Get Into the Game!
Eph. 4:11-16 Sermon– Get into the game
(Preached by pastoral candidate Phil Layton on Sept. 3, 2006)
Turn with me in your Bibles to Ephesians 4. As I was preparing for what I would teach on this Lord’s Day, I really felt this passage was essential and formative, and little did I know that Pastor Dale has already taught through some of the truths in this passage not too long ago. As a firm believer in God’s sovereignty and providence, I don’t assume this overlap is by mere accident or coincidence, but is a passage that God really wants us to get and I hope this will supplement or at least complement what your pastor has taught. Rather than being redundant, I trust this will be a reinforcement and reminder and refreshed look at this foundational passage on what the church is to be and do.
Next month marks the 50th Anniversary of my home church, which has endeavored to make this passage its life verse and mission statement. In fact the words of Eph. 4:12 are printed on the wall of our main church office.
John MacArthur has said: “If there is one passage in all the Bible that has had more of an impact on the formation of Grace Church than any other, it is this text. This passage really defined what we are as a church.”
This passage has also meant a lot to me personally – I chose to devote myself to studying it one semester, and my wife and I really shaped a lot of our thinking and mindset for ministry and our place in the body based on this passage.
KEY QUESTION: What is the purpose of the church?
What is YOUR purpose in the church?
I’m really convinced that this is a revolutionary passage with ministry-shaping, life-transforming truths, and for many people a whole new paradigm. The simple principles in this passage are absolutely essential for any church, and I believe every one of us needs to hear again and live more in light of this message from the living God.
READ TEXT
Proposition: Every person in this room has an important role in serving, ministering, and building up the body of Christ to maturity, Christlikeness and the right balance of truth and love.
I came to the Master’s College because I had a chance to play college basketball at a smaller Christian college. I was a “walk-on,” bench-warmer, third-string practice player, but it didn’t matter to me that I wasn’t a star or on the court – I worked hard in practice to make others better, was the chief towel waver on end of bench during games, it was such a blast just to be there regardless of my role
- Got cut from team next year, devastated, had to work as “assistant manager” (a.k.a. waterboy and laundry guy, cleaning the guys sweaty uniforms after practice, cleaning up their lockers, etc.)
- Different responsibilities during game: setup locker room beforehand, video (hard to sit in booth quietly or in stands), etc. To be away from action was brutal
Some things I learned were:
- Humility
- That every part is important
- That I can help team even if I’m doing what they need rather than what I would choose (video, water, towels, uniforms ready, etc.)
POINT: If I can apply this analogy / illustration to Paul’s message in these verses, it would be this: Every person is on the field level or court level – NOBODY in the church is to be a spectator, sitting back in the stands or bleachers. There are certainly some with more visible or upfront or center stage roles, while most are behind-the-scenes, many are helping from the sidelines, some go onto the court during timeouts to clean it up, some are running the scoreboard, some are in the support band, many are not the star, but every person is crucial. The point of our passage is that every single person is a vital part.
Verse 11 discusses the gifted people God gave to found and build the church
The Apostles and Prophets are the foundation of the church (Eph. 2:20), a unique and limited number of people with supernatural and miraculous abilities and gifts that God used to reveal and confirm the message of Christ and to write scripture.
The ongoing building of the church:
1. Evangelists
§ Not limited to traveling, itinerant ministry, as indicated Paul’s charge to Timothy (2 Tim. 4:5) in the context of an established local ministry.
§ Illustration: Thousands at crusades who walk an aisle but are never accounted for in any church in the area. Goal of many is to “make decisions” whereas Christ’s Commission is to make disciples
2. Pastors / Teachers
§ Comes from Latin “pasture” – refers to someone who tends sheep on a pasture.
§ Only time this word is used in NT used of human ministers, all other occurrences refer to a shepherd literally or Christ figuratively.
§ The function clearly overlaps with overseer / elder (cf. I Pet. 5:1-2, Acts 20:19, 28).
§ Grammatical issue: pastors and teachers or pastor-teachers? Closely related but not all scholars agree this is only one office – Greek syntax of Eph 4:11 seems to affirm that all pastors were to be teachers, though not all teachers were to be pastors
§ Imagery emphasizes responsibility of caring, feeding, and leading a flock (Psalm 23, John 10, etc.)
