind. Only those born of God can really imitate what God does.
There are two kinds of copying, and only one of them is meant here.
The imitation enjoined is not artificial but natural. Here are children playing in the market-place. They hold an imaginary court. This little girl, dressed in cheap finery, is pretending to be a queen. She copies a queen's manners as best she can, but it is all crude and put on. Nearby a small boy is watching his father. Soon friends smile and remark how like his father he is. He hardly knows he is doing it, and it is completely natural: he is his father's son, with his father's life and nature. Now it is as children of God that we are called upon to be imitators of God.
The law made demands on man. This command stands on different ground.
What a mighty principle opens up here for believers! What limits can there be if we are urged to imitate God Himself! This is not a demand pressed on man, as the law was, when man stood before God on his own responsibility as a creature. God has revealed Himself in grace. Still He is God and no one else. And since He has given us His own nature, there could be no lesser or lower standard. That would dishonour Him and the very grace He has shown us.
The title in the verse is not a description we earned. It is one that belonged to Another first.
Having accepted us in the Beloved, the title which naturally could be only His is now by grace applied to all His saints. It is as "dear children" that we are called to show to one another some faint reflection of that love which He has so abundantly bestowed on us in Christ.
More than a title, it is God speaking, and the tone of the word carries its own message.
If He says to me, "Dear child," what a thought I have of Him and what a wonderful condition I am in! Suppose a father says, "Dear child" — the expression gives consciousness of the love. He may have done all kinds of things for me, but the very word conveys to me where I am.
The command names God as the model, yet the next verse points to Christ. Writers hold both together.
We are light in this way — as His imitators. This light has come to us in the person of Christ, so we keep our eye on Him. We are to "walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us." So it is God we imitate. But it is Christ who brought the knowledge of God to us, and that makes Christ our pattern. He is our light, because He has faithfully and perfectly presented God before our soul.
This gets practical fast. One writer points to how God speaks about King Asa in the Bible's record of his life.
Asa's history reveals his weaknesses. God, in His comments on his character, gives no hint of them. He loves to commend whatever is lovely in His servants' lives, and only when necessary exposes their failures and follies. May we in this, as in all things else, be "imitators of God"!
- Forgiven first. The word "therefore" ties the command to what God has already done for us — we imitate God because we are children, not to become them.
- Given the name. God calls us "dear children." That one word carries His love and tells us where we stand.
- Given the nature. Only those born of God can truly copy Him; the imitation is meant to be as unforced as a small boy resembling his father.
- No ceiling. God has given us His own nature, so no lower standard would fit. The law made claims on man; this call rests on grace.
- Seen in Christ. God is the model. Christ makes that model visible — down to small things, like praising what is good in others instead of exposing their faults.
and walk in love, even as the Christ loved us, and delivered himself up for us, an offering and sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour.
Paul has been urging his readers to imitate God. Now he shows what that looks like: Christ's own self-giving, described in the language of the altar — which raises the question of how much of it we can copy.
The command is not to work up a feeling foreign to us. It is to let out what is already there.
We are to walk in love. This is not natural to us as the children of Adam, but it is natural to us as born of God, for God is love. Walking in love simply shows the Divine nature in practice. So it adds, "as Christ loved us," because in Christ the Divine nature appeared in all its fullness and perfection.
The order matters. What we are comes first; how we walk follows from it.
If we are accepted in the Beloved, we are now urged to "walk in love" (Eph. 5:2). We ought to walk in a way that matches our high place. Responsibility flows from relationship... But to imitate anyone, we must know that person. Now God has made Himself known to us. He has placed us in His presence and given us His mind.
The verse traces a movement: love reaches us, and then returns to its source as self-sacrifice.
The burnt offering pictures Christ — He freely offered up His life to God as a sweet savour... When divine love comes down here, it always returns upward as self-sacrifice. God acts in love; Christ walked in love; and divine love acting in a person offers itself to God as a sweet savour.
Two little words carry the weight of the verse. One points to us; the other points higher.
He gave Himself for us, yet His blessed offering and sacrifice was to God. As an offering, it speaks of the value of the gift in God's eyes. As a sacrifice, it shows how great a thing Christ gave up for the glory of God. His sacrifice has the character of both the peace offering and the burnt offering. The peace offering brings us into sweet agreement with God in Christ, and the burnt offering rises to God to delight His heart of infinite love.
The Bible does not always describe Christ's death in these terms. Set this verse beside another, and the difference stands out.
Here we see the sacrifice of Christ on its burnt offering side. It was a sweet smelling savour, and — blessed be His name — it was "for us." In 1 Peter 2:24 we get the trespass offering side of His cross. There "a sweet savour" could not be said. He bore our sins, and drank the cup of divine wrath that our sins deserved.
The verse sets Christ as pattern, but not every part of His death is open to imitation.
The death of Christ was a propitiatory offering, and we cannot follow Him in that. But we can imitate Him in the love that would lead us to lay down our lives for the brothers and sisters (1 John 3:16). Paul mentions two saints of God who risked their own necks for his life. If one risks his life for another, that is the same as laying it down.
This standard reaches past anything the law asked, and it comes with a promise about our own small acts.
