Do You Look Like a Follower of Christ?
Tom Shrader walks through Ephesians 4:7–12, explaining that every believer receives a spiritual gift at conversion, given by God in exactly the measure He intends, and meant to build up the whole body of Christ. He surveys the foundational gifts of apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor-teachers, emphasizing that their purpose is to equip ordinary believers for ministry wherever God has placed them. Drawing on 2 Timothy 3:16, James 1, and 1 Peter 5:10, he identifies Scripture, prayer, testing, and suffering as the four primary tools God uses to mature and complete His people.
“God is not going to give you something to do and not give you the time to do it.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Ephesians
Recorded: 2010 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 44 min
Themes: spiritual gifts, unity, maturity, equipping, suffering, prayer, scripture, service, new believer, feeling unworthy, navigating conflict, pastor, mentor, young adult, struggling to fit in, seeking purpose
Scripture: Ephesians 4:1-6, Ephesians 4:7-12, Ephesians 4:13, Philippians 2, Philippians 3:8, Philippians 3:10, 1 Corinthians 12:4-10, 1 Corinthians 12:28-30, 1 Corinthians 13, Romans 12:6-8, 1 Peter 4, 1 Peter 5:10, 2 Timothy 1:6, 2 Timothy 3:16, James 1:2-4, Psalm 68:18, John 3:13, Acts 6, 2 Corinthians 13:1
Theological Themes: ecclesiology, spiritual gifts theology, sanctification, becoming holy, body of Christ, biblical authority, pastoral care, spiritual maturity
Full Transcript
Context and the Call to Worthy Living
If you have your Bibles, you can open them to the book of Ephesians chapter 4. If you don't have a Bible, raise your hand and the guys will bring you one. When you get it, go about two-thirds of the way back — that will get you into the New Testament. Once you get there, page 152 or so, it's the book of Ephesians and it's the fourth chapter.
We last week looked at verses 1 through 6, and that really sets the context for this week. We're going to have, when we're finished here today, some loose ends hanging out there, so just bear with me. It's as though it's part 1 and part 2, so we'll have some loose ends, and then next week we'll come and tie all this together.
Let me remind you of the context. Chapter 4, verse 1, Paul lays out this call. He says, "I implore you" — literally beg you — "that you walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you've been called." He speaks there of our call to salvation, and the word "worthy" carries the idea of a weight, or a scale, a balance. So he says on one side of the scale is the weight of the calling to salvation, and on the other side is for us to live in a way that represents that.
There is a balance in that. You're called a son, a daughter of the King, a child of the King — now live like it. You are redeemed — now look like it. You've been saved, so there should be a corresponding change in the way you live. There is certainly a change in your heart, so, as the song says, changed from the inside out — now live like it.
Unity Across Diversity
Paul is writing to a group of people who are very diverse. We are diverse, and we tend to look at just ethnic diversity, but even if you said everyone here is the same ethnicity, you would still have different ages, economic scales, heights, widths, and levels of intelligence. We are a very different group. When you take one sinful person and have that person live a life for Christ, that is tough enough. Add just one other person — that is called marriage — and think how hard that becomes. Then think of a family with children, or think of a business, or think of a church.
Paul gets this. He says, listen, this is a very diverse group, and for them to come together as one — look at verses 4, 5, and 6 — Paul uses the word "one" seven times. He says you are of one body, one Spirit, one calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God. There is to be this unity in the midst of very diverse backgrounds.
The only way you are going to pull that off is if you have those five character traits present that are listed in verses 2 and 3: humility, gentleness, patience, love, and peace. For this thing to work together, I need to be more concerned about you and your well-being than about me and mine. There has to be this humility.
The Example of Christ's Humility
We use the picture from Philippians 2, where, like Jesus, you empty yourself. He emptied Himself — not of His deity, but of His glory. He became a man, flesh, human flesh, obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Humble, thinking more about the other person.
