Sermon -- 4th Sunday of Lent March 15, 2026)

CONDUCT YOURSELVES AS CHILDREN OF LIGHT.

EPHESIANS 5:8-14

In the name + of Jesus.

     St. Paul wrote many letters to the Christian churches he served.  For the most part, there was some controversy which inspired the occasion for his letters.  They remind us that no Christian congregation is perfect.  There is a perfect church, but you have to die to enter it.  On earth, the church is filled with sinners.  The Church faces pressure to change its teachings with each generation.  It is infiltrated by false teachers and false teachings.  It usually begins by some saying that there should be room for alternative views of God’s word.  They claim that the Church should do all it can to preserve unity and peace.  “By their love you will know them,” they say.  While we pray for unity and peace, that is not the chief goal of the Church.  The chief goal is to be faithful and to hold firmly to God’s word.  No false teaching is harmless, and we cannot make peace with it.  St. Paul wrote, “All Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16, emphasis added).  So, when St. Paul saw that a congregation needed correction, he wrote a letter.

     Even though these Christians needed correction, St. Paul did not treat them as enemies or suggest that they were outside of the Christian Church.  He greeted them as brothers and sisters in Christ.  He thanked God for them.  He prayed for them.  And he reminded them who they were.  He wrote to the Ephesians, “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.  Walk as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8).  

     Just as our Lord had enlightened the Ephesian Christians, so he has also enlightened you.  Many of you have lived your entire life in the light of Christ.  Having been baptized as infants and having been taught the Christian faith, you have been light in the Lord for as long as you can remember.  If you were enlightened to know God’s word later in life, you are just as much a child of God as any other Christian.  There are not degrees of being saved.  There are not levels to the kingdom of God; there is just the kingdom of God.  You are light in the Lord.  Walk as children of light.

     If you want to be particular about St. Paul’s exhortation, he tells the Ephesians Christians, “Continue to walk as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8, emphasis added).  They were already doing this.  St. Paul urged them to continue in the word they believed.  To “walk” as children of light means to conduct yourself and your whole life as children of light.  To put it succinctly, he says, “You are Christians.  Act like it!”  Conduct yourselves as children of light.

     Before we are told to act like Christians, we ought to remember what made us Christians to begin with.  St. Paul wrote, “You were once darkness” (Ephesians 5:8).  That refers to our natural sinful condition.  The sinful hearts is a dark place.  Even though the Holy Spirit has created in you a clean heart and a right spirit, it does not take much for that to be eclipsed by wickedness.  Just think of how easy it is for you to assume the worst of other people or to despise them when they infringe upon your time.

     Consider how Jesus’ disciples misread the situation with a blind beggar.  Jesus and his disciples were on their way into the temple when they saw the man who was born blind.  Being blind, he had been reduced to begging for alms.  He was a fixture at the temple gate, deposited there by friends.  He sat there, hoping that those who came to worship would be compassionate and generous to him.  Jesus’ disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind” (John 9:2)?  Since most people have sight, the disciples concluded that this must have been some special punishment that God had inflicted upon this man.  They had the idea that people who suffer are getting what they deserve. 

     We make similar judgments about other people because the sinful heart is a dark place.  This darkness is what produces not only wicked thoughts, but it also gives us our excuses for them.  Our compassion for the down-trodden is withheld because we believe they are getting what they deserve.  To be fair, that may be true.  If people blow their money on gambling, drinking, or needless Amazon purchases, they may be unable to pay their rent, their insurance, or their utilities.  We deem them unworthy of pity.  Granted, they created their own misery, but it is still misery. 

     Of course, we are responsible for much of our own misery.  People sabotage their own marriages by looking at computer generated images and fantasizing about other people.  People nurse grudges and withhold forgiveness, insisting that a rift in the family is justified and reconciliation is unreasonable.  Then there is the shame that you keep to yourself.  Even if you don’t suffer consequences for the sins of your past, you still endure the shame of them.  You crave mercy, but you fear the judgment of friends—perhaps even the abandonment by those friends if they ever found out.  If people get what they deserve, we know we deserve a damning judgment.

