What does it mean that "it is high time to awake out of sleep" (Romans 13:11)?

We have seen in verses 1 to 7 subjection to government; in verses 8 to 10 love to all men: now the chapter closes (vv. 11 to 14) with the armor of light. All of these things have a plain reference to testimony, and all are a decided protection for the saint. But subjection to authority or love to all men does not mean by any means the giving up of truth. The light of truth and honesty is to shine with undimmed brightness in all of this. If we are men who have any knowledge of the times, we know that it is high time to awake out of sleep. The world is in darkness, and utterly dead toward God. The believer is in the light, and is alive to God; but he may be sleeping — not using the light, yea hardly sensible of the infinite difference God has made between him and the world. But our salvation — that is, our deliverance out of the world, from the very sphere and presence of sin — is nearer than when we believed. If we were impressed with the realities of eternity when we first believed, how much more so ought we to be now, when we are nearer to the Lord's coming than ever before!

We who believe have salvation of our souls now: but the salvation of our bodies is a different subject, and will be accomplished perfectly at the coming of the Lord. Are we sensible of what a tremendous change this will involve? It will be a transfer from the circumstances of “the night” to those of “the day.” For while we ourselves are not “of the night,” but “of the day,” yet we live in the world in its time of night and are surrounded by men of the world who are “of the night,” and whose delight is in “the works of darkness.” But these circumstances are most certainly not to govern us. “The night is far spent, the day is at hand. ”Do we therefore want anything to do with “the works of darkness”? Let us rather cast them off as a filthy garment, and put on the protective armor of light.

There is another powerful motive for the believer, the nearness of that day when all that is not of Christ must be detected and pass away. "And this, knowing the meet time, that already [it is] time for you to be aroused out of sleep; for now [is] our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, and the day is drawn nigh. Let us cast away therefore the works of darkness and put on the armour of light. As in daylight let us walk becomingly, not in revelling and drunkenness, not in chambering and lasciviousness, not in strife and envy; but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and take no forethought for the flesh for lusts." (Ver. 11-14.) For the earth the Sun of righteousness is not yet risen; for it the believer, though he has Christ the true light for himself, knows that it is night still. Yet daylight has dawned and the morning star arisen in his heart. Hence he sleeps not as do others; or, if he should, judges it as sin, for he is in the secret of the Lord and is charged with the gravest mission of love and holiness in the witnessing of His name as he passes through the world. Man slumbers heedless of danger, spite of solemn and reiterated warning. His evil conscience forbids his crediting the grace which is in God; his self-complacency blinds him to the moral beauty of the dependent and obedient Man, as well as to his own need of such a Saviour and such a salvation as God urges on him; and so he sleeps on till he perishes, waking up too late to the truth he has rejected and the grace he has slighted irreparably then. The believer with his soul saved already looks for a salvation worthy of Christ and of His redemption at His coming; and, though the interval may seem long sometimes, he knows that it is ever growing nearer. The works of darkness are therefore wholly incongruous and must be cast away. In such alas! the Gentiles used to walk when they lived in them; even as the Jews under the law occupied themselves with dead works. But now, dead to them, Christians would put on the armour of light; and though the day be not yet, they as children of it would walk comelily as in its light. What have such to do with revels and drinking bouts, with ways of lewdness and lasciviousness, with strife and envy? Are they not the blessed saints of God in full view of the speedy coming and day of the Lord? How suitable the call to put on the Lord Jesus Christ! As we have Him inwardly our life, may we wear Him outwardly, cherishing Him as our all, and make no provision for the flesh with a view to lusts. This were to revive the old man already crucified, to have believed and to hope in vain.

"It is high time to awake out of sleep: for our salvation is nearer than when we believed." The night of this world is the absence of the Sun of Righteousness. Let us clearly conceive this. In the busy and pleasure-seeking course of this world, for him who has understanding and to whom Christ is known, it is still night; the gloom of night is over it, but the day has dawned to his faith, the Morning Star is arisen in his heart, but the world is asleep in the night. The waking soul sees in the horizon the Morning Star, the dawn along its edge, and waits for day. The heart is in the day, and walks as in the day. As Christians we have done with works of darkness. In conflict we are still; but our armour against evil, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, is the light in which we walk. The power of light and truth and godliness and judgment of evil, which belongs to that day, is in our heart, and the weapons and snares of darkness are foiled and detected, getting no entrance into, no hold on the soul. We walk honestly as in the day, we put on in our ways and heart the walk and character of Him who is the true light of it, the Lord Jesus Christ. Having the hope of being like Him there, we purify ourselves as He is pure, we walk as He walked. We do not provide for the lusts of the nature which belongs to the darkness to satisfy it, but walk as Christ walked.

Such is the Christian in view of Christ's coming, and bringing on this dark and benighted world the light and day of God in His effectual power; and such are the two springs and characters of Christian conduct, recognition of, acting up to, every relative duty in love, and knowing the time, the near approach of the day to which he belongs. (See 1 Thess. 5) "The night is far spent, the day is at hand." J. N. Darby.

