The Call to Gospel Unity

 Okay, my friends, if you would please grab a Bible and open with me to Ephesians chapter four. Ephesians chapter four, you'll find it in the chair. Bibles on page 1,161. If you wanna use that, let me encourage you to have a copy of God's word open to be able to study it, uh, together. There are notes that are in your bulletin if you'd like to use those notes to help follow along in the sermon.

And we come to a very important place in the book of Ephesians. Remember, the book of Ephesians was written about AD 60 that was during, uh, Paul's imprisonment, the first letter he wrote when he was in prison after his third missionary journey. He had lived in this place called Ephesus for three years, ministered among them, and he writes a letter back to them, not because he's addressing a scandal or trying to solve a problem.

He's not trying to step into a crisis. He is simply showing us that the church is a beautiful mess in all of its glory on earth. It is messy. It is full of sinners like me and like you, but it is beautiful and that it is a snapshot of what God's community is beginning to look like more and more and more.

As we await his return. His presence is among his people and he makes us one as a covenant community. So we may not have much in common. Our neighborhoods may be different. Our style, style of clothing may be different. Our drive time to Trinity may be different. Even our political dispositions might be different.

But you know what's not different? That we are united by the good news that grace changes everything. Hallelujah, hallelujah. We are united in the gospel and I wonder if we, o Trinity, can manifest that kind of unity in today's world. Would you stand with me? As we read from Ephesians chapter four, I'll read verses one to six.

This is the point of Ephesians where Paul turns from creeds to deeds. He turns away from the things that we are to be in awe of, of all that God the father has done for us through Christ by his spirit, to now how are we therefore, to live in light of all that he has done. So please give your attention to the reading of God's word.

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called with all humility, gentleness with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There was one body and one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call.

One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God, and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all, but grace was given to each one of us. According to the measure of Christ's gift, the grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of God stands forever. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks, beauty God.

He may be seated. Please.

Paul opens this part of his letter with a very urgent and personal plea, and he walks us through this part of the argument in his book in three movements. The first is the Gospel's call to walk worthy. The second is that the Gospel's character. Of unity. And thirdly, the gospel foundation for lasting unity is called a walk worthy.

What does that mean? When you read this part in Greek, the first word that you read in Greek is the word urge. It's as though Paul has written all of this and he is just like, all the tension has stacked up. And the first word out of his mouth in this section is, I urge you, urge. Therefore, then he urges us to what?

To walk in a manner worthy to urge somebody means that he is trying with everything he can. As much as the Greek language would allow him to write in the first century, he wants us to lean in. He wants us to understand the word parlo means for us to make every single effort, as you'll see that phrase pop up again and again.

And he wants us to recognize our calling. His focus is not on what we do to earn God's favor, but how we have already been called. We've talked about that all the way from chapter one through chapter three. He says, we have been chosen before the foundation of the world, verse four of chapter one. We have been adopted as sons.

Verse five, chapter one. We have been redeemed by Christ's blood, verse seven of chapter one. We've been made alive together with Christ, alive together as a corporate body, as people we've been alive together grafted into this covenant community of his on earth. And our calling is rooted in God's grace, not in our merit.

And if you're new to Trinity, we talk a lot about that truth, that you are rooted because of God's grace, not in your own merit. Although there are some remarkably brilliant, talented, kind, loving people in our church. It is not your kindness, your brilliance, your talents that gets you into right status with the Father in heaven.

It is his it immeasurable grace poured upon you because who of us could be brilliant next to God's omniscience? Who of us could be good next to God's infinite holiness? No, not one. And so we all come together in all of our struggles and all of our unique personalities, all the things that you love and maybe it rubs you wrong.

We are called together to be his body manifested in Tulsa and in this region for his good and his glory, according to that, to which we have been called.

And then he says, you are to peral. You are to walk. You are to move, you are to make progress according to your calling, you were to do so in a worthy way. There is a, um, a tendency in our culture where we define ourselves by our achievements, by our social tribes, by our resumes. The amount of energy that you use to curate your LinkedIn profile or your Facebook profile or your Instagram feeds is pretty remarkable.

You spend a lot of time thinking about how other people think about you and in the gospel, what he says is, I just wanna help you rest. I wanna show you a way that's different. Jesus says to you, I wanna show you a way where you are already accepted. So sure, put your beautiful pictures out on Facebook, but don't do it because you're just hankering for compliments.

Don't do it because you don't think that you're loved in the gospel. You're infinitely loved. And what's the sign of that? He gave his son on the cross for us to die for us, not just the person next to you, but to die for you. And he joyfully did so for the joy set before him, the son of God who enjoyed infinite pleasure, comfort riches in eternal communion with the Spirit, and the Father gave all of that up to enter into human frailty and life as a human being, fully human, fully God.