     The sinful heart is a dark place, but God sees and he knows.  And it will get worse.  St. Paul wrote, “Everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for it is light that makes things visible” (Ephesians 5:13).  Everything will be exposed.  Perhaps you can keep your secrets hidden and take them to the grave with you.  But in the end, everything will be revealed.  St. John was given a vision of Judgment Day.  He wrote, “Then I saw a great white throne and the one who sat on it.  The earth and the sky fled from his presence, and no place was found for them.  I also saw the dead, great and small, standing in front of the throne, and books were opened. …The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and Death and the Grave gave up the dead that were in them, and they were judged, each one according to what he had done” (Revelation 20:11-13).  At this public reckoning, everyone will be fully exposed.  God’s light will shine on each, and each dark deed and secret thought will be made known.

     How terrifying it would be for people to learn about every secret you hide!  But you don’t have to answer to other people.  You may have sinned against them, and you are accountable for that.  But it is God to whom you must give an answer.  And there is no hiding anything from him.  The Bible reminds us, “Death and Destruction lie open before the LORD—how much more human hearts” (Proverbs 15:11)! 

     The sinful heart is a dark place.  It fails to have pity on those who are held captive to their sins.  It claims the right to hold in contempt those who have made a mess of their lives.  God be praised that he does not treat us that way!  The Lord did not abandon us to our foolish errors or filthy judgments.  He continues to shine his light upon us—not just to expose our guilt, but to show us the way out. 

     Of all the people who could have looked down on us in judgment, Jesus is the one.  He kept all of God’s Commandments and did not cave into any temptations.  He could have looked on us in derision and withheld his pity.  We were too lazy to fight.  We caved in under pressure.  We know it was wrong and did it anyway.  Jesus could have insisted that we should get the judgment we deserve.  Instead, he came and suffered the judgment we deserve. 

     But the light of God’s love is seen in Jesus Christ.  God’s grace radiates from him.  In order to deliver us from the damning judgment for our sins, the Lord took away our sins.  So that we would not be banished to the outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, Jesus took up our sins.  He was banished by his Father as he died on a dark Friday when the sun’s light failed.  That is where the Lord took care of your sins and altered your judgment.  You have been cleared of all charges.

     The Lord applied all of this to you in your baptism.  He changed both your status and your heart when he made you children of light.  St. Paul noted that “the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth” (Ephesians 5:9).  God’s goodness has atoned for wickedness.  God’s righteousness covers over your sin.  God’s truth guides those who are saved to godly living.  In the end, God’s light will expose you for what you are—children of God purified in Jesus’ blood.  You will highlight God’s grace.  You will reflect the image and innocence of Jesus Christ.

     That is why the Lord urges you to conduct yourselves as children of light.  St. Paul urges you, “Try to learn what is pleasing to the Lord, and do not participate in fruitless deeds of darkness.  Instead, expose them” (Ephesians 5:10-11).  Continue to walk as children of light.  Continue to hear and meditate on the word of the Lord.  This will guard you from error and guide you in truth and goodness.  Many voices will try to convince you to bless what God does not bless.  The appeal for the Church to get with the times or to allow for alternative views of God’s word will always go on.  Those appeals can be crafted to sound very sensible.  Only by adhering to the word of the Lord are those appeals exposed for the lies that they are.  Only by learning what is pleasing to the Lord will you continue to conduct yourselves as children of light.

     The world will always be a dark place, but the Psalms remind us, “Your words are a lamp for my feet and a light for my path” (Psalm 119:105).  That is the light that keeps us secure and ensures that we are on the right path.  God gave his word to show us his love.  His love is surely made known in the promises, but it is also revealed in his commands.  God gave those commands to us to direct us away from sin.  Sins do not produce anything good.  The Commandments, however, direct us to lives that will be blessed.  Martin Luther reminds us: “He promises grace and every blessing to all who keep these commandments” (Luther’s Small Catechism: Conclusion to the Commandments).  If you conduct yourselves as children of light, you will spare yourself of many griefs. 

     Continue to walk as children of light.  Paul wrote, “Do not participate in fruitless deeds of darkness” (Ephesians 5:11).  He could have just as easily said, “Do not drink poison.  Do not play with fire.  Do not stick a fork in an electric outlet.”  You have been rescued from sin death, and destruction.  Do not return to them; for you are light in the Lord.  You are Christians.  Rejoice in it.  You are Christians.  Act like it.  Conduct yourselves as children of light. 

In the name of the Father and of the Son + and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.