Ephesians 4:1-16 | Walk Worthy

Owen Huard continues a series on the book of Philippians. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

How are we doing tonight? Hopefully good. Hopefully good. Hey, we haven't met yet. My name is Owen. I'm the salt company director here in Denton, and I'm loving life, guys. The fact that I get to spend my Thursdays with you guys is crazy. Just crazy, isn't it nuts? You know, I had you know an idea that our salt company was like fairly good at dancing. I know some of you guys will go to live for worth and stuff on the weekends, but my goodness, I did not know you guys went that hard, okay? Let's run it our holy monkey talk. It was a success, to say the least. You guys were out there just shamelessly dancing on the dance floor, okay? Some of you guys are really good, and then there's some of them are like, hey, you know, we should practice. Guys, I'm one of those people. I'm the one that should practice, okay? I'm really, I'm like not that good at dancing at all. Guys, if the salt company, if the salt network had a competition for line dancing in commu in like the salt companies, we would win by far. It's like not even a question, okay? We would win. We we are the best at line dancing. Just the easiest, um, the easiest thing thing to to put out there, right? Guys, I as you saw, I'm not that big of a dancer, okay? I was maybe out there for like a couple a couple dances, not not not doing too much. Even the line dancing, I'm like, man, it's hard. It's hard for me to like really pick up on it. I look uncoordinated, it's bad. Maggie and I are working on the two-stepping. Okay, we're working on the two-stepping to hopefully one day uh get there. But my wife, she can dance. My wife really, she can dance. The line dancing, she can get out there, she can learn it. She's like a little bit, she can pick it up a little bit quicker. Um, guys, I don't want to like brag or anything on my wife, but I will. In our wedding day, guys, our wedding was amazing. Okay, the dance floor at our wedding was like peak, okay. Way better than than Friday night. Not way better, not way better. It's that that that's that's a hard thing to say. But our dance floor was great. I told my my father-in-law, because he uh was very generous in helping us with our our wedding. I said, Todd, I really only want one thing at my wedding, and I want a good DJ, okay? I invited all my friends to dance for like an hour and a half straight. Like, please, let me just like can we get a good DJ? And he mean he showed up. We paid our DJ, and on our playlist was absolutely zero skips. Okay, we had Soldier Boy, Pitbull, Bruno Mars, One Direction. It was like just banger after banger after banger, and and we were we were out there all night. Okay, even the rest of our night on our uh like our wedding day was just amazing. Okay, it was like picture perfect. We had some pretty like maybe above average chicken um with some pretty solid potatoes. We hung out with you know the people that mean the most to us, all in one room. It was great. And then after all our dancing, man, we had this really fun send-off with you know a bunch of flashlights, and uh, you know, it was it was really good. It was like wedding day was picture perfect. Okay, I literally would not change a thing. A day I'll never forget. And if any of you guys ever get married, it'll be the same exact thing for you guys. I can guarantee it. It's a day that you I like I can remember almost every detail from it. It's crazy, I don't know how. But but I can. Okay. Okay, quickly imagine with me, my my wedding day. Okay, you guys are all invited. This would be the best wedding ever. You guys are all invited. You're sitting out in um, you know, our wedding ceremony. Megan and I have you know done our thing. She looks great in her uh white dress. I look pretty average in my suit. And uh, you know, we say uh our vows, we you know, take take our pictures that that we need to take for our wall and our um you know living room right now that we will frame and we eat this above average food, we dance the night away, and eventually we do do our send-off with with the flashlights and uh you know sparklers, maybe fireworks. Guys, I tried to get fireworks at our send-off, but they said no, unfortunately. But imagine we do this great send-off. And and as Maggie and I are kind of walking uh or running through our send-off, uh we we kind of stop at the end, we do a little dip kiss because we perfected that, and then all of a sudden we just kind of we kind of split ways, and I get in one car and she gets in the other, and we just kind of drive away. Right? That that that'd be weird, right? I get in one car, she gets the other, drive away. We go to two separate hotels, we sleep in two separate beds, right? We we go on two separate honeymoons after that. And when we get back, we actually come and we live in two separate houses. You'd be like, what? Like, what are you doing right now? There would be a lot of questions around what we are doing at all. That would like if you heard that, you would be questioning any everything, and there would be a question that comes to your mind. It's like, hmm, I wonder if they're actually married, you know, because they're not acting like it right now. Right? It'd be weird if we acted that way. Like, why get married at all if you're not gonna act like you're married? Okay, that'd be a silly thing to do. And guys, tonight we're actually at that point in Ephesians, okay? You can open up your Bible tonight, we're in Ephesians chapter four. You can open up there because we're getting to the point where we've already gone through Ephesians 1 through 3, and then we kind of get to this spot