Ephesians chapter 5, beginning in verse 8, for you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth. Finding out what is acceptable to the Lord, and have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret, But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore, he says, awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light. See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. So seeing that we are to awake from sleep and to arise from the dead in regard to our walking as children of light and not have fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, Paul now tells us to make sure that we walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise people. What does it mean to walk circumspectly? The word in the Greek is akribos. It means to be diligent or exact. or careful. To me, in the context of these verses, the word circumspect should be thought of not only as you're watching where you place your feet so that you will not slip or fall, but it also means that you will strive to walk on the path of righteousness during all of your earthly journey through this life. There are two ways that Paul gives to us here. of how we can walk circumspectly, and they are first, that we would not be fools, but wise, and second, that we would redeem the time. Now I've spoken to you already about redeeming the time, but I want to visit that subject again this morning in this sermon as well. So we need to examine this subject more carefully of what it means to walk circumspectly. In my next sermon to you, I'm going to begin to look at the particulars of what it will mean to walk circumspectly, but may the Lord help us in living this kind of a Christian life to him. First of all, that we would not be fools, but be wise. See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. These terms fools and wise in the Bible refer first and foremostly to unbelievers as well as believers. Now you can see this if you turn over to Psalm 14 with me. Psalm 14. It says this, the fool has said in his heart, there is no God. They are corrupt. They have done abominable works. There is none who does good. The Lord looks down from heaven upon the children of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek God. They have all turned aside. They have together become corrupt. There is none who does good. No, not one. Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread? And do not call on the Lord? There they are in great fear, for God is with the generation of the righteous. You shame the counsel of the poor, but God is with the generation of the righteous. You shame the counsel of the poor, but the Lord is his refuge. Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion, When the Lord brings back the captivity of his people, let Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad. So you can see very plainly here that it is the fool who says in his heart that there is no God. What's of interest to us now is verse two, that the Lord looks down from heaven upon all the children of men to see if there's anybody who understands, who seeks God. It is the believer in God who seeks God. But as God looks upon all men, it's apparent from what it says here that he does not find one person. on the face of the whole earth in all generations that does good. No, not one." It says in verse 3. They've all turned aside. They've all together become corrupt. In other words, all of us are fools by nature and practice before we come to Christ for salvation. The prayer of the psalmist David is that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion. This is referring to Christ coming into the world in his incarnation. He's speaking here of looking forward to Christ's coming. Christ coming into the world in his incarnation. And he would come into the world to build his church. And it's through this means that the end of the captivity of God's people would come about. That is, both Jacob and Israel, both Jew and Gentile, who were chosen of God and called, would be set free from the law of sin and death. They would be saved and be able to rejoice over the greatness of the grace of Christ, which has been given to them to find this great salvation. You must not disdain the message of the cross. You must receive the truth that Christ had to die for you to be able to be forgiven of all of your sins. You will then be able to begin to live wisely, walking on the path of righteousness, if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. It is to wholeheartedly embrace the idea that both salvation from sin and the wisdom to live the Christian life are found in Him. This begins with receiving the message of the gospel, and I want you to look over with me at 1 Corinthians 1, and I want to read to you verses 17 to 31. For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect. For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified. to the Jews a stumbling block, and to the Greeks foolishness. But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, the power of God and the wisdom of God, because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh. Not many mighty, not many noble are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise. And God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty. And the base things of the world and the things which are despised, God has chosen. And the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are. that no flesh should glory in his presence, but of him. You are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption, that as it is written, he who glories let him glory in the Lord. So you can see here that Paul is saying that Christ did not send him to baptize, but rather to preach the gospel. Salvation, you should understand, is not sacramental. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. Salvation comes to people only when they're able to understand that they are fools if they do not have God. If they only believe in their own wisdom or in the world's wisdom, they cannot be saved. Paul did not preach with wisdom of words. That is, he didn't preach in a way that showed his ability and eloquence. or public speaking. Rather, he preached in a very plain, straightforward, sincere, and earnest manner about Christ and Him crucified for sinners. He's spoken that way. He says, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect, lest that somehow people would think that they could save themselves or be saved by their own works. Now, we need to understand that when we speak to people around us about Christ. The message of the cross, it says in verse 18, is foolishness to those who are perishing. That is, when we talk to them about Christ, they don't see any real reason why they should have to talk about that or why they should believe in the Lord Jesus for salvation. It's foolishness to them. They're trusting in themselves. They're trusting in their own wisdom. They're trusting in their own works, but the message of the cross is foolishness. To those who are perishing, it seems foolish to them to have to receive this message of Christ, having to die for their sins on the cross. Am I really this sinful, they say? But God, through this means of the preaching of the cross, is destroying the wisdom of the wise, Paul says here, that is the wisdom of worldly wise people who are wise by their own observations and their own understanding of things. It's their wisdom which is being destroyed. Where are these wise people today? who are wise by their own learning and supposedly wise in their own writings. Where is the scribe, Paul says, where is the disputer of the age? Hasn't God made foolish the wisdom of this world? God knew that people would never come to know him through their own wisdom. And so it pleased God, Paul says here, through the foolishness of preaching to save those who believe. So to people who are effectually called to faith in Christ through the gospel, Christ becomes to them the power of God and the wisdom of God. In saving unworthy sinners, Paul says, God is wiser than men. His weakness, which is only the weakness of His love, His mercy, His condescension, that is stronger than men. And so in His saving sinners, He's showing them the glory. of Christ's wisdom and his power to save them. And since there are not many, Paul says, who are wise according to the flesh, who were called, not many mighty, not many noble, God has in this way chosen to save those who are in the world's eyes. They're foolish. to believe in the gospel. He saves them so that they might shame those who are wise in their own eyes. He's chosen the weak people of the world, those who are weak in the eyes of those who are strong in themselves. And God has put these same people to shame as they behold what Christ's grace can do. to transform those who trust in Him. Now let me ask you if you see it that way. Are you being transformed from one degree of glory to another by God's Spirit? Do people around you who do not know the Lord look at you as foolish because you have trusted in the Lord Jesus? Do not be ashamed. of the gospel or of Christ who has saved you, who was once a fool. Myself, who was once a fool in my sin, but rather rejoice that you have the opportunity to show them your weakness, your sinfulness, so that you must needs have gone to Christ so that you could be saved. Christ has become for us wisdom from God. and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. All of these good things related to our salvation, so that when we boast, let me ask you if you do this, when you boast, do you boast in the Lord? Because that's what Paul is trying to get us to do here through these words. All of this grace, which is given to us, should lead us to walk circumspectly. That is, carefully. I went to the Grand Canyon years ago with my parents and my family, and we came up, and there was a rail at the Grand Canyon. You know there's a reason why that rail is there? It's so that foolish young people or other foolish people will not get up too close. There you go. Occasionally, somebody does fall. Well, those things are for our understanding, they're for our learning. When we're young, hopefully, when we're a young person, we hear about Christ. We don't really think we need him, do we? Now, we'll go along with being religious because we think we're pretty smart and we can learn everything that our parents tell us, but I don't really need to be saved to do that. Sometimes young people or children think, but You really need to understand what I'm trying to say to you here, that each of us is a fool without Christ. Even the most religious person, the most moral person, needs Jesus Christ to be saved. That's why it took my dear father 58 years to figure it out, and God opened his eyes to it, and he was saved even though he'd been a moral man all of his life, raised going to church, understood the gospel in a general sense, but didn't understand the substitutionary atonement of