Three or four times a year we do a premarital class here. The Mishers lead one of them and are the group leaders of the whole ministry. It is a really interesting ministry, because you have all these couples coming for premarital counseling. There is one side of me that wonders how valuable it is, because their minds are already made up — it is a really tough group to speak to, because whatever you say, they tend to think they are the exception.
So when you go through "better or worse, rich or poor, sickness and health," they think, "I know it's tough for some people, but it will never be that tough for us. We're in love." Breaking through that sometimes is really hard. They meet at five o'clock on Sunday night, and since I teach at four and six, I am always walking past the conference room. During the course of the eight or nine weeks, I will stop in once or twice.
I stopped in last week and said, "Okay, what are we talking about?" They were talking about marriage and how difficult it can be. They said, "Give us a word of advice." I said, "Okay — not that you'll listen. But here is the deal: guys, if you love Jesus more than her, and gals, if you love Jesus more than him, and if each of you is concerned about meeting the other person's needs rather than having your own met, you cannot fail." And everybody says, "Yeah, yeah" — it is still theory at that point.
Thinking of the Other Person
We used to do the class at our house, and Susan and I were teaching it once. There was one of the girls in the class who had a very irritating laugh — high-pitched, like fingers on a chalkboard, and generally inappropriately timed. By the third or fourth lesson she was getting to me, and I said to Susan, "She is driving me nuts." Susan said, "Whatever — gentleness, humility."
One of the assignments was to name three or four things you like about your fiancée. The next week, this particular young man came back and said that one of the things he loved was her laugh. I thought, just wait until you are on the plane coming back from Maui. But I get sarcastic. The point is, for this to work, you have to be thinking about the other person.
What is true in a marriage or in a business is true in a church. You cannot sit there with a critical spirit — and that is the biggest challenge we face, breaking that habit of thinking like a season ticket holder. It is too hot, it is too cold, it is too loud, you did not do this, you did do that, why is your shirt not tucked in, how come there is no choir today, why is there just a piano. The list goes on.
Unity Without Uniformity
In your mind, you have to shift out of that thinking. This is not Nordstrom's, where we're interested in every little criticism and comment along the way. To meet needs and to serve is to plug you into the body, and that requires you serving. For you to do that, there is going to have to be humility and gentleness and patience — patience with circumstances, patience with people. There is going to have to be a spirit of love, which at its core in 1 Corinthians 13 is seeking the other's good and not one's own, and then there is peace.
Paul shifts back and forth, speaking about individuals and speaking about us corporately, and he says that for this to work, these qualities have to be present. Seven times he uses the word "one," and he talks about this unity. Then in verse seven he shifts again, making the point that within the body of Christ there is unity, but there is not uniformity. Christianity is not one size fits all. We are not Christians coming off an assembly line, all identical.
That is not the way it works, and it is not the way we are wired. Just look at the three church plants we have — Grace Bible Church, Second Mile, and Christ Church. If you took the next three Sundays and went to each one of them, you would find that while we all believe the same things, the expression of that belief can be very, very different. Paul uses the phrase, a little further in this discussion in verse 13, "a unity of faith" — there are core fundamental things we all believe, but the expression of that can look quite different even here on campus.
What happens here in the chapel in terms of worship and experience is very different from what is happening right now in the conference center, with video and a different band, and then tonight it is different again. It is not that one is right or wrong, or that one is better than another. They are individual expressions. So Paul says within this body: unity, but not uniformity.
Spiritual Giftedness
As an example of this, Paul uses the idea of giftedness. Look at verse 7 — Ephesians 4:7: "But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift." What he begins to talk about here is the idea of spiritual giftedness. If you want to take a couple of passages that tie it all together, there is 1 Corinthians 12, verses 4 through 10 and 28 through 30, Romans 12, verses 6, 7, and 8, and 1 Peter 4. There is not any one singular place where we have a complete list of all the spiritual gifts, but there is this consistent idea of spiritual giftedness throughout Scripture.
