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Dr. John K. LaShell Ashe Alliance
The Unity of the Spirit
Ephesians 4:1-6
Jesus Christ loved the Church and purchased it with His own blood. Acts 20:28 calls His blood the blood of God since the Man who died is also God. It is a shocking truth expressed in song by Charles Wesley,
“Amazing love! How can it be that Thou my God hast died for me?” The God who is Life shed His human blood and died, not only for me as an individual, but for His Church. If that is so, every Christian who loves Christ must love the Church of Christ. Timothy Dwight, the grandson of Jonathan Edwards expressed his love for the church in a song that speaks deeply to me.
I love Thy kingdom, Lord,
the house of Thine abode,
the church our blest Redeemer saved
with His own precious blood.
I love Thy church, O God!
Her walls before Thee stand,
dear as the apple of Thine eye
and graven on Thy hand.
For her my tears shall fall;
for her my prayers ascend;
to her my cares and toils be giv’n,
till toils and cares shall end.
I have given my tears, prayers, cares, and toils to the Church of Christ all
my life since I was a young man. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians starts out with a majestic description of our
individual salvation. We, who believe in Christ, were chosen by the Father
before the foundation of the world. We were given faith and saved by the
grace of God. Then Paul turns to the Church, where Jews and Gentiles form
one family, the family of God. He closes that section of the letter with a
stirring doxology.
Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we
ask or think, according to the power that works within us, 21 to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever
and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
Now here’s the rub: We don’t have direct contact with the universal,
worldwide church of God. We live in the fellowship of a local church, and
local churches don’t seem nearly as grand and glorious as the universal
church, which exists throughout all generations. The Apostle Paul is not an idealist. He is very much a realist, so in the second half of his letter to the Ephesians, he turns to the very practical
problems of living together in a local church. Paul knows that problems will
arise between Christians, so he prepares the Ephesian believers and us for
those times.
Because churches on earth are local expressions of the glorious church of
Christ, we may expect them to be better than they are. When people in the
church fall woefully short of ideal Christian behavior—and that does
happen—weak or uncertain believers may reject the church altogether. It
has become common to speak of “church hurt,” but I don’t like that term.
The church doesn’t hurt anybody. People in the church hurt each other.
I’m preaching this message to prepare you for the time to come when you
will experience stresses and strains and misunderstandings with your
brothers and sisters in Christ.
So what should we do when painful words and actions disrupt our
fellowship?
Read Ephesians 4:1-6
So what should we do when painful words and actions disrupt our
fellowship?
- Walk in Love (vv. 1-3)
Love comes at the end of verse 2, but it is the controlling idea for how we
are to walk. Love can be a rather nebulous word. We use it in so many
different ways. I love chocolate. I love my wife. She is not made out of
chocolate, but sometimes she gives me chocolate. What does love mean
in the context of these verses? Love begins with—
A. Humility
The word translated “humility” is composed of two parts. The first part means “low.” The second part means “opinion.” So the humble person has a low opinion of his own importance. He doesn’t think
he’s always right. He doesn’t try to push others down. We have a good definition of humility in Philippians 2:3-4.
Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of
mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not
merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the
interests of others.
Love begins with genuine care for the needs and hurts of others. When you are hurting, it is natural to focus on yourself. It is very hard to think about how the other person feels. Your natural response is to
think, “I am hurt. My family is hurt. That other guy is wrong. He should be held accountable.” It is not natural for you to think, “Hey, that other guy may be hurting as much as I am. I wonder what kind of help he needs.”
Years ago, I found I needed to pray for God to bless the people who hurt me. That’s what Jesus said to do in Luke 6. “Do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” There is a kind of prayer that is not helpful—“Lord, make him repent. Make him see how wrong he is. Make him apologize to me.” Any pagan can pray that kind of “fix him” prayer. Jesus said to do good to those who hurt you and to pray that God will bless them. You can’t do that in your own strength and wisdom, but if you ask the Holy Spirit to fill you and change your heart, then you can learn to care about the other party.