where the theme kind of changes. Okay, the theme changes. And if I could sum up what we've already been through so far, here's how I would put it. I put that Paul spent the first three chapters of this book making a case for our citizenship in heaven. Right? We've been chosen by God to be sons and daughters of the king, made alive in Christ, and now commanded to walk in a manner that is worthy. Okay, you could say that. That's kind of like the title of the sermon tonight. It'd be this similar to this, it'd be walk worthy. This is where we are tonight, and this is what the kind of the rest of Ephesians is all about, right? How to live the life, how to walk worthy. Right, how to walk worthy in the eyes of God. Because we have been made alive in Christ, and now we have to do the thing. Okay? We've got to be Christians. We've got to do what God has called us to do, and we also gotta do what he has empowered us to do. In a way, we've been married with Christ, and now we've got to act like it. Okay? We're not gonna walk down uh this send-off with Christ and go into two separate cars or live two separate lives away from Christ. Okay, no, we've been brought close to him, we've been made alive in him, and now we've gotta do the thing we've got to act like we are Christians. Okay, sometimes it's not the easiest thing ever. But thankfully, Paul is gonna lay out a couple of things for us, a couple of different ways that we're able to walk worthy. And we're gonna see him right here in chapter four. Okay, we're gonna start in verse one. Not Philippians, Ephesians 4, chapter 1. Therefore, I, this is Paul, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to walk worthy of the calling that you have received. Okay, so Paul, he kind of decides to start uh this second half of Ephesians pretty high, pretty loud, okay? You can almost imagine it of like him uh rally rallying the troops around, okay? Kind of like this battle cry. Man, he's a war general getting his boys ready for war, okay? He's like, Man, I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to walk worthy. It's like we've got a mission. We gotta walk worthy, okay? We're gonna do this thing, okay? That's kind of like the theme. He's getting them hyped up for battle. If you want to walk worthy, here's how you gotta do it. We have a mission, we have a goal, we're gonna get it done. Then you can kind of take a look at what he says next. And the the whole kind of attitude changes a little bit. Right, verse two, he says, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace. Right? Well, we were up here, and now he kind of just he kind of brings it down here. We go from a war cry to a call for peace. Man, I think Paul, I mean, he knows something right here. Like what he is saying, what he is calling us to do, man, it's intentional. Because he knows that if any ground is gonna be taken in the battlefield that that we go out to, right? Because this life on earth, man, it is a battle. He knows that if any ground is gonna be taken in this battle against the enemy, then the troops have to be united. The troops have to be on the same side. We have to be organized, we have to be in the right place, right? We gotta know where we're going, we gotta know what goal is in mind, and then we gotta go do it. Man, if we're just scattered, right? Not even fighting on the same side, no ground would be taken. And Paul knows that. Paul knows that. He lays it out for us right here. Man, how we walk worthy to the call that we have received. Right tonight, I think he he kind of puts it into three individual words, three words and three ways that we can walk worthy. Okay, and it's these belong, go, and grow. Okay, three ways that we can walk worthy. Belong, go, and then grow. Okay, that that first word that we have there, belong. Can I see that Paul, he's already talking about it. Okay, even in the first couple of verses, he's already talking about this. Belong. We have to uh belong with one another. Here's how we gotta be united, belonging to the same body, under Christ. Here's how we do it. We'll read verse two with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace. So basically what he's saying is this saying, hey, if we want to be unified, man, we gotta put up with each other. Okay? We like seriously, we're gonna be hanging around each other. Man, we gotta put up with each other. That word bear, right there, in the bearing with one another at the end of verse two. It literally means like, hey, you're gonna put up with them, okay? Like Stephanie, man, I'm gonna put up with you, okay? Anthony, I'm gonna put up with you too. Even Grimmie, man, I'm gonna also put up with you, okay? Even though it's hard to. Man, I'm gonna put up with you. I'm gonna bear your, like, bear your presence, okay? And you're like, okay, you know, is he gonna say my name next? No, trust me. I won't, I'm done with that. But it's like, man, when I'm talking about bearing with everyone, I'm talking about everybody. Right? This is not a call just for some people. It's not a call just uh, you know, for uh the the holy, the super sanctified ones in the room. It's not just for the the new believers, but it's actually is for everybody at every stage of their walk with Christ right now. So we need to bear with one another. We need to put up with one another. We need to be unified. And if you want to do this thing that we called life and you want it to be enjoyable, meaning we gotta belong with one another. I mean, you can try to go at it by yourself. You really can. I it's like, if you want to, I don't think you're gonna make it very far, in my opinion, right? But if you want to do this thing called life well, you gotta belong to one another.

