Be very careful, then, how you live… (Ephesians 5:15)

We enjoyed our walk along the Great Wall of China. It was an incredible experience. And Viv and I are very grateful for all your support and encouragement. Each day of the walk began in a similar way. We would do our stretches to loosen up before we began, so that we would not pull or strain any vital muscles during the day. We were very careful. We made sure that our heads were covered and that we had put plenty of sun screen on exposed skin and that we had sunglasses at the ready to protect us from the harmful effects of the sun. We were very careful. We made sure that we had loaded enough water into our packs at the beginning of the day so that we did not suffer from dehydration. We were very careful. We packed enough food and snacks, especially things like tracker bars and those horrible granola bars to keep our energy levels up. We were very careful. And we made sure that our feet were properly cared for with plasters and ointment, thick socks and good, supportive boots. We were very careful. And as we walked we watched where we put our feet, especially where the going was rough and tricky. We were very careful.

On our second day we were strung out climbing up this hillside when there was a sudden scream from behind us and the guide who was ahead of us raced passed us. One of the girls on the walk had fallen off the path, through some scrub and down some scree. The reason she fell was that she had lost concentration. She had tried to mess about with her iPod rather than look where she was putting her feet. Thankfully, she suffered nothing more than a twisted ankle and was able to continue. But that night, in the briefing meeting, we were told in no uncertain terms that messing about with iPods, mobile phones or any technology while walking was just not on. We were told to be very careful how we walked.

St Paul says in Ephesians 5: 5 “Be very careful, then, how you live.” The word translated “live” in that verse is actually the word “walk”. Be very careful, then, how you walk – meaning how you walk through life. Just as we need to be careful how we literally walk, approaching the task in a wise and sensible way, albeit an adventurous way, so we also need to walk through our lives, through the span of years allotted to us, with care and wisdom. That need not take any of the adventure, enjoyment and fun out of life; but what it does mean is that this very precious gift of life that God has given to us needs to be used properly and to the full. It is not to be wasted. Be very careful, then, how you live.

So what, then, should be the marks of careful, wise living?

Paul offers three marks and he expresses them by a series of three contrasts.

1) Wise people make the most of their time

** Ephesians 5:15-16 **

It has been a real privilege to baptise Natalie this morning. I officiated at Stephen and Jennifer’s wedding two and a half years ago and it’s great to celebrate the birth of their first child. So there is Natalie, with her life ahead of her, and her mum and dad will want her to make the very most of it. Her life is before her, full of hope and possibility. And we pray that she will indeed be able to make the most of the time that is hers.

Wise people know that time is a precious commodity. We only have so much of it, and all of us have the same amount of it at our disposal: sixty minutes in every hour and twenty four hours in every day. None of us can stretch time. But wise people use it to the fullest possible advantage. They seize every opportunity while it is there. For once it has passed, it cannot be recovered.

Somebody once advertised as follows: “LOST, yesterday, somewhere between sunrise and sunset, two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes. No reward offered, for they are gone forever.”

Christians, in particular, are to see every day, every hour, every minute, as an opportunity for serving God, for understanding what God’s will is and getting on and doing it. Of course, it is possible to have an obsessive lifestyle, calculating and counting every minute and giving yourself and everyone else no peace. If that’s a particular danger for you, then take note and learn how to relax, how to rest, how to let go of your over-organised life and allow God to bathe you in his peace.

But for many people, the danger is on the other side: of not taking each day and hour as a gift from God, to be used for his glory, but instead letting them wash over and pass by, like water down a river, never used, never to return. For such people this verse is a wake up call. Paul referred to the times he lived in as “evil times”. Our times, at the very least, contain plenty that is wrong, and we have a chance to do something about it. Take that chance with both hands.

In June Viv and I spent a week in the Northumbria Community, about 10 miles from Holy Island. It was a wonderful experience. The life of the community revolves around a regular pattern of worship, work, relaxation, rest and reflection. Each element is important and valued. Time is used to its fullest.

Wise people make the most of their time.

2) Wise people discern the will of God

** Ephesians 5:17 **

It is vital not to slide along through life in a general haze, hoping things will work out all right, but not being prepared to think them through, to figure out where this or that type of behaviour will really lead.

The wise person knows that the best way to live is found in doing God’s will and nothing else. Jesus himself prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, as he faced torture, the cross and death itself, “Not my will but yours be done.” In the Lord’s Prayer he taught us to pray, “May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Nothing is more important in life than to discover and do the will of God.

Some aspects of the will of God are the same for all of us. God wants all of us to live out the command to love our neighbours as ourselves. God wants all of us to grow more like Christ. God wants all of us to spend some time in worship and prayer. However, God’s particular will is different for each of us: what career we should follow; whether or not to marry and if so to whom; what to do with the “spare” time that God has given to us. So how important it is that we are people who pray, and who offer each other support and wise advice when we really need to know what is right before God for us to do.

I remember the time, many years ago now, when I wondered about leaving the profession I was in and moving into church-based work that would lead eventually to offering for Methodist ministry. It was not easy discerning what was right, what was God’s will for me. After all, Christians are needed everywhere in the working environment, not just in churches. And I was so grateful for those praying, wise, mature Christians, who were willing to talk things through with me.

To live carefully means seeking to discern the will of God.

3) Wise people are filled with the Spirit

** Ephesians 5:18 **

There was an item on the television news this week about Yorkshire Street in Oldham. It is the main drinking area in Oldham and had a 200% increase in serious violent incidents in the first four months of this year. “You go out on Yorkshire Street on a Friday night and you take your life in your own hands. It’s frightening,” a resident said. It was clear that cheap alcohol promotions had fuelled an atmosphere of violence. So Oldham’s Council is trying to change the culture by forcing drinkers to queue up for drinks in a post office style queue and then only being allowed to buy two drinks at a time. Apparently it’s beginning to make a real difference.

Now I have to confess, I drink alcohol. I am no teetotaller, but I respect hugely those who are. The truth is that when you misuse alcohol, when you are drunk, you are under the influence of alcohol. You are not guiding your own life any more. You have allowed the drug of alcohol to take control. It can begin to dehumanise you. As a depressant, it can start to take away your self-control, wisdom, understanding, discrimination, judgement, balance, the power to assess everything; in other words everything that makes a person behave at their very best and highest.

What the Holy Spirit of God does, by contrast, is the exact opposite. Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote this: “If it were possible to put the Holy Spirit into a textbook of pharmacology, I would put him under the stimulants, for that is where he belongs. He really does stimulate. He stimulates our every faculty… the mind and the intellect, the heart and the will.”

Those who are drunk are dehumanised. Those who are filled with the Spirit are actually being made more human, for he makes us more like Christ. And those who are filled with the Spirit of God become naturally thankful people. As verse 20 says:

** Ephesians 5: 20 **

Wise people are filled with the Spirit. And notice that it is a command in the present tense: “Be filled with the Spirit.” It implies that we are to go on being filled. It is not a once and for all experience, it is a privilege to be continuously renewed by worship and prayer. We need to be filled with the Spirit and go on being filled every day and every moment of the day. And when we are filled with the Spirit, then we are also given new love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

The Spirit fills those who are open to God and who ask with humble hearts.

Jesus, in the reading from John’s gospel, expresses this truth in a different way. He reminds us that he is the “Bread of Life” and he invites us to feed on him - in other words, to be filled with his life, with his Spirit.

So, wise people are careful how they live. They make the most of the time. They discern the will of God. And they are filled with the Spirit.