Well, the premier illustration in Scripture of the Christian
life comes in Psalm 1. And Psalm 1 is at the beginning
of the Psalms for a reason. Because this, this image is
there. It's, it's the gateway into the
rest of the Psalms and everything flows from it.
It pronounces a man or a woman of God blessed, who walks worthy
of his or her calling, and who walks not on the counsel of the
wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of
scoffers. But his delight is on the law of
God, and on it he or she meditates day and night.
And with that to the one who walks worthy, the metaphor that
describes him or her is the metaphor of a tree.
You shall be like a tree near planted by a stream, which in
its season yields its fruit, and its leaf doesn't wither.
And all that he does will prosper.
And it's a tree, A strong tree. Rooted, meaning you're mature
and you're grounded, like a watered garden planted near a
stream, perfectly nourished. You're stable.
It means you're providing support for all that are around
you, dependability and a source of constancy.
It's a tree because it's a living metaphor.
You're alive, increasing in fruitfulness, you're growing,
becoming more and more effective, even building on it.
It says you are fruit bearing, a source of blessing and energy
and service to everyone among you.
I want you to consider for a second in this metaphor,
consider a a fig tree and remember that this is a mighty
tree, and this is what you are imaging.
Its roots are up to 100 feet deep, giving stability in harsh
climates and allowing it to flourish while other trees are
dying. And it fruits continually the
the the fig tree fruits over and over and over again.
So while others have ceased being fruitful, this one
provides ongoing nourishment and they fruit in dry seasons when
nothing else is fruitful. It's SAP is medicinal.
There's medicine literally coursing through its bark.
It's wide canopy provides shade for birds and for livestock and
for men. I think of Philip and John 1
when he's sitting under the shade of a fig tree, when the
Lord calls him and scripture says it's an image of
fruitfulness, vitality, blessing, safety and rest.
Scripture says this is the image of the faithful Christian.
You are declared to be blessed and God reveals in Ephesians, in
the New Testament, if you want to begin to turn there, that
this kind of vitality, this kind of light in the midst of
darkness and life, in the midst of death and preservation, in
the midst of putrefaction, it doesn't happen naturally.
If you, if left to your own way, you will not produce this kind
of fruitfulness. It takes supernatural effort and
it doesn't happen by accident. It's Ephesians says in chapters
one to three, it takes part, it takes effort by God, and this
effort began an eternity past. It says that you were elected
and predestinated by God the Father.
You were predestined under unto adoption as sons, predestined
unto sonship. It was through the sacrificial
act of redemption which was accomplished by Jesus Christ the
Son. It was blood bought, and it's
according to the application of the power and the wisdom of God
by His Holy Spirit from everlasting to everlasting.
God has been working out your fruitfulness.
His effort. Again, hear the words of Psalm
1. He shall be like a tree that
grows. You're planted by a stream.
If your delight is in the law of God, you shall be like unto this
great tree, the image of a flourishing life.
And it takes effort on God. It also takes effort on the part
of the individual. That's what we're going to get
into as we look into Ephesians 4.
Paul's going to say, make every effort with eagerness to walk
worthy. And what does this metaphor of a
tree with its canopy and its roots, what does this kind of
fruitfulness look like in practice?
What does it look like in reality?
And the answer is it looks like Ephesians chapters 4 to 6.
This is what it looks like to the faithful application of
Christian doctrine. This is what it looks like in
practice. Hudson preached last week and he
he quoted Abraham Kuyper, one of the most famous quotes in
history, where Kuyper says there's not a square inch of
this universe over which God does not declare mine.
And as you look now to your Christian life and your
Christian ministry, there is no square inch of you in your life
and your ministry where God doesn't say the same thing.
He's making all things new. He's working it all out in your
life, which means how you control your anger, and which
means how you interact with your coworkers and even specifically
how you joke around with your friends.
The kinds of language that you use, your interpersonal
communication, your work ethic, how you order your household,
your interaction with your parents, your relationship with
them, your prayer life. It's all part of His dominion
and it's coming in these next chapters.
He's he's taken the time in Ephesians one to three to build
the foundation, a theological foundation for you and your life
and your ministry. And in chapters 4 to 6, he's
establishing your life on that foundation.
This is how you are to build and we're transitioning this morning
into a, a new section of the book where Paul's going to begin
to apply all of the principles that he's already worked out.
