<p>4:5 <em>Walk in wisdom toward those that are without, redeeming the time</em>- In a preaching context, Paul tells us to &quot;redeem the time&quot;, or &quot;be buying up the opportunity&quot; (Col. 4:5 RVmg.); we are to urgently snap up every opportunity to preach. And walking wisely towards those &quot;without&quot; is a way of witnessing to them. Closer analysis of &quot;redeeming the time&quot; reveals that this is in fact a quotation from the LXX of Dan. 2:8, where Nebuchadnezzar tells the wise men that they want to 'redeem the time, because you know that the decree for their execution is gone from me'. There are other allusions in Col. 4 to Daniel: captivity, earnest prayer, thanksgiving, making manifest wisdom to the world as we ought to, walking in wisdom in the eyes of the world. Daniel and his friends urgently devoted every moment of their lives to prayer in order to redeem time, so that they would be delivered; and Paul took as it were a snapshot of their frantic urgency, and applies it to each of us, also living in Babylon. &quot;The days are evil&quot;, the world around us is insidious- and therefore we must redeem the time from it (Eph. 5:16). Or it could be that 'the evil days' refers to the great and special day of evil, at the second coming (Eph. 6:13, in context; Ps. 37:29). In view of the coming of that day and the judgment it will bring, we ought to have a deep sense of the future we might miss, and the urgency of our present position; and devote ourselves therefore to redeeming the time. The sure coming of that day is an exhortation to the believer, &quot;that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles... for we shall give account to him that is ready to judge&quot; (1 Pet. 4:2-5). Peter's message is that there's no need to spend time living as the world does, tickling the desires of our nature- for we already spent enough of our time doing that. We are men and women living under judgment, and therefore should devote our lives to the service of God's will.</p>