wisdom" (1: 17). Walking in a world of spiritual darkness that knows not the Saviour nor

the Truth, how wise we need to be! Some Christian's walk may not be actually sinful,

but it can be very unwise, and what problems this can cause! "Walk in wisdom toward

them that are without" Paul urges in Col. 4: 5.

Not only this, but we should "redeem the time" or more understandably "buy up the

opportunity" for Christian witness, because the days are evil and this is the only adequate

antidote. This means we have to be wide awake and on the alert all the while not to miss

opportunities that present themselves.  How sad it is when we only recognize an

opportunity for witness by its back! The times cry out for those who are bold enough to

show Whose they are and Whom they serve. If we do this then we shall certainly be

among those whom verse 17 describes as "understanding what the will of the Lord is".

The Apostle continues:

Over indulgence in wine which leads to drunkenness is to be shunned. Rather than

being filled with what would intoxicate, let the filling be by the Spirit of God. The last

phrase has often been misunderstood and interpreted as though this is Pentecost repeated

with all its miraculous evidential gifts. The parallel passage in Colossians makes it quite

clear with what the believer is filled. "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all

wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual

songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord" (Col. 3: 16). The Lord Jesus had

said concerning the Holy Spirit: "He shall glorify me: for He shall receive of Mine, and

shall show it unto you" (John 16: 14). There can be no doubt that when the believer is

filled with all that pertains to the ascended Christ, this is accomplished through the work

of the Filler, the Holy Spirit, and it should be a continuous experience, as the present

tense is used. The original does not say "Become full of the Spirit" as some think.

Rotherham renders it literally "But be getting filled in Spirit", which does not describe a

mighty upheaval in the senses, but an uplifting of Christ as Saviour, Lord and Head in the

renewed mind of the believer through the operation of the Spirit of God, leading to the

praise described in verse 19, "psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs".  Psalms almost

certainly point to the O.T. Psalter, but the difficulty for a number of the Lord's people is

finding an acceptable and easy way of singing the prose of the Authorized or Revised

Versions. The Anglican chant, used properly, comes the nearest to this. The metrical

versions, as used in Scotland, often gets too far away from the original to be used as a

translation, and is but a paraphrase of the Hebrew. It is not so easy to identify "hymns

and spiritual songs". There is evidence from the early centuries that Christians praised

God in singing, but we have no exact knowledge of the forms this took. We have a

record of Paul himself singing hymns and that in the most unlikely circumstances, after

he had been cruelly beaten and thrown into the Philippian gaol (Acts 16: 23-25).

A praising heart will be the more easy when we constantly remember how much we

owe to the Lord for His vast redeeming love and providential goodness: