Today we come to the final section of chapter 13.
Romans 13:11–14
11 Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
Paul concludes this section with a final call to remember the time, the era, they are in. The NIV I think translates this more clearly: "And do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber." The "this" is likely referring to everything Paul has said about living a sacrificial life in 12:3-13:10. By "sleep" he is likely referring to the moral malaise of people generally in their culture.
He seems to be referring to a future salvation that is currently here in part. This is almost certainly the return of Jesus that Paul is looking ahead to as the completion of his kingdom. This is what he means by "salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed." In verse 12 the ESV translates the word prokoptō as "far gone". The NIV translates the word "nearly over". The idea of this word is to move forward to a final stage or to progress or improve. The ESV translations leads us to believe the time is over. That seems to be a little strong.
I talk about this often, but remember there are four eras of redemption history: creation, fall, redemption and restoration. Paul is saying here that we exist in the era between the redemption brought by Jesus in his first coming and the final restoration at his second coming. Believers living in this era of the church live in the already-not yet tension of God's kingdom coming but not yet in full. The Lord's return is imminent so Christians must always be ready, living as Jesus called us to.
So, as the darkness fades away we must live as we are in the light. To do so we must put on the armor of light and clothe ourselves with the Lord Jesus. Paul uses this language often to describe the Christian way of life (see Col. 3:12 and Eph. 6:10-20). He tells us to "walk properly as in the daytime". This means we ought to live our lives with nothing to hide, faithfully following the way of Jesus. This he illustrates with sinful activities that normally occur at night and were very common in the Roman world: orgies, drunkenness, sexual immorality and sensuality. Then he kinda pulls a fast one on his readers and lumps quarreling and jealousy in with the others. The Roman house churches likely had problems with all of these vices. Practicing these vices then are walking in darkness, not in the light; they are the result of conformity to this age, not the transformation and mind restoration in Jesus.
So Paul has now grounded our way of living as Christians in God's mercy that he has shown us in salvation and here in the future hope that we have of Christ's return. So how we interact with one another in the church and the broader community around us, including governing authorities, is incredibly important in the Christian life. It is the outworking of our bodies being surrendered to God and transformed by Jesus and it is the result of our future hope in Jesus' imminent return.
Additional Content
The images in this clip from the Lord of the Rings I think really illustrates the idea Paul is getting at with the imagery of the night passing away and the dawn breaking. It's more than a little cheesy, I know, especially without watching the whole movie. But humor my nerdy, epic story side for a moment and check out this clip.
The image really comes in at 2:10 so if you want to skip the cheesy lines go ahead to 2:10.
Reflection
For today, imagine the picture that Paul paints for us here. The night is passing away, dawn is breaking. Participation in the vices he mentions here indicates we are still living in the darkness of the night. Imagine yourself putting on Christ like you would clothing. Wearing Christ now, you are walking in the light of the morning sun and living his way because of his great mercies to us and awaiting his imminent return.