A United Church

A dividing spirit

It’s exciting that today we can sit here with our faces uncovered. I know it served it’s purpose, but I don’t think anybody really enjoyed having something constantly touching their face - particularly on those hot days when the sweat just pours off you.

But we’ve got through. The mask mandate is gone and it’s now up to you whether you think it is worth wearing or not. Now, as much as I was never a big fan of wearing masks, I think we would have to agree that this was hardly our biggest concern throughout the pandemic.

I still remember, as I’m sure you do, the common refrain we heard during the early phase of the pandemic - “We’re all in this together”.

Unfortunately, in many ways it seemed a rather empty refrain. Sure we were all in it together in the sense that everyone had some effect from the pandemic. But the impact on people’s lives were not equal.

As we endured two substantial lock downs, some people sat pretty with a secure income meaning they were actually saving a lot of money, while others struggled to put food on the table for their families. The divide between the haves and the have nots grew even bigger.

What’s more, in our forced isolation, we lost sight of community. Sure we can all probably point to some great examples where people went above and beyond to look after others - churches often featuring in the forefront of such efforts, but unfortunately, more frequently, people kept to themselves.

Far from being about togetherness, people moved further apart from others.

And then the vaccines came. They were the long sought after thing - many thought that once these arrived, it would all be over.

The reality was far from that.

Now there is a massive debate surrounding the whole issue of vaccines, and I don’t intend to go there at all today. The point I want to make about the vaccines is that the drifting apart we saw before they came out, was about to become a tearing apart.

The dividing lines were everywhere. Friendships have been broken. Family relationships have been shattered. And churches have become divided over the issue.

I want to suggest that the devil is using this issue around vaccines to divide people. This is not to suggest that the vaccine is either inherently bad or inherently good - I would suggest it is neither - but rather that the devil has used it to exploit people and turn people against each other.

This is a plan the devil loves to use. The more divided we are, the less he has to do, and that’s because we start to do his job for him.

When we come to Christ, we become a member of his body, but as his body splinters, it’s effectiveness in the world is greatly reduced.

It’s a sad indictment when you hear people being turned away from the church because the conflict in the church becomes too much.

This morning as we come to a one off message from Ephesians, I want to begin to explore the idea of unity. What is it? How do we get it? And why is it important?

And as we do, we can think about some of the things that are happening. The vaccine debate is only one issue. The reality is that we can become split on any number of issues.

Well, let’s turn to Ephesians now...

Context

Well, the fourth chapter starts with the words - as a prisoner for the Lord...

Now, when he says this, he’s not just saying it metaphorically. He is actually literally in prison which has been a direct result of his missionary work. It’s traditionally been held that it was his imprisonment in Rome which is where the book of Acts leaves him.

Paul grew quite a strong affection for the church in Ephesus, something that was on display at the end of the third missionary trip in Acts 20.

The letter itself is almost like a big prayer written out for the Ephesians, at least, certainly much of the first half of the letter reads this way.

And we get some great truths in this early section, including a very powerful section at the start of the second chapter which I suspect includes some verses that many of you have probably memorised from Sunday School.

But it is as we get to the fourth chapter that Paul’s focus shifts to a more practical mindset. He explains what he thinks is important for them to focus on, and first up is the issue I’m going to look at today - the issue of unity.

Now it’s perhaps worth noting that when we say the church of Ephesus, it’s actually quite likely that we might be talking about a series of churches. This is interesting because what we’re going to be talking about is not just unity within one particular church, but unity between chuches as well.

Character Matters

Well, actually, he doesn’t actually launch straight into the whole spiel about unity, at least strictly speaking, not directly.

But I’m going to argue that what he does say will be laying the ground work to allow the unity to happen.

In verse 1, he exhortation is that they may “live a life worthy of the calling you have received”.

What is that calling? Well, remember he’s saying this in the fourth chapter. The first three chapters have described in quite some detail the way in which God has saved us. This is our calling. To be reconciled to Christ.

Sometime we can use the word “calling” in a more specific sense. For example, I would describe a calling that God has given me to become a pastor. But don’t get confused with a specific call that some of you might get, with the more general call that we all have.

The call that every single one of you have on your life, is to be reconciled with Christ. And to live a life that is worthy of that.