And he died on the cross for you. Now, friends, I know it's a Sunday morning and I know it's rainy outside, but we will spend all eternity pluming the depths of that mystery, and we will only grow more deeper for deeply in our gratitude for the fact that he gave his one and only son that we, by our faith in him, we'll be reconciled to the father.

And that is amazing, good news. And we were to walk in a man are worthy of that despite all the cultural headwinds that we face. And there are so many, the gospel, as we've often said, is not the ABCs of the Christian life. To quote Tim Keller, it is the A two Zs. It is the whole of the Christian life, the person who has never believed the gospel that's curious in this room.

And the person who has walked with Jesus for decades, do you know what they both need? The, the same degree. They both need the gospel. Martin Luther King. Um, on March 22nd in 1964 in a speech in St. Louis, I was just in St. Louis to celebrate Nathan this weekend. And it reminded me of a speech where he, he said to his, um, to those who are listening, he says, we will live together as brothers or we will perish together as fools.

He said that to the church. We'll figure out a way to walk worthy together, to live together as brothers, or we will perish together as fools. And that is indeed still true today in 2025. And that's something that Paul is trying to get at. Here we are called by the gospel to walk in a worthy way. How do we, how are we to do that?

Well, Paul then says, number two, the gospel character of unity. It's as though Paul anticipates our questions. How do we do that? And he says, in verses two to three, with total, with all humility, what else does he say? Gentleness with patience, bearing together with one another in love and eager to maintain the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace.

He says, this ought to be your character. Resume O Trinity. You ought walk in humility. And the Greek and Roman culture of Paul's day. Humility was not a virtue. It was associated with ility and weakness. It was associated with those who were actually the servants in the house. But Paul says, no, that is how we are to live politics.

What was despised by the world. And he makes it the first fruit or the first characteristic of the church's life together. Why? Because Jesus himself, he says in Matthew 1128, he's gentle and he is lowly in heart. Jonathan Edwards once said that nothing sets a Christian apart or outta the devil's reach.

So much as humility. And humility is kind of like trying to, to grab one of those bouncy balls in the swimming pool in the summer. You can't quite grab it. You try, it's gonna pop up again. Humility is something that is very hard to go after when you try to directly be humble. It's like, I'm gonna try to be humble today.

And humility is a virtue that is caught not pursued. What do I mean by that? Humility is not thinking less of yourself. It's just thinking about yourself less. And if you're really striving after community and you're always thinking about how do I or after humility, and you're always thinking about how do I become humble?

You're filling your mind with you. But if you just go and you serve your wife, husbands, your children, men, your colleagues at work, you don't fight for the credit, you're glad to share it. You're more interested in the person next to you than you are in how they perceive you. Oh, then you begin to go.

You're seeing a little bit of what Jesus intends for us to be with gentleness. Gentleness is not. Oh, how do I say it carefully from the pulpit? Gentleness is not being a wuss. It is not being, um, um, a, uh, somebody who is, um, uh, always kind. It means strength under control. When you think of the word gentleness, now we think about somebody who gets pushed over.

But no, when scripture gentleness is more like a wild mustang that you have harnessed, that you have broken, that you have ridden. It is strength under control. It is strong, but that strength is under control. And so you can be gentle and imagine the ways that it takes, the energy that it takes to be gentle.

Whenever you're tired or you're hungry or it's late at night, moms and dads and your children, oh, you love them so much, but if they don't get to bed, you know, you feel this energy and yet you're gentle. It is strength under control. It is like a furnace that is used to weld, not to create a forest fire.

It is strength. Under control. That is what the Greek word intends to get at, and it is the heart of what it means to be humbled by grace. It's the opposite of harshness or brashness or the tribal anger that marks so much of our public discourse and patience. Oh, it says the way he piles it on. Are you humble?

Are you gentle? Are you patient? To be patient means to bear with one another. It means to have a life together that endures the disappointments and the hurts and the differences even in your own house. And Paul is realistic friends. He does not say that unity is the absence of conflict. He says it is the presence of long suffering love for one another.

And speaking of love here, he uses the term agape. It is bearing together in love. It's a commitment that seeks the good of the others, even at the cost to yourself. And when he says he is eager to maintain the spirit of unity and the bond of peace, he says he's eager. He, he is one who is actually excited about pursuing avenues of unity in the midst of potential division.

The word for for bond, there is the word for ligaments and the bond of peace and the ligaments of peace. If there are not peacemakers in the church and all of us should be, then it's like a body with no tend to connect the bones to the muscles. How will it possibly move and grow? Paul's answer is, without unity of the spirit and the bond of peace, it won't.

Okay. Brass tacks, we live in a time of incredible polarization. And isn't it interesting how in 2025, maybe one of the chief ways that God shows the beauty of the gospel for the world is the way a people in a room who may be very different in so many ways, they are un unified in the gospel and they fight for the unity of the gospel.