Brief Application:
§ God’s Word says clearly in this verse that pastors and teachers are given by God to the church. Are you thankful for the gifted people God has given to your church?
§ Do you let those in the church know how much you appreciate them for their service to you?
§ Do you pray for your spiritual leaders, and seek ways to support them?
LOOK AT v. 12 -> Move from the “Equippers” to the Equipped
Lloyd-Jones: “Equipping … was a term that was used for the setting of bones which had become dislocated. When bones are dislocated, the particular limb to which they belong is not perfect. So the idea in the word used by the Apostle is that these different parts and portions of the body [you and me] should be put into the right alignment, should be properly adjusted, and that each one should be fully developed” (199).
Main Point #1: Every Christian is to be doing the work of service / ministry and every Christian is involved in building up the body
Proof: That word “for” – for the work of service – does NOT mean the pastors and teachers do all the work of service, the original language is clear, these gifted people are equipping THE SAINTS for the work of service or ministry, it is the saints, the laypeople, YOU, who are supposed to be doing ministry and service.
Don’t miss this: God has given gifted leaders in the church not so they can do it all, but so that YOU can be equipped to do the work of the ministry.
The leaders in our passage are getting people out of the stands and into the game. A pastor is more like coach whose primary goal is to train so that the team can go out.
Application: How ridiculous would it be for a football team sending the paid coach out on field to play a game, thinking well hey he’s the most educated, and he knows the game better than anyone, besides I’m not sure I really deserve to be out there and it’s more comfortable here on the sidelines where we don’t have to sweat. The other team with all their pads would cream the coach or coaches – as silly as that sounds, that’s exactly what you are doing when you choose not to be involved in ministry or service, instead hanging out on the sidelines where it’s more comfortable.
If I can modify the metaphor, imagine the teammates just staying in their huddle, never breaking to run a play and the referee keeps throwing flags and they’re going backwards. The players’ logic – it’s so much fun in this huddle, in our little group here, why go out there and run around where we might get hurt? When it comes to evangelism or other ministry, is this your mind-set? When believers huddle together for Bible studies, the goal is not to stay here but to break and be ready to get out there
Another team image that can apply to the church would be teammates fighting amongst selves and they never progress. Listen, these are not the right picture – the coaches job is not to play the game himself, he is working his tail off to get team trained so they get out there and are doing it, and the ideal is where he hardly has to tell them what to do, they’re just getting after it, anxious for the next play, working together in harmony.
Are you part of the problem or part of the solution? What ministry are you involved in? Remember, don’t think of “ministry” as some official thing, serving is just meeting needs of people.
If you think of ministry or ministers as the paid staff of a church, you are hurting God’s plan. The “early church often used the word ‘minister’ or ‘ministry’ as referring to what all Christians are and must do … ‘the conventional modern distinction between the clergy and laity simply does not occur in the New Testament at all.’ There are indeed pastors, as distinct from other Christians. But the difference is one of spiritual gifts and service rather than of ministry versus non-ministry.” (Boice, 141).
When Grace Church began growing many years ago, a publication did an article where they interviewed many in the church to try and figure out how and why the church was thriving, and they titled the article “The Church with the 900 Ministers” (because there were 900 members, and all were active in ministry)
“We didn’t have many formal programs, but everyone was ministering his gifts. People were always calling the church and asking if they could visit someone in the hospital, if the nursery needed more helpers, if someone was needed to clean the restrooms and windows, if help was needed to evangelize, or if someone was needed to teach a class. Everyone made himself available. People would also tell each other how God was blessing their ministry, and they gave God the glory for what was happening. That’s the way a church should be …
[John MacArthur writes that we should not] sit on the sidelines, get comfortable, and watch while others minister. That can be deadly!