Such love goes far beyond what the law demands, that a man love his neighbour as himself. Christ did more, for He gave Himself to God for us. This is the love we are asked to imitate... In its little measure, like the infinite love of Christ, it will go up as a sweet savour to God.
- Down — Love begins at God's side, not ours. Walking in love lets our new nature show itself in practice.
- Up — Divine love comes down to us. When it acts in a person, it turns back upward as self-sacrifice offered to God.
- To — The gift was for us, but the offering was to God. Christ gave Himself up for the glory of God.
- Fragrance — This verse shows the burnt offering side of the cross, which delights God's heart. The sin-bearing side is different: there Christ drank the cup of wrath.
- Echo — We cannot repeat the propitiation. But we can love enough to lay down our lives, and even that small measure rises to God as a sweet savour.
But fornication and all uncleanness or unbridled lust, let it not be even named among you, as it becomes saints;
Paul has just held up Christ's self-giving love as the pattern for the believer's walk. He turns straight to the ugliest sins of the body and of money. Why must these sins not merely be avoided, but never even mentioned?
Chapter 5 opens with a call to copy God and to love as Christ loved. Then comes a guard. Close warmth among believers carries its own danger.
Still, the sweeter and more blessed it is, the closer it stands to evil — unless divine power and self-judgment keep it. It brings people together. It awakens spiritual affections. But what begins in the Spirit may end in corruption of the flesh, as we see at Corinth... These lusts of the flesh were not merely forbidden; they were not even to be named. They were God's holy ones, saints; and the question now was what is fitting for saints, not merely for men.
The warning does not call for a joyless life.
There is danger even among the saints of God. The devil can come in and turn love between believers into a snare. He does this not only when we allow open evil to break out, but through the unjudged leaning towards it... The Lord in no way forbids the happy cheerfulness which He loves in His saints. He does not call us to be monks. That is man's way of keeping the flesh under restraint, and only another form of self. We may have self in a legal form and self in a lax form. Under any form it is not Christ, and the only thing which God values now is Christ.
The ban reaches past behaviour to conversation, and for a reason.
The things listed in verse 3 appeal to instincts rooted deep in man's fallen nature. We do well to avoid the things themselves, and also the contamination that comes from thinking about them. We cannot talk about them without thinking of them, even if we condemn them in our talking. Therefore let us not talk about them.
It also settles how sin should be confessed in public:
The apostle Paul's confession in 1 Timothy 1:13 is a model. It is not "sharing" but a confession meant to praise the grace of God in reaching such a sinner as he was. Notice that his confession does not go into indecent details. He speaks only of how he opposed God — his blasphemy against God's truth and the harm he did to His people. As for confessing sexual matters in public, Scripture emphatically forbids this.
Silence is not softness. Talking about these sins lightly makes them look small. Older translations render the ESV's "sexual immorality" as "fornication":
This means that we should not mention these things frivolously and so make little of them... The Bible does not use the word fornication only for prostitution. It covers all sexual relations outside marriage — even where the couple mean to marry, and even if it happens only once.
The third word in the verse looks out of place beside the first two. The Greek word is pleonexia, "to have more":
It is not limited to money, and it is often linked with open wickedness. The word means "desiring more than is necessary," and so "reaching out to grab." That is why it is applied to the lusts of the flesh. It is declared to be idolatry (Col. 3:5).
That is why greed and immorality keep appearing side by side:
Elsewhere (Eph. 5:3; Col. 3:5), and especially in the first passage, covetousness and fornication are spoken of together. Fornication really springs out of covetousness, as the tenth commandment had already taught.
The measure is not public decency but identity. The order matters: the walk flows from what believers already are.
Since believers are "called saints" (Rom. 1:7; 1 Cor. 1:2), their ways should be such as are suitable for saints... They are not called to become saints by a holy walk. They are urged to a holy walk because God's calling has already made them saints... How unfit it is for people set apart like this to walk in uncleanness! And how wrong for followers of Him who was rich, and became poor for our sakes, to be clutching at the riches of this world!
The title itself carries the duty. A saint is "one set apart for God," and Scripture assumes "there is a line of conduct that is fitting for saints" (Morrish Bible Dictionary).
- Position first. The verse follows the call to walk in love as Christ loved us. Holiness here answers grace already received; it does not earn it.
- Standard second. You do not become a saint by clean living. You live as what God has already called you.
- Scope third. Covetousness stands beside immorality. Both grasp for more than God has given, and Scripture calls that greed idolatry.
- Speech fourth. These sins must leave our talk, not just our conduct. We cannot discuss them without dwelling on them, so keep the details out of public.
- Balance last. Silence about filth is not gloom. The Lord loves cheerfulness in His people. Monk-like rules only dress up self; the one thing God values now is Christ.
and filthiness and foolish talking, or jesting, which are not convenient; but rather thanksgiving.
Paul has just warned against immorality and greed. Now he turns to how God's people talk. This verse is not about crimes but about conversation — dirty talk, silly talk, and clever talk. It does not only ban them. It names a replacement.
