The day's almost here, wear the armour of light
Text Romans 13:12 Time 29/12/13 Place Childs Hill Baptist Church
We
are at the end of another year, the year 2013, and near the beginning
of another new year, 2014. It is a time for reflecting on the past
and making plans for the future. One way for us to prepare for the
year ahead is to take a Bible text and consider it together. It can
be a sort of motto text for us in the year ahead. It would be a good
idea for us all to try to learn it.
The
verse I want to draw your attention to is Romans 13:12
The
night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the
deeds of darkness and put on the armour of light.
There are at least two pictures here then. First, let's think of
night and day, the light of day and the darkness of night. Then at
the end of the verse there is the reference to the armour
of light. Armour
has changed down the centuries but it has certain typical qualities –
a breastplate, a helmet, a shield, etc.
At
this point in Romans Paul has moved from the part of his letter where
he deals chiefly with doctrine or creed to the part where he deals
with duty or conduct.
The teaching on belief occupies chapters 1-11. In Chapter 12 he
begins on behaviour. The chapter begins by speaking about our
relationship with God and the need to be willing
to be a living sacrifice and to have our minds renewed. Further, to
view our own selves with great humility, soberness and faith. It
moves on to our relationship with one
another which should be marked by love and faithfulness, sympathy and
kindness. Thirdly, we come to our relationship with outsiders, which
must be marked by meekness, integrity, peaceableness, patience,
kindness and persistence in doing good.
As
we come into Chapter 13 Paul speaks of the need to submit
... to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except
that which God has established. He
concludes in verse 7
Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if
revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honour, then
honour.
This
leads into a short section on the law that calls for all
to love one another, that
being a way of summing up the law, Love
your neighbour as yourself. As
he says
Love does no harm to its neighbour. Therefore love is the fulfilment
of the law.
Romans
13:11-14 gives a very strong argument as to why such things must
become a priority for us – why we must give ourselves up to
pursuing such ends and not only those ends but others like it. Paul
says (11a) And
do this, understanding the present time.
Jesus spoke of people in his day who would look at the sky at night
and say ‘Oh the sky is red – it will be fine tomorrow’ or at
the sky in the morning and say ‘Oh, the sky is red it will be
stormy today’. They knew how to read the weather but not the time
in which they were. May be you’re like that. If I ask you the time
you can look at your watch and tell me. If I ask you the season you
have no hesitation in telling me it is winter but if I ask whether
you understand the time in the sense of knowing where we are, our
place in history, you do not know. It ought not to be like that.
It
is time for believers to wake up and see that their salvation
is nearer now than when we first believed. As
Paul says in verse 12 The
night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the
deeds of darkness and put on the armour of light.
Let's focus on that one verse and think about it. We want to say five main
things.
It
is clear from the way that Paul speaks that he would characterise the
time in which he was living as the night time, the time of darkness.
If that was the case then, it is still the case now. Darkness stands
for ignorance and wickedness and we live in a world of ignorance and
wickedness. At the beginning of this letter Paul describes the pagan
world of his day and it is not very different to what we see in our
society today.
29-32
They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed
and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and
malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant
and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their
parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although
they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things
deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but
also approve of those who practise them.
There
was a time I think when there were great hopes of somehow escaping
the darkness of ignorance and wickedness. At the beginning of the
twentieth
century, for example, that was a great hope. But what happened? By
now everyone goes to school and more people go to university than
ever before and yet not only is there still a lot of ignorance but
the moral climate has clearly deteriorated.
We
often hear the compliant that children are coming out of school
unable to read and write. A 2010 study by Sheffield University
academics, for example, claimed that 17
% of 16-19 year olds across the country are functionally illiterate,
meaning they can understand only the simplest text. “This
is less than the functional literacy needed to partake fully in
employment, family life and citizenship and to enjoy reading for its
own sake,” the authors said. And if we ask how many 16-19 year olds
know anything about the gospel or what the Bible says we would find
even greater darkness.
The
moral darkness is currently growing at a rapid rate. At the resent we
have over 84,000 people in prison and many awaiting trial. Pick up a
newspaper and read of the appalling acts of sexual abuse, rape and
murder that go on every day. Think of what is going on in Syria and
in Afghanistan and the Congo and other places. Think of North Korea.
We are in a dark world.
Now this is not the only thing the Bible says about this world that
it is in darkness but it does say that the
whole world is under the control of the evil one and
we ought to remember that and not be surprised when we see what
wickedness there is.
2. Be encouraged that the night is nearly over
So
that's the first thing to get but see what Paul says in its context.
His point is that The
night is nearly over. This
ignorance and wickedness is about to disappear. It is not going to
last. But isn't this just hopeless optimism. Why should Paul believe
such a thing? What evidence is there for it? Things seem to be
getting worse rather than better and certainly if you consider the
history of the world from then until now then there seems to be no
sign that The
night is nearly over.
It
is often said that the darkest time is just before dawn and certainly
we cannot take the increasing darkness as a sign that the night is
not nearly over. Paul always believed that this world has a limited
time span. The God who created it is the God who is going to bring it
to an end. When that day dawns then night is over. We ought to
believe that too.