This is the ethical application of all the doctrine that's come
before. And this is kind of typical of
Paul. If you read Paul, if you study
Paul, he, he works out all of this rich theology and doctrine.
And then there's a transition where he says we're not moving
beyond doctrine, but we're now focusing and applying everything
that we've learned to the tangibles of everyday life.
And when he does this, he even has a a catch phrase that he
uses so that you know, when you're in his books.
We're moving to apply. We're moving the application.
It comes in Romans 12/1 or he says, moving from doctrinal to
ethical. He says, I appeal to you
therefore, brothers, I urge you therefore, brothers, I beg you.
Therefore, brothers, now that you know who God is, this is how
to live in Ephesians 41. Turn there.
This is the language he uses this morning to transition us
from doctrinal to practical. He says the same words and the
same word order. I therefore urge you.
I therefore beseech you, I therefore beg you to walk
worthy. And what follows after that are
ethical commands. These are demands that Paul
places on your life saying this is how you are to live.
And in the book of Ephesians, there are 41 of these commands,
which is why everybody likes Ephesians 4 to 6, because
there's no confusion on how we are to live.
It's why people like the book of James.
There's 54 at least commandments that James gives.
And so we're like, man, there's no, I can't confuse what I'm
supposed to do when it's just over and over again.
He's telling me this is how you live and this is how you live.
And so 41 commandments, how many of those do you think came in
chapters one to 311 commandment that we've come across so far.
We made a lot. We made a big deal of it and
we'll come do it again, which leaves 40 commandments in the
next 3 chapters for the remainder of the book.
And it and it has to be this way.
I'm going to pause for a minute. Paul's teaching us something.
This has to be the pattern of our life and of our ministry.
Because if you tell someone, your friends or your church
members or your children, if you tell them how to live without
first telling them who they are in Jesus Christ, then you're not
producing Christians, you're producing hypocrites.
And it's so important to understand that the order must
be in your discipline and in your discipleship.
You have to teach. This is who God is, and this is
who you are, and this is what God has done for you in Jesus
Christ. Now, children, obey your parents
and be careful how you joke. And this is how you should live
and all of the ethical outworkings of it.
Now walk worthy of the gospel and guard your speech and be
quick to forgive. And so the one commandment that
we've faced so far came in Roman or not Romans, in Ephesians 211
and 12. The commandment was, remember,
remember where you were, remember where you came from,
remember where you were before you were called by God.
And he says you were dead. In that context, you were dead
in your sins and trespasses. You were a stranger to the
covenant of promise. And remember that as Jesus pours
out his blood as a new covenant, and you are no longer a stranger
to that, We're going to take the Lord's Supper in a moment and we
are no longer strangers but partakers in that covenant.
He says, remember that you walked following the course of
this world, and you come to Ephesians 4.
And he says, now God is redeeming, that no longer do you
walk according to the course of this world, but you walk worthy
of the gospel. This is the second commandment
that we face in the book. The first one said you were
dead. You walked according to the
course of this world. Remember that.
But now walk worthy of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Walk worthy of your calling. Read Ephesians 4 one to six with
me. This is our text.
And hear this, this commandment, Paul says.
I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a
manner worthy of the calling to which you've been called, with
all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one
another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit
and the bond of peace. There was one body and one
spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to
your call. 1 Lord, 1 faith, one baptism, one God and Father of
all, who is over all and through all and in all.
Paul says Walk worthy of your calling 8 times in Ephesians, 33
times in all of Paul's writings, he uses this command to walk.
It's the ordinary living of the Christian life.
It's extraordinarily ordinary. Walking is and you might
remember the story I told of going to Powell's Books back in
Isaiah because this is one of the premier commandments of
Isaiah and 2/5. He says walk according to the
light of the Lord, walk in the light of the Lord.
And we visited Powell's Books, this city block of books.
And I remember in this premier place on an end cap, there was a
book called How to Walk. There's a big old thick step by
step instruction guide. And I thought what a, what a
weird thing to have such a long book over something that's so
banal and ordinary. And, and that's the point.
That's why Paul brings this out. This is how you walk.
He's teaching you now how to walk.
It's so simple. And he says you are to live this
lifestyle, this unique Christian lifestyle, this Christian walk,
a life of holiness and righteousness and moral purity.
