Conclusion: Using Your Spiritual Gifts (Eph 4:1-16)

Announcements

Be aware, that Heritage Days is this week, which means that parking on Wednesday for Bible Study & Prayer might be a little difficult. We will still have Bible Study & Prayer, just be sure to leave early enough to find parking—you may need to park in one of the lots on Second St. or the lot behind the pet store.

Speaking of Heritage Days, we do have an outreach opportunity on Saturday during the Heritage Days parade. This outreach opportunity is very simple, we’ll just be passing out flyers to those that are here to watch the parade. We’ll meet at the church building at 1:30pm because the parade comes right up second street. If you’re unavailable, but you’d like to help with another outreach ministry, there’s a sign-up sheet at the front of the room.

On Sunday, July 17th at 6:30pm, we have baptisms scheduled at the Miller’s home in Houtzdale. The directions for their home from the church is on the insert of your worship guides; or you could just take their address and plug it into your GPS. If you or someone you know needs to baptized, please speak with me as soon as possible.

Let me remind you to continue worshiping the Lord through your giving. To help you give, we have three ways to do so, (1) cash and checks can be given at the offering box. Checks should be written to Grace & Peace; debit, credit, and ACH transfers can be done either by (2) texting 84321 with your $[amount] and following the text prompts or (3) by visiting us online at www.giving.gapb.church. Of course, everything you give goes to the building up of our local church and the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Prayer of Repentance and Adoration

Call to Worship (Ps 55:9-16)

Our Call to Worship this morning is Psalm 55:9-16, it’s a continuation of our Call to Worship from last week. In this week’s section, you’ll see David call for the destruction of those who cause violence and strife in the city. He speaks of an enemy who taunts him, but it’s clear that this enemy was once his friend. He ends this section by expressing his need for God to save him. Please stand and read Psalm 55:9-16 with me—I’ll read the odd-numbered verses, please join me in reading the even-numbered verses.

Psalm 55:9–16 ESV

9 Destroy, O Lord, divide their tongues; for I see violence and strife in the city. 10 Day and night they go around it on its walls, and iniquity and trouble are within it; 11 ruin is in its midst; oppression and fraud do not depart from its marketplace. 12 For it is not an enemy who taunts me— then I could bear it; it is not an adversary who deals insolently with me— then I could hide from him. 13 But it is you, a man, my equal, my companion, my familiar friend. 14 We used to take sweet counsel together; within God’s house we walked in the throng. 15 Let death steal over them; let them go down to Sheol alive; for evil is in their dwelling place and in their heart. 16 But I call to God, and the Lord will save me.

Congregational Singing

Come Praise and Glorify (44)

All the Way my Savior Leads Me (172)

Scripture Reading (Ps 100)

Our Scripture Reading this morning is a psalm of thanksgiving. It’s probably familiar to you, but it stresses the importance of serving the Lord in a very specific way. Tara can you read Psalm 100 for us?

Psalm 100 ESV

A Psalm for giving thanks. 1 Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth! 2 Serve the Lord with gladness! Come into his presence with singing! 3 Know that the Lord, he is God! It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. 4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him; bless his name! 5 For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.

Sermon

Introduction

If you have your Bible with you this morning, please turn it to Ephesians 4:1-16.

Over the past two months, we’ve been working through a series concerning the spiritual gifts and this morning, we’re wrapping up this series with a final exhortation by Paul for believers to use their spiritual gifts. He emphasizes the idea of unity within the body while still stressing the need for people who are gifted in diverse ways to use their gifts. You’ll notice that this final exhortation by Paul has been his exhortation in just about every passage that we’ve worked through concerning spiritual gifts, which hopefully helps us to all see how important it is for us to use our spiritual gifts within the body of Jesus Christ.

It might sound a little familiar because this exhortation has remained the same in every single instance of spiritual gifts in Scripture, but the reality is, when Scripture repeats itself multiple times, it does so to emphasize what it’s saying. And in this case, the emphasis is simple—every person has at least one spiritual gift that ought to be used for the local body of Christ. Our differences in gifting and in personality is a benefit to the local church.

Keep this in mind as we read Ephesians 4:1-16 together.

Ephesians 4:1–16 ESV

1 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. 7 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. 8 Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.” 9 (In saying, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? 10 He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

As we study this passage, we’re going to break it into two parts: (1) Maintaining Unity in the Body (1-6) and (2) Diversity within the Body (7-16). Both sections work together to express the need of theological unity in the body of Christ despite diverse gifts and personalities. In fact, it’s through the church’s diversity of gifts and personalities and it’s through the church’s unity on truth that provides strength to every member and strength to the church as a whole. Or in other words, be unified on the truth, but have and use your different gifts and different personalities.