My intention today is not to go through all the gifts, but to remind you — or perhaps inform you — that you have a spiritual gift. Let me give you some characteristics of spiritual giftedness. Number one: everybody has one. At the time that God saved you, He gave you a spiritual gift. A spiritual gift is a special enablement to perform a task with ease and efficiency within the body of Christ. There is something that God has gifted you to do.
We might call it being "in the zone." Listen to a baseball player on a hitting streak, and he will say the ball looks like a beach ball coming in. Listen to golfers talk about putting, and they will say the hole looks as wide as a basket. A shooter in that zone experiences that same sense — the point where God has placed you and given you a gift.
There is a lot of misunderstanding, I think, about the idea of giftedness and what it means to do something God has called you to do. I used to teach a Wednesday night class for years, and there was a man who would always come early to make sure the room was set up. He would get my music stand, set out a stool with the Bible on it, and have a bottle of water ready. He came early every time, and when the class was done, he tore everything down.
One night after class he said he would like to meet with me. I asked if it was urgent, and he said no, it could wait a week or two. He told me what it was about so I could be thinking about it: he wanted to know what his spiritual gift was. I thought, this is perfect — because it was written all over him. He had the gift of service. It was bigger than Dallas.
When we finally sat down to lunch, he said he wanted to know his spiritual gift. I told him I had thought hard about it and that he had the gift of service. He said no. I told him again — he had the gift of service. He said no again. I took him through the whole litany of evidence, and each time I said he had the gift of service, he pushed back. Finally he explained his thinking: he said it could not be the gift of service because he enjoyed it so much. Sometimes we think that if we are going to do something for Jesus, it is going to be hard and unpleasant. But that is not how a spiritual gift works. Even when you use your gift and find yourself exhausted at the end, it is a good exhaustion. It is not the feeling of laboring and straining to make something work. It just happens naturally.
Every Believer Has a Spiritual Gift
There is a joy in it. Every one of us, at the point of conversion, received a spiritual gift. And we see here that it is from God. In that corresponding passage, 1 Corinthians chapter 12, Paul said, "There is a variety of gifts, same Spirit, variety of ministries, same Lord, variety of effects, same God, but to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit." Again, in the passage in front of us, chapter 4, verse 7, it is from God, from God's grace. He has given it to you.
And here is why He gave you a spiritual gift: each one is given a manifestation of the Spirit for the common good, for other believers. When you do not use your spiritual gift in the body of Christ, we lose. That is really important.
It is not just East Valley Bible Church. We need your help in children's ministries, student ministries, and a whole variety of areas — you can see the opportunities in the bulletin. But we are talking about the church in the big picture. God is not just doing His work at East Valley Bible Church. God is working in a whole variety of other places, and you need to participate wherever God has called you, wherever His opportunities exist.
You are constantly in a place of ministry, and every one of you is called to minister. That is how God is going to accomplish His work. Ray Stedman wrote these words over thirty-four years ago: "The work of the church is healing the brokenhearted, giving deliverance to the poor, opening the doors to the captives, setting free people who are bound in prisons of doubt and fear, anxiety and selfishness, and leading them into liberty, freedom and power." That is the work of the church. That is what God has called us to do, and it takes every single one of us to do it.
Stedman continued: "We are all in the ministry — to each is given a gift for that purpose." When I read those words, that resonates. It is not the people who are on staff or have a desk here or an extension that are in the ministry. We are all in the ministry. God has placed you in full-time ministry.
Ministry Happens Everywhere
That ministry may be within the local church, or it may be tomorrow at Mesquite, where God has students, teachers, and administrators — and that is ministry. It may be at Intel, or Discount Tire, or Costco, wherever He has placed you. It happens in the neighborhoods, and it happens among moms.