We don't live this way because we have to live this way.
He's going to make the point we live this way because now we get
to live this way. We love to live this way.
We've been radically and supernaturally born again and
this is what we desire. And as we read through these and
he puts forth these virtues, we say, yes, I love this.
This is what I want to be like. This is who I've been called to
be. So we walk this.
That's so counter intuitive to our culture.
Paul says in verse one, we do this because we have been
effectually called according to the gospel and we walk this way
because we've been predestined to sonship and because we've
been redeemed and blood bought by Jesus Christ.
And because we've been sealed by the Holy Spirit and united at
the church and given an inheritance which is a foretaste
of our future inheritance in glory.
And it means that God's act of calling has made us alive.
You read Ephesians 2. He says you were dead in your
trespasses and sins walking according to the course of this
world. Something happened and now
you're alive and you have this desire to walk worthy.
And what that something is, is the calling of God who made you
alive. And you as the Christian are now
the the same supernatural walking illustration of the
power of God that Jesus demonstrated when he went to
Lazarus's tomb in John 1143 to 44.
Jesus goes to the tomb of a dead man.
He's been there four days. I love it.
The King James Version says he stinketh and he goes to the tomb
and he stands in front of the tomb and he declares Lazarus he
calls to him come out and Lazarus walks in the same way
God came to you. You were dead in your trespasses
and sins. You were walking according to
this world. You loved the things the world
loved. You were bought into it.
Jesus called you and said, come and follow me and you walked and
you must walk. And this is the line of thinking
that Paul writes, says he comes to verse one.
This is in his mind. He says, I therefore a prisoner
of the Lord, you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to
which you have been called, not the way the world lives, not the
way that you used to live. We remember, we keep it in our
mind how we lived before so that we can love and appreciate where
we are now. Now we walk worthy of Our
Calling. And when Paul commands you to
walk worthy, it's pear potato to walk the ordinary walking.
But he says walk worthy. This is the word axios.
The word worthy means literally bringing up the other beam of
the scales. It means literally bringing into
equilibrium. And what are we bringing into
equilibrium? You're bringing your life into
equilibrium with your calling. You're bringing it into balance.
James Montgomery Boyce says we use this this worthy language
even in our own, even in our own literature and how we speak in
the day today. He says if you have a worthy
opponent, if you're facing a worthy opponent, it's somebody's
whose gifts are in balance with your own.
Or if you have a laborer who, who's worthy of his wages, it's
somebody who's who's practice, he's working out in his job,
he's he's earning his wages. Those two are in balance.
So here Paul says your high theology and your doctrine has
to be brought into equilibrium with your practice.
The weight of theology has to match the weight of practice in
your life. And what that doesn't mean when
he says walking worthy, that doesn't mean walking deserving,
that you're worthy of your calling.
You're deserving of your calling.
It's actually exactly the opposite.
He says the calling is so valuable that God has put on
your life, that it deserves something of you, that it's,
it's worthy of your life. He uses this elsewhere.
Philippians 127 Only let your manner of life be worthy of the
gospel of Jesus Christ, meaning the gospel is worth so much that
your life comes into conformity with it.
Similarly, Colossians 19 to 10. And so from the day we heard, we
have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled
with the knowledge of His will and all spiritual wisdom and
understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord.
So the Lord is worthy, and He's so worthy that our lives come
into conformity with Him. Matthew 37 to 8 John the Baptist
says it this way. Bear fruit worthy of repentance,
saying God has granted you repentance leading to a
knowledge of the truth that is so beautiful, that's so worthy
that you bring your life into conformity with it.
The gospel, your calling, repentance, your Lord.
Now walk worthy. And in Ephesians, as you go
through the remainder of the book, Paul will use other
language to to represent the same thing.
This worthiness. He'll use the word proper
sometimes, Prepe, he says sexual immorality and all impurity and
covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper
among the Saints, as is seemly, as is suitable, as is
appropriate. Sometimes he'll use the word out
of place. Anakin, he says in Ephesians,
let there be no filthiness or foolish talk, nor crude joking
which are out of place. And you say out of place for
what? Out of place for your walk.
This is out of place for how you are to be walking in the Lord.
