August 25, 2025 • 28 mins
What does it mean when Paul warns against "obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking" in Ephesians 5:4? Contrary to some interpretations, this isn't a blanket prohibition against humor and joy - God clearly has a sense of humor! Just look at the platypus, the grumpy black rain frog, or the bizarre blobfish.
Diving into the original Greek words reveals Paul's true concern: speech that wounds rather than heals. "Aischrotēs" (obscenity) refers to deliberately hurtful language aimed at causing pain. "Mōrologia" (foolish talk) combines the roots for "stupid" and "speaking" - those words we blurt without thinking and immediately regret. "Eutrapelia" (coarse joking) was actually positive in earlier Greek literature but had been corrupted by culture into something harmful.
The deeper message transcends simple word policing. Paul challenges believers to examine what their speech reveals about their hearts. Like a panda among snowmen, Christians should stand out rather than blend in with the surrounding culture. Our words should reflect our identity as disciples of Jesus - not because of rigid rules, but because of the transformation Christ has already worked in us.
A powerful illustration shows how words can strip away someone's sense of worth like petals from a rose. A woman who begins her day feeling beautiful and confident can end it feeling worthless after enduring a barrage of cutting remarks, backhanded compliments, and thoughtless criticisms from family, coworkers, and strangers.
Paul spent four chapters in Ephesians reminding readers of God's immense love and Christ's sacrifice before addressing behavior. This reminds us that our distinctive speech flows from gratitude for what God has done, not from obligation to a checklist. Do your words set you apart as someone transformed by grace? Join us as we explore how speech reveals the condition of our hearts.
Have you subscribed to our podcast yet? Never miss an episode that could transform how you think about your words and their impact on others.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
God, we give you thanks and praise for the
opportunity to gather for thebaptism of Young River and the
reminder of the gifts that yougive to each one of us, not
because of anything we do, butbecause we are called children
of God and Lord.
We thank you for this question,this series of questions that
have come from the body here atCentral, and the opportunity to
dive into scripture to find somekind of answer, to make better
(00:21):
sense of what's going on inthese passages and in these
stories.
Lord, I pray for open heartsand open minds to receive your
word this morning, and may weopen up the deepest parts of our
hearts, the places where wehide our maybe our most secrets,
and to allow you to come inthis morning.
It's your name.
We pray Amen.
Please be seated.
Yeah, welcome once again.
(00:45):
Glad to be worshiping with youthis morning and if there's
anyone new here, just a bigwelcome.
Man, we're so glad you're hereand please take time to visit
Kirsten or myself out in theConnect Center.
Out there we have a little giftfor you.
I believe Ryan calls it a swagbag.
So if you're interested in whata swag bag has, go check it out
.
But yeah, man'm just gladyou're here.
Thanks for checking us out andfor those of you online, welcome
(01:08):
.
Before we get started, it issomeone's birthday in the house
today, peter Deusteman, who isback there running slides for us
.
It is his birthday today, so wecan show him some love.
So when you see him out there,go and wish him a happy birthday
and if you're interested injoining a life group here, also
(01:30):
talk to Peter.
So thanks, peter, appreciateall you do.
Man, this morning we arecontinuing our sermon series on
the you Pick series, which isthe series where you guys pick
the questions, and normally,preparing for a sermon man, it's
always a little nerve-wrackingand more excited than nerves.
But this morning this week, Iturned to my wife and said man,
this is the last sermon that I'mgoing to give before the vote.
(01:50):
And so I said there's a littlebit extra stress in this one, so
we'll see how it goes.
But the question we had lots ofquestions so we couldn't answer
them all, but this one I foundpretty interesting.
It came from this passage fromEphesians 5, verse 4 in
particular.
Verse 4 from Ephesians 5 saysthis nor should there be
(02:13):
obscenity, foolish talk orcoarse joking, which are out of
place, but rather thanksgiving.
These are one of those verses Icall them footloose verses,
based on the movie Footloosestarring Kevin Bacon where you
can take a verse out of contextand make it sound like there's
absolutely no part of thisbehavior.
In the life of a Christian, ina disciple of Christ, there is
(02:36):
no spot for jokes or humor orlaughter or dancing.
If you're Kevin Bacon, whateverit might be, there's no place
for it, and sometimes this verseis often used in that.
And the exact opposite is true.
We know God has a sense of humor.
We know God loves to bring joyinto our life, where laughter is
a sign of that, and we see it.
You don't have to look anyfurther than creation itself,
(02:58):
right?
God has created this creaturehere known as the platypus,
right?
You look at this thing andthere's no reason.
It doesn't make any sense.
How about this one here?
Yeah, that is the proscibusmonkey, and no joke.
This is the face that myteenage children look at me when
I try to say cool things likesix, seven or sheesh, all those
(03:19):
things.
She's dying right now.
She's dying, right.
What is this?
This is a sign of God having asense of humor.
How about this guy?
This is the black rain frog.
I don't know if he's so much asfunny or I feel like he might
murder me in my sleep.
It's one of the two.
How about this one?
The blobfish?
Right?
What is the purpose?
What is the purpose?
(03:45):
But yet for God to laugh andcreate this and for us to laugh
and there's no other creature onplanet earth more evidence that
God has a sense of humor thanthese poor individuals.
That's right.
When Ryan's away, the childrenwill play.
So take that.
Our lead pastor Ryan is aDenver Broncos fan, so, and he's
not here today.
So, hey, all right, he's in thewoods.
(04:07):
He can't even probably watch,so I'm safe, it's fine.
It's obvious from creation thatGod has a sense of humor.
It's obvious from scriptureitself.
These couple of verses here talkabout joy and laughter.
Proverbs 17, 22,.
A joyful heart is good medicine.