Prayer for Illumination

Maintaining Unity in the Body (1-6)

Paul starts this passage of Scripture with an exhortation based on the previous text. “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”

Of course, that brings us to the need of knowing what the foundation for this exhortation is—why is Paul urging them to do this?

We see this primarily in ch. 3, which is where Paul writes to the Ephesians about what he calls the mystery of the Gospel and about how the Gospel was revealed to be not just for the Jewish people, but also for Gentile people.

He writes of the unity between Jewish and Gentile people that believe, which becomes part of the foundation for what he says in ch. 4.

And he writes about the foundational elements of the Gospel—that God, who is the Creator, in His wisdom, sent His Son, Jesus who died and was raised for those of us who believe to be able to enter into God’s presence with boldness and confidence.

He prays for them to be strengthened in their faith and then he writes this exhortation in ch. 4. “I therefore . . . urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”

The foundation for walking worthy is Jesus’ sacrificial atonement for you on the cross—this is what ought to motivate you to walk worthy of the calling to which you have been called.

And of course, we know that the meaning of walking in a context like this is that of living life a certain way. This isn’t about your literal walk or your gate, but rather the way that you live your life—we know this because even today, 2,000 years after this was written, the colloquialism “walk the talk” is still utilized.

Thus, what Paul is exhorting the believers in Ephesians to do is to live their lives in light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ—he calls it their calling.

He explains that there are certain characteristics necessary to live life in light of the Gospel, he lists them in vv. 2-3, “with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” He lists essentially five characteristics, let’s take a closer look at them:

Humility is the idea of thinking rightly about oneself. One who is humble sees himself the way that God sees him—not in a haughty way of pride, but rather with right understanding of who God made him to be and what He is to do in light of this truth.

Gentleness is the idea of not being harsh or severe, particularly with other people. The American Heritage Dictionary defines gentleness as someone who is “considerate or kindly in disposition; amiable and tender.” In many ways its being gracious because of the realization of who you are in Christ.

Patience—Merriam-Webster defines patience as “bearing pains or trials calmly or without complaint.” I prefer the translation that the KJV uses for patience, the KJV translates patience as longsuffering. I prefer it because it implies that there is indeed suffering in issues of patience, but patience is the endurance of such suffering.

Paul says that they are to bear with one another in love—and of course this is the αγαπη-type of love that’s defined as God’s love for us. It is a willing choice to love someone even if you don’t necessarily like being around them, it is love based on volition or choice, not on feeling or preference.

And Paul says that they are to be eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace—Note that the primary issue at hand in this phrase is the unity of the Spirit. The “bond of peace” actually just modifies unity of the Spirit; and take notice that like I’ve so frequently warned, this is not unity for unity’s sake, but rather unity of the Spirit. Unity of the Spirit implies doctrinal agreement on right theology, we know this because all of Eph 3 speaks of theology and doctrine and Paul emphasizes that they believe the same right doctrine. There ought to be unity between those who agree with right doctrine.

Really, what Paul writes in vv. 2-3 is that they are to live their lives in light of the Gospel; and he explains that this is done with humility, gentleness, patience, love, and unity of the Spirit.

It’s interesting to me that all of these characteristics with the exception of humility is found in Galatian 5’s list of the fruits of the Spirit—and arguably, we all already know that humility is commanded in addition to the fruits of the Spirit throughout Scripture.

In fact, I think we can all agree that humility is a necessary part of salvation itself—no one comes to Christ until they acknowledge that they, themselves cannot solve the problem of sin in their life, they need Jesus to save them. To come to this realization requires humility on behalf of the individual.

And what Paul writes in Ephesians 4 is that the Christian life is to be walked in humility, gentleness, patience, love, and unity.

He then expounds significantly on his meaning of unity through vv. 4-6 and really, all the way to v. 16. Vv. 4-6, “There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

If there is doctrinal and theological agreement on truth, then what Paul says is that the unity ought to be cohesive and he gives multiple examples of just how cohesive it’s supposed to be.

The first example is that just like there is one body and one Spirit you are to be cohesive as a church—there’s two ways to look at this phrase. Despite the fact that just about every English translation translates Spirit with a capital S, the truth is that the Greek word πνευμα doesn’t necessarily need to refer to the Holy Spirit—it can refer to man’s spirit, it can even refer to wind or breath. In this instance, it could mean the body and spirit as in man’s body and spirit being cohesive. So much so, that you cannot separate the two.

