Ephesians 4:17 through 24 speak concerning the consciousness of the inner life, the sense or feeling of life. Verse 17 says, “This therefore I say and testify in the Lord, that you no longer walk as the Gentiles also walk in the vanity of their mind.” This verse mentions the vanity of the mind. Whatever is in the mind of the unbelievers is vain, an emptiness and vanity, in the eyes of God. Even the best thing that they think and consider in their minds is vain. It is a vanity of vanities. They walk in the vanity of their mind because in their mind they do not have God; they do not have Christ who is the reality.
Verse 18 says, “Being darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance which is in them, because of the hardness of their heart.” After speaking of the mind, this portion speaks of the understanding. When the mind is filled with vanity, the understanding is darkened. That they are alienated from the life of God means that they do not have the life of God; they are cut off from the life of God. This means that they do not have the sense of the life of God, the consciousness from the life of God. This verse also mentions ignorance. This ignorance, this foolishness without knowledge, is due to the hardness of the heart. In these verses we have the mind with vanity, the darkened understanding, and the hardened heart. We should pay attention to the order here. First the mind is full of vanity; then the understanding is darkened because of the hardness of the heart. This proves that they have nothing to do with the life of God. They are alienated, cut off, from the life of God.
We need one or two messages for each of these matters, which are all related to the inner life. In order to learn the inner life, we must know all these things. If I had the time, I would like to sit with you once or twice a day to talk about all these matters from the New Testament teachings. These things have been lost in today’s Christianity. We may have been Christians for many years and may have listened to many messages from the pulpit, but we may not have heard a message about these matters. What is the vanity of the mind? What is the darkened understanding? And what is alienation from the life of God due to the hardness of the heart? I am sorry to say that in today’s Christianity no one stands up to teach the Lord’s people about these things.
Verse 19 begins, “Who, being past feeling.” This verse speaks of feeling. Do not think that the feeling, or consciousness, of life is a term invented by us. No, this is something we have discovered in the Word of God. Darby’s New Translation renders this phrase as “having cast off all feeling,” while the Interlinear Greek-English New Testament renders it as “having ceased to care.” Those who have vanity in their mind, whose understanding is darkened, and whose heart is fully hardened have cast off all feeling, and they no longer care. They give up all care for the feeling.
Verse 19 continues, “Have given themselves over to lasciviousness to work all uncleanness in greediness.” Because they cast off all feeling, they give themselves over. In Ephesians Paul exhausted his vocabulary, using all the words he could use. We should pay attention, however, to the matter of the feeling. The Gentiles’ minds are full of vanity, their understanding is darkened, and their heart is hardened because they cast off all feeling; they do not care for the feeling.
This is the description of the Gentiles. However, verse 20 says, “But you did not so learn Christ.” We have learned Christ not in the way of casting off all feeling but in the way of caring for all feeling. Then verses 21 through 23 say, “If indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him as the reality is in Jesus, that you put off, as regards your former manner of life, the old man, which is being corrupted according to the lusts of the deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind.” Verse 24 goes on to speak of putting on the new man. Putting off the old man and putting on the new man depend on the spirit of the mind. What then is the spirit of the mind, and how can we know the spirit of our mind? By all these verses we must conclude that in order to know the spirit of our mind we must know the inner consciousness of life. It is by the inner consciousness of life, the inner, deeper feeling of life, that we know the spirit of our mind. Without this inner feeling, consciousness, and sense of life, how can we know the spirit of our mind? If we read these verses carefully, we will conclude from the context that there must be a consciousness, a feeling, a deeper sense within us by which we are able to know the spirit of our mind.
This passage presents a contrast between the Gentiles and the Christians. The Gentiles cast off all feeling, but as Christians we take care of the inner feeling. It is by this inner feeling that we know the spirit of our mind. Then we are able to realize the putting off of the old man and the putting on of the new man.
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