And so there's a way that Paul is teaching us as he teaches us
how to walk. There's a way that is
distinctively Christian to live born out of a transformed life,
born out of relationship with God.
And it's not born out of obligation.
We don't do this because we have to.
We do it because we want to. And it's what's taught in these
three chapters. And and this is summed up in
this image of the the scales. You're bringing the scales into
equilibrium. Your doctrine with your
practice, your response proportionate to what God has
done for you in Christ. And so for Jamie and I, this has
been a struggle from the beginning because there are
there's a way that seems natural to you.
In our early Christian walk, it was much easier for me to
prioritize theology. I can sit on my bathroom floor
and read or lay in my bed and read theology from sunup to
sundown. Not an issue.
I won't get bored with it. But what was harder for me is
going and putting that into practice, to be the hands and
feet and to interact with people.
And for some people it's much more difficult.
So chapters one to three of Ephesians were easier for me
than 4 to 6. And Jamie says that I'm an ivory
tower by default, right? That fixed and immovable
structure. You sit in there and you study
and you never go anywhere. And she out of love, wanted to
live out the ideal Christian life.
She wanted to go and be the hands and feet of Jesus.
And theology was an afterthought.
And I said, well, if I'm an ivory tower, then you're just
wheels that don't carry anything.
You're wheels with no theological freight.
And so the, the dumb metaphor that we've used to kind of
categorize our life and our marriage is we are an ivory
tower on wheels. And so we have theology and we
take it with us when we go to be the hands and feet.
And so it's silly. It's but, but it's, it works for
us. And so for, for me, the priority
would be the theology of knowing that we are the orphans and the
widows and knowing theologically what God has done for us.
And, and I challenge Jamie in that way and she challenges me
to say, no, practically, we go and we love on orphans and
widows and sojourners. And when you bring those two
things together, the theology and the practice, amazing things
begin to happen. There are entire churches and
entire denominations whose practical acts of service
outweighs their knowledge of God, and in the same way,
there's entire churches and denominations whose knowledge of
doctrine outweighs their service, Paul says.
Bring them into equilibrium, balance them out and beautiful,
beautiful things will come. And everyone of you has to be an
ivory tower on wheels. You can take that and run with
it. And this is a chance for your
Paul's giving you a chance between chapter 3 as you enter
into chapter 4 to, to perform a spiritual diagnosis on yourself
and say, am I in alignment? Where am I out of balance?
Where do I need to adjust? Does your practice match the
high theology of Ephesians one to three?
And so as, as we go through the remainder of these 6 verses,
this, this concept of walking worthy, now that you understand
it, Paul's going to apply it in two places.
He's going to apply it and say, this is how you walk worthy at
the level of the individual. This is what you strive for.
And this is where you apply the doctrine of walking worthy at
the level of, of corporate local church.
So individual virtues and corporate unity, elements of
corporate unity, individual virtues and corporate unity.
And to introduce this, as we look toward the individual and,
and how we're called to walk worthy, I want you to remember
this, this verse that Hudson preached last week that kind of
puts us into this section. Paul prays in Ephesians 320 that
God would give us abundantly more than we could ever ask or
think. He prays that God will give us
more than we could ever ask or imagine.
And what he means by that is not money or free time or or power.
What he's talking about is virtue, that God has declared
you to be righteous and now he is making you righteous, patient
and long-suffering and loving and humble and kind and, and
it's a blessedness that you experience the fruit of walking
squarely within the will of God and the peace that comes from
that. You know how sweet your sleep is
at night and how quickly you go to bed when you know that your
life is pleasing to Him and you know that you're you're
producing fruit and you're walking according with your
calling. It's a transformed way of
experiencing the world. The inner joy and the peace
that's born out of that relationship.
The inward glory of holiness that's radiating like a theater
and and displaying God's holiness to the world.
A clear conscience for moral purity in a fulfilled and
fruitful life. This is what he's praying for.
Our Calling is transformative and Our Calling is eternal.
And Paul teaches that we are destined for glory, and that
glory isn't only a future thing. That glory begins now, and that
glory is today. It's not a worldly glory.
It's a true glory. And true glory, the world wants
it and it craves it, and it can't get it, so it offers you
cheap substitutes. But in the church, we have the
real thing. And so it's true glory.