unknown 10:17

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SPEAKER_00 10:18

Each other, the community that we have, the believers that we have in this room, right, in our church, in our network across the country, in the world, then they've been given as a gift because the Lord knows, man, this life is hard enough on its own. He's given us, he's given each other to help up, to help us, to help one another. But the Christian life is meant, is not meant to be lived on our own, right? Exiled away from everyone else, but rather Paul is arguing here that we should be living in community with one another, that we should belong, belong to something. Okay, isn't this like the whole thing about college? It's like half the reason you guys come to college is just to belong to something, right? You want to be uh a part of a community with a goal and a mission in mind, and you want to go and do it. Okay, you want to be a part of a community. And what Paul is saying here is that you should be a part of a gospel-centered community. It's not just any community, but it's a community that's what? A community that's humble, a community that's gentle, patient, marked by love, enduring through the hard times. That's the community that salt company should look like in this room. Those characteristics. I mean, Christian community, like in general, right? Even just, I mean, Salt Company as a whole, is not like the other communities, okay? It's not like the Frats, right, or the Sororis who all live together and they just throw like major, major ragers on the weekend, okay? That that's their goal. Or it's not like the sports teams on campus who just have the goal of like winning a championship. It's like, hey, we are gonna rally around this thing, we're gonna train every single day, we're gonna have practice at 6 a.m. and we're gonna do this thing, okay? We have this goal. I mean, Christian community is not like that. Okay? Sure, throwing parties and winning championships is is is fun sometimes, right? But at the end of the day, it means very little. At the end of the day, it means very, very little. The community that we have here, right? I'm not bragging about Solomon, but the the community that we have in Christ in general, it's different. Not because of you know who we are, but it's actually who unites us. Right? We've already seen this theme in Ephesians, that we've been united with Christ in a way that transcends all culture. It cultural boundaries are not a thing in God's community. Okay, here, look at this with me. In verse 4, we kind of get a glimpse into this. Here's what it says it says that there is one body in one spirit, just as you were called to one hope at your calling. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in all. Right? Didn't Zach just preach on this a couple weeks ago? Right? The blood that was spilled on the cross for us unites us with God, but also unites us with each other. Okay, Ephesians talks about Jew, Gentile, united as one. And that still applies to us today, right? Although we don't use those words very often, right? Gentiles, so like in the past. But it still applies to us today. Okay? The nerds united with the jocks. Okay, the mean green united with the pioneers from across town. The vegans are united with normal people in life. Okay. But it all started with one thing, okay? It all started with one people being united with another. It started with the with the sinner being united with the holy. It started with the sinner being united with the holy. God's grace transcends any sin in any cultural boundary. Jesus is the one who creates the unity. He did it on the cross for you. One so that you can be brought into his presence, but also that you can be brought into God's community. Jesus is the one who creates this unity, but Saul Company, we are the ones that have to keep it. Right? He is the one who creates it, but we are the ones that have to keep it today. Guys, I want to give you practical ways to do this. Very, very practical ways. And here's three things that I think will help you guys get into gospel community, but also to stay in it. Okay, I want you to get in it, but I also want you to stay it because I think it's helpful. Okay, here's the first thing that you should think about. The first important thing about gospel community is that it's not found, it's forged. Gospel community is not found, it's forged. Okay, like what does this mean? When it's not found, but it's forged. It means that you gotta work at it. Okay? You really gotta work at it. Right? Making friends doesn't just happen. You don't just walk into a room and then all of a sudden it's like, yep, we're gonna be friends. It's like, no, you actually gotta, you gotta go, you gotta have a conversation with them. You gotta be like, okay, man, yeah, what do you like? Oh man, okay, you like that. I like that too. We should go do that together sometime. And then you go out and you do the thing, okay? It's not just, hey, uh, I see you, we're gonna be friends. No, that's not how the real world works, okay? If you did, man, college is gonna be pretty lonely for you. But hey, you it's forged. It's not just found. It's not just gonna fall into your lap, but it's something that you gotta work at. Okay, the quickest way to do this, the quickest way to become friends with someone is by sharing one of two things: either your front seat or a meal. Okay, if you want to build friendships that last, you need to be intentional with the conversations in the time that you have them. I think you'd be intentional with your front seat and with your meal first, in your front seat. Okay, you're driving somewhere. Man, Emiliano, let's go. We are going to Target right now, and we're just gonna walk around, okay? We're like, we are gonna be friends and we're gonna walk around, we're gonna do the thing. Okay, we're gonna uh man go pick up this person and we're gonna go to Sonic. Great. It's like, hey, why is the front seat the best the best place to really ask questions, to build friendships? Because they can't get out, okay? What are they gonna do? They're gonna open the door and they're gonna get out? No, I'm not saying like you're trapping them, but it's like it is a generally a good way to like have a conversation with someone. It's man, share your front seat. Are you going to King's Church on a Sunday? Hey, dude, do you want to ride with me? Okay? Hey, I'm I'm going to class. I know we're in the same class. Man, do you want to ride with me? Man, I'll even pay for parking on campus because it's a billion dollars. Okay? I'll do it. I'll do that for you because I