… Service to others doesn’t necessarily have to be related to church-designed programs. Paul is saying, “Use the God-given ability you have to minister to others!” You don’t need to have a program to be able to minister to others. Let the abilities God has given you flow from your life, whether it be in a structured program or personal interaction. A believer is indwelt and empowered by the Holy Spirit for the purpose of serving others. If you don’t serve you’ll be creating a bottleneck. Don’t go to your church and say, “There are too many people! I don’t know where I can serve.” If you’re filled with the Holy Spirit, God wants to cultivate a ministry through you that is essential for that church…” (Master’s Plan for the Church, 40)
Application: Have you ever heard someone say “Well, I didn’t get much out of church today?” You almost want to ask them “what did you put into it?” We all tend to have the mindset of what church can do for us, rather than what we can do for the church. Or some people say they want to get involved, but they don’t really want to do mundane things that need to be done, nursery, parking lot patrol, something that will interfere with their Saturday or personal times – something so they can feel good but not sacrifice
When Jaime and I started attending we started babysitting for free for couples when we didn’t have kids, helping people move, etc. Those are things included in “ministry”
Back to Eph. 4:12, not just work of ministry, but also edifying or building up
“Build up” – see 4:29, also Acts 20:32 address to Ephesians
I can’t be arrogant enough to think I can invent a better strategy for building a church than what Paul and the scripture writers have laid down. I don’t want to fill a room with people by giving them what they want to hear, I’m accountable before God to give them what they NEED to hear. Notice Paul does not say pastors and teachers are for the entertaining of the saints, or even just the education of the saints – the mandate is equipping the saints not with intellectual knowledge only but to do something with it!
READ ROMANS 12 FOR FURTHER STUDY AND EXAMPLES OF WAYS YOU CAN SERVE, MINISTER, AND BUILD UP THE BODY
The leaders are to lead and feed as shepherds and teachers, making disciples, and preparing the congregation so that every church member can be involved in ministry and service and we all are supposed to be a part of building up the rest of the church, and we are to do this until … VERSE 13
Main Point #2 – All Christians are to pursue unity, knowledge and maturity
1. True Unity of faith
2. True Knowledge of Christ
3. True Maturity in Christ
Proof: The word “attain” (NASB) or “come to” (NKJV) means “to reach, to arrive at, to come down to the goal,” often in Acts used of travelers arriving at their destination.
The first goal is unity. How do we pursue unity? READ 4:2-3
Church at large is not very united:
“To dwell above with saints we love, Oh that will be glory but to live below with saints we know … well, that’s another story”
Protestant are now divided into over 200 denominations, and most of these denominations are further divided into many factions. For instance, there are about thirty kinds of Baptists besides the thousands of independent Baptist churches.
Ex: Two-Seed-in-the-Spirit Predestinarian Baptists, Free Will, 7th Day Baptists, Duck River Kindred Association, Fire Baptized Holiness Church, Schwenkfeld Church, the Pillar of Fire Church, the Triumph of the Church and the Kingdom of God in Christ Church, even a “Cowboy Church” in Texas … what happened to the “One Lord, one faith” of Eph. 4:4ff?
-> When the church functions the way it should, the saints will be equipped and serving and building up the body, and that’s when true unity comes.
Application:
What are YOU doing to build up the true unity of the faith? If you’re not doing anything, you’re unconsciously actually hurting unity.
Unity is the first pursuit, the second is knowledge. Biblical knowledge is always needed by the church.
I’ve seen surveys where they asked church-goers basic Bible questions and the answers were dismally ignorant. Some said:
- An epistle is a female apostle
- Eve was married to an apple
- Jezebel was Ahab’s donkey
- Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luther, and John, etc.
The knowledge in our passage is not just Bible trivia, though
“This is more than intellectual head knowledge, this is intimate, experiential heart knowledge [intens. prep epi], a growing personal relationship with the Savior … when they focus their attention on getting to know Christ better, their differences [with each other] begin to fade and their mutual knowledge of Him and love for Him begin to draw them to each other. The better they know Him, the closer they are drawn to each other” (Strauss, 263).
Application: Do you have a growing experiential knowledge of the Son of God, not just knowing about Him but knowing Him, more and more every day? What will you do specifically and practically to increase your loving knowledge of Him? Make a note to yourself right now, write down something specifically this week (ex: read gospels every morning, spend time in prayer by turning off radio or TV, etc.).