A couple of weeks ago I waslying in bed just scrolling
watching silly videos and therewas a video of this dad watching
(04:30):
a scary movie and on itsomething scared him and he
immediately said nope, and heturned the channel to Bluey and
he was like yay, and I diedlaughing.
I'm not kidding.
Tears rolling down my facecould not breathe Closest to
death I've ever been.
It was so funny.
It's good medicine for theheart.
John 15, 11,.
Jesus says these things I havespoken to you that my joy may be
(04:52):
in you and your joy will befull.
So in this verse, this passage,paul is not saying that
laughter is bad, that humor isbad, but he is directing us at
the power of our words.
He's directing us at the powerof our words and the effect that
they have on not just otherpeople but us as well.
(05:13):
He's also calling to attentionof how easy it is for us to slip
away from words that bring life, from words that encourage.
How easy it is to be pulledinto what the culture says is
acceptable speech is acceptableway to speak to one another.
(05:35):
It's incredibly easy to bepulled in to that.
A couple of years ago myyoungest, ezra, started
kindergarten and a couple monthsin we started to notice that he
was using language that wethought was pretty inappropriate
for a kindergartner.
And so if you have delicateears, plug your ears.
But he would start using wordslike oh, this sucks, so not
(05:59):
super delicate, but you knowwhat I'm saying, or he'd say
crap, and we're like what isgoing on?
You're in kindergarten already.
The culture has got your hooksin.
And so we sat him down.
We said, ezzie, where who areyou hanging out with in school,
or who's your friends?
Where have you heard this kindof talk?
And a big smile on his face andhe said you, daddy.
Yeah.
(06:21):
And then I turned to my wifeand she had a bigger smile on
her face.
You know we talk about inbaptism.
We say it every week, everytime there's a baptism, we say
as you, as parents andgodparents, and influence in
this child.
They are watching, they arelistening.
And it's so true.
And the words we speak and theway we speak to people is so
(06:46):
easily taken off the path aswhat it looks like to be a
follower of Christ and suckedinto.
What the world says is okay andwhat the world says is
acceptable.
And so Paul is not writing thispiece of his letter to the
church of Ephesus saying nojoking, no laughter, no joy.
He's saying those are goodthings given to you from God,
but what and how are you usingyour words?
Does it model that of Jesus ordoes it model that of the world?
(07:14):
And so, as we dive into thispassage, there's really a
message within the message.
This is the last one before thevote, so it's a two-for-one
today.
So there's a message within themessage.
We're going to look at thesewords because the question
really did ask what is themeaning of these words?
What is Paul getting at here?
But there is a bigger, greatermessage going on here, so we do
(07:35):
want to look at these words.
What did Paul mean when hespoke these words?
Which means we have to dig intoour Greek bag this morning and
look at some Greek words.
The first one is this bag thismorning and look at some Greek
words.
The first one is this Paul saysthere should be no obscenity,
which the Greek word is eroskrotos.
Everyone say eros krotos.
Well done, eros krotos.
The meaning of this word.
(07:55):
There's a couple differentthoughts here.
One they believe that it refersback to the verse right before
where Paul is talking aboutsexual immorality, back to the
verse right before where Paul istalking about sexual immorality
, and so talk of that nature.
But more people, more scholars,more commentaries lean towards a
different meaning.
They lean towards this eroskrotos meaning deliberate,
(08:17):
hurtful language, deliberatehurtful words to one another,
words that is not one of thoseaccidental slip up or you didn't
mean it, but words where youwound up and just took a shot
with a hurtful word with theintention of hurting someone.
You know my two boys we hearthis every now and then.
(08:38):
They'll be scrapping in theirroom and we don't know what
they're fighting or arguingabout.
But one of them has been knownto yell you are the worst
brother ever and we're like geez, what is going on, that such
hurtful words could be said andwe go in there and they're
fighting over the Lego piece orsomething like that.
But it's intentional wordsmeant to hurt someone.
(08:59):
Right, we do this, and thereason might be because that
person has hurt us, or we have alot of hurt and pain that we're
dealing with and we want to getthat out, and maybe that's one
way that we do it.
Or we do it because we want tomake ourselves look better to
other people or look better thanother people.
(09:19):
We want to bring others down,and so we use words, eroskrotes,
words that intentionally hurt,obscenity.
This is what Paul is speakingabout.
The second word was absolutelymy favorite is morolegio.
Everyone say morologeo Probablyjust botched the Greek, but
(09:40):
that's okay.
My Greek professor's notwatching, it's fine.
This means foolish talk.
This is what Paul says foolishtalk.
It's translated as foolish talk, but when you break down the
word, it's two Greek words puttogether.
The first one says moros, whichmeans stupid.
It's also where we get our wordmoron from Moros.
(10:01):
Stupid legio speaking, moronspeaking that's what this word
means Stupid speaking.
This is that type of languagethat where we wish, once we say
it, we could get it back in ourmouth as fast as we can.
There's a perfect example ofthis almost happening yesterday,
and I kid you not, I almostsaid it if it wasn't for this
(10:22):
message this morning.
Okay, Almost got in big trouble.
We're on the way to footballearly morning.
My son Arlo plays some football, and we had to get to Anoka by
eight o'clock in the morning,and so I set an alarm for 6.30.
My wife sets an alarm for six.
She wants to get up a littlebit earlier than I, so that's
fine, no worries.
Her alarm goes off at six andshe likes the snooze button.
(10:44):
Now there's no snooze button.
That's a really outdatedreference.
She just says Alexa, snooze.
Right, that's really what we donowadays Snooze, snooze, snooze
.
I hear it a couple of times andall of a sudden my alarm for
630 goes off and we arisetogether and so we get ready and
it's chaos.
Man, we got these kids that wehad to get ready for.
We had to pack lunches, makesure all his golf is football
gear.
It's crazy.
This hour that we have isabsolutely chaos.
