You have your Bibles turned with me to Ephes
ians chapter 4 in verse number 11.
Working our way through verses 11 through 16
different times, looking at different verses
in
this one context. And today we're going to
wrap this section up. So I want to begin one
more time
by reading this whole text verses 11 through
16. Russell Paul writes, "And he gave some as
apostles,
and some as prophets, and some as evangelists,
and some as pastors and teachers, for the equ
ipping
of the saints, for the work of service to the
building up of the body of Christ, until we
all
attain to the unity of the faith and of the
knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man,
to the measure of the stature which belongs to
the fullness of Christ. As a result,
we are no longer to be children, tossed here
and there by waves and carried about by every
wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by
craftiness and deceitful scheming. But
speaking the
truth in love, we are to grow up in all
aspects into him who is the head, even Christ,
from whom
the whole body, being fitted and held together
by what every joint supplies. According to the
proper working of each individual part, causes
the growth of the body for the building up of
itself in love." Now, last time we were here,
you look there in verse 12, we said that that
word
equipping, also in other translations, is
translated perfecting, same Greek word, and it
has to do
with the idea of bringing the saints of God to
spiritual maturity. That's God's will for all
Christians, that we are always to be growing
to greater and greater levels of spiritual
maturity
in the time that we have in these bodies on
his earth. That is what is involved in, from
Romans 8,
same thing, God's conforming us to the image
of Christ. That's the same thing, it's the
same
process as he's conforming us to the image of
Christ. We are growing to greater and greater
levels in our life of spiritual maturity, and
this is a lifelong process for every one of us
.
And we have learned in our study of this
section that in addition to giving all
individual
Christians spiritual gifts, Christ has also
given to the church as a whole, remember from
last time,
there in verse 11, "some as apostles, some as
prophets, some as evangelists, and some as
pastors
and teachers." What for, Paul verse 12, for
the equipping of the saints? That's why those
offices
are given, gifted men given for the equipping,
the maturing of the saints. And as we
discussed,
the office of apostles and those New Testament
prophets have passed away, they're done away
with, they were there for the beginning and
the foundation of the building of the church,
and now what do we have in the church? Evangel
ists and teaching shepherds, if you remember
that
little nuance, that pastors and teachers is
really in the great construction one office,
pastor-teacher teaching shepherd. And these
men down through church history, God has
gifted to be able
to equip the saints, synonymous again with
bringing the saints to spiritual maturity, how
? Through
the preaching and teaching of God's word on a
regular consistent basis. Again, the Creeke
word
there for equipping in verse 12, it means
fully equipped, full grown, complete, total,
mature,
all those words carry the idea of the original
meaning. And as you know, God is not demanding
out of Christians sinless perfection in this
life. If he was, none of us would be able to
deliver.
Right? I mean, we can all amen that one, right
? From personal experience, because we would
all
be in a lot of trouble on day one of that
endeavor, right? The only sinless perfection
that any of us have in this life is Jesus's
sinless perfection that he achieved in his
life on this
earth as our substitute. And that
righteousness, as I said earlier, is then imp
uted to us by grace
through faith alone in him. That's the only
sinless perfection we'll ever deal with until
we get to
heaven and we're in glory. And then we will be
practically sinlessly perfect. And as a result
of that sovereign grace that is extended to us
in salvation, God is now asking for fully
equipped,
full grown, mature Christians to spend their
lives and being conformed into the image of
his Son
with the time that we all have left. God is
asking that we mature spiritually
during the time that we live on this earth
from the very moment of regeneration until the
very
moment of our last breath. That is what God is
asking of every Christian. If you're a
truly a Christian, you should want that for
your life. When you hear me say that,
you should say, "Yes, that is what I want." As
I talked about last week, the purpose of the
church
and church leaders, again, is to help you in
this endeavor to bring you all to spiritual
maturity.
And as we saw, God uses all kinds of things to
bring us to maturity. He uses, of course,
the Holy Spirit. Remember last week Paul got
on to the Galatians in Galatians 3.3? "Are you
so foolish?"
He said, "Having begun by the Spirit, are you
now being perfected by the flesh?"