Or, if you insist that it should be Spirit (as in God’s Spirit), then we need to understand body to mean the body of Christ or the church. In that light, it would be speaking of the universal church of God—everyone who has repented of their sins and genuinely believe in God through Jesus—and in this sense, it talks about the unity between the truth church of God and the Holy Spirit.

Regardless, the end result is the same—there is a cohesiveness of unity that is to be emulated in the local body of Jesus Christ.

The second example is that of the Lord, the third, faith, the fourth, baptism, and the fifth God the Father Himself.

In every example given, the result is the same. There is a cohesiveness in the examples that exists, so much so, that no one can separate them.

And Paul is calling all genuine believers to walk in this unity that’s so cohesive that nothing can break it apart, but remember, this is a unity that’s predicated on true biblical doctrine and theology.

It is unity that has its foundation on genuine belief in the truth—it is not unity despite belief, it is not unity regardless of doctrine, it is unity predicated on truth.

This unity should be cohesive and unable to break apart.

And the beauty is that the humility, gentleness, patience, and love that he’s already encouraged them to exhibit help with the idea of being unified with other likeminded believers.

Because of Jesus’ sacrificial atonement on the cross for your sins; because of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, you are to live your life in a way that is worthy of the Gospel. You are to live with all humility, gentleness, patience, love, and unity with other believers that’s predicated on true doctrine, but he isn’t done talking about unity. In fact, the remaining section though it focuses on diversity, is undergirded with the principle of unity over true doctrine.

Or in other words, as we study the remaining section, keep in mind that despite the diversity he mentions, he’s still claiming there should be unity in the church.

Let’s read together the remaining verses, 7-16.

Diversity within the Body (7-16)

Ephesians 4:7–16 ESV

7 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. 8 Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.” 9 (In saying, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? 10 He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

Paul brings up this idea of grace that’s given to the measure of Christ’s gift. The wording might be a little clunky, but remember that this is the same idea that he’s presented in 1 Corinthians and Romans; and it’s the same idea that Peter brings to like in 1 Peter.

In v. 8, he summarizes Psalm 68 with the point being again, that there are spiritual gifts given to every believer. The point of Psalm 68 is that the one who wins the battle has the right to give gifts to those who are his people. Likewise, Jesus, having won the battle over sin has the right to give His people spiritual gifts.

Darrell Bock, “In the victory [Jesus] Christ brings, there are also benefits that come to us . . . The gifts Paul has in mind are given to all God’s people.” (TNTC, 123)

It’s the idea of spiritual gifts that were given by God as a gift to His people, but before he actually talks about gifts, he interjects a thought in vv. 9-10.

This is purely an interjection, you can see that it is by the formatting in the ESV, the parenthesis makes it clear that this is an interjection or a rabbit trail of sorts. V. 9, “In saying ‘He ascended,’ what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.”

And we just have to pause momentarily because some of the English translations of these two verses have caused significant confusion. In the NASB, KJV, and CSB, v. 9 is translated as “Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth?”

Do you catch what the difference is? The NASB, KJV, and CSB all say that Jesus descended into the lower parts of the earth, whereas the ESV, NIV, and NLT state that Jesus descended into the lower regions, which is the earth.

This difference has led to the belief that Jesus, after his death, descended into hell before His resurrection—you can see the idea in what’s referred to as the Apostles’ Creed as well as in Roman Catholic doctrine.

The issue is that to assume that it’s talking about hell or hades reads into the text and it removes the text from the context—or in other words, if this is talking about Jesus descending into hell, what does that have to do with spiritual gifts, which is the point of the text? Not to mention, you have to sort of read into it a little bit to get the idea that it’s speaking of hell or hades, when the text itself doesn’t mention hell or hades.

The simplest and clearest reading of the text is that when the Bible says that Jesus descended, it means that He descended to the earth; and when it says that He ascended, it means that He ascended from the earth for the purpose of filling or fulfilling all things.

And it is the fulfillment of all things that is the foundation for Him giving spiritual gifts to all His people.

So, Paul gives some examples of these spiritual gifts in vv. 11-14, “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.” We’ll pause here just momentarily.

Notice, that just like every other passage about spiritual gifts, Paul doesn’t spend a significant amount of time describing the gifts or really even telling us exactly how they work.

That’s probably intentional—again, because his point in every spiritual gifts passage isn’t to provide a comprehensive list of gifts, but rather to encourage utilizing whatever your spiritual gift is for the good of the church. And probably because he assumes that they already have some idea of how the gifts function.