want to be your friend. And then it's a meal. Guys, if you want peace in life, man, eat food with someone else. Okay, seriously. Totally. Yes. The ladies in the front agree, they're like, yes, we'll take food. Chick-fil-A, okay? Anything. It's if you want to build relationships and you want them to last, go eat food with someone. It's intentional. Okay? It is intentional time where you guys can both enjoy the spoils of this life together. And it'll build relationships. Guys, I think that's how you get into gospel community. Here's a great way to stay in it. Okay? The next two are great ways to stay in it. And the second thing that gospel community does is it says, I'm sorry. Gospel community says, I'm sorry. Guys, if there's anything that I know, right, in being a Christian over the past couple of years, being around people who are also Christians, being in this community, it's that I am bound to screw up. And so are you guys. And that we are still sinners. Okay? There have been time and time again where I have had to say I'm sorry to so many people. To so many people. And I feel like that's a word that we don't really say that often anymore. Like, I'm sorry. Sure, we might say it in a roundabout way of, hey dude, yeah, yeah, my bad. Or it was like, you know, yeah, I didn't mean to. But dude, actually saying, hey, I'm I'm sorry. I mean, I I talked bad about this per about you or behind your back. Okay, I said I was gonna be there for you and I wasn't. I mean, I'm sorry. Those are almost the two two most powerful words that you could say to someone to stay in gospel community because guys, we are bound to screw up. Sin is still a very real thing in this world. The gospel community says, I'm sorry, and then the last one kind of rises at coattails, is that gospel community remembers the gospel. Or you can say that the gospel community says you're forgiven. When someone does come to you, and they have the courage, they have the humility to come down and say, hey, I screwed up. I sinned not only against God, but I sinned against you. When they come to you and be honest with you. Remind reminding yourself of the gospel and saying, hey, I was once forgiven, now I will forgive you. The gospel community remembers the gospel. We are still a people that are broken, corrupt by sin, in need of forgiveness. That'll reign true in your friendships. We can combat this, you can fight this. You can create unity by saying I'm sorry and by saying you are forgiven. Those are great ways to not only get into community, but also to stay in it. Gosh, if our salt company said more of those words, we'd be in a better place. If our world said more of I am sorry, you're forgiven. Our world would be in a different place. Okay, let's keep going. That's the first thing. Uh to belong. Okay, we've got to belong in gospel community. Let's keep reading Ephesians. We're gonna look at that second word tonight. Not only do we need to belong to community, but we also need to go. Okay, to go. Here's what it says in verse 7. We'll just continue right down where we left off. It says, now grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of God's of Christ's gift. For it says, When he ascended on high, he took the captives captive. He gave gifts to people. Verse 9. But what does he ascended? Meaning except that he also descended to the lower parts of the earth. The one who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens to fill all things. And then here we go. He himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. To what? To equip the saints for the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ. You know, just a couple weeks ago I shared about my story, uh, my own personal uh, you know, hardship uh that I went through when I was younger. And it was in about uh probably sixth grade or fifth grade uh when I when my mom signed me up for football. Okay, I really wanted to play football, but my mom signed me up. And it if if you were here, you remember that I was very, very small. I was like the smallest kid out there, and I got smoked. Like my first game, I was literally like bang. I was breathtaking away. I thought I was dying. I was like, mom, I need to quit. Okay, football's not for me. Okay, I got hit so hard in that first week that the rest of the season, I was literally on the edge of the end of the bench, and I'm like, coach, don't put me in. Like, don't put me in. You I'm gonna fumble the ball. I it's literally a turnover, okay? Do not put me in. This was my entire like mentality as I was playing football as a fifth grader. Okay, the next year I ran cross-country, and then I found out I really like running non-contact sports more. But that whole year I was like, Coach, don't put me in. Seriously, do not put me in. I'm I'm not like equipped. I'm not, I don't have the body for this. Okay, what Paul says here in Ephesians 4, man, it it Paul is coaching he's calling on you. He says, You at the end of the bench, it's time for you. Man, you're you're in the game. You're gonna go, right? You are going to play, you are now a part of this team and you're gonna be you know productive. You're gonna be the quarterback. And guys, I was the quarterback. Who made me the quarterback? I don't know, okay? But I was a backup. Right? But but this is the coach that's calling you when you're like, man, I'm just sitting on the bench. This is the coach saying, Hey, it's time for you to go. And when we say go, I think it I think we really look at verse 12 and we're moved to go to do the work of ministry. I I I really like verse 12. I think it's great because it's absolutely, absolutely the reason why Salt Company and King's Church is even here in Denton in the first place. To help equip the saints to do the work of ministry, to what to build up the body of Christ. You might you might read that and you're like, really? Like me? Like I mean, I'm a saint, right? That's true. Telling me we're in the citizens and saints. I'm a saint. You want me to do ministry? Oh, and isn't that your job? Isn't that why you get paid is to do ministry, right? Certainly, yes. You know, I am someone who uh you know works to do ministry. But guys, you guys have also been called to do the work of ministry, even as college students. This is like really like contrary to how we kind of see things and label things in today. Like you've got a job, Owen, you've got a job. Zach, you got a job. Tyson's got a job to do ministry. You guys are the ones that are gonna do it. But in reality, what Ephesians 4 actually says is that, hey, we we are equipping you guys, the saints, to go do the work of ministry.

