Don’t Substitute the World For …
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. And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God. – Ephesians 5:8-21 NKJV.
Don’t substitute the world for what? Don’t substitute the world for the Kingdom of God!
Some of us who are older remember the TV show “Cheers” which ran from 1982 to 1993. For those who have never heard of it the show takes place in a bar. A few lines from the theme song is descriptive of what took place in that bar and in a lot of bars:
Sometimes you wanna go
Where everybody knows your name
And they’re always glad you came
You wanna be where you can see
Our troubles are all the same
You wanna be where everybody knows your name
Basically, the culture of bars revolves around the familiarity of those who frequent the establishment with each other along with drinking alcohol.
Ephesians 5:18 gives us one way that this is a substitution of the world for the Kingdom of God. Getting drunk on alcohol is a substitution for being filled with the Holy Spirit. Have you ever been filled with the Holy Spirit? If you have you know it is a far greater high than any alcohol or drug can possibly give you!
Another substitution of the world is having fellowship with as Ephesians 5:11 puts it: …the unfruitful works of darkness. Hebrews 10:24-25 tells us what we ought to be doing instead of going to bars which is the world’s substitution for church: And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.
If you have been substituting the world for the Kingdom of God you are told what to do there in Ephesians 5:14:
Awake, you who sleep,
Arise from the dead,
And Christ will give you light.