My two daughters — Sarah has a girl of three, a girl of two, and a three-month-old, and Haley has a boy of four and a boy of two. So between them there are five kids, with the oldest being four and a half. There are moments in that season of life where you find yourself wondering, is it worth it? I remember seeing it with their mother periodically. I would come home on certain days and Susan would say, "All I've said all day is no, no, no, no, no. I want to talk to an adult. Say something to me." And then I would say, "What's for dinner?" — which was clearly not what she had in mind.
My girls have had one of those weeks recently. It is really worth it, but it is really hard. That is a ministry. If you are one of those moms or parents, you need to hear two things. Number one, you can do it. Number two, it is absolutely worth it. Do not stop.
I think that is the hardest thing in parenting — to keep it up, stay consistent, stay on them, stay disciplined. They do not outgrow the need for it. You have to stay on it until they are eighteen, or whatever age they reach independence. Until then, you are the authority figure, and that comes with a lot of downside. You are the bad person a lot of the time. I was always clear with my kids: I do not really care if I am your friend right now — I am your dad. God put me in your life to say no. That is part of the job, and it is a tough, tough job. But it is a ministry.
My point is to remove the idea that ministry happens here and only here. Does ministry happen in the church? Yes. Is it the only place? No. That is why it matters everywhere you go — you are ministering, and God has given you a gift for that purpose.
The Right Gift in the Right Measure
God has also given you just the amount of that gift He wants you to have. Consider the gift of teaching as an example. Does it mean you must rise to the level of Spurgeon, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, James Boyce, John MacArthur, or Mark Driscoll in order to have the gift of teaching? Clearly those men are gifted, but the absence of that level of gifting does not mean you lack the gift. You might have the gift of teaching, and if we were to rate it, it might fall far below what those men possess — but it is still the gift of teaching. He gave you just the right amount of the right gift for you.
It is the same with time. We often hear, "I'm too busy, I don't have enough time." The reason that thinking troubles me is this: God is not going to give you something to do and fail to give you the time to do it. When you say you do not have enough time, the truth is you have more than enough time to do what God has actually given you to do. You have either overestimated what He has called you to do, or you are spending your time on things outside of what He has assigned to you.
The Gifts God Has Given You
God has given you a gift — exactly the gift He wanted to give you, in exactly the amount He wanted you to have it. As Paul writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:6, "stir up that gift which he's given you." Stir it up, use it, develop it, grow it. If He wanted you to have a different gift, He would have given you that gift. He has given you the gift He wants you to have, and He wants you to use it in the body of Christ — not just East Valley Bible Church, but in the church, the community, wherever God has placed you.
That means you are in full-time ministry. I get the question all the time: "How's the ministry going?" Right back at you. How's the ministry going at the bank? How's the ministry going at the credit union? How's the ministry going at the mortgage office, the hospital, wherever God has placed you? You have a gift, and God expects you to use it for His honor and His glory.
That also means wisdom is required in how you steward your time. Pray, "God, give me understanding — tell me what to say yes to and no to." Either you are investing your time in the area He has gifted you in, or you are wasting it in something other than that area. God has given you the gift He wants you to have, and He wants you to use it exactly as He intended.
Paul's Reference to Psalm 68
Verses 8, 9, and 10 are particularly interesting — verses 9 and 10 are literally a parenthetical insert. Paul refers back to Psalm 68:18 and quotes from it in verse 8: "He, when He ascended on high, He led captive a host of captives, and He gave gifts to men." Paul then explains: "Now this expression, 'He ascended,' what does it mean except that He also descended in the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is Himself also He who ascended far above all the heavens, so that He might fill all things."
In Psalm 68:18, the picture is of God leading the nation of Israel and conquering enemies. Notably, Paul changes one word from that original text: where Psalm 68 says He *received* gifts from men, here Paul says He *gives* gifts to men. This ascent and descent points to what Jesus Himself declared in John 3:13: "No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven, that is, the Son of Man." It is the same truth we examined in Philippians chapter 2 — the incarnation. God became man and dwelled among us.
And it is the ascended, descended, and ascended-again Christ who gave you this gift. Like a conquering general distributing gifts and power to his soldiers, He gave these gifts to His people.
