I was a fourth-year student at Dallas Seminary, a dedicated Bible student for 15 years, before someone suggested to me that the issue of pursuing unity in my ministry could be a very significant issue. But I remember the day like it was yesterday. The venerable Professor John Reed, the Head of the Pastoral Ministries Department at Dallas Seminary and I were having a casual conversation in his office. We were in the midst of a discussion about I Corinthians when Dr. Reed, somehow knowing that I hadn’t considered how important the issue of unity in ministry would be, suggested to me that I Corinthians’ emphasis on unity versus divisions in a church might be a very important concern in my future ministry.
Today, 40 years later, I can testify that no truer words have ever been spoken. What I have learned through hard experience is that unity or disunity in a church can be make or break for ministry success, it can be make or break with regard to a church’s very existence, it can be make or break in terms of glorifying God, and it can be make or break with regard to some people even continuing in relationship to Christ. In other words, the matter of pursuing or guarding the unity that is already ours in Christ, is perhaps as important as any other issue in Christian ministry and the welfare of a local church.
So, I have some questions for each of you this morning: Is the issue of pursuing or guarding unity in your church, or among believers even on your radar? Is it something that you would consider part and parcel of being and living like a follower of Christ? Is it something you ever pray about? And if unity were threatened in your church, would you even be aware of it? If so, would you know what Jesus Christ wants you to do about it?
If your answer to any of those questions is no, then I encourage you to listen to this message very carefully this morning, because the quality of your Christian experience may depend on it.
And as I say this, I should note that we live in a highly individualistic culture in the U.S. and especially in Nevada. Nevada generally, and Reno specifically are characterized by a pioneering and independent spirit—you do your thing and I’ll do mine and leave me alone while I do mine. But this is not the spirit of Christ. The Spirit of Christ urges us to interdependent and cooperative love. As Jesus prayed his final prayer for his disciples and later believers in John 17, he prayed twice that we would all be one even as He and the Father are one.
And that priority of unity is reflected in Ephesians 4.
Again, remember that Paul is writing to the Church at Ephesus on the western coast of present-day Turkey about 60 A.D. He’s writing while under house arrest in Rome. And we have reached a turning point in his letter. He pivots from doctrine to practice. He has told the Ephesians in chapter 1-3 who they now are because of what Christ has done for them. Basically, before they came to faith in Christ they were lost, dead in their trespasses and sins, condemned people, dead men walking, who were constantly harassed by evil spirits in their experience. After coming to faith in Christ, they had been made alive in Christ, forgiven of their sins; they had become children of God, heirs of the Kingdom of God, blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. They had been made alive, given eternal life, and had now been given authority over the very evil spirits who had harassed them, and they now had hope in this world, having been reconciled with God and man.
And all this had come about because the greatest man who had ever lived, the Son of God, had been crucified in their stead to die for their sins and had demonstrated it by being raised from the dead. God the Father had sacrificed His son on the cross to save them and us from the just penalty for their and our sins. And so what a privileged position we now have because of what Christ has done for us.
And so, the letter, as is typical of some letters of Paul, takes a turn with the very first word in chapter 4. “Therefore.” Paul is saying here that based on everything he had previously written, this is now how they should then live. And so this is now how we should live. He writes, “Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called”
And thus our first point this morning: “Live a life worthy of your high calling as a follower of Jesus.”
Paul cites the fact that He is a prisoner of the Lord to stress the fact that His entire life is devoted to living a life that is worthy of the Lord Jesus—even if it means suffering greatly for Him, as it did for the Apostle Paul, and as it will for many of us. He is saying follow my example in this. Jesus is worthy of whatever you suffer for Him, given what He has suffered for you.
He implores, beseeches, urges and encourages us to do so. Clearly this is God’s will for everyone who is a believer here.
The word worthy in the Greek here speaks of balance, as on a scale. It’s speaking of an attempt to bring balance between the weight of what Christ had done for you in light of the weight of what you can then do for Him. Christ has given His life for you so that you might live, and rule and reign with Him. How can you balance that out? How can you live a life worthy of Him, but by giving your all, sacrificing your life for all that He has done for you and given you.
At this point I think of a song sung by a one-time well-known Christian singer, Evie. “How can I give thanks for all that you have done for me?” That is really the question each of us ought to be asking God and the Lord Jesus Christ when we understand what Jesus has done for us. And Jesus’ answer is just this—say thank you by living a life that is worthy of Me—that honors me through how you love others and seek unity with other believers.
And then, Paul talks about our calling. He says, live a life worthy of the calling with which you have been called.
Did you know that you have been called by God? Yes, you have. According to God’s Word, if you are a believer in Christ, it’s because God has specifically and sovereignly called you to be a child of God and His servant in this world. In fact that is the very meaning of the word church in the Greek. The church, consisting of all believers, consists of those who have become the church, the ekklesia in the Greek, or those who have been called out from the world to follow Christ.
Romans 8:30 confirms this fact as it says, “and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.” If you have been justified by faith in the blood of Christ, then guess what, you have also been called by God, thus demonstrating that God predestined you before the foundation of the world, to be his child, and to be so blessed.
