Ephesians 4:1-6, 11-16
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 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.
11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 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. 14 Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. 15 Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. 16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Today is a special Sunday. Not only because it's Father's Day; but we are also celebrating, (now that we're finally back together), our three new members, the Marazitis and Lynn Ware, who joined the church almost two years ago! It’s a joy when we can add to our number! Not every church has that privilege (of adding new members). Many churches are desperately trying to hold on to the members they have and some of them even want to hold on to people (on their roles) just to say how “big” the church really is. I think there are many reasons for churches unable to add new members, but one is that maybe… they don't treat each other so well.
Paul's exhortations in Ephesians, which is a great follow-up to last week's Music Sunday with the gifts of the Spirit in Galatians, is clearly more than just a wish list for Paul. It is a plea. He literally uses the words “I beg you”. This is how earnest he is that he wants all of us to act differently. For all those who want to be like Christ and desire church unity, we need to model these behaviors, which are not only listed here and crucial to the church, but also to society. Ancient Hellenistic moralists believed that people should be reminded of what they already know, so they will act accordingly. We know how we're supposed to act, but, in the moment…sometimes we're not so successful.
This morning's text is about exercising and also sharing the gifts that God has given us and we need to be reminded, again and again, to be humble, to be gentle and to be patient, bearing with one another in love. Isn't that really what every father, every parent wants of their children? Aren't these things among the most desirable outcomes when our children mature? Isn't that what God the Father desires for God's church? And I'm sure as we can think back even on the last week, we all probably have examples in our lives, if we're honest with ourselves, where we weren't completely gentle or humble or patient or bearing with one another in love. Perhaps you were successful in doing that with others, but you're still beating yourself up…. Like having that everything bagel with the extra cream cheese. I don't know why I torture myself over having an everything bagel with cream cheese, but I did it…and I loved it!
But more seriously…now, more than ever, we really need to return back to these behaviors as we seek to return to, or learn our “new normal” for our church life. And, unfortunately, we're really not out of the woods yet. And we don't really know what the future holds with the variants, which is both disconcerting and, quite frankly, terrifying. So now, more than ever we need to exercise patience and understanding with one another. And, as I said before, there is a wide swath of opinion about masks and distancing and singing and gathering. We need to exercise patience and gentleness as we wade through these waters, because, friends, there's still a lot of work to be done. There's a lot of catching up to do, quite truthfully, on the parts of mission and ministry that had to be put on hold. I feel like there's a lot to be caught up on and we're all glad to be back together, but maybe… don't have full energy, especially as we move into the summer. Most of us are hoping to be able to go away. To return back to vacation spots, open up our second home, use somebody else's beach house—before we gear up and get to full mission and ministry. And there may be some things that we have to shift and change. We're already having conversations about new technology to help bring, not only the Word to people, who are homebound, but to the world, hopefully. We've got to do this with one another together, on a joint faith journey even though we think differently from one another on a variety of things. And although we've been temporarily derailed for at least the last 18 months, as Paul writes in Verse 14, “we must no longer be children tossed to and fro, blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people's trickery, but speaking the truth in love.”
I don't know about you, but I've been tossed around, to and fro, by every single doctrine on every news station, every news outlet. Everything that's been dumped in my Inbox is trying to figure out where the truth is for me, for us, and for the world. It's not easy. We have to grow up and understand that regardless of what the world says, we are Tekna Theou. We have a different calling than most. We have a responsibility to show others how to be kind, how to be patient, how to have mutual forbearance in love and understanding. We need to grow up and be adults. We need to adult ourselves so that we make our father and the Lord, our Father, proud. Easier said than done.
I have found a new-found appreciation for watching golf again this spring and summer, I think, because I'm really desiring to get back on the golf course and so this inspires me. But what has not inspired me is a growing number of young men golfers who don't seem to be able to keep their patience under control. It's not just a dropping of a golf club when they have a bad shot, it’s much worse. About a month ago I actually saw a golfer take his golf club and swing at and then kick the tee-box. I've seen golfers who have snapped their golf clubs in half. I've seen them yell at patrons, because they just have to blow off steam. This is an example of other people who are not behaving well, and we're doing the same thing. We just don't want to admit it. Sometimes we regress, especially under pressure, and I get that. We regress either in adolescence or even into our early days, but the call from Paul and because of Christ is to be an adult; to stand up for what you believe; to have mutual forbearance and patience, especially with those whom we don't agree with; but also, because that's what God calls us to do as Christians.
One of the women of this church, who has now gone on to her “great reward,” tells a beautiful story. Elsie Force, many of you knew, tells a beautiful story about a man who graduated from college and his father asked him what he wanted as a graduation gift. He said he wanted a red sports car. The father, instead, presented him with a Bible. The son was so infuriated that he took the Bible and he chucked it into his closet. And it sat there, collecting dust, for years and years and years. Long after his father had passed (they hadn't spoken in over a decade), he decided to look at that Bible one more time and read the inscription, “Dear Son, I'm so very proud of you. Not only have you worked hard, but I hope someday you're going to be a doctor. I hope this book guides you as you start your medical degree, so that you can care for others, because that's your gift. Oh, and if you open up the Bible to the middle, there's the money to buy the car.”
Is this us? Yes, brothers and sisters, this is us! So friends, before you want to strangle someone or even make a judgment or send off something unpleasant in an email or on Facebook or out in the world, keep returning to this text. Don't be thrown to and fro by others’ doctrines and others’ comments, but let's be mature as Tekna Theou. Amen.