What does this mean in practice? Well, if you’re reconciled with Christ, then you should be mirroring the attitudes that Jesus has. And to be more specific - well, this is where the passage takes us.

You see, verse 2 then becomes more specific about certain characteristics.

It says: “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.”

Humility

Now as we know that Paul is about to make us think about unity, let’s just think of these characteristics in regard to how they can help us move towards unity.

Starting with humility....

Now I know that every conflict is unique in its set of circumstances, but allow me to paint a fairly generic picture.

It usually starts with some form of difference. That might be a difference in values, or a difference of belief or opinion. Those differences are inevitable. God has made us all unique, so one thing which is almost certain is that if you’re spending time with someone else, you will find such a difference.

Now, to this difference, lets add a little pride and arrogance. Well this gives the difference some energy. As one view is expressed, pride blinds us from seeing another perspective. And so as the other view is expressed, there is increasing frustration, knowing that the other person just doesn’t get it.

What I find interesting is that we often don’t see what we’re doing as being about pride. That’s because we’ll argue facts are facts. What we don’t recognise is that quite a number of our facts are based on assumptions.

The problem is, to recognise this, we need humility. And that can be a very hard thing to do, particularly if you have spent a long time arguing a particular way.

So let’s go back to the difference I described before. Let’s assume that instead of pride and arrogance, we add humility, well now things end very differently. One person can express their view, you might disagree, you might even strongly disagree, but you won’t think yourself better then them. You have the ability to recognise that they are coming from this from quite a different place. You’ll be able to see a path forward where you can still work together.

Gentleness

The next characteristic is gentleness, and this is something which is often misunderstood. It’s sometimes also translated as meekness, and the picture that comes to mind is a doormat.

In the context of unity, we sometimes might think this is what we need to do. Just let others have their way and don’t make a fuss. But this is actually not what is meant, and that is not the best way to have unity.

It is rather having your strength under control. It’s having the ability to not assert your person rights.

Understanding it this way, you’ll see how it’s going to achieve a much better sort of unity.

Patience

The third is patience. It’s slowing down your anger. It’s not rushing towards other to show them how good you are.

Love

The fourth and last goes with the patience - it is bearing with one another in love.

And this is really what it all comes down to. We love because God first loved us. When we love, we completely change our perspective of the other. Other people cease being opponents, they are friends. They are brothers and sisters. We might have differences with others, but there is a bond that we have. Because love overlooks the things that so often divide.

The Basis of Unity

Okay, well, we could certainly dwell on these characteristics more, but I want to move on because it is from verse 3 that Paul get more explicitly into the issue of unity.

Verse 3 then becomes quite a strong statement when he says: “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace”.

It doesn’t say: ‘now make sure the people around with you agree with you and then be unified’. It also does say: ‘now, wouldn’t it be nice if we could get along’.

It’s actually saying that we need to make an effort to do this. And the fact that it says: “Make every effort...” indicates that this is something that really needs to take some priority.

But the big question is: why bother?

In fact, the question of why bother is probably more pertinent today, then it was when this was written. When this was written, there wouldn’t have been countless churches to choose from, and so if you wanted to go to church, you had to learn to get along with the person next to you.

Today, however, things are quite different.

You see, why make every effort at unity when you can go somewhere that more readily agrees with you?

Now to be sure, there are times when it might be appropriate to switch churches. I don’t want this to sound like once you’re in a church your stuck there for life.

But, if our first thought when we don’t agree with something is to move - this is not making every effort. So again I ask: why bother?

One...

Well, I think we start to get an answer as we look at verses 4, 5 and 6. As you read these verses, there is a word that is repeated seven times. It’s the word “one”.

Just look at them...

There is:

One body;

One Spirit;

One hope;

One Lord;

One faith;

One Baptism; and

One God and Father

So why bother about making every effort at unity. Because there is power in what we share!

I talked about the inevitable differences that we have. Well guess what? Those differences pale in comparison with what we share in common.

God has given us so much. And if you’ve accepted Jesus, then you share in it.

But this raises an important point. The unity we share is what we find in Christ.