The “mature / complete / perfect man” is interpreted by most as the church, not talking about you or me individually:
- summation of all believers in the one perfect Man, Christ Himself as the head
- the singular number indicating or emphasizing the corporate unity
believers are to grow out of their individualism into the corporate oneness of the full-grown man. The maturity is contrasted with what follows in the passage.
Is maturity in Christ something your friends would say you are growing in? What are you doing to grow in your Christian walk? Are you being discipled by someone? Are you discipling someone? Why not?
TRANSITION: This is the true “church growth” recipe: not growing the size of the church primarily but the growing the knowledge and spiritual maturity of however many are in the church. It’s not getting as many bodies in the building as possible, but building up the body of Christ by biblical ministry of all church members. The pastor(s) can’t do it all, this you have a vital role to fill in God’s plan.
Main Point # 3 – All Christians are to be discerning the truth and speaking it in love, v. 14-16
The “no longer” in v. 14 implies present circumstances in the church, and tells how genuine progress must take place. The “mature / complete / perfect man” is interpreted by most as the church, not talking about you or me individually:
- summation of all believers in the one perfect Man, Christ Himself as the head
- the singular number indicating or emphasizing the corporate unity
- believers are to grow out of their individualism into the corporate oneness of the full-grown man. The maturity is contrasted with what follows in the passage.
Picture:
What is Paul picturing here with “Not to be children” – what are children like and where is that not a good thing spiritually? (get interaction – Bible study setting)
- fickle (changing mind all the time, easily distracted)
- undiscerning
- gullible
- immaturity
- instability
- ignorant, etc.
“BLOWN ABOUT” illustration: When I was a kid in Philippines as young kids when a typhoon would get blown around, but my dad, the mature man wouldn’t
The analogy of an immature Christian or church is graphic: they are unstable, lacking direction, as easily driven and influenced as a small rudderless boat being tossed back and forth by powerful waves and winds from every direction. Paul was shipwrecked more than once, and may have had an experience like Acts 27 in mind when thinking of untaught and undiscerning Christians. Ephesus was a commercial center where seafarers and ideas from all areas of Rome and the East would invariably converge, and the dangers of false teaching are what Paul is concerned about here
Contrast: v. 14 v. 15
“crafty scheming” “in love”
“deceit” “speaking the truth”
“we might no longer children” (static condition) “we are to grow up” (dynamic)
In contrast to the teachers presenting false doctrine in a deceptive manner, God’s people are to grow through proclaiming truth in a loving manner).
The phrase “in love” occurs more often in Ephesians than any other Pauline epistle, and this section has the greatest frequency anywhere (v. 2, 15, 16)
It forms an inclusio or envelope figure to 4:1-16 and such “book-ends” show that unity and the church begins and ends with love as its central and indispensable means of growth and walking worthy
LOVE WITHOUT TRUTH – TRUTH WITHOUT LOVE (the balance is critical)
Notice that Paul uses the word “grow” here – church growth is not about numbers, it’s about spiritual progress of those who tell the truth in a loving way, see end of v. 16
Spurgeon: “How can I best utilize myself for the benefit of the rest of the members of the Church?” Do not ask, “How can I benefit myself?” but let your enquiry be, “How can I be most profitable to my fellow-Christians?” … Oh, for grace to be unselfish! There is such a thing as Christian selfishness; and, of all evil things in the world, it is the most unchristian. When the first and last concern of a man is his own salvation, his own comfort, his own advancement, his own edification, and nothing besides, he needs to be [delivered] from such a selfish spirit as that
If one part of body is not working, the whole body suffers. If a body part is not following the head’s direction, it’s being dysfunctional.
Are YOU hindering God’s work by not doing your part. Are you making excuses?
How are you serving? How are you praying?
I know from experience it’s easy to become lazy or make excuses as to why we’re letting ourselves slip spiritually. You may not have a lot of time, but don’t underestimate even the power of your prayers for each other, or an encouraging note, or having people over, or doing something kind that you know someone really needs.
Remember, don’t think of ministry as something that has to happen on church campus, think of ministry as your heart focus and constant desire to serve the body.
How will you obey Christ by getting in the game? The choice of where to serve may vary, but the one choice not open to us is to sit in the stands and do nothing: that would not only be sin, it’s selfish, and hurts the whole body, not just yourself. What will you do this week to obey the word of God?