THE PRIMACY OF UNITY

Ephesians 4:1-6 (KJV)

I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,

With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love;

Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

One Lord, one faith, one baptism,

One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

I understand that some of the kids in our school got to use a microscope last week.

Some of you will remember that I tried to use a microscope to describe the focus of the book of Ephesians.

First we need to bring God into focus.

He is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or thing

Then we can bring Christ into focus.

He is the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person

You can’t see Christ properly until you see God properly.

Once you have seen Christ properly, as the express image of God, then you can finally come to see what is important to Jesus – which is the church.

Ephesians 3:21 (KJV)

Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

It is the church that is the theme of the book of Ephesians.

·   It is the church into which God has chosen to unite believers of all races

·   It is the church that is the mystery of the gospel

·   It is the church for which Paul and millions after him suffered

·   It is the church Christ loved and gave Himself for and

It is the church every believer who knows Christ fully will dedicate himself and herself to.

Chapter three was a parenthetical passage where he dealt with his imprisonment and how he prayed for the believers to respond to it.

In chapter four he gets re-focused into the theme of the local church.

And his first subject is the primacy of unity in that church.

Unity in the church is so important that’s why the devil attacks that unity, every single day.

Notice with me three things

I. A PRACTICAL STATEMENT OF UNITY

Ephesians 4:1-2 (KJV)

I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,

With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love;

Practically speaking unity is only possible when the members of the church are

A. Lowly

It means modest and humble.

Most problems between people happen when one or the other or both

·   Think too much of themselves or

·   Think too little of themselves

The person who thinks too highly of themselves believe they deserve better than others.

·   They might get upset when someone has something they wish they had

·   They might get upset when someone sits where they always sit

·   They might get upset when someone is asked to do something they want to do

The insecure person believes everyone is out to get them. They think

·   Others are talking badly about them

·   The pastor didn’t ask them to do a task because he likes someone else better

·   They were not invited to an event because others didn’t want them there

In both cases we need to get over ourselves!

Church is about the Lord.

Stop thinking about you and your feelings and start thinking about Christ and the feelings of those He loves and died for.

B. Meek

It means gentle

I was in Bible college when I heard meekness described as a stallion broke to ride.

Meekness is not weakness.

Meekness is strength in submission.

I have a beautiful Quarter Horse named My Sweet Jewell.

·   She is the foal of one of my parents’ horses

·   She is named after my grandma Jewell and

·   She was broke by my dad

Jewell weighs about 1100 lbs.

The truth is, Jewell is strong enough that, if she wanted to, she would never have to do anything I want her to do.

But she is gentle.

She is strong, but her strength is in control.

God does not ask us to be weaklings.

He does expect us to direct our strength for good uses.

C. Longsuffering

Lenient and patient

It is hard to be patient with some people isn’t it?

If you think that is difficult just think how difficult it must be for them to be patient with you!

D. Forbearing

To put up with and endure

There isn’t a person alive who is perfect so everyone, at one time or another is going to annoy you.

·   I’ll bet you’ve been annoyed with your kids and

·   I’m sure your kids have been annoyed with you

Think about it, there is no one you love more than your family and yet you get annoyed with them.

It’s a sure thing then that you are going to get annoyed with the people at your church – the thing is, it’s much more likely that you are going to hurt your church than your family by expressing your annoyance.

God’s says, “I want you not only to be patient with each other, I want you to endure each other.”

By the way that’s the definition of walking worthy of the Lord (vs 1).

You don’t have a good Christian walk just because you read your Bible every day and say your prayers at night.

A good Christian walk isn’t being holier than everybody around you.

A walk that is worthy of your relationship with Jesus is one that is lived with all:

·   Lowliness and

·   Meekness with

·   Longsuffering and

·   Forbearing one another

Don’t talk to me about how godly you are if you are not endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

Which brings me to

II. A WORKING STATEMENT OF UNITY

Ephesians 4:3 (KJV)

Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

This word means,

·   to exert oneself,

·   to make speed,

·   to be earnest.

This isn’t in any of the official definitions but as I studied it I thought we could say that it means, “to break a sweat.”

God told Adam

Genesis 3:19 (KJV)

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.

You’re going to have to work at

earning your keep and keeping unity in your church.

There is thirdly

III. A DOCTRINAL STATEMENT OF UNITY

Ephesians 4:4-6 (KJV)

There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

One Lord, one faith, one baptism,

One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

That this body is the local church is evident from verses 11-13

The apostles were the cornerstones of the churches

·   Prophets

·   Evangelists

·   Pastors and

·   Teachers

All serve to perfect saints in a church.

A. That it says one body does not mean one universal body but that each church is one body.

·   We are a unit

·   We are cohesion

·   We are a building fitly framed together

If a church sees itself as anything other than that it will disintegrate.

·   There will be no commitment to it

·   There will be no faithfulness to it

·   There will be no reason to work through the difficulties in it

B. It has one Spirit

The Holy Spirit of God who has

·   Convicted us of our need to be saved

·   Regenerated us so that we are saved

·   Sealed us so that we cannot be unsaved

·   Led us to the church we belong to and

·   Gifted us for a specific ministry in that church

C. We have one hope

Which is eternal life with God in heaven.

D. We have one Lord

It is Jesus Christ

·   It isn’t Yahweh

·   It isn’t Jehovah

It is the New Testament Lord Jesus Christ

E. We have one faith

This is the doctrines which we are convinced of.

·   We don’t believe we are saved by works, we believe we are saved by faith

·   We don’t believe we are kept by works, we believe we are kept by the Holy Spirit

·   We don’t believe we receive saving grace in the Sacraments, we observe the Lord’s Supper

·   We don’t believe the church is the kingdom of heaven on earth, we believe the church is the bride of Christ, being prepared for Him

·   We don’t believe we make the world good enough for Christ to come again, we believe we witness for Christ until he comes again

F. We have one baptism

That is:

·   By immersion

·   After salvation

·   As a testimony of our faith

·   Through the authority of a Scriptural Baptist church and

·   In obedience to God’s Word

G. We have, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

He is the Trinity, One God in three Persons

1 John 5:7 (KJV)

For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.

·   We are all saved the same way

·   We all worship the same God

·   We are all united for the same purpose and

·   We are all going to the same eternal place

Conclusion

Now here is the thing, none of this will really matter to you unless you have the right relationship with Jesus Christ.

If your relationship with Christ is right, you won’t be able to help yourself – your relationship with your church will be right too.