And the implication is, if you began in the
Spirit, if you were born by the Spirit, if you
went
well by the Spirit, you could never get to
maturity through the flesh. That only happens
by the power of the Spirit. And then remember,
God brings trials and testings into our life
to bring us to spiritual maturity. Whether you
like it or not, that's
how he works. James 1, 2, and 3. "Consider it
all joy, my brethren." How crazy is that?
"Consider it all joy when you encounter
various trials." Only Christians say, "Yes,
joy, trials,
knowing that the testing of your faith
produces endurance." Remember, we went through
that in
James. Only we think like that. And in line
with trials and tests, right in line, involved
with
that, God uses suffering to mature us. 1 Peter
5, 10, "After you have suffered for a little
while,
the God of all grace, who called you to his
eternal glory in Christ, will himself," look
at that
word, "perfect." Same thing as mature, confirm
, strengthen, and establish you. So also, God
uses
his word to bring us all to spiritual maturity
. 1 Peter 2, "Like newborn babies." Kind of
like my
little grandson, Lawson. He's still, "I want
to buy," he calls it, his bottle. Long. He
longs for that
bottle when he doesn't have it. "Long for the
pure milk of the word, so that by it you may
grow."
That's spiritually grow in respect to
salvation. So think about it. The Holy Spirit,
trials, testing,
suffering, and the Word of God all play a role
in God working to bring you and to bring me
to greater levels of spiritual maturity in our
Christian life. So as your pastor,
I don't need to help the Holy Spirit, right? I
mean, he can handle his role perfectly by
himself
without any help from me, correct? And I don't
need to make you suffer and bring trials into
your life.
God will take care of that perfectly by
himself, right? But I want area that I am
involved in,
in bringing you to spiritual maturity, Sunday
in and Sunday out, bringing you the preaching
of the Word of God. That is where he has
called me to do this work, to assist you. And
that's what
Paul is getting at here in our text. Today, in
our day, it's evangelists and teaching pastors
equipping you, maturing you for the ministry
of the preaching of the Word. As I said,
especially
at this stage in the life of our church, folks
, and who we have here Sunday in and Sunday out
,
really, this is my primary goal, to bring you
and to bring myself higher and greater levels
of spiritual maturity through my pulpit
ministry of the Word. My ultimate goal is not
to get more
people in the building here. It's really not.
I mean, we'd like to see that, right? We'd
love to
add a bunch of more chairs and have a bunch of
more people in here. But that really is not
the model
of ministry that I follow. Brother Moeke
taught me this long time ago. Success in the
ministry
is not measured by numbers, but by faithful
ness to the work that God has given you to do.
Faithfulness determines success. Now, some
might say, well, that's exactly what I expect
a pastor
who has a church of 25 people on Sundays to
say. It's not about the numbers, right? You
expect
me to say that. But as far as I read here, you
can really double check it. You can look at it
right now. God didn't say he's given some as
evangelists and teaching pastors to fill the
building. Do you see that anywhere in this
text? That's not the purpose. Let me tell you
something
else. The purpose is really not even to get
people saved. That's a shocker. Although if
somebody
comes in here to our worship service on Sunday
, which is designed for the saints, not for the
world,
and they get saved, hallelujah. Praise God. We
will be so glad. But the primary purpose in
the
church is for the saints of God to come here
and worship and for the saints of God to come
here
and be taught and be brought to maturity. And
if in the process of that, someone who is lost
comes
in here and gets saved, hallelujah. Let's bapt
ize them and get them in the fold. A young
preacher
once said to Charles Spurgeon, my congregation
is too small. And Spurgeon said, well, perhaps
they
are as large as you'd like to give an account
for on the judgment day. Now I can feel that
answer.
The reality here with us is I'm not
responsible for how many. You know what I'm
responsible for?
What kind of ministry do I have with who it is
that God brings in our door?
What kind of ministry is in this building when
you come here and when others come here? I don
't
have any programs. And I'm not here to
entertain. I am here to equip the saints more
than anything
else through the preaching of the word of God.
Paul understood this, of course, better than
anybody. He said this, look in Colossians 1.28
. We proclaim him admonishing every man
and teaching every man with all wisdom so that
we may present every man complete. Same word.
Mature in Christ. He got it. Paul told Timothy
and 2 Timothy 4 verses 1 and 2,
I solemnly charge you in the presence of God
and of Christ Jesus who is to judge the living
and the dead and by his appearing and his
kingdom preach the word. Be ready in season
and out of
season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with great
patience and instruction. Other translations
for instruction is doctrine there. Our exhort
ation in preaching must always be built upon
doctrine.
