EPHESIANS 4:13-16 A Mature Man

Introduction

I never tire of saying how extraordinarily kind God has been to us here at Bethel Baptist Church. One of the many ways He has extended His grace to us as a church is in the way He has enabled us to make so many changes and updates to our 107-year-old building. From the new bathrooms to the handicap ramp and stairs, new carpet and tables for the fellowship hall, and two major expenses with the new roof and new pavilion all taking place in one summer, and all fully paid for in advance, God has surely done exceedingly abundantly beyond all we can ask or think in caring for the needs of our church grounds and property.

But if you’re familiar with how church renovation projects often go, you understand that God has shown us even greater grace than merely having cash on hand to address our facility’s needs. Because church renovation projects very often cause a great deal of fighting in a church—even to the point of churches splitting and collapsing as a result.

Nothing reveals the underlying fractures in a church congregation like having to make decisions about spending significant amounts of money, does it? People reveal where their heart really is when a decision about the color of the new carpeting or type of roofing or how to paint the walls doesn’t go according to their preferences. Churches have fallen apart over the most insignificant things—and it’s almost never the big outside forces that blow a church over. It’s more often than not the little, picayune squabbles that spin up into church-splitting firestorms.

The main reason that this happens so often is because we are suffering from a great deal of immaturity in our churches. The poet Ogden Nash once wrote “You are only young once, but you can stay immature indefinitely.” If there is a better epitaph for our day and age, you’d be hard-pressed to find it. From politics to boardrooms to higher education institutions to families, immaturity runs rampant—and finds its way into far too many churches as well. And where immaturity and self-centered priorities are allowed free reign, real cooperation and unity together is all but impossible.

The Apostle Paul is continuing his teaching on the character of true Christian unity here in Ephesians 4. The first three chapters of the book center on the theology of our union with God and with one another through Christ, and beginning here with Chapter 4 Paul is unpacking the practical outworking of that unity. In verse 3 we are told to

Ephesians 4:3 LSB

be diligent to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

In verses 4-6 we are told that this unity we have derives from the unity of God Himself, and so is a unity that cannot be broken:

Ephesians 4:4–6 LSB

There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.

And here in our text this morning, we are told that the gifts of the victorious Christ that we examined last week are to be used

Ephesians 4:12–13 LSB

for the equipping 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 full knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ,

How do we combat the destructive nature of the spiritual immaturity that so easily plagues a church? How do we guard against that same kind of division creeping into our fellowship here at Bethel Baptist Church? What I aim to show you from our text this morning is that

Christian UNITY is FOUND where Christlike MATURITY is FOSTERED

The goal of this entire chapter—of the rest of this book going forward, in fact—is that the church in Ephesus (made up of Jews and Gentiles both) would find real Christian unity with one another. Paul has exhorted them that a walk worthy of their calling is a walk in unity together; he has shown them that the victorious Christ has won for them gifts in the church to cultivate their unity, and here he shows that those gifts are meant to foster maturity in Christ. And by that maturity they will find true Christian unity.

There are four distinct areas of our life and fellowship together as a church where Paul calls us to foster Christlike maturity. First of all, we see in the second half of verse 13, that we are called as a congregation to

I. Foster the CHARACTER of Christ (Eph. 4:13b)

Look again at verse 13—the gifts that the ascended Christ gave His church are meant to equip the saints

Ephesians 4:13 LSB

until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the full knowledge of the Son of God...

Fostering the character of Christ in our fellowship starts with

Real KNOWLEDGE of Christ (cp. John 6:69)

In his commentary, Matthew Henry said of this knowledge that it is

...not a bare speculative knowledge, or the acknowledging of Christ to be the Son of God and the great Mediator, but such as is attended with appropriation and affection, with all due honour, trust, and obedience. (Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 2313). Hendrickson.)

Consider the way the Apostle Peter spoke of knowing Christ in John 6—Jesus had just fed the 5,000, and in the ensuing run-in with the Pharisees a lot of His followers turned back and stopped following Him. When the disciples pointed out that Jesus was losing His audience, He asked point-blank, “Do you also want to go?” (John 6:67). Peter’s answer reflects what real knowledge of Jesus Christ looks like:

John 6:68–69 LSB

Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. “And we have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.”