Then the thought of the Lord's coming is used to enforce all: "It is high time to awake out of sleep; for our salvation is nearer than when we believed." The night of this world is the absence of the Sun of Righteousness. Let us clearly conceive this. In the busy and pleasure-seeking course of this world, for him who has understanding, and to whom Christ is known, it is still night; the gloom of night is over it, but the day has dawned to his faith, the Morning Star is arisen in his heart, but the world is asleep in the still-continuing darkness of night. For us indeed the night is far spent, but the world is asleep in the night. The waking soul sees in the horizon the Morning Star, the dawn along its edge, and waits for day. The heart is in the day, and walks as in the day. As Christians, we have done with works of darkness. In conflict we are still; but our armour against evil, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, is the light in which we walk. The power of light, and truth, and godliness, and judgment of evil, which belongs to that day, is in our heart, and the weapons and snares of darkness are foiled and detected, getting no entrance into, no hold on, the soul. We walk honestly as in the day, we put on in our ways and heart the walk and character of Him who is the true light of it, the Lord Jesus Christ. Having the hope of being like Him there, we purify ourselves as He is pure, we walk as He walked. We do not provide for the lusts of the nature which belongs to the darkness to satisfy it, but walk as Christ walked. Such is the Christian in view of Christ's coming and bringing on this dark and benighted world the light and day of God, in His effectual power; and such are the two springs and characters of Christian conduct; recognition of, acting up to, every relative duty in love; and knowing the time, the near approach of day to which he belongs. Compare 1 Thess. 5. "The night is far spent, the day is at hand."

Now, what do I hear the watchman say, in answer to the scoffer? Listen: "The morning comes." The morning will surely come, a morning without clouds for every believer, a morning of clear shining after rain. After all the night of sorrow we look for the coming of the Lord as the Bridegroom of our hearts, and oh, what a moment it will be when He comes, and the children of the day rise to meet their Lord in the air. Oh, happy saints! blessed are ye who belong to the Lord, and are of the day. The apostle in writing to the Romans can say: "And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand" (Rom. 13:11-12). The apostle does not mean that we are more sure about being saved, but that the hour of our deliverance out of this scene, body, soul, and spirit, is nearer than when we believed. The Lord is about to take us to the place to which we belong. Where does a Christian belong to? To heaven. Where does a man of the world belong to? To earth. Ah, but, you say, if I were to admit that I belong to heaven, I should have to shake off a good deal of the world. Well, that would do you no harm. It is a very good thing for a man who is running a race to shake off a hindrance. Would that you could see clearly that the Christian belongs to heaven, to Christ, who is there, and that he is not of the night, but is a child of light, and belongs to the day. He is looking for the morning, and he is fitted for it by his Saviour's work. Now that the night is far spent and the day so near at hand, it is high time to awake out of sleep. Why? Because we are going to be judged? No, but because our salvation is nearer than when we believed.

The Apostle appeals to believers as "knowing the time". The world may be full of misgivings, their hearts failing them through fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth; but this only proves that the world does not know the time. We know that all the confusion and unrest in the world only tells us that the day of glory is not far off. We are called to glory. "We rejoice in hope of the glory of God". "We are saved in hope". (Rom. 8:30; 5:2: 8:24); and we know that the full salvation for which we wait is nearer than when we believed. Knowing the time — that the dawn is breaking — it is high time to awaken from sleep.

"And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly as in the day …" (Rom. 13:11-13).

Here the exhortation to awake is based upon the fact that the day is approaching which will mean our full and final deliverance from the present age. We are still in the night but we belong to that day and are to walk "honestly" or "becomingly" as in that day — not taking the ways and customs of the night-age as our standard, but walking according to the ways and principles of the day-age, before the day comes.

There are two ways in which the promise of the Lord's coming is intended to act on the believer. First, to excite and stimulate his spiritual affections, augmenting thus the abundance of his labour of love for the Lord's sake; and secondly, as a warning to his conscience, since he is ever in danger of departing more or less from God by reason of the deceitfulness of sin (Heb. 3:12-13). Both these ends are contemplated in the exhortation before us. It was high time to awake, because the day was at hand; but that day was the day of their completed salvation and glory (verses 11, 12). They had need of watching still, for it was yet night, and the dangers of the night remained around them still But deliverance was the near expectation of those who were thus aroused. They had not to seek afresh the evidence of their hope and title of blessing in the day that was so near. Because they had believed, they were already saved in hope, and the salvation of promise was daily drawing nearer to their sight. They stood already sealed and fitted, by the grace of God, for participation in the inheritance of the saints in light. They were already "of the day" (1 Thess. 5:8). But they had diligently to look to their ways, as called to stand before God.

What a word for this moment!— “Knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep … The night is far spent, the day is at hand.” What an arousing motive for holiness! Beware of all pretended holiness that has not this intelligence and this motive. What! is the Lord at hand, and we, Christians, asleep?— whether we think of joy to us, for ever with the Lord — how near now our salvation — or the day of wrath and judgment on a rejecting world. “Let us, therefore, cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.” If the world is steeped in dishonesty in this dark night, “Let us walk honestly, as in the day.” What a change there would be in the conduct, even of Christians, if we were really to awake, to expect our Lord, day by day.

We have now another thing. We are "children of the light and of the day." We walk in the night and in the darkness, but the darkness is passing away. The hour of dawn is approaching. It is already time to be aroused out of sleep. Our salvation, final salvation of course, is getting ever nearer, but for us, already the light shines upon us. If it has not come for the world, for us it has come. We are in it in such sort that we should be reflecting it. Heaven is open to us, and the glory in the face of Christ already shines upon us. Practically to enjoy this is to manifest it and to manifest what we are. It is to put on the armor of light. Who is unaware of what a defence light is in itself in the midst of darkness? The evil deeds of men are done in the darkness. Light reproves them. How blessed to walk in the joy of that which manifests us for what we are, and which, by its presence in us, rebukes evil and breaks, as it were, the power of temptation; but we have, therefore, to put on the Lord Jesus Christ in a practical way. It is, in fact, but to sit in the sun and the sun will make its mark upon us; but that means the heart laid hold of and therefore no thought of provision for the flesh, which, with its lusts, belong to the darkness.