We have to continually, from this pulpit, from
the TV screen and Sunday school, we have to
continually provide you sound doctrine. That's
how you mature the saints. And in order to do
that,
look at what Paul says in 2 Timothy 2.15. Be
diligent, not lazy. Be diligent to present
yourself
approved to God as a workman who does not need
to be ashamed accurately handling the word of
truth.
That has to be the commitment of every
faithful pastor more than anything else.
So we've seen here this progress to maturity
through gifted men equipping the saints.
And now I want you to notice in this text,
this progression is just going to keep going
like this.
Next, we're going to see you, the saints, do
the work of ministry. Look next in verse 12.
The evangelists, again, and the teaching
pastors, what are they for? Verse 12, for
the equipping of the saints, for what? For the
work of service. Also translated for the work
of the ministry. Okay, so you're reading that.
So who does the work of the ministry right
there?
The preachers? Saints. A lot of people,
especially older Southern Baptist,
and everybody knows I'm telling the truth,
think that the pastor is supposed to do
everything in
the church. He's supposed to cut the grass, do
the sermons, visit all the people and do it
all.
That's not what the Bible is teaching here, is
it? I mean, do you see that anywhere here?
Do you follow the progression of this verse?
The pastors are to concentrate on preaching
and
teaching the Word which matures the saints,
and the saints do the work of serving one
another,
and the saints do the work of ministry outside
the church. Remember back in Acts 6,
they had the Greek widows were not getting a
fair shake out of the food that was being
passed out.
So they sent a report back to Jerusalem, hey,
we're not getting what we're supposed to get.
Those Jerusalem Jewish widows are getting the
first dibs, and they're getting more food than
we are.
So the apostles heard this, and they said, "
Man, we can't get by down at issues like that.
We don't
have time for all that. Choose out of this
group seven men to handle this." That's where
Deacon
started. And then in Acts 6 verse 4, what did
they say? "But we will devote ourselves,
apostles,
to prayer and the ministry of the Word." So it
's clear their task was to equip the saints,
mature
the saints through their ministry of prayer
and preaching the Word, and then the saints
were to do the practical work of the ministry
and tend to these widows who were not getting
a
fair shake with the food. Every Christian is
called a minister. Every Christian has been
given spiritual
gifts to do the work of the ministry. You all
have callings and administrations that the
Holy Spirit
of God enables, empowers, and wants to see you
functioning in. Every one of us is called to
serve
in the Church of Jesus Christ in a multitude
of ways. Peter, Peter makes this very clear
in 1 Peter 4-10. Look what he says. "As each
one has received a special gift,
employ it in serving one another as good
stewards of the manifold grace of God." God
has given every
Christian a gift. We talked about that I think
two Sundays ago, and it could be a gift of
multi-faceted
levels of that gift that can branch out into
all kinds of things that you're gifted to do.
And God has made you all stewards of this gift
, as Peter just said, which means, guess what,
if you're a steward, you don't own that gift.
You're a steward of it. God owns the gift. You
only
manage the gift for God. And so it goes
without saying that if he has made you a ste
ward over
the giftedness that he has given to you, he
wants you to use it. He wants you to use it if
you don't
know what your gifts are. Find out what they
are and start using them. It's not hard. Every
Christian has a spiritual task, so get to
doing it is what I'm saying. We are here in
the pulpit
ministry with our gifts trying to equip you
through the preaching of the Word so that you
can serve
effectively. And then really, when you think
about it, really, the gifts that you have,
they're not really for you. They're for others
. And so if you don't use them,
then somebody else doesn't benefit from them
because you're not using them. If you go back
and dig into the book of Acts, it's
interesting. You will actually find that
Christianity started out
as a layperson's movement, really. There weren
't any professionals in the early church.
There were laypeople serving each other and
witnessing to the world. And over time,
things changed to what we have today. The
pastorate has become a profession. You get a
degree from a
seminary and then you get called to a church
and you're basically paid by that church to
this body
of lay spectators to watch you work. And
especially in big churches, even when they
need to get something
done in the church, well, they just hire
somebody to do it is what they do. Instead of
somebody
within the church that has the ability of
getting the job done and serving in that way,
well, just hire somebody outside and pay them.