And we see this of course, in the examples of so many one of you prayed for the saints that went before us. You see this in the example of so many in scripture. David, who was the one who was anointed by Samuel, even though he was anointed, he knew that Saul was still the king and it was before his time.

And so he persuaded his men and he did not attack Saul whenever he had the opportunity. And he allowed Saul to escape the cave in one Samuel chapter 24, when he had him trapped in the cave and could have killed Saul. He didn't. He was humble. Or you see Moses, though he was a great leader, he was described as more meek than any man on the planet.

Numbers. Chapter 12 says, Moses was very meek, more than all the people who were on the face of the earth. But Moses implored to the Lord his God, and said, oh Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people? And in Exodus 32, he pleads with the Lord to have patience with his people. And God did, or to bear with one another in love.

In the New Testament, the apostle Paul had Barnabas alongside him and they worked together sharing the gospel. And even when they disagreed, they chose to fight and think about how do we do this together even if we have different perspectives? And they supported each other. There were sharp disagreements.

It says in Acts chapter 15. And so they separated from each other, but Barnabas took mark with him and he sailed away to Cyprus. And Paul chose Silas and they departed. But later in Paul's ministry, he wanted Barnabas. He cared for Barnabas. He wanted him to be with them. He wanted to send greetings to Barnabas.

They were friends, they disagreed, but they were still friends. They fought for unity and they knew the best way to do that was for Barnabas and John Mark to go this way, and Paul and Silas to go this way. And it's held out as an example, not of division, but of them fighting for unity. And we could go on and on unity in the early church.

You know, then they make every effort in the Jerusalem Council in Acts chapter 15. There was a disagreement in the early church over whether those who were non-Jews, when they became Christians, if they should be circumcised. And rather than trying to let all of these little churches splinter out into different opinions, they came to together in the Jerusalem Council and they said, let's figure this out.

And they fought in the best of ways for unity. May we be a church that always does that, that always strives for unity together. So I. Verse one says that we are called to walk in a worthy manner. Verse two says that the gospel is characterized by our shared unity together. And thirdly, that we have the gospel formed in us by a lasting unity.

There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope that belongs to your call. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God, and Father of all, whose over all, and through all Paul grounds this unity, not in human effort, but in the unshakeable reality of the work of God. Seven times he says one.

Do you see it?

One body, one spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God. Why seven? It's as though Paul says, I'll try to put the number perfection out there. One, may we be a people who fight for unity together, and may they be true of us. One commentator says it's a reflection in Ephesians chapter four of the Triune God's work.

One spirit unites us together. One Lord is the sinner of our faith in our allegiance. And one God and Father spirit son. Father one father is overall and through all.

One of the, uh, unique aspects of being a minister is that I get to enter into a lot of your relationships and we know that we see in Jesus the perfect example of each of these. Jesus said, if. They said, Jesus, if you're the our Lord and teacher, Jesus said, you go and do likewise. And he washed the disciples feet.

He was humble. When Jesus was weary and he was tired, and he said to his disciples, this is what it's like. You're gonna be weary and tired, but you take my yoke upon you because I am gentle and I am lowly in heart. Jesus was patient. He cried out, oh, faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you?

In Mark chapter nine, Jesus was patient. Jesus bore with one another in love. He bore his disciples and he even forgave those who betrayed and who abandoned him. Jesus settled on the cross. Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. Jesus bore with one another in love. Jesus displayed his unity.

Let them be one father, even as you and I are one. He prays in John uh, seven 17. He made every effort to keep the unity of the bond of peace. Jesus went all the way to the cross to keep the unity of the bond of peace. And Paul doesn't just expect us to go and to walk in humility and to bear with one another.

Impatience. He expects us to walk in the way of Jesus because Jesus has given you all that you need in His spirit to do so. You had the power to do these things in light of what he has already done for you, not because you have to earn God's favor, but because you have it and you get to walk in his achievement for you.

But as your pastor, quite frankly, entering into your relationships, there are a couple of dynamics that I see among us, and I'm just gonna talk real frankly about the way that we sometimes sabotage our own unity. The first is a term that may be unfamiliar to you. If you know me, some of you know this, that, you know, I talk about this often in staff meeting.

It's called triangulation. Triangulation is when. Party A and party B have a conflict and instead of party A addressing it with party B, they bring in party C. And Party C loves to be confided in, oh, thank you for telling me this. I'm so glad you've told me this. I must be really special. You've confided this.

And then Party C tries to be helpful and goes and tells party B, Hey, party A told me that you guys were having, and now you've brought in you, you've tri, you see the word picture, you've triangulated somebody else into it. Brothers and sisters, Matthew 18 calls us that when we have something against another brother, we go to them.

