Gentleness Produces Unity

Do you know why you should never gossip on a vegetable farm?

Because corn has ears, potatoes have eyes, and beanstalk.

Today we are going to continue our series on Unity. Unity is essential for the body of Christ. The modern church has a tendency towards isolation and division. We are called to break down those walls and build bridges to cross the gaps of isolation and division.

We are going to use Ephesians 4:1-3 as our guide in this series.

Ephesians 4:1–3 CSB

1 Therefore I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to walk worthy of the calling you have received, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

Paul wanted the believers to be unified. He told them to walk worthy of the calling of Christ. In order to walk in a worthy manner and to remain unified he knew that they would need to be humble, gentle, patient, loving, and bound together in peace.

These are important words. They hold the key for us to remain unified in Christ. We are in this world together for such a time as this to work in the kingdom of God. As we examine this scripture, I believe the Lord will work in our hearts to bring about needed improvement in our relationship with Him and others.

The message today is going to focus on Gentleness that Produces Unity.

Everyone knows who superman is, right? He’s the comic book hero. Superman's powers include incredible strength, the ability to fly. X-ray vision, super speed, super hearing, and super breath. He is nearly unstoppable.

But Superman didn’t walk around in his daily life blowing his super breath everywhere he went. No, Superman lived his daily life as the meek and mild Clark Kent. Some would call him “wimpy” or weak.

It really didn’t matter what people thought of him, because he knew that at any moment he could hit a phone booth and immediately become SUPERMAN!

Now I know superman really has no place in a Sunday sermon, but I think we can use Clark Kent as an example of gentleness that produces unity.

Clark was really overlooked by the world, but inside of him was greatness. He didn’t need to have everyone else know about his powers. He just lived a life ready to serve at any moment.

I think we are all have a little superhero blood running through our veins because when we join the family of God we aren’t the same anymore. We have been translated from darkness to the light. We went from losing the battle to becoming the victors!

Through Christ we have been changed. Now it’s our job to let everyone know that we are better than everyone else in every way…NO! That’s not our job.

Paul clearing believed that we are overcomers. That we have the victory. That we are the chosen. That God is on our side.

He didn’t write to the church that we should live in a prideful way. He told us that to be in unity we must become gentle.

We do not live for Christ to get something; we live for Christ because He has already done so much for us!

Paul does not tell us to manufacture unity, but to maintain the unity already existing in the body. This is not organizational uniformity, a “super church”; this is organic, living union and unity.

Just like a body works in unison, we are to work in unison as believers. And one of the ways we can do this is by gentleness.

Gentleness is Developed

I am convinced the longer that we all live the more grace and gentleness we should be developing towards other people. As we face different trails and difficulty we will either become bitter and angry or we will become sweeter and more understanding.

As believers we should be more understanding because we have experienced first hand the grace of God in our lives. Even through the difficult situations we can look back and see that God has delivered us time and time again. His fingerprints are evident on the lives of His children. Even through suffering.

We don’t like to suffer. We don’t like to talk about suffering. Mainly because it’s not a great experience to suffer. We like to focus on the positive things. In fact most of us would do just about anything to avoid hard times or pain.

There may be some people who say, teach, or even preach that God won’t allow any suffering in their life. Well, to that I say, You’d be the only one!

The key to developing gentleness instead of bitterness is to remain obedient to the Lord. This involves what we talked about last week…Humility.

Remember Jesus:

Hebrews 5:8–9 NLT

8 Even though Jesus was God’s Son, he learned obedience from the things he suffered. 9 In this way, God qualified him as a perfect High Priest, and he became the source of eternal salvation for all those who obey him.

Jesus must be the ultimate example of what it means to be gentle and strong at the same time. Here the bible tells us the even though He was the Son of God He learned obedience from suffering. In the same way, when we experience difficulty or suffering in our lives we must remember to stay humble and obedient to the Lord.

We aren’t promised a walk through the roses in this life. Remember Jesus told us that the people of His time hated Him and that if we are obeying Christ that the people of our time will hate us also. We should expect to suffer for our faith. It’s part of the deal.

Through it all we are being shaped and formed into something useful in the kingdom. If you keep the right heart what will be produced is a gentleness that can do amazing things for others.

How is the roughness of wood smoothed and prepared for a beautiful finish? The abrasiveness of sandpaper; something rougher and stronger is applied to the surface of the wood to remove the rough spots.