We got all this money. We can do that.
And what's really wrong? I really think this
is really wrong. It's a lot of churches do
this.
You've been in churches that do this. When a
church loses a pastor, what do they do to go
get
another one? Well, they go steal one from
another church. They send a pulpit command out
and they
sit in the back and they listen to them and
they steal that pastor from that church. And
lo and
behold, he gets a calling to come. It seems
like it's never to a smaller church with a
lower salary.
Always the calling is to the bigger church
with the higher salary. It seemed like funny
how that
works out, right? So they steal another church
's pastor instead of already having leadership
available that they've trained up within their
own church who's ready to step up to the plate
and take over. That's the way they did it long
ago. They didn't go steal pastors from other
churches.
I mean, that's what we got right here in our
church. Look, if Christie's uncle would have
been
successful in totally running me over with the
forklift a couple of years ago, which was a
very close moment to death for me a few years
ago. And I met the Lord that day. You got Dr.
R.D. Peters right there ready to go next
Sunday. Next man up. You don't have to have a
pastor's
search committee. You don't have to go steal a
pastor from another church. You've already got
somebody raised up ready to go. That's the way
it's supposed to be. The setup now of having a
professional pastor or a group of them to do
all the work of the ministry totally. You know
what
that really does? It really robs the saints in
serving in the church. And really all it does,
especially in these giant churches, it just
makes people Sunday morning spectators.
And the ministry staff does all the serving
and then they just go to the house. One
commentator
says this, "The distinction between clergy and
laity is unscriptural and perhaps the greatest
single hindrance to the spread of the gospel."
It's quite a quote. Now, keep everything
balanced.
In reality, the Bible does call for special
honor, give honor to whom honor is due for
those who
serve as pastors in the church. We know that.
But in the big picture, guess what, man? I'm
just one
of you, especially me, the old oil-work
warehouse preaching pastor. Okay? I'm up here
and I'm just
using certain gifts that God has given me to
the best of my ability, the best way I know
how.
I'm not educated, but it's not for me to visit
the sick or the shut-ins any more than it is
for you to visit them. You can do that just as
well as I can. It's not for me to call and
check
on people any more than it is for you to do
that as serving the church. Instead of asking
me, "Hey,
have you heard from so-and-so in a while? We
haven't seen them in church in a while." Well,
you'll call them. We got the numbers. We got
everybody's number. You haven't seen them in a
while. Don't call me. Call them and say, "Hey,
what's going on?" Guess what? When you do that
,
you represent the church just as well as I can
. You do it just as well. It's not just for me
to do.
Guess what? It's even the same thing with
discipling new Christians.
Those of you who have some maturity, you got
some time walking in the Lord, guess what? You
can
disciple a new Christian just as well as I can
. And you should do that. The same thing with
helping
people with their problems. I don't care
whether it's spiritual or physical. You run
into a snag,
you don't know the answer to the question.
Yeah, come see me. But you can do that just as
well as
I can, praying for people, encouraging people,
witnessing to people outside the church. The
list is long. And you can do all those things
just as well as I can. And listen to this. If
our church
is functioning at really that kind of optimum
level in the way that Paul is talking about
here,
you all together will be serving in those ways
and more than I just listed for you. And I
mean,
I'm already doing my primary work of service.
The old plate is full if you catch my drift.
All right? If you think it ain't, just come
follow me around for a couple of days. I got
an extra bedroom. You can watch what I do. But
again, look at verse 12. It's very clear. The
equipping of the saints is happening right
this minute. It's happening. You're being
equipped
right now. What is it for? For you? For the
work of service. That's you. My primary work
is equipping
you through the prisoner word to do this, to
do the work of ministry, to do the work of
service.
God has designed the church not to be a place
where you just come on Sunday as a spectator,
to be served by the pastor who has prepared
all week this sermon for you to hear. And then
you
just go to the house. Look, my task in
studying in prayer or anything else is to try
to develop in
all of you full grown, fully mature, equipped
saints, including myself, in order for you to
do
the work of the ministry in the church. That's
how this all works. If everybody in here
is fully functioning in the way that God
intended for all churches to function, let me
tell you
something. We will have a really healthy
church that makes an impact in this world no
matter what
our size is, no matter how many people we have
. If everybody's functioning at this level, man
,
there's no telling what God may do. All
pastors really just love when somebody comes
up to them
after church and they say, "I think we need to
do this or that," which in the Greek really
means
"I think you need to do this or that." Really?