It's true virtue, not virtue signaling along with the
culture, but actually becoming a beautiful, righteous, moral,
pure person. And it's true blessing, which
doesn't come from money and sex and power, or a big house or a
big rock on your finger or big muscles.
It comes from living your life as God designed it and walking
according to your calling, knowing that you're operating
squarely within the will of God and you're pleasing to Him.
That life will prove to be more blessed than anything the world
can offer you, more than you could ever ask or imagine.
And you can test God on these things.
He will prove Himself. This is the blessed life.
This is the life that Paul's living, which is why in verse 1
he reminds you again, I believe he reminds you here again that
he's a prisoner. We keep saying it over and over.
I'm a prisoner for the gospel. I'm a prisoner.
Paul, therefore a prisoner. And I think he reminds you here
again that he's in prison, in prison for two reasons, I think.
First, because he's saying if you live this blessed life, it
also might happen to you. This is what comes from living
contrary to the world when you live morally pure.
And 2nd and more importantly, I think he's telling you and it's
worth it, the life worth living does not depend on money.
The life worthy of living doesn't depend on whether you're
in jail or not. He says the gospel is going out,
that the gospel is not bound. Salvation is being worked out.
It's being worked out through me.
I'm living within the will of God.
There's joy, there's peace, there's blessing.
It's worth it if you do end up here.
And so he says live the way I'm setting before you in the
chapters that come. And he and he showcases this
lifestyle with six virtues that he lists that every individual
must exhibit to walk worthy. And these are beginning with
this, this first virtue on Paul's list.
It's first because it's the greatest, the foremost of all
Christian virtues. The first on his list is
humility. A Christian is humble, and
humility is quiet strength. It's never weakness.
Humility is not weakness. It's the strength that comes
from esteeming yourself rightly before God.
Humility is understanding who you are.
When you know who God is and what you've done and what he's
done for you, there's only one response, and it's humility.
And when you esteem yourself that way, all of these other
virtues are going to flow from it.
It's The Fountainhead. And humility was not a virtue in
the ancient world. If you if somebody was humble,
it was derogatory. It was it categorized somebody
that's a servant or a slave, servile, a weak or a lesser man
is a humble man. And it became a virtue with
Jesus Christ. It only was a virtue when Jesus
came and he said, I am gentle and lowly.
I am humble. And he showed us what a humble
life, the power of a humble life.
And he preached that this is how we're going to be.
This is when it became the first distinctly Christian virtue.
And a virtue is, is literally the word you.
You can see it in the word veer is the Latin word for man.
So if you're ever doing a crossword puzzle and it wants a
three letter word from Latin, it's it's veer.
And that's where we get virtue, which means manliness.
And so if you're going to be a true man in the ancient Roman
world in which Jesus walked and said you need to be brave and
strong and intellectually astute.
And if you are these things, then you are a true man.
And Jesus comes and he says, no, no, no.
You've heard it said these are the virtues of a true man.
But I say to you, if you want to be a true man and you want to
embody true virtue, it starts with humility and gentleness and
meekness. That is the marks.
Those are the marks of a real man.
And I've gotten to participate, had the privilege of
participating in manhood ceremonies for individuals in
the church and outside of the church.
And I only have one piece of advice every time I come to one
of those and it's be like Jesus Christ.
Because the world's going to tell you this is what a man is.
And that changes from culture to culture.
There's there's what people say this is in America, this is what
a man is. But if you want to know what a
real man is, open your scriptures to the Gospels.
Read about the life and ministry of Jesus Christ and model your
life after his. Because he was a man in the best
sense of the word. He was a man, a true man.
And if you are like him, then you'll be walking worthy.
He's everything a man intended is intended to be.
So humility is the foundational Christian virtue.
All others flow from it. Which is why when Augustine was
asked what are the Christian graces, premier Christian
graces, he said humility, humility, humility.
Paul in Acts 2019 says he's served the Lord with all
humility and with tears through many trials.
Humility is rightly esteeming yourself before God.
And when you have the right view of yourself before God, then the
second virtue flows from it. It's meekness.
These first two virtues are a pair, humility and meekness.
Gentle and lowly, they come together.
Meekness is often misunderstood. It's strength under control.
It's not that you don't have strength, it's that you, you
wield it properly. It's prowtase.
