The Christian Life 101, Part 1

Life is messy, agreed? Some messes we create, others are imposed upon us.

But in either case, it's a disservice to perpetuate a false notion that walking with God allows us to bypass occasional chaos. Today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll continues teaching from Paul's letter to the Ephesians. In the passage we'll examine today, we'll be reminded that our best defense against a complicated life is to stay focused on the basics.

Maybe you feel somewhat overwhelmed by the confusion that's stirring up angst in our culture these days. Let's return to what Chuck calls the Christian Life 101. If you have brought with you a copy of the scriptures, would you turn into the New Testament with me to the fifth chapter of the letter Paul wrote to the Ephesians? Ephesians chapter 5, I want to begin the reading at verse 15. By the way, before reading, let me tell you, when I first began to think seriously about this passage in knowing that today would come, which was several weeks ago, it occurred to me that tucked away in these very few verses here in the central section of Ephesians 5 is really the Christian life in a few words, which led to the title of the message, the Christian Life 101. This is really its most foundational statement once you have come to the cross and then gone beyond that to begin to grow, these are our marching orders. Ephesians 5, 15, therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is, and do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to God, even the Father, and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ. You're listening to Insight for Living.

To search the scriptures with Chuck Swindoll, be sure to download his Searching the Scriptures Studies by going to insightworld.org slash studies. And now the message titled The Christian Life 101. There are times it helps just to get back to the very basics. Life gets complicated, things get convoluted.

When that happens, it helps to sort of blow the dust off of the mix of essentials and non-essentials and come back to what is absolutely foundational. Sometime when we do that, we call it Project 101. There are certain courses we take in school. 101.

You can't get more basic than 101. Our older daughter Carissa sometime ago sent us, Cynthia and me, a rather cute thing on the email. I'm calling it Parenting 101. It's a series of tests on how you can know whether it's time to start having children. It's a little late arriving to us, but for some of you it may help.

There are ten exams in all, ten tests, and we'll see how well you do, you who are still wondering about whether you should start your family. This may help. The first is the mess test. Smear peanut butter on the sofa and curtains. Now rub your hands in the wet flower bed and rub that on the walls. Cover the stains with crayons.

Place a fish stick behind the couch and leave it there all summer. The mess test will help you know if it's time to start having children. The toy test is another. Obtain a 55 gallon box of Legos.

If Legos are unavailable, you may substitute roofing tacks or broken pieces of glass. Have a friend spread them all over the house, put on a blindfold, and try to walk to the bathroom or the kitchen without screaming. The toy test.

Here's the grocery store test. Borrow one or two small animals. Goats are best. I like that line.

Goats are best. And then take them with you as you shop at the grocery store. Always keep them in sight and pay for anything they eat or damage. It's followed by the dressing test. Obtain one large unhappy octopus.

That's a great opening line, isn't it? Try to stuff it into a small net bag, making sure all the arms stay inside. Then there's the feeding test. Obtain a large plastic milk jug. Fill it halfway with water suspended from the ceiling with a stout cord. Start the jug swinging back and forth and then try to insert spoonfuls of soggy cereal, Froot Loops or Cheerios, into the mouth of the jug while pretending to be an airplane. When finished, dump the entire contents of the jug on the floor.

Then there's the night test. Prepare by obtaining a small cloth bag and fill it with 8 to 12 pounds of sand. Soak it thoroughly in water. At 8 p.m. begin to waltz and hum with the bag until 9 p.m. Lay the bag down. Set your alarm for 10 p.m. Get back up. Pick up your bag and sing every song you have ever heard. Make up about a dozen more.

Sing these until 4 a.m. Set the alarm for 5 a.m. Get up and make breakfast. Keep this up for 5 years. Look cheerful. Then there's the physical test for women. Just for the women. Obtain a large bean bag chair and attach it to your front under your clothes. Leave it there for 9 months. After the 9 months, remove 10 of the beans. That's great.

Here's the physical test for men to know if we're ready. Go to the nearest drug store. Set your wallet on the counter. Ask the clerk to help himself. Next, proceed to the local grocery store.

Go to the head office and arrange for your paycheck to be directly deposited at that store. Purchase a newspaper. Go home and read it quietly for the last time in your life. Before I read the final assignment, let me give you one more that came to me.

I call it the release and be embarrassed test. It has to do with preparing your children for the public world and then standing back and waiting to see what they're going to say to very important people. A friend of mine sent me a true story of a friend of his who came on late after about 8 or 9 day trip. It was lightning, thundering, raining, and their plane was delayed. So he got in late and the shuttle finally got him home in the middle of the night. Wouldn't you know it, the kids were all afraid and they'd all crawled in bed with mom.