(11:06):
We get into the car.
We're both sweating my wife'ssweating.
She's trying to put her makeupon and she says I should have
got up earlier Now if not forMorologio.
I'm not kidding.
I had the phrase ready to comeout of my mouth that says maybe
(11:27):
you shouldn't have snoozed somany times.
Ladies and gentlemen, this isthe definition of moron speaking
Right there.
Sometimes we don't catch thewords before they leave our
mouth.
We don't think before we speak.
Another way that we see this alot is when we say something,
(11:49):
maybe with a little bit of truth, but when we say it, we realize
we hurt somebody.
When we say it, we realize thatit had effects that we didn't
want it to have.
Or maybe not.
Maybe we said it because weknew the effects that it would
have, and we add two littlewords onto that.
Anyone know what they are.
(12:09):
Just kidding, I just saidsomething about you that caused
you pain.
Just kidding Like that makes itall better.
I've had talks with lots ofstudents on Wednesday night
about these two words and it'sjust not students, it's adults
(12:34):
that use this as a parachute toget out of something that we
didn't want to get into, becauseyou might have been just
kidding and you may haverealized that you crossed the
line in what you said, but thosewords have struck the heart
that person's not forgetting.
The words have already causedtheir damage.
We can't pull them back.
That's what morologio means.
It means thinking before youspeak.
(12:56):
Eros crotes words that aremeant to cause harm.
Morologio, moron speaking.
And the last one is this onehere, paul, the translation is
coarse joking.
But eutropalia, eutropaliaEveryone say eutropalia.
This is a really interestingword.
(13:16):
This means coarse joking, lewdor profane behavior or words.
But what's interesting aboutthis is this exact Greek word
goes back hundreds of yearsbefore Paul.
We see it in writings ofAristotle and we see him using
it as a form of humor thatbrings joy, that brings pure
(13:38):
laughter, that uplifts people'sspirits, not in the way that
Paul is using it here.
Why would Paul use this wordthat for hundreds of years has
been a positive spin on joy andlaughter, and here he's using it
as a negative connotation.
(13:58):
I think it's because herealizes that the culture has
taken something that's meant tobe good, meant to be uplifting,
meant to bring us joy andhappiness, and the culture.
We've gotten hold of it andwe've tainted it and we've
corrupted it, and now somethingthat was good has now become
harmful.
(14:21):
These are the words that Paulused to describe the words that
we speak to one another.
These are the words that Paulused to describe the words that
we speak to one another and hesays stay away from these things
.
Now, all these words havemultiple things in common, but
the first is obvious that thesewords are used to hurt or tear
down individuals.
The second is this these wordsare used as a gauge for what's
(14:42):
really going on inside of us.
Matthew says this as a gaugefor what's really going on
inside of us.
Matthew says this, for themouth speaks.
What the heart is full of,what's in here, comes out here.
So, if you just pause for amoment and think about the words
that you spoke this week, andto who, what does your heart
(15:07):
look like?
Is it joy?
Is it uplifting?
Is it, like Paul says it shouldbe, that of thanksgiving?
Or if you take a step back.
What is going on in our hearts?
Is it anger?
Is it hurt and pain?
(15:27):
Is it gossip?
Is it a desire to makeourselves look better than
others or elevate ours overother people?
What is being reflected of ourheart in the words that we speak
?
And the third thing that he'shaving in common is that Paul is
really telling us again themessage within the message, that
(15:55):
it's more than just the wordsthat we speak.
He's not giving us a guidelineor words that are good or words
that are bad, which of course wewant right as Christians.
We want.
We wish Paul would just saycome out and say these are the
good words, these are the badwords.
Say these words, don't saythese Great thanks, appreciate
it.
That's a lot easier.
That's not what he's sayinghere.
The deeper message here is thatyou should not use these words
or speak in this manner to otherpeople, not because it's in
(16:18):
this realm of bad or naughtywords, but because that does not
reflect a person who followsChrist, because that does not
reflect a person who followsChrist.
This type of words and languagedoes not reflect the type of
person who calls themselves adisciple, the type of person who
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calls themselves a follower ofJesus.
We are called to be different.
See, at the time where Paulwrote this, this was the culture
, this is what they were livingin.
And he says no, don't use thosewords, don't speak that.
Look different in how you speak, because you are called to be a
follower, a disciple, of Jesus.
(17:02):
I encourage you to go and readActs chapter 19 sometime today
or over the weekend.
Read Acts chapter 19.
Acts chapter 19 tells the storyof when Paul was in Ephesus.
Okay, so the letter that wehave of Ephesians is from Paul,
written in a Roman prison andwritten to the church of Ephesus
(17:24):
.
Four years earlier he was inEphesus doing ministry, and so
Acts chapter 19 lays it out ofwhat his journey looked like in
Ephesus.
And an incredibly crazy storyhappens in Acts chapter 19.
And I'm going to tell you thestory, but go home and read it.
It's absolutely insane.
(17:45):
So Paul is in Ephesus and whenPaul's there, he's doing
incredible things through thepower of the Holy Spirit,
through God, doing incredible,amazing things.
He's healing people, doing allthe things that Jesus was doing.
And these gentlemen in theBible they're Jewish men, is
what it says.
But really, when you dive downdeep.
It's really these con men,these men who did not follow
(18:07):
Jesus, these men who did notknow Jesus but were looking to
make bucks.
Everywhere they went and theysaw Paul doing these incredible,
amazing things, includinggetting these demons out of
people, bringing these people tohealing from being oppressed
and possessed from these demons.
And they think to themselvesman, this is a way to make a
(18:28):
buck, man, if we can kind ofpull a demon out of someone, man
, people will pay big money forthat.
And in Ephesus there was a manwho was possessed by a demon.
And so these three gentlemen goup to this man.