That’s real knowledge of Christ, isn’t it? Not just an intellectual knowledge, but knowing with everything inside you that there is nowhere else we can go! That Jesus Christ is exactly Who He says He is; that He is God Himself in human flesh, He is your only hope, your only Savior, that there is nowhere else to turn for life, for hope, for salvation. There are a lot of people who would affirm that they are Christians, but when push comes to shove will leave Jesus behind when following Him becomes more difficult or disappointing or demanding than they were ready for. But the heart that really knows Christ is the heart that says, “If it’s not Jesus Christ, then it’s nobody. If I walk away from Him, I HAVE NOTHING AT ALL.” That is real knowledge of Christ.

Fostering the character of Christ in your life and in the life of your fellowship means fostering real knowledge of Christ, and it means fostering

Real LIKENESS to Christ (cp. Rom 12:2)

Ephesians 4:13 LSB

until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ,

Fostering the character of Christ means that you see yourself becoming like Him—you begin to see the things that delighted Him are becoming your delights as well—particularly in your obedience to your Heavenly Father. You find that you are able to say the same as He said in John 4:34

John 4:34 LSB

Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work.

Real likeness to Christ means that you see His compassion for others beginning to take root in your heart—you begin to respond to the lost the way Jesus did in Matthew 9:36

Matthew 9:36 LSB

And seeing the crowds, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and downcast like sheep without a shepherd.

Real likeness to Christ means that you grow in taking on others’ weakness and pain so that they may have your strength and comfort—sacrificing for their joy and salvation in imitation of the way Christ sacrificed Himself for you:

2 Corinthians 5:21 LSB

He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

The gifts that Christ has given His church are given so that we might foster the character of Christ in our lives and in the life of our fellowship—Christian unity is found where Christlike maturity is fostered. Paul goes on in verses 13-14 of our text to exhort us to use the gifts Christ has given the church to

II. Foster CONFIDENCE in the truth (Ephesians 4:14)

In Verse 14 we read:

Ephesians 4:14 LSB

so that 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,

For several years our family would take vacations down to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. The first year we went, the boys were 6 and 7, and Hannah had just turned 2. It was the first time the kids had seen the ocean and the surf, and they were kind of nervous standing there on the beach watching me getting knocked around by the waves. But it didn’t take long before they were jumping in and playing in the surf for hours on end.

Paul uses that same image here in Verse 14, of children getting swept off their feet by the waves of false teaching or theological fads. As JRW Stott put it:

“Such are immature Christians. They never seem to know their own mind or come to settled convictions. Instead, their opinions tend to be those of the last preacher they heard or the last book they read, and they fall an easy prey to each new theological fad” (Stott, J. R. W. (1979). God’s new society: the message of Ephesians (p. 170). InterVarsity Press.)

Oh we have a long list of those fads in Evangelicalism, don’t we? The Prayer of Jabez, The Shack, Heaven Is For Real, the Circlemaker, the Harbinger, Left Behind, the Enneagram, essential oils, Jesus Calling, The Daniel Diet, Experiencing God, Blue Like Jazz, and on and on it goes. But Christlike maturity means not getting swept up in every new thing that comes down the pike. Instead, Christian,

Develop your TASTE for SOLID teaching (Heb. 5:12-14)

A great deal of our chronic immaturity in our churches stems from our resistance to solid food in our churches. As the writer of Hebrews put it:

Hebrews 5:12–14 LSB

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern both good and evil.

When we spend our time in God’s Word acting like a stubborn five-year-old sulking at the breakfast table because we want our Fruity Pebbles instead of the ham and eggs on our plate, we are starving ourselves out of the maturity we are called to pursue. And the glut of junk food Christian devotionals out there that promise to get you your daily dose of Bible in 90 seconds or less (I wish I were making that up, but I’m not...)—surface-level marshmallow fluff like that will never produce a mature Christian.

Develop your taste for solid food; seek to dig into God’s Word and chew on it. Commit to serious time reading the Scriptures, and take advantage of every opportunity to study it with other believers through the gifts of pastors and teachers that He has given the Church. Many a Bible study has evaporated into oblivion because the people who were so enthusiastic about starting it suddenly decided it was more work than they signed up for.