"Out of place" is a word about fitness. Older translations read "not convenient." One writer explains it and ties the whole demand back to who believers already are:
They are not called to become saints by a holy walk. They are urged to a holy walk because they are saints through God's calling. The apostle says these things "are not convenient" — that is, not suitable. … It is not only in deed, but in word, that believers are to act in a way that suits saints.
The three words in this verse are milder than the sins listed just before them. That is exactly the point — the warning follows the evil into its socially acceptable disguise, and then supplies its opposite:
He does not limit his warning to unrestrained immorality, or to the greedy desire for whatever pleases man. He extends it to unholy language too, whether openly shameful or hidden under a veil of refinement… Here again he brings in not only the absence of what is improper in the Christian, but the positive side as well: the heart turns to God's goodness, and that breaks out in thanksgiving.
At first glance the verse sounds like a ban on laughter. Commentators say it is not:
The Lord in no way forbids the happy cheerfulness which He loves in His saints. He does not call us to be monks, which is man's way of keeping the flesh under restraint, and only another form of self. Self can take a strict, rule-keeping form, and self can take a loose form. In any form it is not Christ, and the only thing God values now is Christ.
The test is a Person, not a rule:
In the presence of Christ we will find joking unsuitable. This does not mean that the one who walks in the light of God's face is unhappy. No cloud hangs over the joy of the person who is in God's presence. But such a Christian feels which things do not suit someone called to imitate God.
One writer explains why even "foolish talk" is banned. The mouth drags the mind with it, even when the speaker means to condemn:
Things like those listed in verse 3 appeal to instincts deeply rooted in man's fallen nature. We do well to avoid the things themselves, and also the stain that comes from thinking about them. We cannot talk about them without thinking of them, even if we condemn them as we talk. So let us not talk about them… A Christian is neither a fool nor a jester, so let us not appear as either in our conversation.
The hardest item to give up is the one everyone admires, and dropping it has a cost:
We will soon find that refusing to join in foolish talking and jesting will bring plenty of scorn, and make us a spectacle. A quick wit or a clever reply is a natural ornament! But harmless as it may seem to us, there is very grave danger of defilement lurking here.
The verse ends with an exchange, not a vacuum:
Scripture is positive as well as negative; if folly is not to flow from our lips, giving of thanks should. Happy occupation! The heart is so satisfied with divine grace, and so taken up with Christ, that out of its abundance thanksgiving wells up to Him.
The trade is not joy for gloom. It is one kind of happiness for another:
Nothing is truly pleasant to the Spirit but Christ. In a saint, joy in the Holy Spirit should take the place of the thoughtless merriment that is natural to us. We are to trade the mirth that so often leaves a sting for that pure and precious gladness in which God Himself has a part.
Guarding the lips is not enough. Speech only reports what is already in the heart:
What is the remedy? Here it is — a heart filled with the peace of Christ, the word of Christ, Christ Himself. Nothing else will do. We must begin with the heart. Where the heart is fully occupied with heavenly things, we will make very short work of every attempt at evil speaking, foolish talking and jesting.
- Fitting — "Out of place" means unsuitable. The standard is not a rule list but what suits people God has already called saints.
- Refined — The warning reaches past open filth to polished, witty forms of the same evil.
- Free — Cheerfulness is not banned. Life in God's presence is happy, and harsh self-denial is only self in another form.
- Costly — A quick wit is an ornament people admire. Laying it down brings scorn; keeping it risks defilement.
- Exchanged — Thanksgiving takes the empty place. It starts in a heart occupied with Christ, not in guarded lips.
For this ye are [well] informed of, knowing that no fornicator, or unclean person, or person of unbridled lust, who is an idolater, has inheritance in the kingdom of the Christ and God.
Paul names impurity and greed, and then calls greed idolatry. That raises two hard questions. Why is wanting more treated as worship? And what does it mean to have no inheritance in the kingdom?
Two different Greek words for knowing stand side by side in the opening phrase. One writer explains what each one adds.
In Ephesians 5:5 the true reading brings both Greek words for knowing together: iste (from oida) and ginoskontes. Knowledge gained from outside had passed into inward, conscious knowledge. It was what they were well aware of, and knew. In the way the words are used, that process could not run the other way.
The word covers something far more ordinary than theft — which is exactly what makes it dangerous.
Covetousness involves no dishonesty. It is not even hard or sharp dealing. It is no more than the desire for more — the very spring of modern effort, the drive to better yourself that everyone is urged to have, from the workman to the millionaire. So the creature becomes the object, not God; and so covetousness is called idolatry. It is man looking down, not up in dependence on God.
Why does Paul call a greedy person an idolater? One writer answers by defining what an idol is.
You do not need to bow down to a piece of wood or stone to be an idolater. Whatever commands the heart is an idol. Giving the heart to that thing is idolatry, and the one who gives it is an idolater… What is covetousness? It is either a desire to get more, or the love of what we have… But whether it is the desire to grasp or the desire to hoard, either way it is idolatry.
It is easy to read a list of sins as a description of other people. One writer turns the list back on the readers.
These are things for use. They are exhortations, not merely to apply to other people, to measure them by, but to take home to ourselves. They are for saints, not for the world. No doubt we find the evil warned against in the world. Our hearts ought to feel for those who will have no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. But remember that the main purpose of the Holy Spirit was to warn and guard the saints themselves.
