Ephesians 4:1-6
Why do we try to live obedient lives? Is there an obligation to God to obey him because he saved us? Do we obey out of fear of what he might do if we do not obey? On the other hand, we are saved by grace. We do not deserve to be saved; we did not earn our salvation; and there is nothing we can do that would repay God for his act of saving us. So we can celebrate God’s grace and not get too concerned when we are not 100% obedient.
We tend to fall on one side of this or the other. Either we emphasize our efforts or we emphasize God’s grace. But both are true. Eight times in the New Testament there is this phrase “make every effort.”
Paul writes in Romans 14:19
Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.
He writes in the text today: Ephesians 4:3
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
The writer of Hebrews 4:11
Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.
Hebrews 12:14
Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.
Peter writes 2 Peter 1:5–7
For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.
2 Peter 1:10
Therefore, my brothers and sisters, make every effort to confirm your calling and election. For if you do these things, you will never stumble,
2 Peter 3:11–12, 14
You ought to live holy and godly lives 12 as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming.
14 So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him.
We cannot sit back and coast to heaven. We have to make every effort to be obedient, to live lives that please God. But there is also the teaching that it is by grace that we have been saved.
Ephesians 2:8–10
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
We are to make every effort and yet, our salvation, being rescued, and our salvation, being made holy, is the work of God. It is God’s gift, not our efforts.
In Romans 7 Paul agonizes because although he tries to do what is right, he does wrong. (Romans 7:15)
I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.
In his frustration he cries out (Romans 7:24-25)
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
We are to make every effort to do what is right and yet, because of our sinful nature, we inevitably do what is wrong. In our desperate situation, Jesus rescues us. We are saved by his mercy and grace.
So, our effort or grace, which is it? How are we saved? How are we being saved? How will we be saved? These are the three stages of salvation. Justification, sanctification, glorification. Are we saved by grace or by making every effort to enter the narrow gate? Are we being saved by making every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him or by grace?
One image I use to help me think about this comes from the novel Les Miserables written by Victor Hugo. In this novel, Jean Valjean carries Cosette over the wall of Paris to safety. Who saved Cosette? Jean Valjean saved her because he is the one who did the work of climbing over the wall. He had to use both hands to climb the wall so how did Cosette get over the wall? Cosette had to hold on to the neck of Jean Valjean.
Jean Valjean did the work of climbing but Cosette had to make every effort to hold on. We are saved by grace but we also have to make every effort. It is not one or the other; it is both.
This is true for our salvation – we have been saved, and it is true for our salvation – we are being saved. The Holy Spirit is at work in us, making us holy, but we have to cooperate with him, disciplining our flesh, resisting temptation, reading our Bible, meeting together with other believers to lift up our praise.
So we work in cooperation with the Holy Spirit to be transformed into who God created us to be. As we grow in our relationship with Jesus, the fruit of the Spirit Paul lists in Galatians begins to, more and more, define who we are. (Galatians 5:22–23)
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control.
What motivates us to grow in our faith so the fruit of the Spirit becomes descriptive of who we are? Duty? No. Obligation? No. I think Paul tells us in Ephesians 4:1 what our motivation should be.
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.
We have been chosen by Jesus and have been made, by his blood sacrifice for us, the beloved sons and daughters of God. Peter describes who we are in his letter: (1 Peter 2:9)
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
We are a royal priesthood, princes and princesses of the kingdom of God. And a prince or princess has the responsibility to act in a way that reflects who they are. They are not just anybody. They are not commoners. They represent the king or queen.
In August 2012, Prince Harry of England, son of Prince Charles and Princess Diana, went to Las Vegas and partied. Pictures of that party revealed Prince Harry in all of his natural self and a video of him cavorting in his natural state with others at the party was made public.
What do you think Queen Elizabeth, his grandmother, had to say to him when he returned to London? I would imagine she reminded him of who he was and who he represented. I would imagine he was reprimanded quite severely. His behavior had disgraced the royal family and hurt the public view of the royal family. He had acted disgracefully. He had not acted in accord with who he is as a prince of the royal family of England.
Paul writes: “I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.”
We were not born into nobility, but we have been made noble by the work of Jesus on our behalf. We are a royal priesthood. So now we have to begin to act in accordance with who we are. We are not commoners. We are the beloved sons and daughters of God. We represent Jesus, not ourselves, and what we do reflects on how people view Jesus.
Paul writes in (Colossians 3:1–10)
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
When we act in the ways Paul lists, we disgrace who we are and who we represent. These behaviors do not reflect who we are in our relationship with our Lord and King.
