Unite to Community

Ephesians 4:1-7

Ephesians 4:1–7 NLT

1 Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God. 2 Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. 3 Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. 4 For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future. 5 There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all, in all, and living through all. 7 However, he has given each one of us a special gift through the generosity of Christ.

You have been called by God. (Names) There has been a bit of push back on the use of the idea of calling in the last few years. What does it mean? Are people really called? Who is “really” called?

This passage tells us that we are all called…called to living a life worthy of our calling. So lets just settle the debate at least for our Church....Yes calling is a thing, yes people are really called, and yes You and I are called.

We are called to Love God with all of our heart, mind, soul and strength and also to Love others. We are called to work together to find our specific call and to allow God to use us all woking together to live a worthy life.

There is nothing like the feeling of being part of group where you are all functioning as independent units to accomplish an agreed upon mission.

There is often a misunderstanding that Unity means that everyone thinks the same acts the same and does the same things. This is not unity it is conformity.

Unity is the use of our diverse strengths, personalities and special skills in perfect unison. While all the things we have talked about in the last few weeks are essential to unity…we will not all Unite to them in the same way!

That’s ok! Turn to the person next to you and say its ok for you to be you.

It’s important for you to hear that......all this talk about unity the last few weeks has not been aimed at getting you all to be the same…It has been about getting us all to use our gifts and abilities for the same purpose.

I think all of us have a story of someone who had good intentions but instead of developing our unique gifts tried to clone us or make us more like them.

It is natural to resist these attempts not becuase you have a rebellious streak but because within each of us God has placed a desire to be who God created us to be.

We will get into the specifics of who God created us to be individual in the next few weeks. However in order for that to matter we need to be willing to use our uniqueness in unison with the Body of Christ.

The gathering of God’s people matter.

Paul begins to tell us here that the Unity that God desires in the Church requires our observation and our participation.

Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God. 2 Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. 3 Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace.

It is impossible to lead a life worthy of God’s calling alone. Notice...There is a lot of we talk in this passage......However the We is designed to help us live for one.

4 For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future. 5 There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all, in all, and living through all.

We are called to unity for a single purpose....

7 However, he has given each one of us a special gift through the generosity of Christ.

Each of us has a unique gift, ability, we are called to use in community. How do we do this?

Prioritize your gifts and abilities around God’s single purpose through God’s vehicle (The Church) to save build God’s kingdom on earth.

If we are not using our gifts and abilities in our community of faith we are exalting ourself and not God.

Let me explain…I know I teased this a couple of weeks ago and in the beginning of our time together…but God has gifted each and everyone of us to fulfill certain roles in the Church…the following is just a snapshot example of what we are going to talk about in the future.

Apostle: Starts New Things, Prophet:: The ability to see and speak truth and challenges status quo. Evangelist: Introduces people to their faith, Shepherd: Nurtures and cares for others, Teacher: The ability to make certain concepts understandable.

These roles while focused on the Church are also used in everyday life. Every one of these areas are used in everyday life for secular pursuits.

Some use their apostle gifts to start new business, some use their prophetic voice to speak truth in meetings about a wrong direction or even right direction the business is going, they use the evangelist voice to promote a product or business idea to others…(the Sell what they believe in), They use their shepherding skill to manage employees by making a great working environment, and the teach people new ideas that are designed to enhance the business or expand its reach.

Every successful business has people with these different skills working together to fulfill their economic mission, vision and values. A great idea in business without the right people working together is often just unrealized potential.

Paul is begging us to use the gifts we often use to live a successful secular life to build the kingdom of God.

I make this comparison to illustrate the fact that all of us have gifts given by God that can be used to build the kingdom through the local church…Yet many times people struggle to see how what we do to make a living connects to how to offer eternal life.

In fact we often want to separate what we do in “real” life from how we live the rest of our life. This makes serving a chore becuase we tend to think we have to operate outside of our giftedness instead of contributing in a more organic way.

Without focusing on each one of these roles right now where do you think you would say your gifts lie? Look at the things you are good at and ask yourself what area that palce you in?

Or you could even sit and talk with me for a bit and maybe we can 1 find your area and 2 look for ways in which you can invest in the life of this church with your gift?

What do you think a A Church full of people that have embraced their calling and invested their time together could in a relatively short period of time?

100 AD....25K, 300 AD 20 Mil, Without internet, was illegal in most places faced extreme persecution

This does not happen with the waive of a wand but the cooperation of Gods people working together in the face of good times and challenging times.

In case you think that does not or cannot happen now…lets look at China at the beginning of Mao’s 1949 great persecution was about 2 mil, By the late 80’s it is estimated that 60 to 80 mil.

Illegal, underground, leaders killed, still very controlled by government.

How did they do it? Can we do it?

Alan Hirch

God’s people cary within themselves the same potencies that energized the early Christian movement and that is currently manifesting itself in the underground church of China.

Apostolic Genius Lies within you and me…we just need to access it and implement it in our life. This happens by being an authentic community of faith in a free society.

Our mission is to Connect people to God and others by creating a space where everyone can belong. But in order for that to happen we must be committed to belong to this community ourselves.

One cannot expect others to commit to a cause that they are not a real part of.

We can birth a new excitement for our faith if we would just make finding and implementing our gifts a priority instead of an inconvenience that we have to find room for.

Are you ready to be a part of that kind of moment? Silence and some sort of physical response.

Communion