If you look closely, these gifts aren’t actually gifts, but rather roles within the church—the apostles existed in the first century to essentially start the church and finish the New Testament, the prophets existed primarily in the Old Testament with the purpose of warning the Israelites to repent and believe, and of course, we still have people who are evangelists—who are gifted especially with the proclamation of the Gospel and encouraging people to repent and believe, shepherds who pastor believers after their initial salvation, and teachers who edify the body through training.

And in this instance, it really isn’t about the gifts or the roles themselves, it’s all about the purpose—Paul gives two primary purposes of these roles or spiritual gifts: to equip the saints and for building up the body of Christ.

And really, these purposes are the purposes of every spiritual gift, not just the roles that he just listed in v. 11. Though arguably, these roles primarily exist just for these purposes.

The reality is that every spiritual gift exists to equip the saints and to build up the body of Christ—this is done by diverse people within the body of Christ utilizing their different spiritual gifts for the common good of the church. This is done because the diversity within the body recognizes that what unifies them is genuine and true doctrine.

Paul says that this equipping and building up is to continuously happen “until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”

This process of equipping and building up is to continuously happen until we all reach maturity of faith and knowledge of Jesus, which let me simply remind us that this will not occur on this side of eternity—maturity in the faith and knowledge of Jesus doesn’t reach completion until we see Jesus face to face.

Thus, until that point, every believer needs to be equipped and every believer needs to be built up continuously—and this is done through all of us utilizing our spiritual gifts for the common good of the church.

Note again, that the gifts that Paul mentions are really more of roles and they’re really more of the roles within the body of Christ that’s responsible for teaching and preaching—the reason for this emphasis is found in v. 14.

That through the equipping and building up of the saints, “we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.”

It’s interesting to me that Paul returns back to the idea of right doctrine, right theology, and right teaching. And it brings it full circle to what he was saying in vv. 1-6, the need of us being completely unified on right doctrine, right theology, and right teaching.

It emphasizes the importance of preachers and teachers and shepherds and evangelists actually preaching and teaching the whole counsel of God and the whole Gospel.

It also emphasizes what exactly the role of preaching and teachings is; and what exactly the role of pastors and evangelists is—it’s to equip those that genuinely believe to do ministry and it is to build up the church with proper teaching and preaching. It is to help people mature in their faith so that they stand firm on the truth, so that they are no longer children in the faith, so that they no longer fall for false teaching.

And then Paul ends this section of the passage with vv. 15-16. Instead of believers staying spiritual children, instead of believers falling for every false teaching by human cunning and craftiness, instead of believers being immature, v. 15, “Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.”

Because of Paul’s emphasis here with gifts being focused primarily on those that preach and teach, it is no wonder then that the result of proper preaching and teaching is that of spiritual maturity.

It’s the ability to speak the truth in love, for the people of God to grow up spiritually with Jesus as their head.

The result of proper preaching and teaching is that every person within the body of Christ is matured in such a way that they’re held together in unity, they’re equipped, and the whole body continues to grow in love as the whole body functions together.

If the preaching and teaching properly teaches and equips the people, then the result is that the people, will spiritually mature, the people will be unified on the truth, the people will work together, and the people will utilize their own spiritual gifts in love to build itself up.

Or put differently, as you spiritually mature, the result ought to be unification on truth and the willingness and ability to utilize your own spiritual gifts to help build up the church.

Harold Hoehner, “Each believer is to function in Christ’s body by God’s enabling grace in accord with the measure of the gift Christ bestowed on him. When each believer accomplishes that measure, then the church grows properly, coming ultimately to the measure of Christlikeness. Stunted growth comes when one does not allow his or others’ gifts to function. Paul emphasized body growth, not self-growth. Each individual contributes to this unified growth as he allows his particular gift(s) to function.” (BKC, 636)

What Paul is really trying to get across is this, as each believer utilizes their own spiritual gifts, the whole church grows. And if you choose not to use your spiritual gifts, the whole church suffers.

For instance, if the pastors, teachers, and evangelists don’t utilize their spiritual gifts well—then the people don’t spiritually mature, they don’t grow, they can’t be unified, and the people will be unable to discern what is the truth so they’ll fall for every false teaching.

If the pastors, teachers, and evangelists don’t use their spiritual gifts well—the whole body of Christ suffers.

Likewise, regardless of your specific spiritual gifts, if you don’t use your spiritual gifts well—the whole body will suffer.