If you eat a meal at a royal palace, there are behaviors that need to be learned. The way we eat at home, in the country, is not how we eat in a palace. If you sit down at a formal place setting, there can be five knives, seven forks, five spoons, and five glasses. What do you do with all those utensils?
If you manage to pick the proper knife, fork, or spoon for the particular course being served, then there is the challenge of using them in the proper way. When you eat soup, you do not bring the spoon toward you, you push it away from you as you eat your soup. When you cut meat, there is a proper way to hold the knife and fork and a proper way to place the knife and fork on the plate when you are not eating. A friend of mine recently had a meal in Buckingham Palace and told me the true challenge is knowing how to eat peas properly.
I have never been at such a meal but if I were to one day be invited for a meal like this, I would be terribly intimidated. I would prepare well and then watch carefully to see what others were doing.
When we are rescued by Jesus and drawn into his kingdom, there are a lot of things we have to learn and unlearn. Our old behavior will just not do. A couple weeks after I submitted to Jesus and began following him, I went out with my roommate and came back to our university housing drunk. I was a happy drunk and if I saw myself in a mirror, I would giggle.
There was a Messanic Jew named Julian who had taken me under his wing. He saw me in the hallway and asked, “Jackson, what have you been doing?” (My father called me Jackson and Julian had met me with my father when I arrived at university.) I giggled and Julian told me to go to bed and he would talk with me in the morning. The next day we met and he showed me the Scripture about not getting drunk and I have not been drunk since then.
There are a lot of other behaviors I have had to learn and unlearn over the years. Paul continues in Colossians 3 to tell us how we are to behave.
12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. 13 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.
I have come a long way over my years as a follower of Jesus and these behaviors are more a part of my life than they used to be. I still have a long way to go.
In today’s text in Ephesians 4, Paul lists just three of the behaviors of Colossians 3 and ends with the same plea for unity.
2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
To learn how to use 22 knives, forks, and spoons in one sitting is too much and to go through the nine behaviors of Colossians 3 is also too much for one sermon. So we will look just at the Ephesians 4 list. First, Paul tells us to be completely humble and gentle.
The Greek word for humility occurred rarely in Greek literature and when it did, it was used in a negative context: servility, weakness, or a shameful lowliness. In the Greek/Roman world, you did not advance by being weak. Weakness got stepped on. Strength was shown and any weakness or fear was hidden.
The Old and New Testaments completely upended this understanding. In the Old Testament, the word translated humility is used 250 times, often in contexts that speak of the Lord bringing down the proud and arrogant and exalting the lowly or poor whose trust is in him.
In the New Testament, humility speaks of the “lowliness” with which we serve the Lord, as Paul did when he came to the Ephesians “with great humility.” (Acts 20:19)
But the great model of humility in the New Testament is Jesus. The Greek/Roman view of humility was turned on its head by Jesus when he did not ascend the Messiah’s throne by force, using his power to defeat the Romans, and take Israel back for the Jews.
Instead, Jesus, in the words of the early church hymn that is recorded in Philippians 2:5–9
6 Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
Jesus ascended to the throne by humbling himself and that is the model for all who follow him.
There is nothing of weakness in humility. But there is a different perspective that allows someone with strength to be humble in a situation. (Hebrews 12:2)
For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
The chief priest acted from a position of power to defeat Jesus but Jesus who had the power of heaven at his command, humbled himself and then, out of the ashes of shame and defeat, he rose to the position of all power. The chief priest saw a threat to his power and acted with power. Jesus saw into eternity and acted with humility to save all who would come to him.
Jesus spoke words in Matthew 11:28-30 that have been of great comfort to his followers over the centuries.
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Jesus modeled humility for us and he also modeled gentleness, which is sometimes translated meekness.
“Walter, get down here right away! Company’s coming and you still haven’t picked up the living room.” Mabel’s shrill voice pierced his ears. ‘Yes dear,” Walter responded as he made his way down the stairs. Mabel saw him descending and attacked, “Didn’t I tell you to change your shirt and put on a sweater? These are your friends coming over, not mine. I want you to make a good impression. Go up and change.” “Yes dear,” said Walter as he reversed his direction on the steps. Her voice followed him. “And then get down here and pick up the living room like I told you to do.” “Yes dear,” muttered Walter.
Meekness, or gentleness as it is translated in the NIV, isn’t that a quality you want to have in your life? As you grow in the fruit of the Spirit, don’t you want to be more meek? More gentle? More like Walter?
The problem with gentleness, or meekness, is that gentleness and meekness are confused with weakness and no one is attracted to that.