What is love? Love begins with humility. Then humility leads to—
B. Gentleness
A gentle person is not pushy. He is considerate. He is courteous. This naturally flows from humility, from having a low opinion of your rights. Gentleness is not a natural response to hurt. When others hurt us, our natural response might go in one of two ways. We might retreat. We might flee the scene, or at least retreat behind a shell of indifference. The other natural response to hurt is to lash out at the person who is causing us pain. We might speak in anger with loud, hostile words. So gentleness is not natural, but the Holy Spirit can change our hearts. When you are hurting, you can ask the Holy Spirit to enable you to respond with supernatural gentleness.
I do need to pause here and clarify the kind of hurt I’m talking about. I’m talking about the normal kinds of hurts that come between Christian individuals or families in the church. However, there are situations in which a gentle, forbearing response is not right. For example, if a woman is being beaten by her husband, she should go to the police, and the church should back her up. In one of our churches, a man brought another couple into his home for the purpose of wife-swapping for the night. He threatened his wife with a rifle, and she ran for refuge to us at the parsonage. But when there is normal misunderstanding or friction or bad communication between brothers and sisters, God wants to give you the grace and strength of the Holy Spirit to be humble and gentle.
What is love? Love begins with humility which leads to gentleness.
Humility and gentleness produce—
C. Patience and tolerance
The word translated patience is a combination of two words. The first means “long” and the second refers to having “a hot, passionate spirit, especially in anger.” So the patient person takes a long time to become hot with anger. Showing tolerance to one another or bearing with one another is similar to patience. It means that you can endure a difficult situation or person for a long time. We want change to happen immediately. Especially, we want the other person to change right now! But the kind of love that makes us humble and gentle also enables us to bear with our pain while we undertake the difficult work of healing. Some physical wounds take a long time to heal. So do some emotional wounds. Some of our wounds will not be completely healed until we see Jesus. That is the reason we need to exercise patience and forbearance toward one another.
Again, who can do this in his own natural strength? Probably none of us, but the Holy Spirit can produce patience and endurance in our naturally impatient hearts. That is the reason the apostle says, “being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” The Holy Spirit is the one who creates unity among believers, and only He can enable us to keep it.
So what should we do when painful words and actions disrupt our fellowship? First, walk in love. But why should we go to all the trouble to walk in love? What might motivate us to want to be humble, gentle, and patient? The answer comes in vv. 4-6. Read vv. 4-6.
- Remember to Whom We All Belong
We are bound together because we belong to the Triune God. We belong
to—
A. One Holy Spirit.
The Spirit called you to Christ through the hope of the gospel, and He put all believers into the same body, the body of Christ, which is the Church. Is the Holy Spirit divided? Is there a different Holy Spirit who lives in you than lives in your Christian brothers and sisters? Do we not all have the same hope? Has the Holy Spirit created two bodies of Christ, one for you and one for the people who trouble you? No, you all belong to the Spirit of God who lives in you individually as His temples and who lives in all of you collectively as His temple. When Jesus saved you, His Holy Spirit moved in to make you His temple. He took up residence in you and claimed you as His own place to dwell. Then, when He brought you all together to form you into a church, He intended you to become one functioning body of Christ, and He moved into your midst to enable you to be that body
here. The members of Christ’s body care for one another. Heather and I have been humbled and encouraged by the people who have taken care of us where we are now. When seven small trees fell on our carport during an ice storm, three men with chainsaws showed up that same afternoon.
Emotional and spiritual hurts are harder to heal than hurts to houses, but the principle is the same. Walk in the Spirit. Live in the Spirit, and the Spirit who lives among you will teach you how to care for each other, even when you are hurting yourself. We need to walk in love toward other Christians because we are bound together by the Holy Spirit and because we belong to—
B. One Lord Jesus Christ.
Are there two Saviors, one for you and one for the people who irritate you? How did you come to Christ? You came to Him by faith. You repented of your sins, and you trusted Jesus to save you. There is one faith, one way of salvation through Jesus Christ. That faith unites you to all your brothers and sisters. And then, all the followers of Christ have the same baptism. In baptism, we are united with Christ in the likeness of His death and resurrection. Going down into the water is like dying. Coming up out of the water is like being raised from the dead. Our baptism teaches us that we have died with Christ to sin, and we have been raised to new life so that sin is no longer master over us. Jesus is our Master. Jesus is our Savior, and Jesus is our Lord. You belong to Him, and so do the people whom you find difficult.