They get a crowd around them towatch the show, put out the hat
so they can put a couple bucksin.
And they said we are going toheal this man from this
(18:48):
possession.
And so in a big showboating way, they say in the name of Jesus
and in the workings of Paul, befree.
And the man stops in his track.
The man possessed by this demonjust stops and he looks at these
three men in the eye andscripture tells us this is what
(19:09):
he says.
He says I know Jesus, I knowwho he is, I know who Paul is.
I have no idea who you are.
You see, he knows Jesus becauseeven the demons tremble at the
name of Jesus.
He knows Paul because you knowwhat Paul talks and acts a lot
(19:36):
like Jesus.
He doesn't know these threeguys, and so this man jumps on
these three false preachers andteachers and the scripture tells
him that this guy just beatshim senselessly and these three
guys run off naked.
That's a sermon for another day.
We're not going to go down thatroad.
I don't know what that's about.
It's pretty crazy though.
But he looked at him and hesaid you may be speaking the
(20:03):
name of Jesus, but you don'tknow Jesus because you don't
speak like him and you don't actlike him.
That happened when Paul was inEphesus, and now, here we are,
four years later, and he'swriting to the church where this
happened.
He says this is importantbecause we are called to be
(20:25):
followers of Jesus.
We are called to look different, to speak different.
I want to show you this pictureup here.
I'm a youth director, have beenfor a long time, so this is a
little trivia game I got for youStudents.
We've done this before you, soyou can't answer.
Besides the blue, cold, smileyface, or not smiley face, what
(20:46):
in this picture, stands out toyou?
What's different?
Santa hat, there's somethingeven more scarves.
There's something even moreright there.
Nice job, kelsey, you'll seethe arrow.
There's a panda bear in themidst of the snowmen.
(21:06):
Yeah, that's some of the fun wehave on Wednesday nights.
Come on, check it out.
So my question to you, central,is do people have to really
really really listen hard?
Do they really really reallyhave to look hard to notice that
(21:27):
you stand out, or do you blendin with the culture?
Do the words that you speak andthe way that you speak to
people about people, does itlook just like everybody else?
Does the way that you act andtreat people?
Does it stand out or does itblend in with the rest of the
(21:53):
culture?
Because this is what Paul iswriting about.
This is why our words are soimportant, because we are called
to look and act and speakdifferent.
I think it starts with ourwords, because words have power.
(22:14):
This rose we're going to callSally.
This rose is going to representSally, and Sally is a young
woman who woke up one morningand is feeling absolutely
beautiful, is feeling absolutelyready to tackle the day.
You know, she checked her auraring, her iPhone watch and she
said she got great sleep, greatreadiness, she's ready to tackle
the day, she's feeling good,she wakes up on time, didn't hit
(22:37):
the snooze button, she's readyto go.
She gets dressed, she does herhair, she does her makeup and
she's feeling absolutelybeautiful.
And she goes to the kitchentable and there are her two
amazing adult or not adultteenage children having their
bowl of cereal before they go toschool.
She walks in good morning,kisses them on the head and her
(23:00):
teenage daughter turns and looksat her and says are you wearing
that?
Is that how you're doing yourhair?
Are you wearing that?
Is that how you're doing yourhair?
That's all right, that's fine.
She's still feeling great,she's still feeling beautiful
and she kisses them.
Goodbye and heads to work.
And on the way to work she'srocking out to KTIS, listening
to some worship music maybeNickelback, I don't know whoever
(23:21):
this person is and she's lovinglifestyle.
And this guy comes up, speedingup behind her.
She gets out of the way to makeroom for him.
He comes flying by and you cansee that he's just yelling out
some just derogatory stuff andgiving her the bird for no
reason whatsoever.
Maybe that guy got late in thatmorning.
Maybe he's having a roughmorning but he is just taking
(23:43):
his day out on her.
But it's all right.
She's still feeling pretty good.
She gets to work and she seesher friends and her coworkers.
But there's something off,there's something weird.
They're kind of ignoring her,they're not talking to her and
as the day goes on she goes intothe break room to get some
coffee and she can overhear themtalking about her, talking
(24:11):
about the way she looks, talkingabout the way she speaks,
talking about her family,talking about her job
performance and how it's notvery good.
So the day goes on.
She's feeling a little bit lessbut she's still hanging in
(24:33):
there and later in thatafternoon she's about ready to
leave and someone makes one morecomment about her brand new
dress that she bought and shewore and she felt great in.
And she's they said, is where'dyou get that?
Is that a hand-me-down?
And then someone looks at herand says you know, we're a
little worried about you.
You look really tired.
And they kept saying thingsthat kind of hurt and tore apart
(25:01):
, but they ended it by sayingjust kidding.
So on the drive home she's notfeeling as great as she did that
morning.
She gets home, cooks dinner,eats dinner with the family it's
pretty quiet Lying in bed withher husband.
Before they go to bed, sheturns and says goodnight and her
(25:24):
husband doesn't say a thing.
He just turns and goes to sleep.
And this woman who woke up thatmorning feeling absolutely
beautiful, feeling absolutelyworth it, has now gone to bed
(25:45):
feeling like nothing because ofthe words of other people.
This is not who we're called tobe.
We are called to be people whospeak life.
We are called to be people whospeak truth.
We are called to be people whouplift people.
(26:05):
The end of that chapter says weare called to be people who
uplift people.
The end of that chapter says weare called to be light to
people.
We're called to stand out.
I'm going to leave you withthis.
There's always a question of why, right?
Why would Paul say these things?
(26:27):
What's going on?
And to answer that question,why?
I think it's very clear.
Because our passage from todaystarted at chapter 5 in the book
of Ephesians, which meansthere's four chapters before we
came to this.
In those four chapters of thebook of Ephesians, paul takes
four chapters to write andremind the people of Ephesus
(26:47):
about the gospel.