The Foundational Gifts Listed in Verse 11
Verse 11 lists some of these gifts specifically: "He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers." Paul uses this same list in 1 Corinthians 12:28, where he presents it as sequential — "first apostles, second prophets, then teachers." This is the group that laid the foundation of the church.
The office of apostle no longer exists. Apostles were men who literally saw Christ and the risen Christ, and who validated their authority through signs, wonders, and miracles. The word itself means "to send out." These were the ones who laid the foundations of the church. The prophets here are not simply Old Testament prophets, and the idea is not primarily foretelling. The word prophet literally means "to cause to shine." They would take the word of God's revelation and declare the truth, illuminating it. Evangelists are those who preached and explained the good news to those who had not previously heard it. These first three categories of people served the body of Christ at large in that early church.
Pastor Teachers and the Local Body
When Paul reaches the fourth group, he combines pastors and teachers in a distinctive way. The word translated "and" in that pairing is not linking two separate groups — it could be read as "pastor, and that is, teacher." While the first three gifts functioned more broadly, the pastor teacher was typically identified with one local body, such as East Valley Bible Church.
The words pastor, teacher, elder, and bishop are closely identified with one another. They carry the idea of overseer, guardian, and protector of the sheep — the shepherd. This is why, when the risen Christ encounters Peter, He asks him three times, "Do you love Me?" and each time says, "Feed My sheep, care for My sheep." The pastor teacher is the one who takes the Word of God and applies it to people's hearts.
This role also carries with it the idea of the incarnation — it is relational, it is connectedness. And importantly, a person may carry this function with or without the formal title. A small group leader here is genuinely pastoring and shepherding the dozen or two dozen people under their care. The giftedness shows up across the church, both among those on staff and those who are not.
Paul is not listing every gift here. He is laying out for the early church those foundational gifts and then turning to explain why they were given. That explanation begins in verse 12.
The Purpose of the Church and Its Equipping
The word "equipping" means to restore or make complete. It is a medical term used to describe setting a bone. Paul closed out 2 Corinthians in chapter 13, verse 1: "Finally, brethren, be made complete, made mature." This equipping is for the body of Christ, for the work of service, to build up and strengthen the body of Christ.
There has been a whole discussion — quieter now than it was years ago — about the church growth movement. So many churches adopted a core value: we exist for people who are not already here. To say that we are concerned about reaching lost people is good, but the church really exists to minister, to equip, and to serve the people who are here. That is what the church is about.
We are concerned about loving those that God has not yet brought into His family. We are concerned about reaching out, loving, sharing, proclaiming the truth, and ministering to the community. We feel very strongly that because East Valley Bible Church is in Gilbert, Gilbert should be a better city because we are here, and it should be a better state because we are here.
At a time when things could not be much more divided than they are right now, we as followers of Christ should be able to come with humility and gentleness and patience and love and peace. We should be a vehicle God uses in the midst of this — a calming effect, not an energizing, stirring-up effect. But within the local body, He has given us pastors and teachers to minister and to equip.
Four Tools God Uses for Spiritual Equipping
John MacArthur is helpful here. He identifies four basic tools that God has given us for spiritual equipping. Number one is the Scripture. Number two is prayer. Number three is testing. And number four is suffering. So when we speak of building up, restoring, and making complete, MacArthur is suggesting these are four ways God does that.
The First Tool: Scripture
Turn to 2 Timothy chapter 3, verse 16. Paul is writing to his protégé. In chapter 3, he has told Timothy that in the last days, difficult times will come. There will be lovers of self and lovers of money. He describes very much the world we live in — a world filled with rights and not responsibilities, people who love money, love self, are arrogant, disobedient, revilers, irreconcilable. Doesn't that sound like the world you are living in? Gossips, those with no self-control, haters of good.
