Notes on the Book of Ephesians - Chapter 6

Notes on the Book of Ephesians

Taken at a Bible Study Led by Walt Henrichsen

In San Francisco, 19-23 March 2007

Table of Contents

Chapter 6

Obeying and honoring parents (6:1-3)

When obedience to parents is no longer essential

Fathers do not provoke children to wrath (6:4)

Slaves and Masters (6:5-9)

Dealing with higher and higher expectations in today’s professional world

Eternal accountability for our work (6:8)

Was the American Revolutionary War legitimate?

Employer - employee relationships (6:9)

Put on the full armor of God, especially in interpersonal conflicts (6:10-20)

The value of the full armor of God

The day of evil – when we are tested and face potential failure (6:13)

Taking up the armor is active

Perpetual prayer (6:18)

God put Paul in prison (6:20)

Encourage people by rejoicing with them in temporal successes (6:22)

Rewards and honor

Chapter 6

1-4 children and parents

Obeying and honoring parents (6:1-3)

Q: “Honor parents and live long” – is that promise you claim?

Q: Do you think that in the OT all people who honored their parents prospered and lived long lives?

• In general it’s going to be good, but don’t expect too much.

Q: Who decides how long and how well?

• Because there is no eternal hope given, they promise has to be temporal.
• Moses wouldn’t say honor hour mother and dad that you may lay up treasures in heaven.
• It was a national, not an individual promise.

Q: In the OT if you were willful with God, how would He get your attention?

• [Through external sources of pain]
• Nu. 15:30,31 – no sacrifice for intentional sin [the individual gets cut off from his people]
• But here is a sin that cannot be identified by society [honoring father and mother]

Q: How would the Jewish society know if you were honoring your mother and father?

• If God is going to express His displeasure, it has to be now.
• Note two things: Jesus says love the Lord with all your heart is the first commandment.
• ‘Honor father and mother’ is the first of the societal commandments.
• 1-4 were vertical, 5-10 horizontal.
• Second, it is the first command with a promise.
• If you look at the Decalogue, it’s the only command with a promise.
• I suggest to you that it forms the very fabric of society.
• If a child does not learn obedience in the home, that child is going to have to learn it some place else.
• And the more that lesson is postponed, the more expensive the price.
• In our society, if a man disobeys, he is incarcerated.
• These are people who insist on learning lessons the hard way.
• Note further, if you want your children honoring you, the only way you will see it happen is if you honor your own parents. And they don’t have to be alive for you to do it.

Q: Why does Paul add, “obey”?

• In the OT, when a child refused to obey, they were supposed to stone him [Dt. 21:18-21].
• What it means is that you think and speak of them with great respect.
• It is the first in importance in societal matters.
• Some parents are easier to honor than others.
• I can say with all honesty that I never saw my father sin, not once. I know he was a sinner.

Q: God forbid this happens, but suppose a child’s mother is a whore, his father is a pimp, and he has AIDS. Should such a child honor his parents? And if so, why?

• Yes, because it’s a command and you fear God, and it’s God who chose these parents.
• You affirm God’s goodness in giving these parents to you, whoever they are.

Q: What if a sister in Christ was abused by her father?

• God in His infinite wisdom decided that that was the best environment to prepare her for heaven.
• Nothing in the commandment suggests that the parent is worthy.

Q: How do we apply this?

• You get to decide, but you’ve got to defend it before God.
• Honoring is different from obedience. Obedience would be on parents' terms.

When obedience to parents is no longer essential

Q: When do children no longer have to obey parents? Where do we hypothesize that line is?

• When they stop eating at my trough – when I’m no longer supporting them.
• But gentlemen, in the Bible there were two kinds of women:
• Women who were either under the authority of the father, or the husband, or the son, or as a last resort the elders
• The other kind of woman is the strange woman, a euphemism for a whore.
• That’s why in our culture, the father escorts the daughter down the aisle and gives her to her husband, signifying that there is a transfer of authority from the father to the husband.
• The father was her head, and the husband is now her head.
• Paul says if she is a widow, then she is to be under the authority of her son.

Q: What does the authority look like?

• It’s between you and God. It’s your call, but remember you’ve got to justify it before God.

Q: Are obeying and honoring the same?

• A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife [5:31].

Q: Why is the woman not mentioned in this verse?

• Because if a man gets married, he’s no longer under his father any more.
• In most cultures, the woman leaves her father and mother to live with the husband.
• Biblically, at that time the man creates a new unit. That was the natural course of action.
• The man leaves and they become a new unit. I think at that point he ceases obeying and just honors.
• Although, I think a man would want to get before God and contemplate long and hard even as a married man why he would want to disobey his parents.
• So in essence, mutual submission is always in effect.
• But mutual submission does not answer the question of authority.
• Mutual submission has to do with attitude.
• I don’t submit to your wishes because you have authority over my life.