He takes four chapters to remindthem of how much God loves them
for who they are.
He takes four chapters in thebook of Ephesians to remind them
of what God did for themthrough Christ coming, living
and dying, and the power that'sin God through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ.
(27:07):
He takes four chapters toremind them who they are.
And then, in chapter five, hesays therefore, which means the
why is because of everythingelse I've told you.
Because of everything else I'vetold you, why speak different,
(27:33):
why look different?
Why stand out?
Because of what Jesus has donefor you, for what Jesus has done
for me, not because of anythingwe have done to deserve or earn
it, but purely that we are sonsand daughters of God.
So, people of Central, do westand out?
Do our words sound differentthan the culture around us?
(27:59):
Do we represent Christ to thosearound us?
Not because of a checklist, notbecause of a demand, but purely
because what Christ has donefor us.
Amen.
God, we give you thanks and praise for the
opportunity to gather for thebaptism of Young River and the
reminder of the gifts that yougive to each one of us, not
because of anything we do, butbecause we are called children
of God and Lord.
We thank you for this question,this series of questions that
have come from the body here atCentral, and the opportunity to
dive into scripture to find somekind of answer, to make better
(00:21):
sense of what's going on inthese passages and in these
stories.
Lord, I pray for open heartsand open minds to receive your
word this morning, and may weopen up the deepest parts of our
hearts, the places where wehide our maybe our most secrets,
and to allow you to come inthis morning.
It's your name.
We pray Amen.
Please be seated.
Yeah, welcome once again.
(00:45):
Glad to be worshiping with youthis morning and if there's
anyone new here, just a bigwelcome.
Man, we're so glad you're hereand please take time to visit
Kirsten or myself out in theConnect Center.
Out there we have a little giftfor you.
I believe Ryan calls it a swagbag.
So if you're interested in whata swag bag has, go check it out
.
But yeah, man'm just gladyou're here.
Thanks for checking us out andfor those of you online, welcome
(01:08):
.
Before we get started, it issomeone's birthday in the house
today, peter Deusteman, who isback there running slides for us
.
It is his birthday today, so wecan show him some love.
So when you see him out there,go and wish him a happy birthday
and if you're interested injoining a life group here, also
(01:30):
talk to Peter.
So thanks, peter, appreciateall you do.
Man, this morning we arecontinuing our sermon series on
the you Pick series, which isthe series where you guys pick
the questions, and normally,preparing for a sermon man, it's
always a little nerve-wrackingand more excited than nerves.
But this morning this week, Iturned to my wife and said man,
this is the last sermon that I'mgoing to give before the vote.
(01:50):
And so I said there's a littlebit extra stress in this one, so
we'll see how it goes.
But the question we had lots ofquestions so we couldn't answer
them all, but this one I foundpretty interesting.
It came from this passage fromEphesians 5, verse 4 in
particular.
Verse 4 from Ephesians 5 saysthis nor should there be
(02:13):
obscenity, foolish talk orcoarse joking, which are out of
place, but rather thanksgiving.
These are one of those verses Icall them footloose verses,
based on the movie Footloosestarring Kevin Bacon where you
can take a verse out of contextand make it sound like there's
absolutely no part of thisbehavior.
In the life of a Christian, ina disciple of Christ, there is
(02:36):
no spot for jokes or humor orlaughter or dancing.
If you're Kevin Bacon, whateverit might be, there's no place
for it, and sometimes this verseis often used in that.
And the exact opposite is true.
We know God has a sense of humor.
We know God loves to bring joyinto our life, where laughter is
a sign of that, and we see it.
You don't have to look anyfurther than creation itself,
(02:58):
right?
God has created this creaturehere known as the platypus,
right?
You look at this thing andthere's no reason.
It doesn't make any sense.
How about this one here?
Yeah, that is the proscibusmonkey, and no joke.
This is the face that myteenage children look at me when
I try to say cool things likesix, seven or sheesh, all those
(03:19):
things.
She's dying right now.
She's dying, right.
What is this?
This is a sign of God having asense of humor.
How about this guy?
This is the black rain frog.
I don't know if he's so much asfunny or I feel like he might
murder me in my sleep.
It's one of the two.
How about this one?
The blobfish?
Right?
What is the purpose?
What is the purpose?
(03:45):
But yet for God to laugh andcreate this and for us to laugh
and there's no other creature onplanet earth more evidence that
God has a sense of humor thanthese poor individuals.
That's right.
When Ryan's away, the childrenwill play.
So take that.
Our lead pastor Ryan is aDenver Broncos fan, so, and he's
not here today.
So, hey, all right, he's in thewoods.
(04:07):
He can't even probably watch,so I'm safe, it's fine.
It's obvious from creation thatGod has a sense of humor.
It's obvious from scriptureitself.
These couple of verses here talkabout joy and laughter.
Proverbs 17, 22,.
A joyful heart is good medicine.
A couple of weeks ago I waslying in bed just scrolling
watching silly videos and therewas a video of this dad watching
(04:30):
a scary movie and on itsomething scared him and he
immediately said nope, and heturned the channel to Bluey and
he was like yay, and I diedlaughing.
I'm not kidding.
Tears rolling down my facecould not breathe Closest to
death I've ever been.
It was so funny.
It's good medicine for theheart.
John 15, 11,.
Jesus says these things I havespoken to you that my joy may be
(04:52):
in you and your joy will befull.
So in this verse, this passage,paul is not saying that
laughter is bad, that humor isbad, but he is directing us at
the power of our words.
He's directing us at the powerof our words and the effect that
they have on not just otherpeople but us as well.
(05:13):
He's also calling to attentionof how easy it is for us to slip
away from words that bring life, from words that encourage.
How easy it is to be pulledinto what the culture says is
acceptable speech is acceptableway to speak to one another.
