Eph-80-81 - Lesson 31 Pt-2- Ephesians 4: 25-32
Verse 29, King James says, Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. Here is a very hard verse because a lot of times, I believe, we as Christian believers, even the best of us, fall short in this verse. We do allow corrupt communication to proceed out of our mouth. The word ' corrupt ' in its intensity means ' putrid.' The word 'communication' is the word logos. And this is a figure of speech: hypocatastasis , which is a... the object given is compared to a main idea which is implied from the context. No corrupt - putrid, word - logos , which is likened to fruit. ' Corrupt' is ' putrid fruit.' When fruit becomes rotten, it' s putrid. That's the comparison. ' That which is good' is just the opposite; it' s profitable. It' s not putrid. And it' s profitable to the use of building up, edification. The building up in respect to the need of that believer. Some of the Greek texts read ' edifying of believing. ' And I think that' s right. We' re dealing here in this section with a born-again believer, or believers. I believe after I give you my literal here according to usage and the expanded one, you'll see the greatness of this verse 29. {Literal translation according to usage:}Let no impure word come out of your mouth, but that which is pleasing, building up the believers in order that it... in order that it... (your words) may give grace (God' s) to the hearing ones. Now look at that literal again. The reason we're to have no impure words coming out of our mouth, but only that which is pleasing because we're building up the believers in order that it (your words), my words, the words that I speak may give grace, what grace? The grace God gave us that we can show that same kind of grace to the hearing ones. Sometimes the rottenest stories you ever hear come from believers. The dirtiest stories you ever hear come from believers. This verse knocks that kind of crap r
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do to believers. Now we go to verse 28. King James says, Let him that stole steal not more: but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. And here again, is another great work that I believe should be in our research journal GMIR, Walter' s work on " Workers for God." It' s just tremendous where he... you know... he just goes into God' s men are called many things in the Word. They' re called: fellow workers, ministers, or servants, slaves, fellow slaves, partners, messengers, soldiers, fellow soldiers, athletes, fellow athletes, stewards, ambassadors, witnesses, all of those. And he covers them so beautifully. And I love very much how he covered the word ' slave,' because it' s a much stronger word than to be a minister, or to be a servant. It is to be one who is branded, marked out, sold out. And baby, from that