Aristotle in the ancient world, when he was describing this
word, he's always trying to find the golden mean between two
extremes. And so he said, between the
extremes of being angry all the time and never being angry, you
have meekness. That was his definition.
And you come closer to our modern generation.
William Barclay, probably with Aristotle in mind, says that
meekness is always being angry at the right time and never
being angry at the wrong time. And so meekness is not weakness,
it's incredible strength, but it's contained and it's
controlled, which is why this word was used in the ancient
world of a powerful animal that has been brought under control,
completely under control of its faculties.
That's the image, and Scripture says it was the premier virtue
of Moses in Numbers 12/3. It says that Moses was very
meek, more than all people who filled the face of the earth.
And stop there to say meekness and humility.
Comparing it to the ancient Roman world, these virtues,
their origin is supernatural. There's a reason that Romans did
not value these things. It's because they were dead in
their trespasses and sins. They did not understand.
And so these things come from the Holy Spirit, which is why
when you read Galatians 5, it says the fruit of the Spirit as
Lovejoy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, meekness, and self-control because it is a
fruit that is generated by the Spirit of God.
And Jesus says like unto Psalm 1, Jesus says in Matthew 5, the
meek are going to inherit the earth.
The meek are blessed and they're rich and they're so rich they
they will inherit the world. And so gentleness and meekness
come first. I know that if you embody these
things, you will be living just like Jesus Christ.
Because if you go to Matthew 11/29 he uses these two words to
describe himself and his own heart.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and
lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls.
It's the same 2 words, gentle and lowly, humble and meek.
Humility and meekness enable the third virtue which is patience,
macrothalmia and it means a long-suffering endurance.
The Proverbs talk about this as personal endurance.
It's it's used of a city that's under warfare and under siege.
It's used of rulers and it's used of Saints.
And this is patience that keeps you from lashing out, acting
quickly. It keeps you from vengeance and
from demanding immediate justice.
And you have to to just like we paired gentleness with humility.
These second two virtues are a pair because meekness out of
meekness flows forbearance. And so patience or forbearance
or a pair. If you're long-suffering, then
you bear with others in love, which comes to the 4th 1
forbearance anexomanoy. It means bearing up or enduring
weight or carrying weight, enduring people, enduring
hardships. If you want to attach a verse to
this virtue, you can attach first Corinthians 412 to 13.
This is how we embody this forbearance.
Paul says when reviled, how do you respond?
You bless. When you're persecuted, you
endure. When you're slandered, you
entreat. That's forbearance.
And it kind of goes with this next one because all of these
things he says must be done in love.
The 5th virtue is love agape. It's not a possessing love, it's
a giving love. It's a love that is external and
moves outward to others. It's an active, giving,
charitable love. And he's going to say in the
very next chapter of Ephesians, therefore be imitators of God as
beloved children. And we're going to continue to
walk there, he says, and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave
himself up for us. And so love is the motive and
the bond and the fuel of all the other virtues.
And it's essential for you as we go through this list and you
say, you see, meekness and humility and patience.
Virtues are things that you can work on.
The the last virtue he's going to say in a minute is, is
eagerness. Make every effort.
Make every effort to embody these things.
Challenge yourself in these ways.
Clinton Arnold applies that it says if you have a tendency to
be proud, arrogant, egocentric, and boastful, then you need to
cultivate the virtue of humility.
If you're quick to get angry, then you need to cultivate the
virtue of patience. If you're insensitive and
bullish and rough and bossy and quick to impose on others, you
need to cultivate the virtue of gentleness.
If you're intolerant with the shortcomings of other people,
then you need to work on bearing with them and love.
And Paul's going to continue this with the 6th and final
virtue. It's eagerness, verse 3, eager
to maintain the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace.
So if you want your life to be blessed and a source of blessing
to other people, if you want your life to be characterized by
the metaphor of a strong tree near planted by a stream, then
remember it took effort on behalf of God.
And he's been working and calling from all eternity that
you might be this kind of person.
And now he says it also takes effort on your part to embody
these virtues. The word eager in Greek means
literally to make haste, to be busy, to be diligent, to make
every effort to apply yourself to these things.
And elsewhere in the Bible, Paul uses this word to to talk about
enduring through a long journey or enduring through completing a
difficult task. It takes sustained and Godward
effort to walk worthy of the gospel, which is why the
metaphor of the tree is used because it takes a fig tree a
minimum of 10 years to establish the root system and the canopy
so that it can be a refreshment to the others around it.