(05:35):
It's incredibly easy to bepulled in to that.
A couple of years ago myyoungest, ezra, started
kindergarten and a couple monthsin we started to notice that he
was using language that wethought was pretty inappropriate
for a kindergartner.
And so if you have delicateears, plug your ears.
But he would start using wordslike oh, this sucks, so not
(05:59):
super delicate, but you knowwhat I'm saying, or he'd say
crap, and we're like what isgoing on?
You're in kindergarten already.
The culture has got your hooksin.
And so we sat him down.
We said, ezzie, where who areyou hanging out with in school,
or who's your friends?
Where have you heard this kindof talk?
And a big smile on his face andhe said you, daddy.
Yeah.
(06:21):
And then I turned to my wifeand she had a bigger smile on
her face.
You know we talk about inbaptism.
We say it every week, everytime there's a baptism, we say
as you, as parents andgodparents, and influence in
this child.
They are watching, they arelistening.
And it's so true.
And the words we speak and theway we speak to people is so
(06:46):
easily taken off the path aswhat it looks like to be a
follower of Christ and suckedinto.
What the world says is okay andwhat the world says is
acceptable.
And so Paul is not writing thispiece of his letter to the
church of Ephesus saying nojoking, no laughter, no joy.
He's saying those are goodthings given to you from God,
but what and how are you usingyour words?
Does it model that of Jesus ordoes it model that of the world?
(07:14):
And so, as we dive into thispassage, there's really a
message within the message.
This is the last one before thevote, so it's a two-for-one
today.
So there's a message within themessage.
We're going to look at thesewords because the question
really did ask what is themeaning of these words?
What is Paul getting at here?
But there is a bigger, greatermessage going on here, so we do
(07:35):
want to look at these words.
What did Paul mean when hespoke these words?
Which means we have to dig intoour Greek bag this morning and
look at some Greek words.
The first one is this bag thismorning and look at some Greek
words.
The first one is this Paul saysthere should be no obscenity,
which the Greek word is eroskrotos.
Everyone say eros krotos.
Well done, eros krotos.
The meaning of this word.
(07:55):
There's a couple differentthoughts here.
One they believe that it refersback to the verse right before
where Paul is talking aboutsexual immorality, back to the
verse right before where Paul istalking about sexual immorality
, and so talk of that nature.
But more people, more scholars,more commentaries lean towards a
different meaning.
They lean towards this eroskrotos meaning deliberate,
(08:17):
hurtful language, deliberatehurtful words to one another,
words that is not one of thoseaccidental slip up or you didn't
mean it, but words where youwound up and just took a shot
with a hurtful word with theintention of hurting someone.
You know my two boys we hearthis every now and then.
(08:38):
They'll be scrapping in theirroom and we don't know what
they're fighting or arguingabout.
But one of them has been knownto yell you are the worst
brother ever and we're like geez, what is going on, that such
hurtful words could be said andwe go in there and they're
fighting over the Lego piece orsomething like that.
But it's intentional wordsmeant to hurt someone.
(08:59):
Right, we do this, and thereason might be because that
person has hurt us, or we have alot of hurt and pain that we're
dealing with and we want to getthat out, and maybe that's one
way that we do it.
Or we do it because we want tomake ourselves look better to
other people or look better thanother people.
(09:19):
We want to bring others down,and so we use words, eroskrotes,
words that intentionally hurt,obscenity.
This is what Paul is speakingabout.
The second word was absolutelymy favorite is morolegio.
Everyone say morologeo Probablyjust botched the Greek, but
(09:40):
that's okay.
My Greek professor's notwatching, it's fine.
This means foolish talk.
This is what Paul says foolishtalk.
It's translated as foolish talk, but when you break down the
word, it's two Greek words puttogether.
The first one says moros, whichmeans stupid.
It's also where we get our wordmoron from Moros.
(10:01):
Stupid legio speaking, moronspeaking that's what this word
means Stupid speaking.
This is that type of languagethat where we wish, once we say
it, we could get it back in ourmouth as fast as we can.
There's a perfect example ofthis almost happening yesterday,
and I kid you not, I almostsaid it if it wasn't for this
(10:22):
message this morning.
Okay, Almost got in big trouble.
We're on the way to footballearly morning.
My son Arlo plays some football, and we had to get to Anoka by
eight o'clock in the morning,and so I set an alarm for 6.30.
My wife sets an alarm for six.
She wants to get up a littlebit earlier than I, so that's
fine, no worries.
Her alarm goes off at six andshe likes the snooze button.
(10:44):
Now there's no snooze button.
That's a really outdatedreference.
She just says Alexa, snooze.
Right, that's really what we donowadays Snooze, snooze, snooze
.
I hear it a couple of times andall of a sudden my alarm for
630 goes off and we arisetogether and so we get ready and
it's chaos.
Man, we got these kids that wehad to get ready for.
We had to pack lunches, makesure all his golf is football
gear.
It's crazy.
This hour that we have isabsolutely chaos.
(11:06):
We get into the car.
We're both sweating my wife'ssweating.
She's trying to put her makeupon and she says I should have
got up earlier Now if not forMorologio.
I'm not kidding.
I had the phrase ready to comeout of my mouth that says maybe
(11:27):
you shouldn't have snoozed somany times.
Ladies and gentlemen, this isthe definition of moron speaking
Right there.
Sometimes we don't catch thewords before they leave our
mouth.
We don't think before we speak.
Another way that we see this alot is when we say something,
(11:49):
maybe with a little bit of truth, but when we say it, we realize
we hurt somebody.
When we say it, we realize thatit had effects that we didn't
want it to have.
Or maybe not.
Maybe we said it because weknew the effects that it would
have, and we add two littlewords onto that.
Anyone know what they are.
(12:09):
Just kidding, I just saidsomething about you that caused
you pain.