Fathers do not provoke children to wrath (6:4)

Q: Why is the command in 6:4, “Fathers not provoke your children”? Why not fathers and mothers or just mothers? After all mothers spend most time with them.

• Because the Bible addresses the areas of our greatest need.
• We men are quicker to anger. We feel more easily that they are not submissive to our authority.
• Wives are usually more compassionate.
• It may be a bit different in Hong Kong and Asia, where academic competition is great and many mothers have a strong personal interest in the academic achievements of their children.
• Fathers tend to be more nitpicky.
• Pr. 18:13 – He who answers a matter before he hears it, it is folly and shame to him.
• Every child disagrees with his parents how he is raised.
• Every person grows up thinking, “When I grow up and have a family I think I am going to do things differently.” It’s a normal rite of passage.
• Whenever a person feels like a victim, the question is, “Did you think I was trying to harm you, or did we have a difference of opinion about what good looks like?”
• If it is the latter, then be of good cheer, your time will come.
• If it is the former, then something is very, very wrong.

Q: What does provoke my children to wrath look like?

• It often has to do with making a decision without all the facts. Accusing them.
• Don’t ever accuse your children. If they lie, let it go. It will come back.
• Help them see that their word is like water in their hand.
• When it [your honest reputation] disappears, you can never get it back.
• Col. 3:21 – Fathers, do not provide your children, lest they become discouraged.
• Discouraged is athumeo in Greek and means ‘without passion’
• Boys especially need time with their fathers.
• One brother with four fine sons had one son who was a habitual liar. He asked him, “Why?”
• His son said, “Dad, I’m afraid you’ll spank me.”
• He said, “If I promise to not spank you, will you not lie?”
• His son said yes, and he never lied again.

Q: If you have evidence of lying, will you do something?

• If I probe, then most of time it can come out.
• Most children have little or no recollection of anything before the age of 5.
• It seems like parents would naturally have discipline problems in early years, but the children won’t remember the pain of it if it’s done then.
• So, [for instance,] when my children were really young, I’d put them up to my face and say [something like,] “What did you say to your mother?”
• Somebody said that raising children is like riding a roller coaster.
• Some men enjoy it, and some men are terrified of it.

Q: To clarify, did you say, that Eph. 6:2 was not a promise to every individual?

• I think the intention was to show the gravity [seriousness] of the issue, but I would hold that very loosely in my convictions.
• Almost always, the generation the received the wrath of God was not the generation that sinned, but the generation that followed.
• Remember Hezekiah after acting foolishly? What was his response?
• No problem, go ahead, God. It won’t be in my lifetime. Let them suffer for it. I’ll be gone.

Slaves and Masters (6:5-9)

6:5-7 has three parts to the command:

• Obey your masters with fear and trembling, in sincerity / singleness of heart
• Not by way of eye service
• As unto Christ, not unto men

Q: What is eye service?

• Insincerity; just going to work to show my face and not working hard, but looking like working hard.
• Doing it with bitterness, like a son asked to sit down who does but says, “Daddy I’m sitting down on the outside but not on the inside!”
• As unto the Lord; do it well even if you’re not happy about it. Ex: clean the toilet well.
• It’s easy to work hard when you are being watched. That’s eye service.
• It’s when the master is watching, I perform well, but when he’s gone, I slack off.
• People naturally do not do what you expect. They do what you inspect.
• This verse is calling for the opposite.

Dealing with higher and higher expectations in today’s professional world

Q: How about when the expectations are very high, whether from the boss or yourself? Most of us are professionals. I’m in charge of 6 labs. There is no end to the demands as a professional.

• The only answer I can give to that is “as to the Lord.” Each man has to decide.
• One brother shared: today, professionalism is auditing yourself.
• We are not like people in McDonald’s. Nowadays people are working longer hours.
• You become less of a professional if you don’t. That’s the trend.
• Another shared: It’s easier to plan for my subordinates. I know how to plan out expectations for subordinates, and I ask if I’m expecting too much from them, but it’s sometimes difficult for me to set expectations for myself. I am not watched. Once in a while my superior gives me some expectations. Before this study, she asked me to give her some statistics that would take 2 weeks to do. So I’m not meeting her expectations each hour.
• My vocation [full-time Christian work] is held in disrepute in this culture.
• Vocational Christian workers are perceived as being lazy and not productively employed.
• I would suggest that that is the universally accepted opinion of businessmen in the US with a few exceptions. Generally, that’s the way they are.
• A friend of mine said that a Campus Crusade worker came into his office to try to raise some money, and after he explained it, my friend said, “Well, that’s what I do. Why should I pay you for what I do?” That’s how they see it. Ultimately, I think it’s got to be as unto the Lord.
• I’ve concluded that men in my vocation cannot be men pleasers [because they can’t possibly do it].
• That’s the general perception I’ve observed.