Some hear such a warning as a threat to the freeness of forgiveness. One writer answers by pointing to God's unchanging nature.
It is most important to remember this. Let sovereign grace do all it will. Let it reach the worst. Let it cleanse the most defiled. Still God's moral ways do not bend. His nature does not change. He hates and can never tolerate wickedness. His love may find — and has found — a glorious solution to that difficulty in the cross of Christ. But God and sin can never walk or live together.
Does this verse put a believer's place in doubt? One writer answers by separating standing from conduct.
The believer is a joint-heir with Christ, for in Him "we have obtained an inheritance." But to have a part in the kingdom of Christ and of God, our character must suit it. Seen in Christ, we are already fit to share the inheritance of the saints in light. Here, though, the question is not so much one of standing as of conduct.
Another writer draws the line between a fall and a way of life:
A child of God may fall and commit some of these things, but no true believer will continue to live in them.
This verse looks ahead. It says both what such people will miss and what the kingdom will be like.
Those marked by uncleanness, covetousness and idolatry will not only miss the blessings of the coming kingdom of Christ and of God. Being disobedient to the gospel, they will also come under the wrath of God. Unlike this present evil world, the kingdom of God will be a place where love rules and lust is shut out. What will be true of the coming kingdom should mark the family of God today.
- Know it. Paul points to what the readers already know. Facts they were taught have become inward certainty.
- Name it. Covetousness is the desire for more. It needs no dishonesty, so it passes for healthy ambition.
- Face it. Whatever commands the heart is an idol. Grasping or hoarding, greed puts something in God's place.
- Own it. The warning is written to believers to guard them, not handed to them as a measuring stick for the world.
- Match it. Grace has not changed God's nature. The kingdom is where love rules and lust is shut out, and that future should shape life now.
Let no one deceive you with vain words, for on account of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
Paul has just listed sins that shut a person out of the kingdom. He knows someone will always say it is not that serious. This verse calls that talk deception. Then it gives the reason God's wrath falls on a whole class of people.
The deception is not crude. It comes dressed as reasoning and learning. Its work is to make sin look appealing.
The apostle warns us not to let empty words deceive us. So men with their philosophy and science will excuse lust. They try to dress sin up in poetry and romance to make it look attractive. Even so, because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the children of disobedience. The "sons of disobedience" are those who have heard the truth but have rejected it.
One version of the empty words turns grace into a licence to sin. Paul answers it without a long argument.
Man's empty philosophy might indeed try to twist the teaching of grace into permission for immorality. But the apostle warns them against such corruptions of the truth... There is no need for a long argument. This teaching approves the very practices that bring God's judgment on the children of disobedience. Its emptiness is clear at once.
The phrase is not a label for one act. It is a family word. Some quotes here use the older wording, "children of disobedience."
Sons are those who show the typical or distinctive traits of their fathers. Scripture often uses this idea of a child standing for a parent in moral matters. So the "sons of disobedience" (Eph. 2:2) are those whose conduct shows disobedience as plainly as a son resembles a father.
Commentators differ on how wide the word "disobedience" reaches. Smith ties it to hearing the gospel and refusing it. Others read it as covering a whole way of life. One writer points to Saul, Israel's first king:
Here God explains the reason for His final judgment on Saul. It is the same reason as His judgment on every sinful man: disobedience and departure from God. And these are the very words we find again in Ephesians 2, the chapter that declares the sinner's condition of death: "sons of disobedience" and "without God in the world."
Those words matter. This wrath answers the sins Paul has just listed. It does not fall only on people who refuse the message about Christ.
We think it very unsound and dangerous to teach that people will only be judged for rejecting the gospel. "For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words: for because of these things [and not merely because of their rejection of the gospel] the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience."
The threat is not aimed at the believer. But the fact that such wrath is real is exactly what makes the next command urgent.
Men might deceive them with empty words. They might chatter about Christian liberty and anything else. But "because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience." He is speaking, of course, of the world, and not of Christians. He does not threaten Christians with the wrath of God. At the same time, this wrath really does come upon the children of disobedience, and that makes the warning deeply solemn. Christians, therefore, must not be in any sense partakers with them. There must be the fullest possible separation.
So what about someone who claims to be a Christian and lives in these sins?
The firm and decisive way in which the Apostle draws the line in verses 5 and 6 is very striking. The kingdom of Christ and of God is marked by holiness. The unholy are outside that kingdom and subject to the wrath of God. There was to be no mistake about this. Then as now, some wished to blur this sharp line and excuse unholy living. Other scriptures show that a true believer may fall into any of these sins. But no true believer is marked by any of them. Whatever people say about themselves, no one marked by such sins should be counted a true Christian.
- Empty words — the lie is polished, not crude. Philosophy, talk of liberty, and grace turned into permission all make sin look attractive.
- Real wrath — no long argument is needed. The very things people excuse are the things God's judgment comes for.
- Real family name — "sons of disobedience" means people whose conduct copies disobedience the way a son resembles his father. It is a character, not a slip.