If you’re gifted with serving, but don’t serve, then the church will suffer.

If you’re gifted with mercy, but don’t show mercy to those that need mercy, the whole church suffers.

If you’re gifted with exhortation/encouragement, but you don’t exhort or encourage others, the whole church suffers.

If you’re gifted with giving, but you don’t give, the whole church suffers.

How the church will suffer differs on what gifts are missing, but the whole church will suffer unless everyone contributes, the whole church will be stunted unless everyone participates, the whole church will struggle unless everyone does what God has called them to do.

Really, what we could say is that if you aren’t using your spiritual gifts regularly and actively, you’re hurting the church.

Which brings us to the point where I want to help you understand this whole passage before giving you application. This passage started by encouraging unity, but even in the midst of the encouragement of unity, Paul clarifies that this unity is predicated on true doctrine, right theology, and a good understanding of the truth. Part of this unity is in the fact that we’ve all been gifted with spiritual gifts that are all different for the purpose of using them within the body of Jesus Christ. Paul gives an example of how the shepherds, teachers, apostles, and evangelists are to utilize their spiritual gifts to equip the saints and build up the body—that if they use their gifts properly, the church will attain the unity of the faith, the church will mature spiritually, the church will learn the truth and stand firm on right doctrine so that it won’t be thrown back and forth by false teaching. If the shepherds, teachers, apostles, and evangelists use their gifts well, then every person within the body will be equipped and when they all work properly, the whole body will use their gifts to built itself up. What I want to do for our application is for us to look at this whole text singularly in light of the whole series that we’ve done through spiritual gifts.

Application

So, throughout the past two months, we’ve looked at every passage that speaks blatantly about spiritual gifts within the New Testament. We spent multiple weeks in 1 Corinthians 12-14, in which we learned some basics about spiritual gifts—that they’re from God, that He can give them and He can take them, we learned that there is a need within the local body of people with of diverse gifts utilized by diverse people for the purpose of building up the local church. We also learned that regardless of what your gift is, gifts never superseded simply loving one another, in fact gifts are predicated on the concept of loving one another. We then moved to Romans 12, where we discussed how exactly you’re supposed to determine your gifts and I explained that it’s really counter-intuitive, but the only way that you’ll discern what your gift is, is by already serving in any capacity in the church—you won’t know if you’re gifted with something, until you try it and then 1 Peter 4 emphasized what it meant to actually steward your gifts well. We then spent one week discussing the difference between sign gifts and equipping gifts and we spent some time discussing what the purpose of sign gifts were and why we don’t see them used today from 1 Corinthians 14:1-12. Last week, we took a brief moment to discuss the abuse of spiritual gifts and I warned against those who claimed to use spiritual gifts when really, they were just using the appearance of spiritual gifts; and I warned against people who were abusive as leaders and claimed that they could be because they were spiritual gifted. We’ve worked through a ton of information over the past two months and you might wonder how exactly you can apply the whole series and it really boils down to this:

First, you have a spiritual gift and you need to use it--If nothing is more evident from the past two months it’s the simple fact that you do have at least one spiritual gift. It was given to you by God to use within the church for the common good of the people.

You might not know what your gift is yet, but the reality is that you do have at least one and God expects you to use it for His glory and the building up of His church.

Now, as I’ve said multiple times throughout this series, you will not know what your spiritual gifts are, until you start serving. So, really, my exhortation for those that are still trying to figure out what their gifts are, is to find somewhere within our church that we need help with serving in.

So, for instance, right now, we have outreach ministries opportunities every week—we need help with outreach, it’s the primary means for people to hear about the church and come to the church. If you’ve never done it before, it’s worth trying to do at least once. You might find out that God has gifted you exceptionally well at connecting with people quickly to have effective and quick conversations about the Gospel and the church, but you won’t find that out until you start trying.

Or, in about a month and a half to two months, we’re going to start children’s ministry as part of our discipleship group hour. Both will start the first week of September. As of today, we have enough volunteers for children’s ministry to do a three week rotation, but really, it would be better if we had enough for a 5-6 week rotation to prevent burnout. You might find out that God has gifted you exceptionally well at working with children, but you aren’t going to find out until you start trying.

This applies to every spiritual gift—preaching, teaching, serving, exhortation, encouragement—to determine your gift, regardless of your gift, you need to actually serve.

Once you do figure out what your spiritual gifts are, then the primary point that I’ve been making over and over throughout this series is that you then need to continue using those gifts and you need to continue working to improve your use of those gifts.