It’s certainly not fun or easy, but difficulty can produce gentleness in our lives if we remain obedient to Christ.

Gentleness must be intentional. We must choose to develop it in our lives. Just as Christ chose to be gentle we must also chose daily how we are going to interact with others in the body of Christ.

Gentleness Restores

Galatians 6:1–3 NLT

1 Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. 2 Share each other’s burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ. 3 If you think you are too important to help someone, you are only fooling yourself. You are not that important.

This is our super power! If we are gentle then we have the opportunity to restore others.

We need to have more of an eternal focus instead of an earthly focus. What I mean is that it’s so easy to point out others failures and hope they get caught for the wrong things they have done instead of hoping that the person who has failed will get back on their feet and start walking on the right path.

Our job should be to help others. It’s nearly impossible to restore anyone if we are prideful and self focused. Only a gentle person can look past the sin and failures of others and see a heart that is broken in need of help and restoration.

Unity in the church will only be accomplished if we are willing to help each other when we stumble.

There is a law that the believer obeys; it is the law of love in Christ. “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you”John 13:34.

The Spirit of God is the Spirit of love, for God is love. If we are walking in the Spirit, we will not use our liberty in Christ for selfish purposes; we will allow the Spirit to work through us to help others.

Jesus lived for others, and we must follow His example. We are not independent of one another, for we are members of the same family, and we minister to each other.

If believer is suddenly caught by the enemy and falls into sin. (Or it may be that the word “overcome” suggests being caught in sin and found out by other believers.) Should our attitude be one of judgment and condemnation? No! If we are spiritual (walking in the Spirit, led by the Spirit, bearing fruit through the Spirit), we will seek to restore the fallen one.

This Greek word for “restore” is a medical term used for the setting of a broken bone. Christians are members of Christ’s body, and a Christian in sin weakens the body.

If we desire unity then we will desire to restore those who are broken.

In modern Christian culture most people want to project an image of perfection. Sometimes people don’t feel comfortable sharing issues they are struggling with because they are afraid of rejection. This is not healthy.

James 5:16 NLT

16 Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results.

James reminds us that when we are struggling especially if we have sinned against each other that we need to pray for one another. Lift each other up in gentleness, not harsh words or rejection.

God wants to rescue and restore those who are helpless; they have fallen into the trap of the devil. Satan wants to destroy their lives, but God wants to bring healing and hope. God wants to rescue them with gentleness. Anyone of us could find ourselves in need of gentleness coming to our rescue. As a spider spins its web so too Satan wants to trap us in a deadly snare of sin. While none may come to the rescue of the fly caught in the spider’s web, God wants us to go and gently restore those entangled by sin

Gentleness is Love

Psalm 103:10–11 NLT

10 He does not punish us for all our sins; he does not deal harshly with us, as we deserve. 11 For his unfailing love toward those who fear him is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth.

At the core of Gentleness that produces unity is Love. It will always be love. It can’t be anything else because it’s exactly the center of who God is and what He wants for us!

God’s unfailing love is what produces unity in the church.

Really, this love is what reached all of us when we were dead in our transgressions. It’s really hard to stand in judgement of others when we remember that we have been rescued by grace.

Gentleness is how love connects and touches others in our lives.

Without gentleness “love” does not touch others and Unity will not flourish. Mainly because we are forgetting of the judgement we have been delivered from.

Without gentleness that produces unity we can promote what is harmful instead of helpful, painful rather than pleasing, selfish instead of selfless - it will divide instead of “unify” - hurt instead of heal

Only as our strength is submitted to God, only as power is brought under the control of the Spirit through love, can we become ONE, and represent God in this world.

Gentleness is the balance between extremes, it is strength submitted to God - it is power under control - Gentleness is the loving touch of God on our life that we use to touch others.

Jesus shows us that we should have a heart for the lost.

Matthew 11:29 NLT

29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Jesus was talking to people who had been oppressed by religion. The religious leaders weren’t operating in love or gentleness, they had laid many burdens on the people, and their religion did not give rest and peace.

No human religion can give peace to the heart. And really, that’s the difference. Humanity verses God. We impose so much more than God. The truth is that we can never measure up to a perfect God. We need to be reminded daily that without the gentle heart of Christ we would all be lost.

The gentle heart of Christ should be how we touch the world. This is how we can accomplish unity in the church.

Clark Kent sure didn’t seem all the imposing when you met him, but under that gentle exterior he was wearing his superman outfit and was a super hero.

We could take a lesson from Clark.