- Real deeds — the wrath comes "because of these things." God judges people for what they have done, not only for turning down the gospel.
- Real separation — God does not threaten His children with this wrath. Its certainty presses them to share in none of it. A believer may fall into such sins, but is never marked by them.
Be not ye therefore fellow-partakers with them;
This one-line command hangs on a single word: therefore. It looks back at the sins that bring God's judgment, and it asks what people who have been delivered from those sins should now do about the people who still live in them.
Paul has just said that God's wrath falls on the children of disobedience because of the sins he has been listing. Verse 7 draws the conclusion. One writer answers those who twist grace into an excuse for sin:
Human philosophy might try to twist the teaching of grace into permission for immorality. But the apostle warns them against such corruptions of the truth. There is no need for a long argument. You can see at once how empty such teaching is. These were the very practices that bring God's judgment on the children of disobedience. They had been in that condition themselves. But God called them out of it. How could He bear to see them walk in the very acts He delivered them from?
The word "them" points back to a named group. One commentator explains who earns that name:
God's wrath is revealed from heaven against all the unrighteousness of people who suppress the truth by their unrighteousness (Rom. 1:18). It hangs above all over those who keep sinning against the holy light of gospel truth. Such people are called here the children of disobedience (or unbelief). True faith and willing obedience are one and the same in principle, and this shows it. Faith is an active principle, and works by love. Men hear the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ but do not receive the truth in the love of it. That is when they become liable to the special condemnation announced here.
The verse could have ended with the practices. It ends with people. That last word carries weight:
Whatever they claim to be, they have no part in the kingdom of God. So we, who have an inheritance in the kingdom, can have no part with them. This is what verse 7 so plainly states. Notice too that the last word of that verse is them. We are not only to avoid the sins, but also to avoid all participation with the sinners. The persons as well as the evils are to be avoided. The difference between us and them is as great and as distinct as that between light and darkness.
The warning is not theory. One commentator names the excuse people use, and the places these things reach us today:
People may assume that because God is love, the grace of God is indulgent toward these sinful things, but it is not so. These very things are why the wrathful judgment of God falls on the children of disobedience (v.6). Will a believer let himself share in any way with such people? These things are so glaring today on radio, TV and in newspapers and magazines. Saints must be very careful and watchful against such contamination.
The refusal in this verse is not built on rule-keeping. It rests on what the believer has become:
You know that just doing what is right would never satisfy your renewed conscience. You must have the springs of action purified. It is what Christ has done that asks it of you. These unclean things, as I read in verse 3, do not suit saints. Am I to put uncleanness aside because it is uncleanness? No; I put it aside because it does not suit saints... I refuse to take part in uncleanness, because I was in darkness, but now I am transformed. I am a new creature, a child of light.
Refusing to share is where this passage starts, not where it stops:
It is not enough for our souls to refuse to be partakers with the children of disobedience, as in verses 6, 7. We must have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather even expose them (v. 11). It is all part of our wonderful place and responsibility as children of light. This is not law, which only condemns by a standard applied from outside. It is an inward divine capacity that searches everything. Love is its source and its end, yet it spares evil even less than law does, and it brings in good by the Holy Spirit in Christ.
- Cause. God's wrath falls on these very practices. To share in them is to stand where judgment lands.
- Called. Believers were once in that condition. God called them out, and He will not bear to see them go back.
- Company. The verse ends with them — the people are to be avoided, not just the sins.
- Character. The refusal flows from a new nature, not a rulebook: once darkness, now a child of light.
- Continue. Not sharing is only the beginning. The light also exposes the works of darkness, and brings in good.
for ye were once darkness, but now light in [the] Lord; walk as children of light,
Paul has just warned the Ephesians about the sins that once filled their lives. Here he says why those sins no longer fit them: they are not just in a new place, they are new people, and their walk must match that.
The apostle does not say the Ephesians were in the dark. He says they were darkness. One writer presses how total that condition was:
Now we were what is contrary to His character, we were darkness; not only in the dark, but darkness in our nature, the opposite of God who is light. Not one ray of what He is was found in our will, our desires, our understanding. We were morally destitute of it.
The problem was never only ignorance. Another writer names what the old nature loved, and what has taken its place:
It is not simply that we were in the dark, ignorant of God. Our nature itself was darkness, because it found its pleasure in everything that is against God. Now we are partakers of the divine nature, and that nature is marked by love and light.
The verse does not say only that we are light. It adds the words that carry the whole weight — in the Lord. Our position, and the responsibility that follows it, both start there:
The Lord was light in Himself; we are not light in ourselves, but in the Lord. And the exhortation is, "Walk as children of light." God has taken us out of darkness. Think of it. The more we feel in our souls that we are in the light, as God is in the light, the more we will want a walk that suits it. But we measure all responsibility by our relationship. We are in the light to start, and our responsibility flows from that fact.
The verse does not tell them to become light. It tells them to walk as children of light. The order matters:
Since the change is so complete, the word is "walk as children of light." Be consistent with what you are, not merely with what you ought to be. We are light — yes, light in the Lord. That is at once the ground, the character, and the measure of what suits our ways as Christians. So let us walk accordingly. How comforting is the call of grace to holy ways! God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we are His children, we are children of light. How completely law disappears as the motive or the pattern of our walk.