We might be able to partner with many community organisations. There are people and groups in our community that are doing good things, and sometimes there can be wisdom in working with them to achieve certain goals. However, as helpful as those people or organisations might be, we do not share the same sort of unity with them. They are not part of the one body. They haven’t experienced the one Spirit. They don’t share the one hope that we have been called to. Nor do they know the one Lord, the one faith, the one baptism or the one God and Father.

Though that one Father may in over all, through all and in all, they have not recognised him.

But for those who have confessed with their mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in their heart that God raised him from the dead, we share something very special, and that is worth making every effort at keeping the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

Making every effort means that at times, this might mean we forego some of the things that we want for the sake of others.

Now I just want to be clear. Ultimately, our allegiance is to Christ, not to a particular congregation. But this is the beauty of this message. You see, even if for whatever reason we need to join a different congregation, we still need to make every effort to maintain the unity with all who belong to the one body of Christ.

Towards maturity

Okay, so we’ve seen in this passage the foundational characteristics that will allow unity to happen. We’ve looked at the basis for the unity that we share.

But finally I want to consider where this unity should lead us to.

Diversity

You see, unity does not mean all being the same. God has never intended for us to be a bunch of clones who all do the same thing.

In fact, to fully understand unity, we need to understand diversity.

It is the One Lord at the centre of our faith, but this One Lord, that is, Jesus Christ, has each given us different gifts. And this is where Paul takes us from verse 7.

Now we’re about to do a series on spiritual gifts throughout the month of March, so I’m only going to touch on it briefly here, but it is in giving us gifts that God enables us to have the unity that we need.

In fact, this will be the main idea of what I speak about next week. Next week I’ll be looking at 1 Corinthians 12 which gives us the analogy of a human body, with each part playing the crucial role needed.

In the passage, Paul gives us five significant gifts, which are particularly useful in leadership.

The are:

Being an apostle

A prophet

Evangelist

Pastor; and

Teacher

Now it would be really valuable going through each one in detail, but time is going to get the better of us this morning. It’s perhaps worth just briefly considering the gift of apostleship because this one might be a little confusing.

You see, when we use the word “apostle”, we often refer to the twelve disciples, and also include Paul and James the brother of Jesus. They are the apostles which were given authority that has never been repeated. You could say they are apostles with a capital ‘A’.

But we can think of an apostle with a lower case ‘a’. This is particularly looking at the root of the word, which means “sent one”. Today we might use this word for people who are doing pioneering work - perhaps church planters, or people looking at new mission fields.

While I don’t have time to go through each one in detail, what I really want to point out is that God has given people these gifts so that, (as it says in verse 12), “to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up”.

Maturity

You see, this is leading somewhere, and that is maturity. Verse 13 goes on to say: “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ”.

From verse 14, this idea is fleshed out further.

“…we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves...”

We need this maturity that is going to come from unity in the Spirit, because there are so many things that are knocking us off course.

Paul talks about “every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming”.

The problem is, we can be so unaware of what is going on.

And can I make a suggestion? If you are only listening to one voice… if you just tune in to the things that agree with you and block out everything else… then there is a good chance that you are not utilising the full body of Christ, with the full range of gifts that God has given… and you are likely not gaining the full level of maturity.

Now I do agree, even within the body of Christ, you will hear voices that are speaking more out of their own selfish agenda, or have been unduly influenced by the world. We do have to be discerning here. But yet, we need to acknowledge the wide level of gifting that God has given the many members of his body.

And this comes back to where I started. This takes humility, because sometimes it means listening to people that are different to us.

So how do we know which voices are from God and which are the cunning and crafty people into deceitful scheming? Well, as you grow in maturity, this will become clearer. And I believe, as I think this passage is pushing us towards, one of the best ways to achieve this maturity is actually by working towards the unity within the body of Christ.

This is not just an individual task. God has given us the church because he knows this is one of the best ways for us to grow.

Conclusion

There really are many things which divide us. As I started with my introduction, the pandemic has only made this more obvious.

Within our congregation, we will have lots of debates about lots of different topics, and this is okay, but we need to be very careful to be humble, to maintain gentleness, to be patient and bear with one another in love. Because it is as we do this that we will be able to make every effort to keep the unity in the Spirit through the bonds of peace.

So let me pray...