If we belong to Christ, then we are slaves of Christ. Christ is our Master. Christ is our Lord. In Romans 14, the apostle Paul says, “Who are you to judge the servant of another?… Why do you judge your brother? Or why do you regard your brother with contempt?… So then each one of us will give an account of himself to God.” The issue in that chapter is differing opinions in the church about Jewish food laws and holy days, but the principle is broader. Yes, we are supposed to help a sinning brother, but we are not his final judge. We have no right to despise a brother in Christ. We should look first at our own sins. Then the shortcomings of our brothers and sisters won’t seem as horrible. It is so easy for little resentments and little criticisms to crawl into our hearts like ants crawling into the kitchen during a rainstorm. First, there is one. Then there are two. Then you are overrun with them. Bring those little ants under the ant-killing blood of Christ. Ask the Holy Spirit to exterminate them. Jesus, your Lord, will give you a desire to walk in love toward your brothers and sisters.
We need to walk in love because we are bound together by the Holy
Trinity to whom we belong. We belong to the Holy Spirit. We belong to
Jesus Christ, and we belong to—
C. One Father
You and I have the same Father. We are brothers and sisters. We are part of the same family. Our Father is not just any father. He is God over all. He created everything. He is sovereign over all of history, but here the point is that He is sovereign over all the events of our lives. Everything that pertains to His children is under His loving hand. He works through you and through all the events of your life for your good. He is in every one of His children by His Holy Spirit.
An old chorus says, “He’s got the whole world in His hands, He’s got
the whole world in His hands.” That’s true, but then the chorus goes
on to say, “He’s got you and me brother in His hands, He’s got you
and me sister in His hands, He’s got the whole world in His hands.”
In Ephesians 4, Paul is not so much thinking about the whole world as he is about you and me and our brothers and sisters. We have the same God and Father who is over all our trials and troubles. We have the same God and Father who is at work through and in all of us. Therefore, walk in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Personal Application
Our Father is not divided. Our Lord and Savior is not divided. The Holy Spirit is not divided. You and I and all believers in Christ belong to one Triune God. The love of the Spirit, the love of our Lord, the love of our Father, the undivided love of the Holy Trinity call out to us to walk in love toward each other. Some of you will have relatively easy lives with little conflict. Some of you will have more difficult lives with many hardships. All of us should expect to face challenging situations both outside the church and inside the church. If God expected our church life to be easy, He would never have inspired Paul to write Ephesians 4:1-6.
My life has not been as difficult as the lives of some people, but as a pastor, I have gone through a number of trying times. I haven’t always done well in those difficulties, but God has taught me some things. He has taught me to move toward people who are at odds with me, not away from them. I can remember crossing the street on purpose so that I could give a friendly greeting to a lady who was being distant toward me. The hardest example occurred a few years into my last pastorate. A certain man said to me, “If you don’t change, we will fight, and I will win.” Our regional director told me, “He has gotten rid of the last two pastors. You have two choices. You can leave the church now, or you can stay, but if you stay, you have to see it through. You can’t just take another church when it gets difficult.” I stayed. I won’t give you the whole story, but on the day when the trouble came to a head, I was facing that man, with the regional director in the room, and I felt as if all the heat had left my body. I was so cold that I couldn’t help shivering. I found it difficult even to speak. The man who was trying to get rid of me accused me of smiling, perhaps even smirking. I wasn’t smiling. I wasn’t grinning at him. My face was pulled into what appeared to be a smile by the tension in my freezing body. I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t change it. But later that same day, when I had to be calm, God’s Spirit gave me a supernatural calmness. The church voted, and he left. Soon after that, I had an opportunity to do a good turn to that man. I permitted him to use the church for an event. Somewhat later, when his wife was in the hospital, I visited and prayed with her. Then when she was at home in hospice, I visited again and prayed with them. Eventually, God brought a substantial, not perfect, healing of my relationship with that man.
There have been other difficult situations. Heather could put the name of a woman beside my first heart attack, but that woman and I never became enemies. There was always respect between us. Why do I share these things with you? I want you to know that I am not just preaching a message out of thin air. I want to tell you that it is good and worthwhile to be diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. God knows that tensions will arise in His church, but His Spirit will give you what you need if you ask Him. Some of you men and women have experienced the power of the Spirit in tense situations. I want you young ones to learn to walk daily with the Triune God while you are young so that when you are older, you will walk in love. You will walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called.