The position cannot be lost, but the walk can fall out of step with it. One writer pictures it with sunshine:
If you are outside today, you will be in the sunshine, as long as the sun is shining. You can turn your back on the sun so that you do not see it, but you are still walking in the sunshine, even if you do not enjoy it. This is what can happen in our lives. We cannot return to a walk in darkness because we have been taken out of darkness into His wonderful light, but we can walk as children of darkness. That is why it is said, "Walk as children of light". We are to walk in accordance with the position which we have been given by grace.
The next verse tells us what this walk produces, and where it comes from:
But we are no longer darkness, nor in darkness, but are children of light: the fruit of the light — that is, the practical result of knowing God fully revealed — should be shown in all "goodness and righteousness and truth."
This also gives the believer his motive for refusing the sins listed earlier in the chapter:
I refuse to take part in uncleanness, because I was in darkness, but now I am transformed. I am a new creature, a child of light.
- Were. Not in darkness only — darkness itself, with not one ray of God's character in the will, desires or understanding.
- Are. Light, but never light in ourselves: light in the Lord, sharing the divine nature and loving what He loves.
- Walk. Be consistent with what you are, not merely with what you ought to be. The position sets the measure of the path.
- Bear. The fruit of the light is all that is good and right and true — the practical outcome of knowing God as He has revealed Himself.
- Refuse. The believer turns down impurity not just because it is wrong, but because it does not belong to a new creature, a child of light.
(for the fruit of the light [is] in all goodness and righteousness and truth,)
The call just before this verse is to walk as children of light. Verse 9 breaks in to say what that light bears: goodness, righteousness and truth. The wording also raises a well-known question — fruit of the light, or fruit of the Spirit?
The verse does not start a new subject. It pauses the command to walk as children of light. Then it names what that walk bears, and what it shuts out.
Verse 9 explains what will shine out. The correct reading is not "the fruit of the Spirit," but "the fruit of the light." Three words sum up that fruit — goodness, righteousness, truth. The opposites — evil, iniquity, unreality — should be entirely shut out of our lives. Walking this way as children of light, we prove what is pleasing to God. We prove it not by reasoning, but by practical experience. We put things to the test, and so learn it for ourselves.
These same three qualities do mark the Spirit's work. That may be how the older reading arose. But the contrast being drawn here settles the wording.
No doubt these are the marks of the Spirit's gracious work. That may be what put "the Spirit" in place of "light" in the common text. But there can be no reasonable question that the true thought and word in verse 9 is "the light"... In Galatians 5 it is the fruit, not of the light, but of the Spirit. There it stands against the works of the flesh... Here the contrast is not with legal tendencies and the workings of flesh, which the law both provokes and condemns. It is with the darkness which we once were when we were without the Lord.
The three words cover different ground: how we treat others, how we meet our duties, and how honest we are.
Verse 9 is a parenthesis. Light produces goodness, righteousness and truth. Goodness is that which actively seeks the good of others. Righteousness is carrying out properly the duties of whatever relationship we are in. Truth is transparent honesty.
The order matters. Goodness heads the list, and righteousness and truth come after it.
We are to walk in keeping with the position grace has given us. So we are called to something wonderful: to walk as children of light and show the fruit of light, which is in all goodness. This has the character of love. Only then do righteousness and truth follow. These would be more the characteristics of light, but goodness leads us to the love of God.
No one produces these qualities on his own. They are fruit, and fruit needs a root.
The works of darkness bear no fruit. But those who walk in the light, as He is in the light, bear precious fruit. Goodness, righteousness and truth are out of reach for the natural man. They are found in the way of those whom the Spirit, through faith, shapes into practical likeness to Christ. He is Himself the essence and fulness of these things. By staying close to Him, we reflect what we enjoy in Him. Our fruit, whether scanty or abundant, must savour of the Root that bears us.
So the fruit of light is not just something pleasant in a person. It carries the character of light itself, and light never leaves evil alone.
This is all part of our marvellous place and responsibility as children of light. It is not law, which only condemns by an outward standard applied from without. It is an inward and most searching divine capacity. Love is its source and its end, yet it spares evil even less than the law does, and it brings in good by the Holy Spirit in Christ... Light by its nature reveals itself and everything else. This is just as true in spiritual things as in nature.
- Light, not Spirit — the true reading is "the fruit of the light." Galatians 5 sets the Spirit's fruit against the flesh; here the contrast is with the darkness we once were.
- Light gives — the position comes first; the walk keeps true to what grace has made us.
- Light bears — goodness seeks the good of others. Righteousness meets the duties of each relationship. Truth is plain honesty.
- Light roots — none of this is native to us. The fruit tastes of the Root that bears it, and it grows by staying close to Christ.
- Light reveals — the fruit that pleases God also shows up the works of darkness, because revealing is what light does.
proving what is agreeable to the Lord;
Paul has just called the Ephesians light in the Lord, and this verse tells them what that light is for. So how does a believer find out what pleases the Lord when no rule covers the situation?