Huh? Look, I've told you this before a bunch
of time.
If you come up with an idea to minister in a
certain way, whether it's inside the church
or outside the church, you come up to me, you
know what I'm always going to say? Well, that
's
insane. I say, "That sounds great. Get to work
, head it up, gather some people, get a team,
and I'll support you in whatever you want to
do." That's how I roll, okay? Look, I'd be
doing you a
disservice if I said, "Okay, give me that. I
'll do all that." That would rob you of your
opportunity
to serve, right? That's what this is about. Go
back to verse 12. Pastors are from the equ
ipping
of the saints for the work of service and then
looks next. What happens to the building up of
the body of Christ? That's the next thing in
the progression. When we all do our part and
the whole
church is maturing properly and we are serving
one another with our individual gifts, God's
will
is fulfilled and we demonstrate, hey, this is
a spiritually mature church. Look how they
function
in serving with one another and outside the
four walls. I mean, we don't want a church
that can,
we should strive for a church that can stand
tall with maturity and represent Jesus Christ
to the
outside world. And when people come in here
and get a little dose, they say, "Wow, this
place is
different." And it doesn't stop there. Keep
going. Next, verse 13. What happens next in
this progression
until we attain to the unity of the faith? Oh
boy. Remember, we said God wants a united
church.
God wants a mature, working, serving, unified
church. If you have a church full of immature
saints,
which many places are, that's where you get
all the strife in the church. That's where you
get
all the fights and the problems and the
arguments between one another. And that
usually leads to
church splits as some of us are very well
familiar with from days gone by where David
Miller used
to say one group goes down the road to start a
new church and they call it a manual Baptist,
God
with us. Remember, Paul is still not done with
this train of thought. When we are functioning
properly, folks, not only will we come to the
unity of the faith, but look at this next one
in verse
13, "And of the knowledge of the Son of God."
We definitely want the church to grow up into
the
knowledge of the Son of God, right? Let me
tell you something. This knowledge right here,
this isn't just basic knowledge. This is deep,
personal, experiential acquaintance with
Christ,
which only comes about in your life when you
are being equipped through the preaching of
the word
and not only that, your own personal study for
yourself. Both of those things have to happen.
Look at what Paul says in Philippians 3-10
that I may know him. That's the goal and the
power
of his resurrection and the fellowship of his
sufferings being conformed to his death.
Again, if you have some time under your belt
living the Christian life,
do you not recognize what a joy it is to know
Christ at the depth that you do now than when
you first believed in Christ? Don't you know a
lot more about him now than you did when you
first believed? How fulfilling is it in your
life experience to come to know Christ more
and more
and more as the days go along? That's the best
thing in life. And this is what Paul is saying
.
The results here in this progression are unity
and an ever-deepening knowledge of the Son of
God
as you're being equipped as you're doing your
own study. Paul's not done though. Look next
in verse
13. What does that result in? To a mature man,
man and woman, to the measure of the stature
which
belongs to the fullness of Christ. That result
is the primary goal to become more like Christ
.
San Corinthians 3/18. But we all with unveiled
face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the
Lord
are being, this is what's happening to us,
transformed into the same image Christ from
glory to glory
just as from the Lord the Spirit. There it is
right there. That's the goal. Transformed into
the same
image, the glory of the Lord back to verse 13
of our text to a mature man. We want our
church
to represent a full-grown Christ when people
come in here. Mature saints verse 13 to the
measure of
the stature which belongs to the fullness of
Christ. It's very clear from all this that God
is not satisfied that people just go to church
, just show up at church and that's it. I've
done
check the box off. I'm done for the week. Let
me tell you something that's necessary.
In fact, it's a command, not a suggestion to
forsake not the assembling of yourselves
together.
And if you're a Christian and you're regener
ate and you've been born again and you have the
sovereign
grace of God in your life, there's no place on
earth you might rather be in your heart on
Sunday
than in God's house. But he wants more out of
us than just participating in a spectator
sport.
He wants his will is to have full, grown,
mature, robust, vibrant, strong saints to be
functioning
in his church the way that he has designed
them to function. That's what he wants.