Just kidding Like that makes itall better.
I've had talks with lots ofstudents on Wednesday night
about these two words and it'sjust not students, it's adults
(12:34):
that use this as a parachute toget out of something that we
didn't want to get into, becauseyou might have been just
kidding and you may haverealized that you crossed the
line in what you said, but thosewords have struck the heart
that person's not forgetting.
The words have already causedtheir damage.
We can't pull them back.
That's what morologio means.
It means thinking before youspeak.
(12:56):
Eros crotes words that aremeant to cause harm.
Morologio, moron speaking.
And the last one is this onehere, paul, the translation is
coarse joking.
But eutropalia, eutropaliaEveryone say eutropalia.
This is a really interestingword.
(13:16):
This means coarse joking, lewdor profane behavior or words.
But what's interesting aboutthis is this exact Greek word
goes back hundreds of yearsbefore Paul.
We see it in writings ofAristotle and we see him using
it as a form of humor thatbrings joy, that brings pure
(13:38):
laughter, that uplifts people'sspirits, not in the way that
Paul is using it here.
Why would Paul use this wordthat for hundreds of years has
been a positive spin on joy andlaughter, and here he's using it
as a negative connotation.
(13:58):
I think it's because herealizes that the culture has
taken something that's meant tobe good, meant to be uplifting,
meant to bring us joy andhappiness, and the culture.
We've gotten hold of it andwe've tainted it and we've
corrupted it, and now somethingthat was good has now become
harmful.
(14:21):
These are the words that Paulused to describe the words that
we speak to one another.
These are the words that Paulused to describe the words that
we speak to one another and hesays stay away from these things
.
Now, all these words havemultiple things in common, but
the first is obvious that thesewords are used to hurt or tear
down individuals.
The second is this these wordsare used as a gauge for what's
(14:42):
really going on inside of us.
Matthew says this as a gaugefor what's really going on
inside of us.
Matthew says this, for themouth speaks.
What the heart is full of,what's in here, comes out here.
So, if you just pause for amoment and think about the words
that you spoke this week, andto who, what does your heart
(15:07):
look like?
Is it joy?
Is it uplifting?
Is it, like Paul says it shouldbe, that of thanksgiving?
Or if you take a step back.
What is going on in our hearts?
Is it anger?
Is it hurt and pain?
(15:27):
Is it gossip?
Is it a desire to makeourselves look better than
others or elevate ours overother people?
What is being reflected of ourheart in the words that we speak
?
And the third thing that he'shaving in common is that Paul is
really telling us again themessage within the message, that
(15:55):
it's more than just the wordsthat we speak.
He's not giving us a guidelineor words that are good or words
that are bad, which of course wewant right as Christians.
We want.
We wish Paul would just saycome out and say these are the
good words, these are the badwords.
Say these words, don't saythese Great thanks, appreciate
it.
That's a lot easier.
That's not what he's sayinghere.
The deeper message here is thatyou should not use these words
or speak in this manner to otherpeople, not because it's in
(16:18):
this realm of bad or naughtywords, but because that does not
reflect a person who followsChrist, because that does not
reflect a person who followsChrist.
This type of words and languagedoes not reflect the type of
person who calls themselves adisciple, the type of person who
(16:38):
calls themselves a follower ofJesus.
We are called to be different.
See, at the time where Paulwrote this, this was the culture
, this is what they were livingin.
And he says no, don't use thosewords, don't speak that.
Look different in how you speak, because you are called to be a
follower, a disciple, of Jesus.
(17:02):
I encourage you to go and readActs chapter 19 sometime today
or over the weekend.
Read Acts chapter 19.
Acts chapter 19 tells the storyof when Paul was in Ephesus.
Okay, so the letter that wehave of Ephesians is from Paul,
written in a Roman prison andwritten to the church of Ephesus
(17:24):
.
Four years earlier he was inEphesus doing ministry, and so
Acts chapter 19 lays it out ofwhat his journey looked like in
Ephesus.
And an incredibly crazy storyhappens in Acts chapter 19.
And I'm going to tell you thestory, but go home and read it.
It's absolutely insane.
(17:45):
So Paul is in Ephesus and whenPaul's there, he's doing
incredible things through thepower of the Holy Spirit,
through God, doing incredible,amazing things.
He's healing people, doing allthe things that Jesus was doing.
And these gentlemen in theBible they're Jewish men, is
what it says.
But really, when you dive downdeep.
It's really these con men,these men who did not follow
(18:07):
Jesus, these men who did notknow Jesus but were looking to
make bucks.
Everywhere they went and theysaw Paul doing these incredible,
amazing things, includinggetting these demons out of
people, bringing these people tohealing from being oppressed
and possessed from these demons.
And they think to themselvesman, this is a way to make a
(18:28):
buck, man, if we can kind ofpull a demon out of someone, man
, people will pay big money forthat.
And in Ephesus there was a manwho was possessed by a demon.
And so these three gentlemen goup to this man.
They get a crowd around them towatch the show, put out the hat
so they can put a couple bucksin.
And they said we are going toheal this man from this
(18:48):
possession.
And so in a big showboating way, they say in the name of Jesus
and in the workings of Paul, befree.
And the man stops in his track.
The man possessed by this demonjust stops and he looks at these
three men in the eye andscripture tells us this is what
(19:09):
he says.
He says I know Jesus, I knowwho he is, I know who Paul is.
I have no idea who you are.
You see, he knows Jesus becauseeven the demons tremble at the
name of Jesus.
He knows Paul because you knowwhat Paul talks and acts a lot
(19:36):
like Jesus.
He doesn't know these threeguys, and so this man jumps on
these three false preachers andteachers and the scripture tells
him that this guy just beatshim senselessly and these three
guys run off naked.
That's a sermon for another day.
We're not going to go down thatroad.