Someone who does not say harsh words to another person is considered to be gentle. A young child will try to pet a cat or dog and the adult has to protect the pet from being smacked because the child does not yet have enough control over his or her muscles to be gentle. Being gentle means not bruising someone, physically or emotionally. “Be gentle with her,” says the mother as an older brother picks up the younger baby. “Gently, gently,” says the fruit stand vendor as a particularly hard shopper pinches and inspects each piece of fruit before buying it. “Be gentle with him,” says the mother as the father goes in to discuss with his son the speeding ticket he received.
But gentleness goes far deeper than that.
Aristotle said that a virtue is the mean between two vices. If you take two vices, bad qualities, that stand opposite each other, the character quality that sits in the middle is a virtue. So in this case Aristotle said that with rage on one hand and indifference on the other, gentleness was the virtue that sat in the middle between these two vices.
This gives new meaning to gentleness. Gentleness is more than not bruising another person emotionally or physically. Gentleness carries with it a toughness, a strength that allows a person to stand up in a difficult situation without resorting to rage or indifference.
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
I’m running out of time so let me move very briefly through the rest of verse 2 and 3. Paul tells us to be patient. The Greek word is made of two parts and means, literally, slow anger. This is seen in the revelation of God to Moses when he said (Exodus 34:6–7)
“The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.
Our behavior and our resistance to God’s will for us provokes anger, but God is patient. Peter wrote in 2 Peter 3:9
The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
God is slow to anger, patient, because he loves us and wants us to turn to him. God endures the pain and suffering of the world for a greater good, that more men and women will turn to him.
Paul tells us to be patient with each other, bearing with one another in love. We are to be slow to anger, overlook insults and slights, so that God’s greater good can be worked out. That greater good is the unity of the body of Christ, which I will pick up as a theme next Sunday.
But let me say this morning that the reason God wants us to be humble, gentle, patient and all the other positive qualities listed in Scripture is so that we can be unified. We are created to be in community as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are in community and when we are divided, angry, or bitter, we are breaking the heart of God.
Paul reminds us that
4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
We are to be united in our following of our one Lord. Paul understood this and urged in his letters for the church to be unified.
Paul had a special relationship with the church in Philippi. They alone of all the churches, supported Paul financially. His letter to them is an emotional, love-filled letter and in Philippians 4:2 Paul writes about his distress that there is a broken relationship between two women who had worked with him.
I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord.
Paul wrote to the church in Corinth, distressed that there were factions that had developed. (1 Corinthians 1:10–11)
10 I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought. 11 My brothers and sisters, some from Chloe’s household have informed me that there are quarrels among you.
1 Corinthians 3:3–4
3 You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans? 4 For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere human beings?
Paul tells them they are mere human beings, not men and women called by God into his royal priesthood, not princes and princesses of the kingdom of God.
Last Sunday after church, the softball team I and many others in the church play on, played a game that determined who finished in first place for the season. We were leading 12-3 and the opposing team had just one chance to score more runs. They scored one run and then another and then three more and now they were just four runs behind us. The tension mounted. One of our players challenged the other team, saying they had violated the rules and an argument broke out. The coach of the other team began to curse and say bad things about the man making the challenge.
I went over and defused the tension by saying we believed that they had not violated the rules and we went on with the game. Due to excellent play on our team, we finished the game without the other team scoring any additional runs. We ended the season in first place and this afternoon will play in the championship tournament. We have won the last seven consecutive championships and hope to make it eight today.
After the game I talked with several of the players from their team and some from our team, reminding them that it is just a game and not worth getting so upset about.
This is the role of humility, gentleness, and patience. When these qualities begin to be more a part of our character, we can be peacemakers. We can bring unity where there is discord.
In the church, we sometimes get offended. Sometimes someone will do or say something that will upset you. But I want to exhort you to follow the example of Jesus. Be humble, be gentle, be patient. Bear with one another in love.
The example I used is a bit trivial. It is just a game, but there are more challenging conflicts when more is at stake. I will talk about this next week as well, but the principle is still the same. We are called to be humble and gentle, patient, bearing with one another in love. See how far Jesus was willing to go and use him as your model and inspiration.
Six months after Las Vegas, Prince Harry gave an interview in which he talked about that experience.
Speaking about the compromising pictures for the first time, he said: “At the end of the day I probably let myself down, I let my family down, I let other people down.”
“But it was probably a classic example of me probably being too much army, and not enough Prince. It’s a simple case of that.”
Prince Harry revealed he gets regular nudges from his father reminding him to act more like a royal.
“My father’s always trying to remind me about who I am and stuff like that, “But it’s very easy to forget about who I am when I am in the army.
Like Prince Harry, it is easy for us to forget who we are. We can forget that we are princes and princesses in the kingdom of God. We can forget who we represent and who we reflect.
We are headed to the kingdom of God. We are princes and princess in that kingdom and we need to live like princes and princesses.