Now, there's another result here that Paul
lists and this is very important. Again,
we're in this progression. One thing leads to
another. Look at verse 14 as a result. The
result
of all that we just read. We are no longer to
be children tossed here and there by waves
and carried about by every wind of doctrine by
the trickery of men by craftiness in deceitful
scheming. So with all that we just learned
leading up to this verse, when you are
spiritually
mature as a result, you will have the
knowledge of sound doctrine. You can't be
mature without having
this knowledge of sound doctrine. And let's
look at that verse again. Who is it there in
the verse
that gets carried away by every wind of
doctrine by the trickiness of men by craft
iness and deceitful
scheming? Who is it? Children. Children. What
does that mean? Spiritually immature
Christians.
People, Christians in the church who lack
discernment. They are gullible. They fall
for the TV preachers. They fall for them for
the craftiness and trickery and deceitful
scheming
of the false teachers that permeate our
internet, that permeate our airwaves on
television. When
you are mature, when you are equipped, when
the Word of God abides in you, when you study
to show
yourself approved on the God of workmen who's
not ashamed in your personal study, guess what
you're
like? You're just like what it says at the end
of 1 John 2.14 at the end there. You are
strong.
And the Word of God abides in you and you have
overcome the evil one. That's what you are.
So many Christians get pulled into false
doctrine. You know why? Because they're
infants
in the faith and they stay as infants and they
don't study the Word and they are not equipped
properly with sound doctrine at their church.
They just up listening to man-centered dribble
in Jesus' name. Walter Martin is an important
author. He's dead now. Back in I think it was
the
70s or maybe the 80s. It might have been the
70s. He wrote a very important book called The
Kingdom
of the Cults. And what he did is he wrote the
basic teachings of all the major cults that we
have,
especially here in America. He said in that
book this, "Isn't it amazing that a 90-day
wonder out
of the Jehovah's Witness can take apart the
average Christian in 30 minutes?" Let me tell
you
something. That's so true. But Christians who
don't know their own doctrine well. But to not
be
that kind of Christian, not only do you have
to be in a sound biblical church, let me tell
you,
also you have to do the study for yourself.
You can't just rely on only the equipping that
happens
here on Sunday. Becoming a theologically
knowledgeable, discerning Christian takes work
on your own
part in your own study. Let me tell you
something. I don't have any more education
than anybody else
in here. I've got a high school diploma. I
didn't go to seminary. I'm not smarter or have
a higher
IQ than anybody in here. But I discipline
myself to do the work to know what I know. You
can do
the same thing as me. You can do exactly like
I have done. Turn off the TV. Put the phone
down is the only way you're going to get there
. Get in the word. Put the phone down. Put the
computer down. Turn the TV off and get in some
good sound theological books. If you don't
know
any, come ask me. I got a whole bunch of them
back there and at my house. Let me tell you
something.
You can even study the doctrine of the cults
that come to your door so that you can witness
to them
in an effective way. And generally in America,
there are only two that's going to come to
your
door, right? Mormons and Jehovah's Witness.
Primarily 99.999% of the time, the only people
that are coming knock on your door are them
too. Let me tell you something. It doesn't
take a lot
of time at all to understand the basics of
what they teach about who God is and how he
operates
in salvation from their unbiblical perspective
. It doesn't take a lot of time. I can take you
through it myself. Last time Jehovah's Witness
came to my house, Christie took a picture and
she posted it on Facebook. Boy, was that an
interesting day for them. I'm sure they didn't
have anybody else's house that day. It was
quite like the visit that we had. But what I'm
telling
you is when they knock on the door, don't be
hiding behind the curtain. Oh, look out Martha
,
they're here again. Be quiet so they don't
hear us in here. Oh, arm yourself. Get a
little booklet
back there right down that shelf. Eight things
or something you need to learn about Jehovah's
Witness. It don't take much so that when they
do knock on the door, you open it. Come on in.
I'm
glad to see you. Have a seat right here on the
couch and then you can present the true
accurate
biblical gospel to them as opposed to what
they're teaching and wonder of wonders the
Lord might use
that to get them saved. I can't tell you. I
can't. James White can't even count the number
of Mormon
missionaries that have been saved in him
comparing the biblical gospel to the Mormon
God. It's just
unending numbers and they come back to him and
they tell him, oh man, that night you spent
that time
with me and now I see the truth and they get
saved. Let them in the door. Every single one
of you in
this room should be able to do this. Every one
of you should. And that's in line with 1st
Peter 315.