And one of the joys, and one of the things that we do in our vows as members is we vow to keep the purity and peace of the church to study, to maintain the purity of the church. That's what we do in our fifth membership vow. And so if somebody ever comes to you with a an issue, oh, say, thank you for sharing this with me, and let's pray about it, and then encourage them always to go back to that person directly.

And to do what Matthew 18 says before we bring third parties in because it only muddies the water. Have you seen this to be true in your own life? It is so tempting if your party C the one that's told about this issue is so, it makes you feel good. It makes you feel like you can really be helpful here.

But so often we become what Peter says in one Peter chapter four, a troublesome medler. And so that's a second reason why we sometimes sabotage our unity because we become not caretakers of one another, but become troublesome meddlers. Are you with me? Let me just be frank for a few minutes. To be a troublesome medler means, for example, whenever you are at a Bible study and somebody, let's think of an example.

Somebody shares with you a, a, a struggle that, that somebody's having that directly involves the person sharing their request. You know, my children or my. A friend or pray for this person. And the person that's listening to this becomes a troublesome meddler when they go to that person without, without being asked or pursued.

And then they say to them, oh, I'm, I'm praying for you. And the person that is being prayed for is like, well, I didn't know I needed to be prayed for. And they become a troublesome. This is very, it's, it's hard to avoid this actually as a minister. And so sometimes you'll find me to be very unhelpful

because you'll come to me trying to solve your relational problem and I will put it back on you because I too, am trying to obey Matthew 18 and say, would you go to that person and would you meet with them? And once you've done that, if they're not walking your repentance or you can't reconcile, then, then invite someone to walk with you.

And I'd be glad to help facilitate that if need be. Do you see? Do you see how sometimes we sabotage our own unity and our relational life together? If we're gonna be a church that's really thick on relationships, then we've gotta be really good at not getting triangulated. And that doesn't mean that we shouldn't know all sorts of things about each other's life.

It just means that we recognize, how do we help people reconcile when maybe they may be at odds with one another? Are you with me? Okay. Thank you. Another way that, um, we sometimes sabotage our own unity. You know, here, Paul, one spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism is that we, we keep a long list of things that we're frustrated about and we keep that list sometimes for a long time.

When the Bible encourages us to make, to keep very short accounts later, Paul will say, don't let the sun go down on your anger. That doesn't necessarily, and I'll speak to this later, it doesn't necessarily mean don't sleep until you have stopped being angry. But it does mean keep short accounts. And so if you're frustrated with this with somebody, please go to them.

Enter into that conversation. Have the courage. This is what Paul is saying. I urge you have the courage to step up, oh, Christian, and walk in a manner worthy of the gospel. Don't keep along account. Keep them short and go to them. So those are just three simple things. Triangulation the temptation to be a trouble submitter for the sake of the other, and us not keeping, uh, short accounts.

Because the truth is that Christian unity is not to be created. It is to be recognized, and it is to be preserved by the Holy Spirit. It is to be maintained because the spirit has already humbled us to the dust, and he has given us a sense when you first become a Christian and you are humbled by the gospel, oh, you are so glad to see other brothers and sisters who have also been humbled by the gospel.

And so unity is meant to be maintained, not to be manufactured by the church. We must fight to do that. One last thing. The temptation for us to push against the fragmentation of our society and the consumerism of our society is about to get a lot harder. Every single one of you know how much, most of you know how much AI has changed your life, and it will only make fragmentation even more present in the culture and siloed lives.

We'll be tempted to lead. And so one of the beautiful things about coming to community Group week after week, even when you don't feel like it is to invest into these lives of your brothers and sisters. One of the things about coming to worship week after week is this is where God corporately renews us as his people.

It re grounds us because Paul says he grounds us in this call to unity by the sevenfold oneness. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one Lord, and Father of us all. He re grounds us week after week after week. And so would you join me in striving, in doing everything we can to make every effort to bear with one another in unity, in light of the fact that God has called us out of darkness, of sin into his marvelous light, and he has made us one together in him.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Let's do it by the power. Only by the power of the Holy Spirit, who in us? Let's pray.

Father, would you help us to be a people who are uncommonly unified in the gospel? And would you help us Lord to know what it means to be rooted in you are triune? Lord, thank you, father, that we see the unity displayed on the cross, empowered by your Holy Spirit. Thank you, father, that you are the one who sustains all things by the word of your power.

And I pray that you would help us in a very practical way to be able to be people who know relationally how to preserve unity when it's so tempting to gossip. It's so tempting to not bear with one another in love, but would you help us to be a community that strives to do that? Not to us, oh Lord, not to us.

But to your name, we give the glory. And would you start with the elders and the deacons and the leaders of this church, and would you help each of us Lord to catch that spirit of unity and of joy because you, Lord Christ, gave your life for us and equip us by your spirit to lead lives worthy of the calling, which we have received.

Thank you. In Jesus name, amen.

Sermon transcript is computer generated.