Q: But I think your situation is worse. The sky is the limit for those who are self-employed. My pastors feel they really cannot meet all the expectations. So, how do you set your time limits?

• My wife thinks I overcompensate due to the perception.

One brother: most conscientious Christians overcompensate, work long hours and live a simple life.

• My sense is that most people expect that and don’t ever see it very often.
• So I think verse 7 is such a key verse – “not to men,” Col. 3:23 – “not to men.”

Eternal accountability for our work (6:8)

• 6:8 – “Knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord”
• I don’t know how a person could believe this and not believe in eternal accountability.
• He may not see it in the temporal, [but he will on Judgment Day.]
• Ps. 50:21 – These things you have done [helping thieves, adultery, deception, slander], and I [God] kept silent; You thought that I was altogether like you; but I will rebuke you, and set them in order before your eyes.

Was the American Revolutionary War legitimate?

• We’ve talked about the absence in scripture of an emphasis on changing social order.
• I was at Lee’s conference for Christians from Mainland China
• Some were in the middle of emphasizing the importance of house churches, because the government was unjust.
• They said that when the government is unjust, then it is the responsibility of the Christian to resist the government.
• They pointed to the US and the Declaration of Independence as justification for their convictions.
• I asked them, “If that is the case, then why did Paul say in Eph. 6:5-8 say that slaves should obey their master?
• They replied, “Do you mean that the Revolutionary war from God’s perspective was illegitimate?”
• God does not prohibit slavery, but He will judge me on the basis of how I lived the Golden Rule.
• Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a book supporting the abolition of slavery, used this argument.
• You can ask another man, but you can’t accuse him of not living out the Golden Rule.
• One brother: I really admire Dr. Sun for the Chinese Revolution.
• [Walt:] There’s no doubt I am grateful for the act of American independence, but if I had done it, it would have been wrong.

[Fifth day’s lunch break]

Employer - employee relationships (6:9)

• The employer- employee relationship is contractual.
• You are not responsible for your employees’ having a job.
• You are not responsible for their discipline unless it affects your business.
• Justice is very important in business relationships, but it has no part in the discipline of believers.

Q: Do you have to be careful in crossing the line if the employee doesn’t perform?

• If you don’t perform, then we will terminate the contract. No obligation is required

Q: What is the kind of threatening in this?

• A slave is different from an employee because he’s a commodity.
• He could be bought and sold. He had no rights. He could be killed.
• [Today, as an employer you can rightfully say,] “If you don’t do this, I’ll fire you.”
• It is a promise, not a threat.

Put on the full armor of God, especially in interpersonal conflicts (6:10-20)

• Let me encourage each of you to evaluate yourselves:
• To what degree am I equipped with the armor of God?
• What piece of pieces or armor do you perceive to be less helpful than the other parts?

Q: 6:12 says we wrestle not against flesh and blood. Maybe you don’t, but I do. I find myself wrestling with interpersonal relationships. Why do you think Paul says this?

• The key is the target. They are just tools.

Q: When I find myself in disagreement with another believer, what should be going on in my mind? What armor do I need? Ex: a man at work is in disagreement with me. What should I be thinking about, and what does it have to do with the armor?

• There’s individual responsibility and the cultural environment.
• Usually, we just think of ourselves and don’t think why the other person is blinded.
• It’s important to see why he came to such a conclusion.
• A lot of people have a lot of misconceptions about what the Word says.
• In EBS nowadays, I need to do more clarification than before, because society is more and more against the Bible. The armor is not just intellectual clarification.
• Most people when they argue don’t think they are arguing with principalities, but against flesh and blood.

Q: Can you elaborate how Satan works in the hearts of non-believers at these times?

• If to know the truth is to know the way God looks at things, then I think the evil one tries to confuse and deceive – to make you think just the opposite of the truth.
• In conflict, the real enemy is Satan and not the other guy
• But Satan tries to trick us into thinking the opposite of the truth and think the enemy is the other guy.

Q: Gentleman, I know there are men who intentionally plot evil – steal, kill, rape and plunder. Most of the time we do not come face to face with these people. When was the last time you had a disagreement with an individual who was intentionally trying to do evil – with someone who said, “I know it’s wrong and I want to do it”?