You need to develop those gifts—that might mean learning different ways to evangelize, it may include taking an online class in preaching, it might be that you decide to get some special training to work with children, but once you do know what your gifts are, you need to learn to use them well.

You have a spiritual gift given by God through the Holy Spirit for the common good of the church, use it.

Second, you have a spiritual gift and the church needs you to use it well, this was the primary point of this morning’s message, particularly towards the end of the second section.

There is, definitely, a need for unity within the church when there is pure doctrine that is founded on the Word of God alone.

In these cases, there’s to be a cohesiveness that connects the believers just like the Father and Son are connected and just like the body and the spirit are connected, but unless there is pure doctrine founded on God’s Word alone, there isn’t to be unity.

Paul calls the Ephesians to strive for this unity as part of their worthy walk or lifestyle. And he describes that worthy walk being done with humility, gentleness, patience, and love.

He also explains that part of walking worthy in humility, gentleness, patience, and love is the willingness to utilize your spiritual gifts.

He sums this all up by stating that when everyone within the body is unified and they’re all using their spiritual gifts for the common good, the body grows and it builds itself up in love.

Naturally, the implication is that if the body isn’t growing, it’s because not everyone within the body is using their spiritual gifts for the common good of the church.

Or as I said before the application:

If you’re gifted with serving, but don’t serve, then the church will suffer.

If you’re gifted with mercy, but don’t show mercy to those that need mercy, the whole church suffers.

If you’re gifted with exhortation/encouragement, but you don’t exhort or encourage others, the whole church suffers.

If you’re gifted with giving, but you don’t give, the whole church suffers.

How the church will suffer differs on what gifts are missing, but the whole church will suffer unless everyone contributes, the whole church will be stunted unless everyone participates, the whole church will struggle unless everyone does what God has called them to do.

You have a spiritual gift that the church needs you to use—use it well.

Lastly (and this is more of a catch-all), use your gifts not to puff yourself up or build yourself up, but because you love God, His Word, and the people around you.

We stressed this particularly when we spoke about the sign gifts and when we spoke about the abuse of spiritual gifts—one of the sure-fire ways to figure out if someone is abusing the semblance of spiritual gifts is to check their message with Scripture.

If what they say doesn’t accurately reflect all of Scripture, they don’t love God, they don’t love His Word, and they don’t love you.

If what they say doesn’t accurately proclaim the Gospel, they don’t love God, they don’t love His Word, and they don’t love you.

Likewise, if it’s clear that they aren’t loving towards you, then they don’t love God, they don’t love His Word, and they don’t love you.

It’s the same when you use your spiritual gifts. When you use your gifts, be sure that what you say accurately reflects all of Scripture (to the best of your ability and knowledge); when you use your gifts, be sure that what you say proclaims the Gospel (to the best of your ability and knowledge). When you use your gifts, be sure that you do it because you love the person you’re serving.

You have a spiritual gift that was given to you and that the church needs you to use—use it in genuine love for God, His Word, and the people around you.

What I hope that you’ve learned throughout this whole series is this: God has given us all spiritual gifts and they differ per person because the local church needs a diversity of spiritual gifts.—So, use them, use them well, and use them in love.

Pastoral Prayer

Congregational Singing

There is a Fountain (301)

The Lord’s Supper

Before we partake in the Lord’s Supper this morning, let me just give a few reminders:

At Grace & Peace Bible Church, we practice an open communion, which simply means that regardless of your membership status here, you are welcome to partake with us just as long as you’ve genuinely repented of your sins and believed in Jesus Christ.

In a few minutes, we’ll pass the plates out to you, when you get them, you’ll notice that every cup is actually two cups stacked on each other. Please be sure that you grab both cups—the bottom cup holds the bread and the top cup holds the juice. You will need both.

And after you grab your cups, please hold them until everyone has received their cups—then we’ll partake in the Lord’s Supper together.

Let me remind you of Paul’s warning to the Corinthians—he warns them to be careful not to take the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy way. This includes partaking in the Lord’s Supper when you’re in unrepentant or when you’re an unbeliever. He explains that those who do partake in the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy way will be found guilty of the blood of Jesus and many of them have gotten physically ill and some have even died because of it.

So, in the next minute, before we pray and the elements are passed out, take time to quietly reflect, repent if necessary, and give thanks for Jesus’ sacrificial atonement on the cross for your sins.

Deane, can you pray for the Lord’s Supper?

"The Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, ‘This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’”

“In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’”

“For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”

Congregational Singing

O Great God (35)