But what about this word nearly
you
say to me. If Paul thought it was nearly over then and you are saying
it is still night time now, 2000 years later, what does nearly
mean. Some want to say Paul just made a mistake he thought the night
would be over in is life time but he was wrong. Rather I think it is
to do with the way God sees time. We have often mentioned that verse
in Peter that says that with God a thousand years is like a day and a
day like a thousand years. The word
nearly
here means that in what in God's eyes is only a short time the night
will be over. Think of the difference between a four year old and
an 80 year old. The four year old is waiting for Christmas and it
will take ages until it comes around again next year. For the 80 year
old he hopes he will be alive next Christmas and he knows it will
come around quicker than ever. It is the same length of time but the
perspectives are different. Now we need to get a God perspective on
things. It won't be long. The end of night is near – the end of
ignorance, the end of wickedness, the end of sickness and sorrow and
death too.
One
of the Radio 2 DJs plays a theme song an old Guy Lombardo thing. It
begins
You work and work for years and years, you're always on the go
You never take a minute off, too busy makin' dough
Someday you say, you'll have your fun, when you're a millionaire
Imagine all the fun you'll have in your old rockin' chair
Enjoy yourself, it's later than you think, enjoy yourself, while you're still in the pink
The years go by, as quickly as a wink, Enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself, it's later than you think
It's quite a worldly song but the line it's later than you think is spot on. Sometimes we're tempted to despair at all that's wrong in this world. However, it's later than we think. Soon night will be over.
You work and work for years and years, you're always on the go
You never take a minute off, too busy makin' dough
Someday you say, you'll have your fun, when you're a millionaire
Imagine all the fun you'll have in your old rockin' chair
Enjoy yourself, it's later than you think, enjoy yourself, while you're still in the pink
The years go by, as quickly as a wink, Enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself, it's later than you think
It's quite a worldly song but the line it's later than you think is spot on. Sometimes we're tempted to despair at all that's wrong in this world. However, it's later than we think. Soon night will be over.
Think of a night of pain you may have had with toothache or earache
or something. It came to an end didn't it? It doesn't seem long now.
That's how it will be.
3. Be encouraged that the day is almost here
The
night is nearly over; the day is almost here. The
day, of course, is the day of judgement, the day when every injustice
will be put right, when there will be punishment for all the
wickedness perpetrated in this world. There will be no ignorance
then. Everything will be out in the open. Today you grow up like I
did enjoying Jimmy Savile presenting Top of the Pops and watching
It's a Knockout with Stuart Hall commenting. You listen to Gary
Glitter, you watch the Rolf Harris show. You have no idea that such
men could be guilty of the crimes against children that they have
been accused of. On that day it will all be out in the open. There
are a lot more surprises to come no doubt. On that day Jesus Christ
will come in power and in glory and an eternal day will dawn for all
who have put their trust in him. The fact is a terror for those who
do not believe. What a dreadful day it will be for them. But for we
who believe, what a glorious prospect. Trust in Christ now. He's
coming soon.
4.
So let's put aside the deeds of darkness
The
verse contains an application
The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside
the deeds of darkness and put on the armour of light. The
negative first – we must put
aside the deeds of darkness. What
are the deeds of darkness? He gives example in verse 13 Let
us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness,
not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and
jealousy. We
need to carefully root out of our lives any hint of carousing and
drunkenness, of sexual immorality and
debauchery, of
dissentiousness and
jealousy.
We
are coming to a new year. It is a good time for reflection on the
past and making fresh resolves for the future. What about alcohol and
other drugs. It is an extreme view that says I will not drink tea or
coffee or use pain killers or alcohol. Such good things are there for
our use. Drink wine, if you wish, drink tea and coffee, take a
painkiller if you have a headache. I heard an interview with the
flautist James Galway and his wife over the holidays. He smokes one
cigar a month. That is no orgy and it is the sort of moderation
appropriate for a serious woodwind player. We too must show
moderation. Let's take care over sexual morality – be careful in
all your interaction with others. If you use a computer, read a
newspaper or watch TV be very careful. Let's be resolved this year to
do what we can to be less argumentative and more loving towards
others. Let's never be jealous. Let's turn from all out sins. Let's
run from the darkness.
On
the positive side he says
and put on the armour of light. It
is a wonderful picture. On the one hand there is darkness all around
but then look there are these knights in armour, in shining armour,
in luminous glowing armour. What us this armour? In 1 Thessalonians
5:8 Paul says briefly since
we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a
breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. Faith,
hope and love are vital. We must really work at developing each of
these in our lives – greater faith, more hopefulness and increased
love to God and man in 2014. Of course, in Ephesians 6 he really
develops the idea and speaks of the
full armour of God. He
speaks of standing
with
the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of
righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness
that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, he
adds take
up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming
arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of
the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all
occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.
Here
in Romans he simply says clothe
yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to
gratify the desires of the sinful nature.
Truthfulness, righteous living, readiness to live and share the
gospel, ever increasing faith in Christ, looking to God for
salvation, immersing yourself in the Bible, praying always – these
are the things that should characterise us.
So
here's your memory verse The
night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the
deeds of darkness and put on the armour of light. There
is the fact that The
night is nearly over; the day is almost here. There
is the command to put
aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armour of light. Let's
do it.