I don't know what that's about.
It's pretty crazy though.
But he looked at him and hesaid you may be speaking the
(20:03):
name of Jesus, but you don'tknow Jesus because you don't
speak like him and you don't actlike him.
That happened when Paul was inEphesus, and now, here we are,
four years later, and he'swriting to the church where this
happened.
He says this is importantbecause we are called to be
(20:25):
followers of Jesus.
We are called to look different, to speak different.
I want to show you this pictureup here.
I'm a youth director, have beenfor a long time, so this is a
little trivia game I got for youStudents.
We've done this before you, soyou can't answer.
Besides the blue, cold, smileyface, or not smiley face, what
(20:46):
in this picture, stands out toyou?
What's different?
Santa hat, there's somethingeven more scarves.
There's something even moreright there.
Nice job, kelsey, you'll seethe arrow.
There's a panda bear in themidst of the snowmen.
(21:06):
Yeah, that's some of the fun wehave on Wednesday nights.
Come on, check it out.
So my question to you, central,is do people have to really
really really listen hard?
Do they really really reallyhave to look hard to notice that
(21:27):
you stand out, or do you blendin with the culture?
Do the words that you speak andthe way that you speak to
people about people, does itlook just like everybody else?
Does the way that you act andtreat people?
Does it stand out or does itblend in with the rest of the
(21:53):
culture?
Because this is what Paul iswriting about.
This is why our words are soimportant, because we are called
to look and act and speakdifferent.
I think it starts with ourwords, because words have power.
(22:14):
This rose we're going to callSally.
This rose is going to representSally, and Sally is a young
woman who woke up one morningand is feeling absolutely
beautiful, is feeling absolutelyready to tackle the day.
You know, she checked her auraring, her iPhone watch and she
said she got great sleep, greatreadiness, she's ready to tackle
the day, she's feeling good,she wakes up on time, didn't hit
(22:37):
the snooze button, she's readyto go.
She gets dressed, she does herhair, she does her makeup and
she's feeling absolutelybeautiful.
And she goes to the kitchentable and there are her two
amazing adult or not adultteenage children having their
bowl of cereal before they go toschool.
She walks in good morning,kisses them on the head and her
(23:00):
teenage daughter turns and looksat her and says are you wearing
that?
Is that how you're doing yourhair?
Are you wearing that?
Is that how you're doing yourhair?
That's all right, that's fine.
She's still feeling great,she's still feeling beautiful
and she kisses them.
Goodbye and heads to work.
And on the way to work she'srocking out to KTIS, listening
to some worship music maybeNickelback, I don't know whoever
(23:21):
this person is and she's lovinglifestyle.
And this guy comes up, speedingup behind her.
She gets out of the way to makeroom for him.
He comes flying by and you cansee that he's just yelling out
some just derogatory stuff andgiving her the bird for no
reason whatsoever.
Maybe that guy got late in thatmorning.
Maybe he's having a roughmorning but he is just taking
(23:43):
his day out on her.
But it's all right.
She's still feeling pretty good.
She gets to work and she seesher friends and her coworkers.
But there's something off,there's something weird.
They're kind of ignoring her,they're not talking to her and
as the day goes on she goes intothe break room to get some
coffee and she can overhear themtalking about her, talking
(24:11):
about the way she looks, talkingabout the way she speaks,
talking about her family,talking about her job
performance and how it's notvery good.
So the day goes on.
She's feeling a little bit lessbut she's still hanging in
(24:33):
there and later in thatafternoon she's about ready to
leave and someone makes one morecomment about her brand new
dress that she bought and shewore and she felt great in.
And she's they said, is where'dyou get that?
Is that a hand-me-down?
And then someone looks at herand says you know, we're a
little worried about you.
You look really tired.
And they kept saying thingsthat kind of hurt and tore apart
(25:01):
, but they ended it by sayingjust kidding.
So on the drive home she's notfeeling as great as she did that
morning.
She gets home, cooks dinner,eats dinner with the family it's
pretty quiet Lying in bed withher husband.
Before they go to bed, sheturns and says goodnight and her
(25:24):
husband doesn't say a thing.
He just turns and goes to sleep.
And this woman who woke up thatmorning feeling absolutely
beautiful, feeling absolutelyworth it, has now gone to bed
(25:45):
feeling like nothing because ofthe words of other people.
This is not who we're called tobe.
We are called to be people whospeak life.
We are called to be people whospeak truth.
We are called to be people whouplift people.
(26:05):
The end of that chapter says weare called to be people who
uplift people.
The end of that chapter says weare called to be light to
people.
We're called to stand out.
I'm going to leave you withthis.
There's always a question of why, right?
Why would Paul say these things?
(26:27):
What's going on?
And to answer that question,why?
I think it's very clear.
Because our passage from todaystarted at chapter 5 in the book
of Ephesians, which meansthere's four chapters before we
came to this.
In those four chapters of thebook of Ephesians, paul takes
four chapters to write andremind the people of Ephesus
(26:47):
about the gospel.
He takes four chapters to remindthem of how much God loves them
for who they are.
He takes four chapters in thebook of Ephesians to remind them
of what God did for themthrough Christ coming, living
and dying, and the power that'sin God through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ.
(27:07):
He takes four chapters toremind them who they are.
And then, in chapter five, hesays therefore, which means the
why is because of everythingelse I've told you.
Because of everything else I'vetold you, why speak different,
(27:33):
why look different?
Why stand out?
Because of what Jesus has donefor you, for what Jesus has done
for me, not because of anythingwe have done to deserve or earn
it, but purely that we are sonsand daughters of God.
So, people of Central, do westand out?
Do our words sound differentthan the culture around us?
(27:59):
Do we represent Christ to thosearound us?
Not because of a checklist, notbecause of a demand, but purely
because what Christ has donefor us.
Amen.
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