And so this is your calling, to live a life worthy of Christ.
So, my question is this: Do you seek to live a life worthy of Christ? Do you seek to honor Him by the way you live. Are you in the Word daily taking your directions from Him, in prayer about how you might be used to serve Him and bring others to Christ? Is every choice, every thought measured by whether it honors and will glory Christ? That is now your calling: you are not your own, you were bought with a price.
And in verses 2 and 3, Paul begins to explain exactly what God’s first priority is for you as a believer. And it’s that you pursue unity with other believers. . Now this might be surprising for most of us. We would think that if we are to live a life that honors Christ, the very first thing God would emphasize would be living a holy and righteous life, or loving our neighbors, or something like that. Now Paul will get to that later in chapter 4, but the very first priority He mentioned here is not a holy life, it is not loving one another, but the product of truly loving one another and a righteous life, which is maintaining unity with other believers.
His second point is this: “Do everything you can to guard unity with fellow believers.”
Make it your priority in your Christian life. Don’t ignore it. Don’t think it’s a small thing. It is vital to your Christian life. It is vital to glorifying God. It is vital to being Christ-like. Fail at this and God is saying you nearly fail at everything which is Christ-like.
So if unity with other believers is not even a consideration, if it’s not even on your radar, as it was once for me, it’s time to think again.
Ephesians 4:2: “With all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.”
The very first command which describes how to live a life worthy of our calling is this: to be diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
The Greek for being diligent, means to work hard at, to be zealous for, to be hasty, to essentially do everything possible to preserve or guard what we already spiritually have in Christ—and that is an organic unity with one another, because we are all parts of the same body, indwelt by the same Holy Spirit who directs us to live in accord with the will of the head of the body, who is Jesus Christ.
So the first command is to work hard, be diligent, be hasty, even zealous to guard this unity of the Spirit, which is already a spiritual reality, in our practice in the church of Jesus Christ.
It should be noted that unity is not something that can be practiced in isolation from other believers. Thus, if you are not part of a church, and relationships in a church, you are out of God’s will.
It should also be noted that unity is the ultimate product and proof of Christ’s love. If we love one another as Christ has loved us, then unity will be the inevitable result. When we fall short of that, well, as Jesus said, “A house divided against itself will not stand.”
So, exactly how do we go about accomplishing this unity. It’s with the very character qualities of Jesus Christ that are emphasized in these two verses.
The first mentioned is humility—the opposite of pride and self-dependence. Humility comes not when we are self-sufficient, proud of what we can do and what we know, but when we are fully dependent on Christ, recognizing our total fallibility and insufficiency apart from him and His direction and power. It is the very attitude that Christ demonstrated when He humbled Himself in becoming a man and willing humbled himself in dying on the cross for our sins.
Humility the goes hand in hand with gentleness, strength under control, which is considerate of other feelings. Christ Himself describes Himself as humble and gentle in spirit and invites all to come to Him trusting that He will deal humbly and gently with their sins, as He did by taking the punishment for our sins on the cross. What an example! What a Savior! Hallelujah. And our calling is to follow in his footsteps, especially as we might deal with conflict among our brothers. It should always be done in the spirit of the gentleness and the humility of Christ Himself.
And then there’s that word patience. In the Greek, it literally means lon- suffering. This gives us a clue that pursuing and guarding our unity in Christ will involve some suffering on our parts. Yes, we will be hurt by other’s sins, but just as Christ suffered long and hard for us, we should be willing to suffer at the hands of our brothers in order to maintain unity.
And the third quality, forbearance, or showing tolerance for one another, virtually guarantees this will not be an easy task. Expect that you will have to put up, to some degree, with the sins of others, and that it will not always be easy, but it will be necessary.
So, you’re in the kitchen serving others, and someone gets in your way. Big Momma Boss is there. They have a different idea about how the meal should be served. They step on your toes. They’re taking charge when they aren’t in charge! Do you blow them away? Do you curse them? No, the gentleness and humility of Christ should prevail. Do you talk to them about your problem? Yes, but you may need to be patient to do so at the proper time.
Or you’re an elder or church leader, and someone is out of line. They’re not submitting to the authority of the leaders. What do you do? Slap them down! Put your foot down, and tell them my way or the highway? You’re ready to fire them, when it occurs to you that they are volunteers! Once again, you approach them in humility and gentleness not Lording it over them, but being an example of a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, who when the His disciples argued over which of them was the greatest just prior to the Last Supper, got on his hands and knees and showed who among them was the greatest by washing their feet.
Or you’re setting up chairs and tables on Sunday morning, and someone barks at you like a drill sergeant, and fails to appreciate that you’re even there and helping out. You say to yourself, “I didn’t sign up for this!” Do you decide, once and for all, that’s it, “I’m not taking this any more I’m out of here, because these people don’t appreciate me.” No, with gentleness and humility and great patience you may share with them how you feel about how you’ve been treated, but you don’t abandon them or the whole church, because of their insensitivities.
