¹³ Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. ¹⁴ But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.

Deeds of darkness we should lay aside, verse 12 reads. What are those deeds? Not one to leave things vague, Paul does not shrink back from listing specifics. The culture of the 21^st century does not have a corner on immorality, as though our times are worse than all others. Roman times (and Greek times before that) all had their descent into the worst forms of immorality, all of which are familiar to our times. Point blank, Paul names them and says to make no room for them at all.

The best protection against weeds for a well-manicured lawn is healthy grass, which will tend to crowd out the weeds. So also we should crowd out (make no provision for) sinful activities as we put on the armor of light (vs. 12) and behave properly (this is a positive activity). We should be about doing the right things, which makes less room for the bad things.

This list of bad things almost seems mundane and stereotypical of religious “do’s and don’ts” in our day, but it is no less destructive than in the days of Paul. These activities appeal to “the flesh,” here meaning our more base, animalistic side. “Carousing” refers to excessive feasting or even orgy. The connection with drunkenness and sexual immorality certainly gives it that connotation. Many today live for the partying. One thinks of college students away from home for the first time, caught up in excessive drinking and sexual free-for-all. Much of the world lives for this, whether through personal involvement or vicariously through movies or Internet viewing.

Indeed, our generation today is the generation of visual experience and self-gratification. Image is everything as we view the world and want the world to view us. But animal pleasure is the personal experience people most desire. People now enjoy any kind of relational sex they desire or self-identify with. Sexual boundaries have been removed, whileand at the same time God has been rejected. Does this not remind us of Roman 1:26, “God gave them over to degrading passions …”? Yet strife and jealousy, those destroyers of community, have fallen prey to the quest for personal fulfillment.

Christians should so live their lives as those who have “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” We should eat, sleep, walk, work and play as though wearing a set of clothes named “Jesus Christ.” In everything we do, the justified Christian life should be all about Jesus. This will leave little room for sinful indulgences.

Lord, today I put on the Lord Jesus Christ as my life’s clothing.