Christ, which C. H. Spurgeon explained for him the thousandth time, and he was saved in a moment because he believed in the gospel. So, you want to convince other Christians at some point of orthodox doctrine, Once you become a Christian, this is what you desire to do. You're going to a church now, which is a doctrinal church, a confessional church. You want to talk to other people about these good things. But I want you to understand how much you need Jesus Christ from the very moment that you were first saved until the very moment that you die. You need him every day. to teach you and lead you and to help you on to greater understanding and obedience to Him. So you're wanting to convince some other Christian of the doctrines of grace, or of some particular doctrine, perhaps the doctrine of God, in a classic scholastic sense. And yet, if you don't have love, you will not be able to do it. Where will that love come from? It will come from Jesus Christ. who died for your sins and died so that you'd be able to see these great truths about God, that he is both impassable and loving at the same time. Well, are you able to love people around you enough to truly help them? That's a good question for us to ask ourselves. Well, we need to ask that, that question. And then we need to ask, secondly, are we redeeming the time? See to it that you redeem the time. Paul says here, see that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. So what does it mean for a Christian to redeem the time? Well, the words in the Greek are exaggerazomenai, tone, chiron, redeeming or making the most of the time, esv, making the best use of the time. John MacArthur says, Paul did not here use chronos, the term for clock time, the continuous time that is measured in hours, minutes, and seconds. Rather, he used chiros, which denotes a measured, allocated, fixed season or epoch. God has set boundaries to our lives and our opportunity for service exists only within those boundaries. Matthew Henry says it means literally buying the opportunity. It's a metaphor taken from merchants and traders who diligently observe and improve the seasons for merchandise and trade. It's a great part of Christian wisdom to redeem the time. So how can we redeem the time? I want you to turn with me over to 1 Peter 1, and I want to read to you verses 17 to 19. And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear, knowing that you are not redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold from your aimless conduct, received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. So our life is called by Peter here, the time of our stay upon the earth. And we are to conduct ourselves during that time in fear, that is... in the fear of God. And the reason that we're to conduct ourselves in the holy fear of God is because we have not been redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ. And this was the purchase price of our redemption. And therefore we ought to walk, Peter is saying, circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. So Peter joins hands with Paul right here. Christ offered himself up as the Lamb of God without blemish or spot. Why were we redeemed? Why were we brought back from our slavery to sin? It was so that we could be wise and holy people and become more like Jesus. You see this same truth taught by Paul in Colossians 4. and verse five, behave wisely in relation to the outside world, buying up your opportunities, it says in the Weymouth translation, walk in wisdom towards those who are outside, redeeming the time, it says in the New King James. So we need to walk in wisdom towards those who are outside, and this means those who are outside the church and outside of the faith. We're not to waste our precious time frittering it away in pursuits which worldly people pursue continually. Because how can we serve Christ, his cause, and his kingdom if we're continually caught up in the world's pleasures and pastimes? Whether it's living for our work, or living outside of our work for the things that worldlings continually play at, I'm asking the question, will you waste your precious time? To walk wisely and circumspectly in the fear of the Lord therefore is imperative. It is all important. I want you to look at Proverbs chapter nine with me. And verses 10 to 12, it says here, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. For by me, your days will be multiplied and years of life will be added to you. If you are wise, you are wise for yourself. And if you scoff, you will bear it alone. So these verses show us that if we have a reverential fear of God and cultivate the knowledge of the Holy One, that is our Lord Jesus, then we can expect according to His will and His purpose for our lives that we will have our days multiplied by Him. If we are wise, we are wise for ourselves. If we scoff at the idea that God is sovereign and has all of our days in our hands, then we alone will bear it. Now, these two things are true. God is sovereign, and yet he can multiply your days. See, God is not in fixed parameters. By his own decrees, he works within his decrees to establish his parameters for your life. And he does that partially by a dynamic interaction between you and him personally as to whether you are wise, whether you are circumspect, whether you are really thinking about the meaning of your life. I think of Abraham in Genesis 25, verses 7 and 8. It says there, this is the sum of the years of Abraham's life, which he lived 175 years, and then Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years. and was gathered to his people." Now isn't that precious? I find that extremely precious. Now why does it make that comment? It's because Abraham was a faithful man. A man of faith in God. A man who was circumspect in the way that he lived his life. He was careful about it. He walked closely with God. That's what I'm trying to show you here today. Look also at Proverbs chapter 10. Verses 27 and 28, it says, the fear of the Lord prolongs days, but the years of the wicked will be shortened. The hope of the righteous will be gladness, but the expectation of the wicked will perish. So as we think about these words, we see it's the fear of the Lord, which prolongs days. Now those days aren't any longer, like I've been saying, than what God has decreed that they shall be. But it's saying here that our fearing the Lord will cause us to live longer than we have expected that we should be able to live. Now you remember how when godly Job was going through his trial that he fully expected to die during his trial. but the hope of the righteous will be gladness. And so it says in Job 42 verse 12, now the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning. And verse 16, after this Job lived 140 years and saw his children and grandchildren for four generations. So Job died old and full of days. I find that again, very marvelous. In other words, God gave him gladness in those latter years of his life. Now, this is why I'm trying to show you that when you're going through a trial, because you have been walking circumspectly, as Job did, that you ought to do what David says in Psalm 55, verse 22, cast your burden on the Lord. and He will sustain you. He will never permit or suffer the righteous to be moved. But on the other hand, when a person does not fear the Lord and does not walk circumspectly but acts wickedly, then God can certainly take them to judgment earlier than what they anticipated. Psalm 55 verse 23, but you, O God, shall bring them down to the pit of destruction. Bloodthirsty and deceitful men shall not live out half their days, but I will trust in you. So when a righteous person trusts in the Lord and will walk circumspectly, he will delight greatly in God's commandments, as it says in Psalm 112, Verses 1 to 8, if you'll turn over there with me, you can follow me, and I'll read this for you. It's such a blessed passage. Psalm 112, 1 to 8. Praise the Lord. Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in his commandments. His descendants will be mighty on earth. A generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches will be in his house. and his righteousness endures forever. Unto the upright there arises light in the darkness. He is gracious and full of compassion and righteous. A good man deals graciously and lends. He will guide his affairs with discretion. Surely he will never be shaken. The righteous will be an everlasting remembrance. He will not be afraid of evil tidings. His heart is steadfast, trusting in the Lord. He will not be afraid until he sees his desire upon his enemies. He has dispersed abroad. He has given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. That's the second time I've read that today to you. But this is new. His horn will be exalted with honor. The wicked will see it and be grieved. He will gnash his teeth and melt away the desire of the wicked. shall perish. So to redeem the time, the righteous man should greatly delight in keeping God's commandments. And when you do this, the promise is that your descendants will be mighty on the earth. The generation of you, the upright person, will be blessed. Beloved, this is why we have Bible Club on Tuesday nights. Because we're teaching our children the Word of God and all the different little particulars of it, week by week, to raise them up to be a mighty generation in this next generation by God's grace, power, and His working. What a glorious thing it is. So let me ask you, if this is you, do you greatly delight in keeping God's commandments when you do this? The promise is that your descendants will be mighty on the earth, a generation of you, the upright person, will be blessed. Does this mean that you will never have opposition or persecution that will come to you or that you will always be rich? No, but it does mean that light will arise for you in the darkness It will mean that you will not be shaken and that you will be had an everlasting remembrance by God Himself. This is really amazing to think about, I think. So, I'm trying to show you, you will not be afraid of evil tidings because your heart will be steadfastly fixed upon your walking with your Lord and you won't turn to the right hand or to the left off of the path of righteousness. The days may be evil, but you will redeem the time. Well, let's pray together. Father, we thank you for this amazing passage of what it means to be circumspect and to redeem the time. We've talked about these things, but Lord help us. to live these things out in our lives. Help us to see that time is moving along, moving on, and we are too. And help us to live for you, for your glory, and to do all that we can to promote your kingdom, your righteousness, and your glory, and the gospel. May we be a living example to people around us, a living walking word to them of what it means to fear you, to love you, and to serve you. For we pray in your precious name, Lord Jesus, amen.