The Call Of Believers Series

The Call of Believers

New Hope Community Pastor Bob Briggs Ephesians 4:1-6

As Believers in Jesus Christ we have a call upon our life, a call to walk in unity. Lets read these six verses as we look at the main point of this message…

I. The Call to walk worthy.

The Apostle Paul writes, "As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit— just as you were called to one hope when you were called— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

There are 5 ways Paul points to which will cause a believer to walk worthy of the Calling of God. The first is through…

1. Humility. How do we learn to walk in humility? It is reported that the following edition of the Book of Genesis was discovered in the Dead Seal Scrolls.

And Adam said, "Lord, when I was in the garden, you walked with me everyday. Now I do not see you anymore. I am lonesome here and it is difficult for me to remember how much you love me."

And God said, "No problem! I will create a companion for you that will be with you forever and who will be a reflection of my love for you, so that you will know I love you, even when you cannot see me.

Regardless of how selfish and childish and unlovable you may be this new companion will accept you as you are and will love you as I do, in spite of yourself."

And God created a new animal to be a companion for Adam. And it was a good animal. And God was pleased.

And the new animal was pleased to be with Adam and he wagged his tail. And Adam said, "But Lord, I have already named all the animals in the Kingdom and all the good names are taken and I cannot think of a name for this new animal."

And God said, "No problem! Because I have created this new animal to be a reflection of my love for you, his name will be a reflection of my own name, and you will call him DOG."

And Dog lived with Adam and was a companion to him and loved him. And Adam was comforted. And God was pleased. And Dog was content and wagged his tail.

After a while, it came to pass that Adam’s guardian angel came to the Lord and said, "Lord, Adam has become filled with pride. He struts and preens like a peacock and he believes he is worthy of adoration. Dog has indeed taught him that he is loved, but no one has taught him humility."

And the Lord said, "No problem! I will create for him a companion who will be with him forever and who will see him as he is. The companion will remind him of his limitations, so he will know that he is not worthy of adoration."

And God created CAT to be a companion to Adam. And Cat would not obey Adam.

And when Adam gazed into Cat’s eyes, he was reminded that he was not the Supreme Being. And Adam learned humility.

And God was pleased. And Adam was greatly improved.

And Cat did not care one-way or the other.

Okay, now that I have all the dog lovers with me and the cat lovers composing their emails, let talk for a moment about humility. In the Greek there is not a word for humility until Christians coined it. In fact, humility in the ancient world was something to be despised. Bernard, one of the early church leaders, not the dog, said of humility, “It is the virtue by which a man becomes conscious of his own unworthiness, in consequence of the truest knowledge of himself.”

When we compare ourselves to the light and life of Christ, we see how far short we fall from the God standard and in that light we become humbled. When we compare ourselves with others, we can be trapped in self-elevation that is why we need to live by the God standard. Humility puts Christ first, others second and we last.

Romans 12:3 teaches us that “For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.”