FOLLOWING IN HIS FOOTSTEPS
(Ephesians 4:1-6)
[Ask song director to sing “Footsteps of Jesus” #325 red hymnal]
This morning our Scripture reading is Ephesians chapter 4, verses 1 through 6. The message is entitled “Following in His Footsteps,” and we’re going to be talking about walking.
Talking is easy, isn’t it? Some people have no problems with talking to you about almost any subject you can think of. They can ramble on and on and say thousands of words, and not really say anything of importance.
Three boys were bragging to one another about their fathers. One of them said, “My father is a professor. When he is talking about nuclear physics, there are only fifty other people in the world who can understand him.”
The second boy said, “ My father is a world class brain surgeon. When he is talking about his surgery there are only 20 other people in the whole world who can understand him.”
The third boy said, “ That’s nothing. My dad is a Baptist preacher. When he is preaching, nobody seems to understand him.”
Talking is a wonderful thing. It is one of the ways that God gave us to communicate and relate to one another, but there are many people who call themselves Christians who can talk the talk, but they can’t seem to walk the walk.
Being a born-again Christian is more than just saying the right words. It’s more than doing good deeds, and coming to church, and talking about the Bible. The test of a true Christian comes in our everyday walk with Jesus.
Jesus said in Matthew 10:38, “ . . . he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.” That’s what the message is about this morning - walking “worthy” of Jesus Christ.
Jesus made some very distinct and definite footprints when He walked the earth. He blazed a trail that is easy for us to see, and, to walk worthy of Him, we must follow in His footsteps.
Let’s read Ephesians 4:1-6, “ 1I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, 2with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, 3endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; 5one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.”
Walking Worthy -
What is Paul telling us when he writes, “I, beseech you to walk worthy of your calling?”
To be worthy means to have value. It means to possess useful qualities that make you deserving of something.
It seems that Paul is telling us to do the impossible, doesn’t it? How can you and I as mere mortals ever be worthy of God’s greatest gift? The answer, of course, is that we never have been, nor ever will be worthy.
It says in Romans 3, “ There is none righteous, no, not one;” Romans 3 also tells us that “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” In other words, you and I cannot be righteous in and of ourselves.
All of us are sinners. None of us are worthy of God’s love. None of us deserve eternal life, but, thank God for Jesus! God came to us in the form of the God-man Jesus Christ, and He blazed the trail for you and me.
He left His footprints for us to plainly see and to follow. If we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and follow in His footsteps, our walk will be worthy. So, Paul wasn’t telling us to perform an impossible task.
We can “walk worthy of the calling with which [we] were called,” but only because of, and only through Jesus Christ.
Footprints of Jesus -
Paul goes on in verse two to tell us how to walk worthy. He doesn’t tell us about the footprints of worldly wisdom. The world tells us to walk in haughtiness, and greed, and boasting, and impatience.
The world tells us to prove that we are better than anyone else. It tells us to grab all we can grab. If anyone gets in the way, run over them. No, Paul tells us to follow the footprints of Jesus.
He tells us to walk the way that Jesus walked, and Jesus walked in:
Lowliness -
Lowliness means humility. Lowliness is the opposite of pride, and Jesus was humble. Philippians 2:8 says, “ 8And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.”
Jesus walked a lowly walk. For you and me, He lowered Himself from the highest point in heaven down to earth, and humbled Himself to become a man. And if that wasn’t enough, He humbled Himself even further to the point of death on a cross.
If you want to walk worthy of your calling, you’ll follow in His footsteps and walk a lowly walk like He did. 1 Peter 5: 5,6 says, “ 5 . . .be clothed with humility, for “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”6Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time,”
As we’ve said many times, God resists the proud, but He exalts the humble. So a humble, or lowly, walk is a worthy walk. Not only are we to walk in lowliness, we are to walk in:
Gentleness -
If we follow the footsteps of Jesus, we will be gentle. To be gentle means to be kind and considerate. It means to have a spirit of fairness and compassion. Jesus was the most gentle man ever to walk the face of the earth.