And in a similar vein, Mark Dever, I wish I could remember
where he said this, but I heard Mark Dever talking about how
long it takes to bring a church from a place of unhealth to a
place of health. How long does it take to get a
church from an unhealthy place to a healthy place?
He says in his experience, it's about 20 years, 20 year
transformation and not only 20 years, but 20 years of sustained
effort, effort and doing the right things, prioritizing the
correct things. To quote Eugene Peterson, it's a
long obedience in the same direction and churches think if
we hire the right pastor and make the bylaw changes that are
necessary, then we're going to be healthy.
And you can see here that it's it's not the case.
Paul says no, it takes the cultivation of godliness and
virtue in the decades that that requires, coupled with the
decades of loving your church and pursuing unity together.
And in the same way, pastors think if, if I would just get my
Bible degree, then that would qualify me to be a pastor and I
would be ready. And we said what's missing in
that is yes, the knowledge of God, yes, the Bible degree, but
you have to be an approved Workman.
You have to be qualified through these virtues.
And there's a, there's a quote that I want to bring up that I,
I read to our pastors last Wednesday that sums up the kind
of Christian that we're talking about.
And it shows beautifully what's required to be this kind of
vessel for ministry. This author said that I think
this is even what it means to be a tree near planted by a stream.
The author said the old seminary professors used to speak about a
necessary trait for pastoral ministry called gravitas.
It refers to a soul that's been developed enough.
It's developed enough spiritual mass to be attractive.
Like gravity, it makes the soul appear old.
But gravitas has nothing to do with age.
It has everything to do with wounds that have healed well,
failures that have been redeemed, sins that have been
forgiven, and thorns that have settled into the flesh.
These severe experiences with life expand the soul until it
appears larger than the body that contains it.
Then it is large enough to proclaim a holy joy, which is
what makes the pastor's soul so attractive.
So the soul, your soul has to expand to be larger than your
body in these ways, humility, meekness, patience, forbearance,
love, and eagerness. And if these qualities are yours
and they are increasing, then God will use you and He will
bless you. Ephesians 320 says far more
abundantly than you can ever ask or imagine because of the power
that is work within you. And important to note as well is
in verse 3 is that this this kind of individual virtue worked
out corporately brings unity in the church.
This is the unity that we're trying to maintain.
And you have to see here that we don't build unity as a church.
It says we maintain the unity that the Spirit has created in
us. We maintain the the Spirit's
unity. We preserve the unity.
We don't develop it, so Jesus purchased our unity when he died
on the cross and now he says your job is to maintain it, Ian
Hamilton said rightly. He pointed out there are a few
things more tragic and distressing than a disunified,
disunited, fractured family. It becomes an object of pity if
not derision, never a model to cherish or emulate.
You can apply that to a local church as well.
There are a few things more tragic and distressing than a
disunited, fractured church. But you say the opposite of
that. How beautiful is a United Church
with the unity of the Spirit? How fruitful is a church like
this, where these virtues are there and increasing and they
have preserved the unity of the Spirit?
And then Paul applies the worthy walk to our corporate life, the
corporate elements of unity. It's really interesting that
there is no transition here. There is no lead up.
There's no, that's an abrupt change.
There's not even a conjunction. There's no grammatical
signalling at all. It's just a stop, an abrupt
change. And so in this sermon, I want to
have an abrupt change as well. And I want to invite the choir
to come up and I want to invite the deacons to come up and to
pass out the Lord's Supper because I don't want to go
through the rest of the sermon without the Lord's Supper in our
hands. And I don't want to go through
the rest of the sermon without stopping for a moment and
singing about unity and cherishing this unity that the
the Spirit has created in US. Deacons, go ahead.
As you get here, pass out the bread as we sing.
And for everyone here, as the choir sings this song, I want
you to meditate on the words. And when we come to verse 4,
specifically to this passage about unity, I want you to sing
along with the choir, Jim. We'll give you the cue 3 and 4.
Jim says sing on three and four and focus in and sing these
words about unity when we get there.
Thanks for listening. To learn more about Heritage
Church or if you'd like to respond to this sermon, visit
our website at www.heritageshawnee.org.