We begin our study in Ephesians chapter 4, verse 1 where the Apostle Paul writes: "I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called."
In keeping with our wartime theme, here is where we are drafted into God’s army. We are called into service with the divine calling of God. We receive a call more powerful than the draft. You can dodge the draft, but you can’t refuse the call of God.
After the induction ceremony, our first command is to walk in a manner worthy of His calling. Wow. No pressure, right? Here’s where the changes begin. How many of you noticed immediate changes in your life when you answered His call?
Along with the gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ, we took on a responsibility to honor God with our lives. As members of the church, we must always work towards perfecting our walk. We must always assume that someone is watching us, because in case you haven’t noticed, if you proclaim to be a Christian, you are being watched! And not just by your bothers and sisters in Christ.
Non believers will watch you even closer. They love it when they see a Christian fall. The greatest deterrent people cite for not going to church is hypocrisy they’ve witnessed. A Christian man that goes to church on Sunday should not be found at a strip bar on Friday.
One of my favorite quotes is “Preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary use words.” We send a greater message with our actions than our words could ever convey.
Let's move on to verses 2 and 3:
“with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
Now that we know how important our walk is, through the Apostle Paul, God is going to give us specific instruction on how to perfect our walk in verse 2. Humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness and love. These are all character traits that we receive vertically from God through His Son, Jesus. Our responsibility as believers is to bend these traits outward horizontally to our fellow man.
These may not be the first character traits you would expect to find in a strong soldier, but they are certainly foundational characteristics of a strong Christian man. To some this list might seem passive and anything but strong. But we know that Christ possessed these qualities, and I doubt any of us would say Christ was a weak man, right?
First on the list is humility. Biblically, the definition as used in this text is lowliness, or lowliness of mind. We are no greater than our brothers or sisters. We do not deserve the riches of God’s grace.
In basic combat training, they begin by breaking you down. Making you humble. You can’t be teachable if you already know everything.
Patience and forgiveness. Matthew 6:12 “forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors”. God forgives our debts (our sins) unconditionally. We therefore must forgive those who sin against us unconditionally.
Before we can extend humility, gentleness, patience and forgiveness to others we must first fully understand and appreciate the magnitude of God’s grace. Once we fully understand the richness and fullness of His Grace to us, then and only then we can take that vertical application of love and grace and bend it outwards horizontally towards others.
Now on to verse 3 “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
Who has heard the saying “Together we stand, divided we fall”? This saying is based on verse 3:25 in the Gospel of Mark. “And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.” A lone soldier is of little value in battle. Our strength comes in numbers. We are more effective when we operate as a team, united together with a common goal.
If we look up the Greek meaning for “bond” in this verse, we find it means “ligaments by which the members of the human body are united together”.
The members of the human body this verse refers to is the church and the bond that holds us together is the Holy Spirit.
We must all be united as one with the Holy Sprit within us leading the charge. Without ligaments, the human body will collapse. We are no longer united as one body, but rather we are operating as individuals without the Spirit to guide us.
When a wolf looks out over a flock of sheep, does he look to attack the flock gathered together under the protection of the shepherd? No, he looks for the one sheep that has wandered away from the flock. Alone and without support of others, the lone sheep is no match for the wolf. Once we stop thinking as a church united in Christ and begin thinking as an individual, we abandon our team and we become easy prey to be devoured by Satan.
We are "eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace". Did we establish the peace? No, God did. Our job then is to maintain the peace that God established.
Verses 4 thru 6: “There is one body and one Spirit – just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call – one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”
Who is the one body? The church.
Who is the one Spirit? God / Holy Spirit.
What is the one hope? Hope in eternal life through Christ.
What is the one faith? Faith alone in Christ as our Lord and savior.
Christians represent many different churches. Each church has a Pastor that leads his congregation. Each church has an Elder Board that governs the church and insures doctrines are upheld as well as administer church discipline when needed. But all of us ultimately answer to only one authority.
There is only one God. We only serve one master. All branches of the military answer to one final authority, the Commander in Chief. In our battle against Satan, our Commander in Chief is God. He commands us. There must be a clear and precise chain of command for soldiers to follow or else there is confusion. Confusion causes us to lose our way, and once we are lost, we are soon defeated.
Our Father in Heaven is a God of order. He does not waiver. He does not change His mind. He never makes mistakes. He will lead us into battle with confidence that we will ultimately prevail against the evil that attacks us.
Moving on to verses 11 thru 14: “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.”
God doesn’t expect us to enter into battle without proper training. He gives us pastors, elders and ministry leaders within our churches to teach and train us for ministry. He gives us the Holy Spirit to be our internal compass to insure we’re always pointing towards God.
The Spirit also blesses us with our own special gifts. Some of us have the gift of evangelism. Some of us are lead to teaching. Some of us are shepherds and ministry leaders. Some of us are gifted with the ability to exhort others to excellence. Our spiritual gifts are not for our personal enjoyment.
Matthew 5:14 - 16 explains it like this. "You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven."
God wants us to share our gifts with others. Don’t keep your lantern under the table. Don’t be selfish with your gifts. Share them and do your part. Building up the body of Christ is a team effort, and you’re part of the team.
So how long is our basic training period? How do we know when we’re fully equipped? Verse 13 tells us that we continue to build up the body of Christ “…until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ ...”
Who are some of the leading theologians of our time? John MacArthur, R.C. Sproul, John Piper are a few of my favorites. Do you think any of them would say that they are fully equipped? That they have attained unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ?
We are constantly building up the body of Christ. We don’t stop building until He calls us home because there is no way we can ever measure up to the stature of the fullness of Christ. Notice the verse also says until we ALL attain to the unity. If our brother is not growing we reach down and lift him up. Just like a soldier never leaves a man behind, we too must look out for our weaker brothers, helping to build them up.
God doesn’t want us to remain children in our faith. Why? Verse 14 tells us why: “so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.”
Children are fed milk. In Hebrews 5:12 - 14 the author writes “…you need someone to teach you …the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.”
Do any of your kids have an Adventure Bible? My kids love the Adventure Bible. It breaks Scripture down into Bible stories that they can easily wrap their heads around and enjoy. Is it an adequate substitute for a Bible? No.
As a child they are learning the basic principles of the oracles (or divine revelations) of God. They’re getting the milk. They aren’t ready yet for the meat of Scripture. As children, they do not yet have the discernment needed to distinguish good from evil.
Ephesians 4:14 warns us not to be “… carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.” What do you think Paul is describing here?
“Cunning” in this verse is translated from the Greek word which means “dice playing”. It is intended as a metaphor for deception and cheating. “Craftiness” is translated from the Greek word which means “false wisdom”.
We must mature in our faith and righteousness so that we can use discernment to identify false teaching. We’ll talk more about false teaching when we get to chapter 5.
No comments:
Post a Comment