Past Feeling - Pastor Stacey Shiflett
- Pastor Shiflett
- May 7
- 4 min read
Past Feeling
Ephesians 4:19 Who being past feeling…
Intro: Verse 17 sets the tone for the following verses.
A. The Counsel of the Man of God – This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord…
The word “therefore” is referring to the previous verses, vs. 11-16.
B. The Command to the People of God – …that ye henceforth walk not
God’s people are supposed to walk differently!!
C. The Comparison to the Enemies of God – …as other Gentiles walk…
The question of the hour is this – can a child of God walk like an unbeliever? Absolutely!!
Galatians 5
· 14 For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
· 15 But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.
· 16 This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.
· 17 For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.
Romans 8
· 4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
· 5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.
· 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
· 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
· 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
The phrase that I want to focus on in these verses is “BEING PAST FEELING.”
>>> PAST FEELING: to cease to feel pain or grief; cease to feel pain at; to become callous, insensible to pain, apathetic
A. The unsaved get PAST FEELING for several reasons.
1. They are lost; dead in trespasses and sins.
2. They reject truth over and over again.
ILLUSTRATION: Judas Iscariot was past feeling.
How else do you walk out of the upper room and go sell the Savior?
How else can you betray the Son of God after all you had seen and done?
B. The saved can get PAST FEELING the same way the unsaved do; by rejecting truth.
Walking in disobedience. – vs. 17.
Vain walk; vain thoughts; vain ideas and logic and reasoning and excuses.
Being “past feeling” has some serious side effects.
Becoming desensitized and numb to reality is a dangerous thing.
The results of becoming calloused can be very costly.
Being Past Feeling will produce…
I. Darkness
No less than four times, we find reference to ignorance.
· 17 …in the vanity of their mind…
· 18 Having the understanding darkened…
· 18 …through the ignorance that is in them
· 18 …because of the blindness of their heart:
When people get out of God’s will, they get stupid.
Sin will make you stupid!
They will make ignorant decisions.
They will say ignorant things. They will make ignorant excuses.
Their mind and understanding is darkened.
Being Past Feeling will produce…
II. Distance – “…being alienated from the life of God…”
· John 10:10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
ILLUSTRATION: The prodigal son made some foolish decisions and look at the distance it put between him and his father.
He ended up in a FAR country.
He was a LONG WAY from the life that his father had planned and provided for him.
You can get backslid and become alienated from the life of God.
The most miserable existence known to man is being alienated from the life of God.
Being Past Feeling will produce…
III. Disobedience
· 19 Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
The callousness and numbness will cause you to “give yourself over” to sin.
The word GIVEN OVER in verse 19 is the same Greek word for “betray”.
After you betray the Lord, then you betray yourself!
When you get past feelings, you do things that make your own life difficult.
· Proverbs 13:15 Good understanding giveth favour: but the way of transgressors is hard.
When you betray the Lord, you betray yourself.
Then you betray your family; your church; your testimony; everything and everybody.
LASCIVIOUSNESS: unbridled lust, excess, licentiousness, lasciviousness, wantonness, outrageousness, shamelessness, insolence
· 1 Peter 4:3 For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries:
Conclusion: But the Child of God has no excuse or reason to walk as other Gentiles walk.
So how do we keep from becoming PAST FEELING?
How do we walk different from the unsaved, unbelievers that are PAST FEELING?
A. Remember – vs. 20, 21
· 20 But ye have not so learned Christ;
· 21 If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:
B. Remove – vs. 22
· 22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;
C. Renew – vs. 23
· 23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;
D. Replace – vs. 24
· 24 And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