What is our message, our tool, in the midst of that? "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness." Paul is saying that in this world, here is a tool you have. Here is what gives you authority to speak. We do not have apostles in the office running around anymore. Our authority lies in this Word.
The Word is good for teaching — the word means doctrine. A little later in the passage we are in, Paul talks about the unity of faith. How are we to believe? What should we believe? How should we behave? Who is God? What is God like? There is a gentleman on the radio here, and someone mentioned this week's edition of a show called The God Show. He has all different faiths, all different denominations, all different thoughts, and they are all presented as roughly equal. The premise is that there is one God and a whole bunch of paths to Him, and it really does not matter which path. But we study the Word of God so that we might know the God of the Word.
The Word is good for reproof — rebuke — so that you can go to somebody and say, "Listen, what you are doing is not right." Who made you king? Nobody made you king, but the King did speak, and the King said you shall not do that, or you need to do that. It is also good for correction, which means to restore to its proper place. If a bench were sitting on its side and someone leaned it back upright, that is the idea of correction — to put something back in its proper place. And then there is training in righteousness.
The phrase that is easy to remember is this: the Bible teaches us what is right through teaching, what is not right through reproof, how to get right through correction, and how to stay right through training in righteousness. The Word of God equips the man of God to be adequate for every good work. So if we are going to equip one another — and when we talk about discipleship next week, we will go into more depth — at its core, the question is: what does the Bible say? How does God communicate to us? Who speaks for God? Well, God spoke for Himself, and He spoke in this Word.
The Second Tool: Prayer
The second tool MacArthur identifies is prayer, especially prayer for leaders. In Acts chapter 6, the elders were getting bogged down in the daily operations of the church, and they said this was not good. They needed to free up the elders so that they could teach the Word of God and pray. As you read through Paul's letters, he is constantly praying for people. It is a powerful tool — not just for us to pray for ourselves, but for us to be praying for others, and for the power of that encouragement and of how God works and answers prayer.
I will tell this story. Susan was at Costco checking out, and there was something in her wallet that said East Valley Bible Church. The woman checking her out said, "You go to East Valley Bible Church?" Susan said yes. And she said, "I pray every Sunday for the pastor's wife. I know she is sick, and I pray for her every week." Susan said, "Really?"
Testing and Suffering as Tools for Growth
Consider it all joy, my brothers, when — not if — you encounter various trials. The word translated "various" means multi-colored. "When you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect results, so that you may be perfect, complete, lacking in nothing." In other words, mature. That is what we are talking about: equipping, restoring, building up. Testing is part of that.
Testing is different from temptation. God puts tests in our lives to reveal what is there, for our own good. When we used to go out east, there was the GM proving ground. You would take what you thought was a complete automobile, take it out there, and test it to expose the weaknesses and the strengths. You could walk away and say, "Here is what we have. This works, and this does not." God tests you in the same way, and often you look at that and think, "I would have never thought I could have handled that test," but God provided great strength. Or you thought you were really strong in an area and you just discovered you are not there — you are not equipped, you are not complete. He reveals who you really are. That is one of the key things about testing and suffering: they reveal ourselves to ourselves.
You think you are a loving person until God puts you in an unloving situation. You think you have patience until He puts a person in your life who challenges your circumstances. You think you have joy — that is because everything is smooth. But then all of a sudden there is a bump. All of a sudden the stock market goes down a thousand points in three minutes, and you watch that retirement go from here to here. Do you still have that joy? It is that testing He does, those things He brings into our lives.
The Testing of Prosperity
I talk about this often, but consider the testing of prosperity. It is one thing to be submissive to Him and dependent upon Him when you are sick. It is a whole other thing when you are healthy. I guarantee Susan this morning was so grateful to be at church — she has not been in three weeks. By next week she may take it for granted again. That is how we are, is it not?
The testing of prosperity calls us to lean on Him in the midst of the good times. It means understanding that in the blessings, in the victories, in the deals that close, there is a test. How do you handle success? How do you handle it when everything is going well? Thomas Carlyle, the Scottish historian, said that for every hundred people who can pass the test of adversity, there is only one who can pass the test of prosperity.