Christlike maturity means fostering confidence in the truth of God’s Word—develop your taste for solid teaching, and

Develop your NOSE for FALSE teachers (Acts 17:11)

Like Charles Spurgeon’s famous response when invited to investigate some of the Christian fads of his day, “I can smell them, and that is enough!”—learn to smell a rat! Christlike maturity that grows in confidence in the truth will always ask one simple question of every novel teaching or theological assertion: “Chapter and Verse?” Develop the habit of taking everything you hear back to the Scriptures. Make it your aim to be like the members of the synagogue in Berea—when Paul went there and declared that Jesus is the Messiah (a new teaching for them if ever there was one!), “...they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so” (Acts 17:11). False teachers love to use double-talk (in fact, the Greek word for “trickery of men” is used for “dice-playing” elsewhere in Greek—imagine a street hustler using loaded dice on his unsuspecting mark, or a three-card monte game rigged in his favor.)

False teachers love to use the same language that Christians are accustomed to hearing: “Faith”, “atonement”, “justification”, “repentance”, “Spirit-filled”—but compare the way they use those words carefully with the Scriptures and you will see the subtle re-definitions, the twisting, the special pleadings and hand-wavings they use to introduce their own falsehoods. And like the street-hustler, they do their best work on gullible, immature minds that don’t know how to spot their tricks. Fostering confidence in the truth means growing in the maturity of knowing how to spot the trickery and craftiness of the deceitful scheming of false teachers.

A church that is growing in Christlike maturity will not be split apart by false teaching; it will stand firm against the schemes of heretical teachers who try to insinuate themselves into a fellowship—true Christian unity is found where Christlike maturity is fostered by growing confidence in the truth.

Paul goes on to warn the church at Ephesus not to adopt the trickery of false teachers—instead of “craftiness in deceitful scheming, they are to

Ephesians 4:15 LSB

“...[speak] the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, that is Christ,

The original Greek phrase doesn’t include the word “speaking”—it can also be translated “holding to the truth in love” or “being truthful in love”. But those two elements, truth and love must be held together at all times in our conduct. Christlike maturity means that you

III. Foster CHARITY in your convictions (Eph. 4:15)

False teachers flatter and manipulate; they insinuate rather than declare, they are carefully imprecise so that they can introduce their doctrinal funny business unnoticed. But Paul says that true Christlike maturity is characterized by two equally important elements—truth governed by the Word of God, and love governed by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit through the New Birth.

True Christlike maturity is seen in a body of believers who are uncompromising on the truth of God’s Word. But it is not enough just to be right. Because

Truth without LOVE will DRIVE people away

A church full of Christians who just sit around being RIGHTER than everyone else, that looks down on other churches or other Christians who aren’t quite as right as they are is not a good place to be. As absolutely necessary as it is to be confident in the truth and not tossed about by the waves of doctrinal shifts and fads, it is also immensely unhealthy spiritually to be so right that there is no charity in your heart for anyone who hasn’t come to your same conclusions. Such a congregation is lost in the immaturity of their own self-righteousness, brittle and suspicious and ready to stamp out dissention at any cost. The unity that such a church fosters is not Christlike unity; it is a hard-edged expectation of perfection that will inevitably end in splits and schisms and broken relationships

But the other end of the spectrum is no better, is it? Because

LOVE without truth will LURE people to death

A church that never wants to confront people with the truth because it isn’t “loving” will damn them. A congregation that insists on “love” to the exclusion of truth, that will never lovingly warn or reprove each other, that will uncritically tolerate any kind of behavior and never apply the standard of God’s Word to His people is a church that will soothe sinners into a false confidence that will be shattered on the day when Christ says to them “I never knew you, depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness” (Matt. 7:23). Such a church will not only produce members with no stomach for truth, but will also find itself with no real unity, since as soon as someone does not “feel loved”, there is no reason to stay.