Why? Because of your high calling in Christ Jesus. Jesus died for you, so you could live. He didn’t abandon you or reject you when you sinned. How is it that you can abandon, or return evil for evil to your brother or sister when they sin against you. Forgive one another as God in Christ has forgiven you.
Now Jesus Himself had plenty to say about exactly how you handle a problem with your brother or sister.
If you’ve been offended, or you know your brother has sinned, this is an essential, non-negotiable command from Jesus about how to maintain unity in the body. This is probably the single most important command in all of Scripture about how to maintain unity in a local church. Don’t miss it: Matthew 18:15-17: If your brother sins[a], go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every fact may be confirmed. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.”
Got a problem with someone? They sinned or offended you. Go to him and talk to him privately, alone. Don’t you dare broadcast your problem with that person to everyone else. That qualifies as gossip and will divide the church. The problem is strictly between you and the alleged offender until you have talked to him or her privately.
Second most important Scripture on this subject from Jesus is found in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is speaking on the destructive nature of anger wrongly conceived and wrongly expressed when he says in Matthew 5:23-28: “Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering. 25 Make friends quickly with your opponent at law while you are with him on the way, so that your opponent may not hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and you be thrown into prison. 26 Truly I say to you, you will not come out of there until you have paid up the last cent.”
Make haste, be diligent, work hard. You can’t be right with God unless you’re right with your brother. Drop you gift at the altar amd don’t pretend to worshipGod if you’re not loving your brother. It’s the priority!
And then two others from the Sermon on the Mount is all we have time for: When you feel someone else is om the wrong or that they’ve wronged you, it might be a time for some prayerful self-examination. Matthew 7:3-5: “Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”
And then ultimately, if there is repentance, there must be forgiveness, reconciliation and restoration:
And finally this statement from Jesus after giving us the Lord’s prayer in which we forgive others just as we have been forgiven. Matthew 6:14-15: “For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.”
The goal of our Christian lives is to be the goal Christ had for us. His goal was to do everything he could, including dying on the cross, so that we might brought to repentance, we might be completely forgiven, and fully reconciled and restored to God and each other because of His love. Our responsibility before God has to be exactly the same—to do absolutely everything we can to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Do anything less, and we are not loving God or our brother.
Now in verses 4-6 Paul both gives the reason why we seek unity, agreement and harmony with believers and also limits when we are to seek unity.
Act as though your are one body, led by one Spirit in accord with one Lord and faith in Christ.
The truth is we are one body, indwelt by one Spirit in Christ, when we are speaking of true believers.
Following the analogy of being one body, if you sneeze, do you cut off your nose? If you stub your toe, do you cut off your toe? If you sprain an ankle, do you cut off your foot. No, your goal is healing, and oneness, so that each part might do its part for the over all good of the body? Then why if a member of Christ’s body, do we sever ourselves from the body if someone hurts us, or sins against us and we’ve done nothing to try to heal the rift?
Now, as I’ve said this, it should also be noted that there are limits to our unity. We are truly united only with true believers, who follow the true Lord Jesus Christ, and the body of faith as delivered to us in the New Testament. We don’t seek unity with those who preach a false gospel, like the Mormons, or the Roman Catholic Church, who follow a completely different body of truth, who preach a different Gospel or a different Jesus, or those who follow a Gospel of licentiousness, using God’s grace to justify homosexuality as some churches do today. There can be no unity with those who are not truly believers.
But with regard to true believers, and the true church of Jesus Christ, and our own body—Do everything you can to preserve our unity in Christ.
Now I want to close by giving two examples of my experience, one negative and one positive.
I once received a letter from a personal friend who was a member of Risen King.
I’m going to provide paraphrase of the letter so you can get the gist of it.
It read: This is to inform you that we are removing our membership from Risen King Community Church, effective immediately. We are not going to tell you why, nor do we want you to ask, because we don’t believe you will change. Nor are we going to tell anyone else why, because we are not gossips (Then they proceeded to tell others despite their commitment not to). Please let this letter be our exit interview.” Effectively, they were saying we don’t want to talk to you about this, and we don’t want to talk to you again. That’s it’, it’s over.
Would you say that’s making every effort to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace? Does completely cutting off all communication give opportunity for explanation, repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation, restoration in any way? What if God treated us in this fashion when we sinned. Would we have any hope in life?
And then the second example. I received a call recently from a lady in our church telling me that she had to leave our church. She had been publicly insulted in a small group by a fellow member and she was devastated. I sympathized a little, and then pulled her up short. Asked her what about her commitment to do what the Lord told her to do. Asked her if she had followed God’s command to talk to the person about their sin.
She stopped and decided to do what God wanted her to do, and follow Matthew 18:15.
And believe it or not, the other party reached out asking forgiveness in accord with Matthew 5:23. And there was a wonderful time of confession, forgiveness, reconciliation and restoration that took place. I received a text from her about her joy because she decided to do what the Lord Jesus did for us—He give us a chance to repent so we could be forgiven and completely reconciled and restored to right relationship with Him.
She did what Paul commanded us to do here: She did everything she knew how to preserve unity—and she and the other party were greatly blessed.
May that be our experience at Risen King!
Do everything you can to preserve our unity in the body of Christ.