Suffering and the Promise of Restoration
Turn to page 188 in the Bible we gave you — First Peter, chapter 5. First Peter is written by Peter. First Peter, chapter 5, verse 10: "After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish you."
Peter writes this, and I think he writes it with a level of authority. Every infomercial has its hook — the testimony. "I was this, and now I am this." Peter is writing his own testimony here. This is not a man who was unfamiliar with failure. He is the one who said, "I never knew Him. I never knew Him. I never knew Him." He is the one of whom one of the Gospel writers tells us that as he denied Christ the third time, their eyes met. Can you imagine the power of that moment? Can you imagine what Peter felt — the pain, the discouragement? Think of how you felt at the times you have failed.
Suffering, Growth, and the Body of Christ
Peter — who suffered, who I think was full of all sorts of grief, who wept bitterly — understood discouragement and defeat. He knew suffering, he knew hardship, and he knew hardship for the gospel. He says that after you've suffered a while — he doesn't say how long, just "a while" — Christ Himself will complete you, strengthen you, confirm you, and establish you. The phrase I use all the time is: no matter how bad it gets, it can only last a lifetime.
When we go back to Ephesians chapter 4, Paul says that God has given these gifts so that we equip, build up, and encourage one another, bringing about a unity of faith and of knowledge of the Son — that we are growing in our knowledge and understanding of God and who He is. Paul says in Philippians chapter 3, verse 8: "More than that, I count all things to be lost in terms of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord." Then in verse 10: "I pray that I might know him and the power of his resurrection." It is to know Him — not know Him academically, but to know Him personally.
That is why the church exists: to proclaim the gospel to those who are lost, and also to encourage, edify, and build up — to be there when you fall, to make one another strong.
Every Part of the Body Matters
No one person has all of this. That is why Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 12 the metaphor of the body. The body is an elbow and a wrist and a shoulder and a knee and a hip and a foot and an eye and an ear. He says the same thing applies to us — one part of the body is not more important than another. If the body were just an eye, we would see very well, but we would not be very mobile. We need each part, and that is the way God has designed the body of Christ, with each one of us participating.
Coming to church is not the whole game. To come and then go away and segment that part of your life into a Sunday or into a small group is to miss the fact that God has called you and given you a gift to use wherever He has placed you — in the family He has placed you, the neighborhood He has placed you, the office He has placed you, the school He has placed you — for His glory, for equipping, encouraging, growing, and building the saints for service. We serve one another, and it is not just the work of the professional.
You Are the Church
I do this with the Connect class every time — those are the people who are new to the church. I try to tell them: if you want to get a feel for how we view church, look at it this way. If you go to the hospital, I am not going to be the one who comes and visits you. If I am visiting you in the hospital, you are dying — even if they told you that you are okay, you are not. But when you are in the hospital and somebody from your small group comes to visit you, the church is visiting you.
You are the church. You are not a season ticket holder watching the game go on. You are engaged full-time in ministry to the body — for the sake of equipping, encouraging, serving, and building up the body.
Closing Prayer
Father, thank You for that amazing truth. It is probably something that we instinctively and intuitively know, but our flesh will put us on the sidelines. God, thank You that You have equipped us with everything we need for ministry. God, I pray that each one of us would be engaged in serving You through the local church, and then through the church at large — through the body, through the place that You have placed us — so that whether it be through Your Word, through prayer, through testing, or through suffering, we would be molded, shaped, and used by You for Your glory.
Father, we come together as a diverse group of people, knit together around the unity of the body, the Spirit, the calling, the Lord, the baptism, and You — the one true God. Father, I pray Your Spirit would fill each one of us individually and that You would grow us closer together in our love for You and our desire to serve You through Your community, Your body. God, we pray that Your Spirit would fill us, guide us, lead us, and empower us. We pray this to You in Christ's name, amen.