unknown 22:45

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SPEAKER_00 22:45

Ministry is not done by pastors, rather, it's done by saints. You guys taking up the call to walk worthy, to not only belong to the community, to reap the benefits of it, but to actually go and to do the work of ministry. Okay, so what's this work? Right, what have we been called to do here? I think I'll sum it up in almost in one word here. And it's this to go means to serve. To go means to serve, to serve your church on a Sunday morning. Okay, man, hold the door open for someone who's walking in to church. That's like the easiest way to serve your church, to go, to be doing ministry. Man, hold the door open. Man, are you willing to stack chairs, you know, after service? That's like something that no one wants to do. Can you be in the parking lot, being a smiling face, waving a flag, helping park cars? Okay? These are like the easiest ways to serve your church. Even outside of the church. Man, is your friend in helping a guy that's in salt company moving into a new house? Man, will you help me out? Yes, dude, of course. I'm there, I'll do it. Man, can you serve the people that are in this, in this room? Right? Man, when you run out of gas, is there someone that you can be dependent on? Can you be the person that they're like, yes, I'm gonna call this person because I know that they're gonna come and they're gonna help me out? Okay, can you give them a lift of class? Can you buy them an iced tea from Whataburger? Because gosh dang it, it's good. Okay? What's not the best iced tea. I mean, can you serve the people that are in your community by loving them, by serving them in small ways. Guys, I'm not asking to go to the moon here. I mean in small ways. Amen. It might even look like evangelizing to a campus to share the gospel to your peers. It might be scary in the moment because you've actually got to like talk to someone about Jesus, they might turn you down. It's scary. I understand it, I was there before.