You know this verse, but sanctify as the Lord
in your hearts always be ready to make a
defense
to everyone who asks you to give an account
for the hope that is in you yet with gent
leness and
reverence. That person shows up your door with
some false doctrine. You ought to be able to
defend
the faith and tell them, here's what the Bible
says. But notice it's right in line with where
Paul
goes next in this progression in Ephesians 415
, but speaking the truth in love. Oh, stop
there.
This is one of the big purposes of being
spiritually mature, that you develop the
ability
to speak the truth. Yes, uncompromisingly, don
't leave anything out. Yes, but you do it in
love.
When we make a defense of the faith, when we
present the true gospel, we're not trying to
win
an argument. We're not trying to beat somebody
down verbally with our theological knowledge,
so we can just wipe them out with what we know
and make them feel bad. We're trying to
present the
gospel in order to see another sinner like us
adopted by grace into God's family. That's
what
we're trying to do. The motive is love. Speak
the truth in love. What's the method Peter
just
told us? Gentleness and reverence. You're not
up there hollering and screaming at them that
they
go into hell for what they believe. No, gent
leness and reverence. Be smart. Be smart in how
you do it.
There are two great enemies to evangelism.
Number one, not speaking the truth. In other
words, not giving an accurate gospel
presentation. God loves you and has a
wonderful plan for your
life. It's not the gospel. Number two, indif
ference to people. Second greatest hindrance.
Cold indifference
to people where you just don't care. You just
want to go to battle and you just want to show
them how superior your belief system is to
theirs. Don't even do that. Don't even do that
if that's
what your motive is. Paul is saying mature
saints will speak the truth. They will care
about the
person they're speaking to and they will do it
in love. Sound, effective, evangelism is just
a
byproduct. When you do it right, spiritual
maturity. As brother Ed used to say, doing God
's work,
God's way. God's way for God's glory. So we've
walked our way through this progression of
maturity for the church today. Gifted men,
teaching pastors evangelists, equip the saints
. Then what
happens? The saints do the work of the
ministry. What happens then? The body is built
up and the
results of a mature body are unity within the
body, deep fellowship with Christ, Christ
likeness,
the knowledge of sound doctrine, and a loving,
truth-telling evangelism to the world around
us.
And then Paul's going to conclude all of that
with the back into verse 15 and on into verse
16.
Let's look at them together. We are to grow up
. That's us in all aspects into him who is the
head,
even Christ. Verse 16, from whom the whole
body, that's us, being fitted and held
together by what
every joint supplies. Look at this. According
to the proper working of each individual part,
so each individual part of the body of Christ
has to be working together, causes the growth
of the
body for the building up of itself in love.
And that's how Paul concludes this section.
Simply put,
Christ is the head from whom the whole body of
Christ in all its individual parts working
together
is how the body functions properly. And the
power for all of this is not ours. It's Christ
.
All the parts individually come together
because of Christ's power. Notice the emphasis
so far
in our text has been on our effort, our
responsibility, our service. And that's right.
All of that is
absolutely clear and unmistakable what Paul is
meaning. But when we come here to the end of
this
section, who does it all come back to? Jesus.
It all comes back to Jesus. As we say on the
time,
if we are the place here where Christ is
building his church, not us, certainly don't
look to me
to build it, Christ is building the church.
And you know what will happen more than
anything else
here? Christ will be on it. Christ will be
magnified. Christ will be glorified. All the
glory,
all the emphasis will be put toward him.
Scripture will be fulfilled. And then we will
know the fullness and the fountfulness as God
designed it to be in his church. Is that what
you
want? You can get to it. Let's pray. Father,
we thank you, Lord, for this convicting
section
from the Apostle Paul. Oh, you feel it from
Paul, that he's just trying with all his guts
to get
his point across to what God's design is for
his church. Lord, help us. We get weary in our
struggle
with the world of flesh and the devil. But
take this message, Lord, and help it, starting
with me,
to invigorate and motivate us, Lord, to serve
you at optimum level and live in such a way as
you
are brought on the glory. In Jesus' name we
pray. Amen.