Be brought to completion by the Spirit, part fourThe mountaintopLast week, we visited the mountaintop. We saw God the Father summing up all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth (Eph 1:10). He is doing this by reconciling all things to Himself through Christ, having made peace by the blood of His cross – things in heaven and things on earth. (Col 1:20) So now it’s time to come down from the mountaintop, and resume our daily lives as Christians. Only we do so as changed people. Now we will listen to Him as He directs our daily lives into the love of God. This will contribute to God’s grand project of reconciling all things to Himself through the blood of Christ’s cross.
The crossBecause the cross is where God dealt with all the opponents of His great reconciliation. Col 2:13-15 The cross dealt the strategic blow, the death blow, to sin (Rom 8:3), hostile decrees, the rulers and authorities, and death itself (2Ti 1:10). And think of it! While WE were His enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son. That’s Rom 5:10.
The Spirit’s workAnd so now, we are invited to be completed by the Spirit as Christ’s body, the church. Now God is using the growing church to accomplish His great work of reconciling all things to Himself. Given its immense significance, every detail of this work deserves our closest attention. The specific details are presented in chapters 4 through 6 of the book of Ephesians. These specifics govern our walk: our daily life as members of the body of Christ. Eph 4:1-5 Establishing the unity in the body is the strategic part. The Spirit did that. Preserving the unity is what we do. This is tactical in nature. Yet this tactical phase sends a powerful message about God’s wisdom, and about the power of God’s love. This message reaches the heavens, and impacts the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. (Eph 3:10)
The commandsGod’s wisdom and love are demonstrated, on earth and in heaven, as members of the body obediently submit to the commands found in Eph 4:17 – 6:19. For instance, there is this command in chapter 5: Eph 5:25-28 Christ’s activity is on behalf the church as a whole. So husbands, when you love your wives, you are contributing to the building up of the body of Christ in love. And this is part of how God is summing up all things in Christ. What causes the growth of the body is the proper working of each individual part (Eph 4:15-16). Those parts include husbands and wives. There is a proper way for the husband to function, and that is to love his wife. There is a proper way for the wife to function, and that is to be subject to their husbands in everything. When both are functioning properly, there is growth in the body. Eph 5:22-24
How we growAnd that’s how we grow. We don’t grow to completion, to full maturity, as individual Christians. We grow to maturity as one body. Eph 4:15-16 Notice again that it is the whole body that grows. We don’t grow individually; we grow corporately. We register our impact not as individuals but as members of the body.
No solo actsThere are no solo acts called for in the church. In fact, the solo acts in the New Testament epistles are failures. For example,there is this man in the Corinthian church: 1Co 5:1-2 Or Demas. As long as Demas was in the company of Paul and Luke and Mark, he functioned properly. But as soon as he decided to step out he failed miserably (2Ti 4:9-10). And here is another solo act that completely failed: 2Th 3:14-15 Here again, the individual functioning apart from the rest of the church community in Thessalonica is failing. Badly.
Growth occurs in the bodySo again, the main point is that you cannot grow to maturity on your own. You can only grow in the body. We grow to maturity together. Not as separate individuals, but as one body together. Growth for Christians occurs only in the body, and not alone, as individuals.
The evidenceThis often comes as a great surprise to some people. But let’s examine the evidence. Let’s take a look at “growth” passages in the epistles: Eph 4:11-16 We all attain to the unity of the faith as a group: as one body. We all grow up as the body in all aspects into one head, Christ. The whole body is being fitted and held together, leading to the growth of the body. The verses that talk about growth in the epistles are nearly always talking about us growing together, about the body growing. There is no indication that we are to grow separately on our own – or that we even can.
Grow, y’allThe “growth” commands are second person PLURAL commands. There is not one command related to growth in the New Testament epistles that is in the singular. Eph 2:19-22 1Co 3:6-9 Here again is a passage dealing with growth, and the growth is corporate. One field, one building. 2Co 10:15-16 Another fascinating verse, because here we have a plural “you” and a singular “faith”. The one faith belonging to all of you grows. Col 2:18-19 This is a particularly instructive passage. It speaks of one person defrauding the group by that one person delighting in self-abasement and the worship of the angels. One individual taking his stand on visions, one individual inflating by his fleshly mind, and one individual not holding fast to the head. But it is the entire group that is in danger of being defrauded of our prize. Most significantly, it is the entire body that grows together with that growth from God. 2Pe 3:17-18 Now the fact that the “you” is 2nd person plural does not necessarily always mean that the writer is addressing the people as one body concerning a joint action. However, it is striking that none of the references to growth ever speak about people in the singular. We ALL grow together into the ONE New Man which is Christ, Head and Body. We who are many are ONE body in Christ. Well, we still have additional ground to cover in Ephesians, but that will have to wait until next week. At that time, we will continue our walk in chapters 4 to 6 to see more details of the Spirit’s work of completing the body. We will see that there is an earthly aspect to the work, as well as a heavenly one.
Until the next time, we’re all …. In His grip, Pastor John If you found this helpful, please pass it on! Post it on Facebook, or tweet about it! |