He walks in. He can't even sleep alongside his wife for that night after he's been gone 8 or 9 days. So the next morning decides to have a talk with the children. He says, children, the guy doesn't mind if you sleep with mom while he's gone, but the last night, the night he's going to come back, don't ever sleep with mom. Just leave the bed for me when I get home, okay?

Okay, daddy. Three or four weeks later, he took another trip and the family decided to meet him at the airport. So mom dressed up all the kids, got them ready for dad to come back, and he comes slumping off the plane exhausted.

And the youngest of the family walks out into the gate area, which is packed with people. He said, dad, welcome home. While you were gone, nobody slept with mom.

He said his wife kind of tried to find a column to hide behind. Nobody slept with mom while you were gone. Then there's the final assignment. This is the final exam on the 101 parenting.

Find a couple who already has a small child. Lecture them on how they can improve their discipline, patience, tolerance, toilet training, and child's table manners. Be firm.

Suggest many ways that they can improve. Emphasize to them that they should never allow their children to run rampant. Enjoy this experience because it will be the last time in your life you will have all of the answers. Parenting 101. It's funny, but as I read through this central section in Ephesians 5, I literally couldn't get away from the title The Christian Life 101. There aren't 10 tests here. There are five. And if you read them through, you see they emerge right out of the section Paul wrote without my having to add much to them.

Each one is there. Test number one is the conduct test. That's verse 15.

It has to do with behavior. Test number two is the time test. Verse 16. Test number three is the decision-making test, which is a big part of the Christian life.

That's verse 17. The control test is number four, and that's 18 through 20, even with proof in knowing whether you've passed that test or not. And the fifth test is the submission test in verse 21.

There they are. The conduct, the time, the decision-making, the control, and the submission test. In my opinion, when you've worked your way through these five, you have worked your way through some of the most basic statements concerning being a follower of Jesus. And wouldn't it be helpful if people would have told us right after our conversion, these are important things for you to know, rather than to wallow around and make the mess we've made of things and to learn later in life some of the most basic things that should have been taught us right from the get-go.

Let's go to the first test. By the way, by the way, everything mentioned in these verses is foundational. Everything. Remove any one of them and you've made a significant, you will encounter a significant hindrance in your in your growth.

Any one of them. Follow them carefully and consistently and you'll know what it is to be fulfilled and rewarded in life. They're really worth it. Now the good thing about this test is you're able to grade your own paper. I'll give you a chance a little later on. You'll be able to see how you're doing.

It's a pretty good pulse taker. Some of you have known the Lord 30 years, some 40 years, some only well five or less, but wherever you are you'll be able to know how you're doing after you take the tests and I'll define each one of them. Number one is the conduct test.

That's verse 15. Here's the test. You answer it on your own. Are you careful and wise in your behavior? Pretty simple question, isn't it? Are you careful and wise in your behavior on a scale of 1 to 10?

How you doing there? Now how could I ask you that? Well look at verse 15. Be careful how you walk not as the unwise but as wise.

Right out of the text. Are you careful and wise in your behavior? Please observe he's not talking about where you're going. That's about destination. He talks about how you're walking.

That's conduct. How you walk. It occurred to me that a tightrope walker doesn't concern herself or himself with where they're going but how.

They're getting there. Very delicate balance, very narrow path, that steel cable, that cord that stretches from point A to point B. That person is concerned with how has to do with balance using caution, care, attention to detail, not getting distracted. Observe the word walk.

Be careful how you walk. Paul has used it about five or six times already in this Ephesian letter. Without an exception, it has to do with behavior. The behavior of the Gentiles, the behavior of the believers, the behavior of the lost world, the behavior of those who are worthy of their calling, walking worthy of their calling. Chapter 4 verse 1.

He's used it over and over and he comes back to it right here. Be careful how you walk. Now pause and think. Walking. Those of us who are parents have trained children in walking or assisted them as they learn to walk on their own can tell our own story. Some of our children walk when they were 8, 9, 10 months old. Some didn't walk till they were 12, 15, 18 months old. Some learned slower. Some learned quicker. But every one of them discovered how to do it. And we say as adults, it's not that complicated.

Why can't they get it? It's just left foot down, right foot down, left foot down, right foot down. And it seems so simple once you've learned to do it. But what do they do most often as they learn? Well, they fall. They fall.

They stumble. And then they pick up how to do it. And then they learn how to do it a little more carefully and meticulously. And then they learn how to carry things while they're walking.

And they learn how to do all of this sometime in precarious places, sometime near dangerous places. Invariably we say to them, be careful, be careful, be careful. Don't fall. Don't stumble. I was walking with one of our grandchildren, happened to be Austin, several weeks ago. We were at a conference ground and the ground was uneven.