This verse does not stand alone. Commentators read verse 9 as a side note, so that verse 10 links straight back to the call to walk as children of light. One writer also says why God's will can seem hard to find.
This verse is connected with what is said about light in verse 8; verse 9 is in parentheses. This is what we have to learn in our conduct. People often say it is hard to find out the will of God. But this is because we are not ready to face difficulties, and then we cannot find out His will. In this verse we see the state of soul that loves to please. It enters into the spirit of the walk, and it takes in the wishes of God, so as to be acceptable to Him.
This Greek word turns up in other letters too, translated in different ways.
euarestos (literally 'well-pleasing,' from eu, 'well,' and aresko, 'to please') means 'acceptable' to God, Rom. 14:18; 'agreeable' to the Lord, Eph. 5:10; 'well-pleasing' to Him, Col. 3:20. These passages show that the older rendering "we may be accepted of him" in 2 Cor. 5:9 is wrong: it should be "agreeable to him."
The same word marks a difference Paul kept clear in his own life:
He was certain that he was accepted. Yet he never forgot that he had to stand before the judgment seat of Christ… So for Paul, being accepted and being acceptable were two different questions, and both mattered greatly. He knew by the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ that God had accepted him. He worked hard to be acceptable. So the teaching of grace was not weakened, even though he never lost sight of his responsibility.
This proving grows out of the walk itself. One writer shows how, with a picture from family life.
Being light in the Lord, we are to walk as children of light. That walk will show itself in "all that is good and right and true", for these things are the fruit of light. Walking this way, we shall prove in our own circumstances what is acceptable to the Lord… One writer said: "A child watches his father and learns what pleases him. He knows what his father would want in the situations that come up."
God could have given a list of answers for every case. One writer explains why He did not.
The discernment of a Christian depends on his spiritual and moral state, and God means it to be so. He will not simply be a director who hands us decisions. He makes us depend on our spiritual state even to know what His will is. This is not a set of higher rules for a select few. The discernment of the inward life makes what it sees both a delight and a duty at once.
This proving reaches the smallest choices, down to what we buy.
Is this our simple purpose? … In any common act of life, our question should be: is this acceptable to the Lord? When buying an item of clothing, it should not simply be, will this suit me? but, is it acceptable to the Lord, does it suit Him?
One writer gives the reason it reaches that far: we belong to Christ, who bought us.
To please Him who gave Himself for our sins is both the duty and the desire of the new man… We are no longer our own, but His who bought us. We please Him when we trust Him and obey His words. A Christian's business in the world is Christ, and nothing else. That word covers every lawful kind of situation and work. If we cannot do something wholeheartedly for Him, we should not do it at all.
This proving shows up in real life, and it also draws a line.
In walking as children of light we prove in experience what is acceptable to the Lord. Since He has no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, neither should we. He reproves them and so should we. We are not to argue about them or against them. We are to reject them plainly.
- Light first. The verse hangs on verse 8: because we are light in the Lord, we can tell what suits Him. The order is never reversed.
- Learned, not looked up. We learn as a child learns his father's likes, by watching. That knowledge fits situations no rule could cover.
- Proved, not just known. God holds back a list of answers on purpose. Our discernment follows our spiritual state, and what it sees becomes both a delight and a duty.
- Accepted, then acceptable. Grace settles our acceptance; being acceptable is our daily work. Holding both keeps grace intact and responsibility awake.
- Everything, or nothing. The test reaches clothes and work alike. If we cannot do it wholeheartedly for Him, we should not do it at all.
and do not have fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather also reprove [them],
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
for the things that are done by them in secret it is shameful even to say.
Paul has just told believers to have nothing to do with the fruitless works of darkness, and to expose them instead. So how do you expose evil you are not supposed to talk about?
Secret sins are as common now as they were then. Light exposes them, not our talk about them — and that exposure costs the one who shines.
Instead he should expose them — not necessarily by attacking the world's practices head on, but by a consistent godly life that reproves wrongdoing. Men's secret sins have as large a place now as in Paul's days. They are too shameful even to name. But the light exposes them and declares their true character, for light makes everything visible. Such exposing will not bring love to the witness, but rather hatred, as our Lord Jesus said: the world hates Him because He testifies that its works are evil (John 7:7). In His case the darkness hated the light; it was too much for them.
Everything turns on the word older versions translate "reprove." It does not mean scolding.
This word, reprove, occurs again, you will notice, in verse 13. Its meaning is not exactly admonish or rebuke, but rather expose. It is to expose, as by light, the true character of the works in question. If a believer shines out in his true character, his whole life will have that effect. His Master's life did this in the highest measure. Still, of course, there may be many times when words of rebuke are needed.
The Christian's answer to the world's vices is not debate. It is a choice about what fills the mind and the mouth.
We are not to argue about them or against them. We are simply and clearly to reject them. Even to talk about the vices practised in secret by the ungodly is a shame. The believer has far more profitable things to engage his thoughts and conversation.
Even rightly judging evil leaves a mark. One commentator shows why from Numbers 19.