Christian unity is found where Christlike maturity is fostered—in the character of Christ, in confidence in the truth, in charity in convictions. And one more evidence of Christlike maturity is seen in our fellowship as we

IV. Foster CONTRIBUTION to the body (Eph. 4:15-16)

Ephesians 4:15–16 LSB

but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, that is Christ, from whom the whole body, being joined and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the properly measured working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

Another evidence of Christian maturity in a congregation is our commitment to one another’s spiritual development; an understanding that

We are DEPENDENT on each other to GROW

Paul uses a picture of the human body, where each joint and ligament is involved in holding the whole body together. It’s a metaphor that we all understand on a very fundamental level, isn’t it? When you have a bad knee, you don’t just have a bad knee, do you? That bad knee puts more strain on the other knee, which puts strain on both legs, which affects your back, which affects your mobility and everything else. If you have one arm in a sling, the rest of your body has to compensate, causing aches and pains and discomfort in other joints and limbs that have nothing to do with that bad shoulder.

In the same way, it is “the properly measured working of each individual part” that causes the growth of the body. You may think that you are not important in the life of the church, that you are not missed when you are absent, that your contributions to the life of the body are inconsequential—but God’s Word clearly tells you that you are a vital part of this body! There are no “vestigal organs” in the Body of Christ; no body parts that have no use or serve no purpose. You are here in this congregation for a reason. And that reason is

We are DRIVING each other to CHRIST

We are to “grow up in all aspects into Him who is the Head, that is Christ” (Eph. 4:15). Each individual part of the body plays its role in supporting the growth in love and Christian unity of the whole body so that we may be joined to Christ Himself. Understanding this will transform your entire understanding of church membership.

Here’s what I mean by that—-we are so accustomed to thinking about our involvement here as some sort of consumer—we come here to “get something out of it”, to be strengthened or edified or encouraged, to attend to worship and prayer and preaching of the Word as a means of fortifying our own Christian walk. And of course, those things are all true.

But if we allow that to assume a “consumer” mentality, then we are neglecting the image that Paul presents to us here—you are not only here for your own spiritual benefit, you are here for your brother’s spiritual benefit. You are not just here to grow in your faith, but to help your sister grow in hers.

The attitude that says “I’m just not getting anything out of this Sunday School series, I’ll just skip it and go at 11” not only reveals your inner toddler’s refusal to eat solid food, but also betrays your disregard for your brothers and sisters in Christ who would benefit from your presence and your involvement.

Neglecting the opportunity to gather for prayer on Saturday mornings because it’s not your thing or you aren’t comfortable praying reveals that you don’t realize how much of an encouragement it is to others to have you present to pray with and for them (no matter how poor you think your prayers might be). God’s Word says that you are not a consumer in the Body of Christ, you are a contributor.

God’s Word calls us to Christlike maturity—a maturity that will knit us together in Christian unity that will stand fast in a climate that threatens to tear us apart. How is God’s Word calling you to maturity this morning? He has equipped His church with the gifts to foster that maturity—Apostles and prophets whose foundational teachings have been laid down in His authoritative and complete Word; evangelists and pastors and teachers to proclaim it, instruct in it and apply it to our lives, and fellow brothers and sisters to walk alongside us (and us alongside them) so that together we might grow up into the mature likeness of Christ in all things.

Are you growing in your knowledge of Christ? Are you growing in that knowledge of Him that enables you to spot the trickery of false teachers who want to diminish His deity or qualify His work of redemption to include their own false doctrines? Would you know how to answer a Jehovah’s Witness, for instance, who tells you that Jesus just was a god, on the same level as the archangel Michael?

And more than that, are you growing in your knowledge of what Christ has done for you and what He has rescued you from and what He promises you for your eternity—are you growing in your love and delight and joy and trust in Him that the thought of walking away from Him is as inconceivable to you as water that isn’t wet or a triangle that doesn’t have three sides? Is it impossible for you to imagine your life without your Savior?