In Matthew 11:29, He says, “ 29“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.”
To walk in gentleness doesn’t mean that you are weak. It doesn’t mean that you are a doormat who can be mistreated and taken advantage of. Someone once said, “ Gentleness is a divine trait: nothing is so strong as gentleness; and nothing is so gentle as real strength.”
Many times it takes more strength to be kind than it does to be hateful and angry. Think of the great strength that Christ had when He was suffering on the cross. He was gentle even then.
1 Peter 2:21 says, “ Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps:”
Jesus walked in lowliness. He walked in gentleness, and He walked in:
Longsuffering, or patience -
If you want to see a good example of patience, watch a spider. The spider will spend many hours, sometimes days, spinning its web. When the web is complete, the spider will sit very still waiting and watching.
The spider has a plan, but the plan can never fully develop without patience. As the spider waits and watches, maybe for days, it will feel the web begin to move. It seems that its dinner has come suddenly.
But there was nothing sudden about it. The spider’s patience paid off. Patience does pay off, not just with spiders. It pays off for Christians as well.
Patience can be defined as endurance in the face of adversity. Patience shows fortitude and steadiness when everyone around you is giving up. Patience is that strength of character that helps you put up with the faults of others.
There is nowhere in the Bible that tells us to rush into a decision. God doesn’t operate that way. There may be times when we would like to hear from God quickly, but God will never tell us to rush blindly ahead.
On the other hand, the devil will always encourage us to act in a hurry, because he knows if we back away and think long enough, we will reconsider. How many times have you made a rush decision and then regretted it later? Most of us have done this.
Psalm 27:14 tells us, “ 14 Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the Lord!” If we ever feel the strong urge to act rashly and quickly, we need to step back and pray and think about it.
Verse 2 goes on to say, “ ,bearing with one another in love.” Patience helps us to bear with one another, and love one another in spite of our differences of opinion.
Just because a brother or sister in Christ has a different opinion than you, doesn’t mean you are to resent them or hate them. Remember the second great commandment - “ Love your neighbor as yourself.”
There are two words in verse 3 I want us to look at more closely:
Unity and peace -
“ 3endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
Unity means oneness, and agreement and harmony. Unity of the Spirit was the force that was so strong on the day of Pentecost when the believers “were all with one accord in one place.” (Acts 2:1)
One thing that church unity does not mean is uniformity. It doesn’t mean that everyone is forced into the same mold. The church is made up of millions of Christians who have different personalities and backgrounds.
We are diverse; we are different, but we are in unity. We have a fellowship of faith, hope and love that binds us together.
This fellowship of faith, hope and love that we have holds us together in the bond of peace. Just like in human families, we are bound together. Human families are bound together with family traditions and blood relationships.
Christian brothers and sisters are bound together with the ties of our love of God and love for one another, and by the blood of Christ. Like earthly brothers and sisters, we have different views and opinions.
We will sometimes disagree with one another, but when we do, we must remember our Christian walk. We are to walk in lowliness, gentleness, and patience. We are to follow the footsteps of Jesus.
One in the Bonds of Love -
Verse 4-6 says, “ 4There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; 5one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.”
We are to walk in unity as one body. All the parts of the human body are different. They look different, and have different functions, but they all exist for one purpose – to maintain the well-being of the body.
The church is one body. There is one Spirit, the Holy Spirit, and we were called in one hope – the hope of the gospel of Christ. There is one Lord, our Savior Jesus Christ. There is one faith, our faith in Christ.
When we are saved, we are all baptized in one baptism. And there is one God and Father. It is by His grace that we are saved through faith in His Son Jesus Christ.
In the first verse of our Scripture reading, Paul is begging us to walk worthy. He says, “1I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, 2with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, 3endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
And to walk worthy of this calling, we must follow the footsteps of Christ.
Word Count – 1963
Grace Memorial Baptist Church
April 22, 2007 (A.M.)