And there were some rocks that we could have stumbled over. And I looked down, I had his hand and I said, Austin, he said, I know, Bubba, you're going to tell me to be careful. You're going to tell me to be careful. He's been told be careful all through his years of growing up. Be careful, be careful. That's what Paul is saying. When are we going to learn this? This is 101. You can't just stumble into the world system and think everything's going to be hunky-dory.

Everything's going to be great. I just kind of walk along like everybody else is walking. No, no, no, no.

No. Followers of Jesus use care and wisdom in how they walk. I like the way one paraphrase put it, walk like sensible men and women, not like simpletons. Some of us have learned through walking in the wrong way too many times that there are consequences that accompany it and it isn't worth it. Why didn't we think before we stumbled into the peril, why didn't we think that's going to have a bad result?

Consequences to pay. Be careful how you walk. Okay, test one. Are you careful and wise in your behavior? Test number two. The time test. Verse 16. Making the most of your time.

Because the days are evil. Here's the test. Question. Are you disciplined and discerning in the way you spend your time? Are you, those two words are carefully chosen. Are you disciplined and discerning in the way you use your time? Look at the verse. It's connected with the previous verse because it's really part of that sentence. Be careful how you walk, making the most of your time.

Some Christians never seem to get this straight. We are given to extremes by nature. Either we are wasteful of our time or we are neurotically energetic about our times. We fool around, we mess around, we poorly invest our efforts in areas and just don't get the job done.

That's one extreme. How many great books never get finished? How many great songs never get written? Started but never written.

How many great projects, how many degree programs get underway but left unfinished? How many great resolutions are great to begin with but they die for lack of interest and energy? That's one extreme.

You know the answer to that? Discipline. It's discipline. Never met an individual who was really, really gifted and accomplished in his or her areas and really productive in staying it without discipline. Great writers are disciplined to keep the writing up. They get the book done. Those who compose songs get the songs written. Those who step into projects with a plan to get them, they stay at it and some of those projects are exhausting.

Now the other side. The person who doesn't know the value of play, relaxation, or rest. One of my mentors used to say, a good night's sleep is often more spiritual than another hour of work.

He's right. Some of you don't get enough sleep. Some of you are so driven you've lost your sense of humor. Life has become grim, much too serious.

You're approaching the neurotic level in your driving determination to make the most of your time. But wait, that's not what this is about. Look again at the verse. Making the most of your time, Paul doesn't use the word chronos c-h-r-o-n-o-s from which we get the word chronology for like clock time.

That's not the word he uses. He used the word kairos, k-a-i-r-o-s, which is the idea of opportunity, an epoch, a season. Making the most of every opportunity would be a good rendering. In fact, making the most of conveys the idea in the original of redeeming or buying back.

Isn't that curious? Buying back every opportunity or the benefit of every opportunity might be a paraphrase. The question has to do with your opportunities.

Are you making the most of them? Chuck Swindoll titled today's message, The Christian Life 101. There's much more teaching ahead as we examine the five tests that the Apostle Paul identifies. You're listening to Insight for Living.

Chuck is here in the studio to share a personal comment just for the radio family, so please keep listening. And if you'd like to learn more about this ministry, visit us online at insightworld.org. Walking in wisdom, making the most of our time, maintaining sobriety and a spirit of thanksgiving. These are biblical virtues we're hoping to instill not only in the people of North America, but in men and women all around the world. To that end, we're calling on friends like you to join Insight for Living in the all-out effort to bring God's message of grace to all 195 countries of the world.

We're calling this mission Vision 195. Together, we can implement the great commission of Jesus by making disciples through radio, our website, the mobile app, CDs, books, DVDs, the podcast, our live stream feed, and more. Not long ago, I heard a fascinating statistic. In a meeting with other ministries like ours, one gentleman said they had conducted some research on their audience. They discovered that for every 100 people listening, only six people actually responded.

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Thanks so much. Thanks, Chuck. And let me assure you that your contribution today will be channeled toward reaching people who've come to rely on this daily program. Not long ago, we received an encouraging note that said, Chuck Swindoll has been my pastor on air for the last 40 years. He doesn't know it, but my spiritual maturity is due to his Insight for Living broadcast and the books he's magnificently written.

By the way, we always look forward to his future visit to our small country in Southeast Asia, the Philippines. Thank you, Pastor Chuck. It's comments like this one that motivate us to venture forward with Vision 195. To give a contribution today, call us.

If you're listening in the United States, dial 1-800-772-8888, or you can also give through our mobile app or directly online at insight.org slash donate. Listen again Friday when Chuck Swindoll continues to describe the Christian Life 101 right here on Insight for Living. The preceding message, The Christian Life 101, was copyrighted in 2000, 2001, and 2009. And the sound recording was copyrighted in 2009 by Charles R Swindoll, Inc. All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.