Built Upon the Rock #5
WEEK 5
THE GROWING CHURCH
GETTING STARTED
1. Have you ever known (or been!) a self-confessed Lone-Ranger Christian? (A Lone-Ranger Christian is someone who believes that growing as a Christian is a private matter between that person and God.)
MAIN IDEA
Christians grow as we buildup and are built up by other members of the body of Christ. According to Scripture, the way we attain Christian maturity is through the church.
In Ephesians 4, the apostle Paul turns from proclaiming the riches of what God has done for us in Christ to exhorting the Ephesian Christians to walk in a manner worthy of their calling (v. 1).
In the first six verses Paul exhorts the Ephesians to pursue unity in the church, and then in verses 7 through 10 he begins to explain how Christ has given gifts to his church. In verses 11 through 16 Paul continues,
1. Why did Christ give apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers to the church?
2. Who is it who does “the work of ministry”? Who is supposed to build up the body of Christ (v. 12)?
3. How should verses 11 and 12 impact what we expect our pastors to do?
4. According to Paul, what is the goal of building up the body of Christ (vv. 13–14)? What are the different ways Paul describes this goal?
5. What threat to the church’s maturity does Paul warn against in verse 14?
6. Paul’s picture of a spiritual children being tossed to and fro by bad doctrine and human cunning is a graphic one. Ironically, the difference between real children and spiritual children is that spiritual children don’t always recognize their immaturity. Building off of what Paul says in verse 14, what would be some concrete signs of spiritual immaturity in someone’s life?
7. By what means does Paul exhort the church in Ephesus to combat this threat of false teaching (vv. 15–16)?
8. What are some concrete ways that you can help others grow in their knowledge of Christ and in resisting winds of doctrine and human schemes?
9. From whom does the body of Christ grow (vv. 15–16)?
10. How does the body of Christ grow? (v. 16)
11. What does this whole passage teach us about the nature of Christian growth?
12. How does this passage confront the person who thinks of himself as a Lone-Ranger Christian?
13. How should a commitment to build up the body of Christ by speaking the truth in love impact:
a) Our understanding of “ministry”?
b) Our finances?
c) How we use our time?
d) What we do on Sunday mornings? Sunday afternoons? Other weeknights?
1. Christ gave apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers to the church to equip the saints for the work of ministry, so that all the saints would be able to build up the body of Christ (v. 12). Christ gave these as gifts to the church so that they would teach, train, and equip the church in order that every member would be able to contribute to the body’s growth.
2. All the saints do the work of ministry (v. 12). Every member of the church is to build up the body.
3. Here are two ways verses 11 and 12 should impact our expectations for our pastors:
• First, in light of these verses, we should expect our pastors to devote themselves to teaching the Word and training and equipping the saints for service.
• Second, this means that we should not expect them to do all the ministry for the church, but to equip the body to build itself up in love.
4. According to Paul, the goal of building up the body is that the whole body would be mature in Christ. Paul describes this maturity in terms of unity in belief (v. 13), attaining to the full measure of Christ’s maturity (v. 13), and being doctrinally sound and stable in order to resist false teaching (v. 14).
5. In verse 14 Paul warns against false teaching as a threat to the church’s health. Note that such false teaching is not always obvious: it seeks to subvert the church through “craftiness” and “deceitful schemes,” which means that we must always be on guard against it.
6. There are a number of signs of immaturity: getting easily caught up in new ideas, books, or teachings; getting quickly excited by charismatic personalities; drawing drastic conclusions with the onset of difficulties; being easily influenced by others; tending to believe emotions more than truth; becoming quickly discouraged when emotions don’t always keep up with truth; and so on.
7. Paul exhorts the Ephesians to counter the threat of false teaching by “speaking the truth in love” (v. 15). This means that every Christian is to resist false doctrine and promote sound doctrine by speaking the truth to others. Thus, in some sense, every Christian is to teach the Bible to others.
9. The body’s growth is from Christ.
10. The body of Christ grows:
• As we speak the truth in love to one another (v. 15)
• As every joint holds the body together (v. 16; this may be a reference to the special role that pastors and teachers play in equipping the body)
• As each part—that is, every single member of the church!—works properly (v. 16)
12. This passage confronts the Lone-Ranger Christian by exploding the idea that one can grow best as a Christian by oneself. This passage teaches that we all grow in Christ as members of a body, as each member of that body contributes. The Lone-Ranger Christian is not only missing out on how God wants him or her to grow but is also disobeying God’s call to build up others in the church through committed, accountable relationships.
13. A commitment to build up the body of Christ should have these implications (among others):
a) We should understand ministry to be something that every church member is called to do, not merely pastors!
b) We should give joyfully to our own local church’s work of bringing saints to maturity in Christ, and we should view all of our finances as a stewardship from God to use not only to provide for ourselves but also to further the work of the gospel.
c) Very practically, we should work deliberate times of spiritual conversation, prayer, and Bible study with other Christians into our schedules in order to build up the body of Christ by speaking the truth in love.
d) On Sunday mornings, first of all, we should regularly assemble with God’s people. Second, we should approach the church’s gatherings as an opportunity to worship God, to be built up in faith, and to serve others and build them up in the knowledge of Christ. Practically, this means approaching church with an eye toward serving others. Can you help out with what needs to be done? Can you greet the people who look like visitors, get to know them, maybe introduce them to someone with whom they would connect well? Can you get to know the church member who seems stuck on the fringes of church life? Can you approach someone after the sermon with an encouraging reflection from that morning’s Scripture passage? These kinds of activities should carry into the afternoon and, indeed, all week.