Is the character of Christ becoming more and more evident in your life? Paul points to our speech as one of the measures of our maturity in Christ—

Ephesians 4:15 LSB

but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, that is Christ,

Examine yourself in light of God’s Word this morning—growing up in all aspects into Christ includes learning to speak the truth in love. Are you one of those people who like to think of yourself as uncompromising and bold and forthright in your speech—you brag that you “have no filter”, you just speak your mind and let the chips fall where they may? Friend, let me suggest to you that what you scoff at the notion of a “filter”, you are demonstrating that you do not speak in love. Blurting out whatever is on your mind to someone with no consideration of how your words will land on them is not Christlike maturity; it is selfish, childish immaturity.

Look to the Gospels and see how Christ spoke the truth—whether He was speaking to the Samaritan woman at the well or contending with the Sadducees in the Temple or rebuking the Pharisees in the synagogue or correcting Simon Peter on the night He was betrayed, Christ never separated truth and love in His words. You who are seeking Christlike maturity, see to it that you never separate them either.

Are you allowing your attitude towards this local body of believers to assume a “consumer” mentality? That you measure the worth of your time here only in terms of what you are gaining? Or have you already decided that you have nothing to offer the Body of Christ because you don’t possess the same gifts as someone else? That your presence in worship or participation in Bible study only matters to you, and if you’re not “getting anything” from it that there’s no point in going.

But consider what God’s Word teaches you here—that because you really belong to Jesus Christ by faith, you really are a vital part of this Body! You can no more separate yourself from the life of this fellowship than you can separate yourself from the life of Christ in you! And His Word promises you here that you have been properly measured and fitted here; you have been joined and held together with your brothers and sisters in Christ in order for them to build you up and for you to build them up.

Do you want to know the love of Christ for you? Do you want to grasp the depth of His delight in you and come to a full and mature understanding of His life in you and for you? Then look around this room. This is the presence of Christ for you, Christian—this congregation is the means by which you grasp the height and depth and length and breadth of Christ’s love for you—it is in these brothers’ and sisters’ gracious words to you, their fervent prayers for you, their watching over you and watching out for you in compassion, grace and love. Here in this place you will find a unity like no other, built on the maturity of Christlikeness as you grow up in all aspects into Him as your Head.

What does the Word of God reveal in you this morning? There is a particular kind of wave-tossed, wind-battered immaturity that is increasingly prevalent these days. You see it in people who are always making some life-changing shift in their doctrinal or theological convictions, not just church-hopping, but (if you will) denomination-hopping. The Big Eva church they are part of is shallow and doctrinally squishy. So they jump into a solid, Biblically-meaty Reformed church that is doctrinally robust and well-grounded. But then they decide that church has become too cold and rigid, and they wind up in the Wild Wild West of a Pentecostal/charismatic/NAR church for a few years, and then make a jolting shift back the other way to the formal liturgy of an Anglican congregation and become overnight experts in paedobaptism and the Book of Common Prayer—they have finally found their church home, until a couple years later when they swim the Tiber and become Roman Catholic. (And then leave Rome and become Eastern Orthodox instead...)

This is not the Christlike maturity that the Scriptures call us to—what they call us to is stability. To put down roots in a congregation, to build relationships, to allow that body to look after your growth in Christ and to contribute towards its growth as well. To say “This is my home; this is my people because they belong to my Savior and I belong to them through that same Savior”. To commit to the “long obedience in the same direction” as Eugene Peterson put it. To put down roots and form bonds, for better or worse. To set yourself to labor for the growth of this people, to serve and be served by your brothers and sisters, speaking the truth in love until we grow up in all aspects into Him Who is the head—our Savior, Jesus Christ!

BENEDICTION

Jude 24–25 LSB

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, might, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION:

Read James 4:1-3. What is the underlying reason why so many church fellowships fall into disunity and quarrels? How does Paul’s teaching in Ephesians 4:13-16 address the source of disunity in a church?

How would you define the two ways that we are called to grow in our knowledge of Christ in these verses? Which of those types of “knowledge” of Christ comes more easily for you? How can you grow in both of these ways?

Read Ephesians 4:15 again. What is the danger of boasting about “not having a filter” for your speech? How does this verse define for us the way we should speak to one another?

According to the sermon, why is it impossible for a believer who belongs to Christ to say that they have no role to play in His Body, the Church? Look at Ephesians 4:15-16 for guidance. How can you grow in your support of the Body of Christ at Bethel Baptist in the coming weeks?