It is a great thing for the Christian to be in the habit of living in what is good. We live in a world where we must deal with what is evil… But it will not do to be always occupied with it. It defiles even when we judge it. Think of the man who handled the ashes of the red heifer in Numbers 19. He was doing a service by gathering them up and laying them outside the camp. Yet he was unclean until evening, and the same was true of the man who applied them. It is soiling to our minds even to be judging evil.
Which sins count as the secret ones? The standard is Christ, not what other people notice.
We are to hate the unnoticed, quiet activities of the flesh as much as those that are openly filthy and corrupt. We are to loathe the secret, refined ways of selfishness as much as those that are open and shameless. To the Christian, Christ is the perfect model.
The effect goes beyond one person. Where Christians shine, public life changes — and the reverse is also true.
To speak of the things that the flesh can do in secret is shame. The light of Christ reproves the evil that it exposes. Where Christianity has shaped a land, people cannot publicly commit the gross sins that others commit openly elsewhere. The light in Christians is too strong. Sadly, as the light declines, sins again become more public and open.
- Light exposes. Exposure is what light does by being present. The believer's whole life shows the true character of dark works, though spoken rebuke is still sometimes needed.
- Light silences. The deeds done in secret are too shameful to name. So the Christian rejects them plainly instead of arguing about them or retelling them.
- Light guards. Even honest handling of evil leaves a stain. The man who gathered the ashes of the red heifer was unclean until evening. So the mind is not to live there.
- Light searches. Hate quiet, respectable selfishness as much as open filth. Christ is the standard, not public opinion.
- Light restrains. Where the light of Christ in Christians is strong, gross sin cannot go public. As that light fades, hidden sins come back into the open.
But all things having their true character exposed by the light are made manifest; for that which makes everything manifest is light.
Paul has just told believers to have nothing to do with the fruitless works of darkness. Instead they are to expose them. Here he says why that works: light brings everything into the open. Two questions follow. What does exposing ask of a Christian? And what does the closing clause about light mean?
The word does not picture a Christian telling other people off. It pictures what a lamp does to whatever it shines on.
Notice that this word, reprove, comes again in verse 13. It does not quite mean warn or rebuke. It means expose. It is to expose the true character of the works in question, the way light does. If a believer shines out in his true character, his whole life will have that effect, just as his Master's life did, in the highest measure of all. Of course there will still be many times when words of rebuke are needed.
Light does not just condemn from the outside, the way a rule does. It searches, and it shows things as they are.
It is not law, condemning by an outward standard held up against us. It is an inward and deeply searching divine capacity. Love is its source and its end, yet it spares evil even less, and it brings in good by the Holy Spirit in Christ... It belongs to light to show itself and everything else, and that is just as true in spiritual things as it is in nature.
The sentence does not stop at the verse break. It ends with a clause about light, and commentators differ over that clause. Some read it as a statement about anything that gets exposed. Others say light is what does the exposing. One writer, reviewing a new translation, argued the point sharply.
I have no doubt that this translation of Ephesians 5:13 is wrong. "Whatever is made manifest is light" is not only untrue; it is also not the point of the passage. The passage speaks of things being made manifest by the light. I admit the passage is difficult. But I believe the sense is, "what makes everything manifest is light," or, "it is the light which makes everything manifest." The form of the Greek word is found only here, and it would be a middle with an active sense.
Others say the sentence is true whichever way you take the word. And light does more than detect.
The last clause of this verse changes its meaning. It depends on whether you take the word translated "manifest" in an active or a passive sense. Either way it states an obvious truth. On the whole, the light seems meant to do more than detect. It also subdues and gives life.
If light exposes by shining, then a consistent life is itself the reproof. That is why the reaction is often hatred, not thanks.
Instead he should expose them. He need not attack the world's practices head on. A consistently godly life is itself a reproof of wickedness. People's secret sins fill as much room now as in Paul's day. They are too shameful even to name. But the light exposes them and declares their true character, for light shows up all things. Such exposing will not bring the witness love. It will bring him hatred, as our Lord Jesus said: the world "hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil" (John 7:7). In His case the darkness hated the light: it was too much for them.
Light and love are not rivals. And the light itself is not ours.
In verse 13 Paul continues along the line of holiness, righteousness and truth. But it is very important to see that the light of God never contradicts His love... Christ is always the true light. We have no light in ourselves, so even if we as Christians are called light it can only be light "in the Lord".
A verse about exposing evil is easy to aim only outward. It has a nearer target.
Bright sunlight shows up every detail of natural things. In the same way, the true light of God shows the real character of everything in the spiritual and moral realm. Are we willing to turn that light on our own conduct? And on popular religious schemes that compromise more and more of the truth of Scripture?
- Expose, not scold — "reprove" means to show a thing's true character, the way light does. Direct rebuke has its place, but it is not the main idea.
- Light acts — it is not an outward rule held up against evil. It is a searching power that shows itself and everything else, in spiritual things as in nature.
- Two readings — some say the Greek must mean "what makes everything manifest is light." Others say the truth holds either way: light both detects evil and subdues it.
- Shining costs — a godly life exposes darkness without attacking it. The darkness answers with hatred, as it did to Christ.
- Borrowed light — we are light only "in the Lord," so the first surface the beam should fall on is our own conduct.