unknown 24:38

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SPEAKER_00 24:39

But Ephesians 4 says, hey, we gotta go. We gotta do the work of ministry as saints. A part of that is sharing the gospel. Because how are they gonna believe if they don't have anyone to tell them? Okay. Guys, here's how I'm gonna encourage you over the next you know three weeks. I'm gonna encourage you to deny, but hey, we've got like three weeks left in in the school year, okay? And I don't know what it's like uh for you over the past um you know, school year in this call to go and to serve. Maybe you've done great at it. Okay, you're sitting up here and you're you're doing the thing and you're serving your people well. Maybe you mean you you've been a little you know a little lackless. You've got a little regret there. Of like, man, I wish I was there for more people. And I wish I was doing this. Here's what I say. I mean, you've got three weeks left of your school year. Okay, we still have three weeks left of the school year. And my hope is this is that as we go into the summer, that you would look back, that you would not look back on the past 30 weeks and feel regret, but you would look back on the last three weeks and feel proud of how you served the people around you. As you go into the summer, I mean, would you be able to look back and say, Yes, I I went. Right, I went and I served my community. So over the next three weeks, what would it look like for you and your friends to go to campus? Man, once a week for the next three weeks, to go share the gospel, to step out in boldness, right? Like we just talked on Sunday. I mean, to pray for Bob, okay? To pray for the burden, to go share the gospel on your heart, mean that you'd have the opportunity to do that with someone, and that you would have the boldness to open your mouth and to speak the words of the gospel. What would it look like over the next three weeks if you went to campus? Walked around the union, walked around the library, shared the gospel with people who think that they're living the life by going through the party scene, by spending every single waking minute uh in the library getting their grades up. What would that look like? I want you guys to leave campus for the summer, not looking back on regret, but looking back, being prideful. A righteous pride on how you spent your last three weeks here on campus. Okay. We've got to belong to a gospel community, but we also gotta go and we've got to serve those who are in our community. Right? We've got to go and serve those people who are in our gospel community, but also those outside of it, right? Going into evangelize to those people. And then finally, we need to do this. We need to grow. We need to grow ourselves in community. Okay, let's keep reading. We'll finish this section of Ephesians 4. It says in verse 13. It says, until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God's Son, growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ's fullness, then we will no longer be little children, tossed by the waves and blown around by every wind of teaching, by human cunning and cleverness in the techniques of deceit, but speaking the truth in love. Let us grow in every way into him who is the head, Christ. From him the whole body, fitted and knit together by every supporting ligament, promotes the growth of the body for building itself up in love by the proper working of each individual part. So here's the way that Paul ends this section of Ephesians is by comparing us to what we used to be, into what we might be.

unknown 28:02

Right?

SPEAKER_00 28:02

He first says that we should strive to grow into maturity or to be sanctified in Christ's fullness. So that we might what? He compares us to little kids in this sense so that we might not be tossed by the waves and blown around by the wind. Okay, he compares us to little children. Seriously. Little children. It's like me? I mean, I'm like a grown man. Okay? Guys, just this past week, or you know, maybe maybe before. I can't remember exactly when. It's been a long week. Uh my sister-in-law came to town. She came to Texas and she visited Maggie and I. So this is Maggie's sister, and she brought her her niece, or her niece, my also my niece, her child, um, with her, and they stayed with us for you know a couple days. They came to Salt Company. Uh, you know, it was great. It was a fun time. She was back in the, she was in, oh, oh, because that's me. But she came and she stayed with us. And uh, we we obviously Maggie and I don't have a kid yet. So we're like sitting there at the dinner table, and I can't remember what we were eating, but uh Kenzie is just sitting in this chair. She's 18 months, okay? So she's like, she can like uh start to kind of talk, she can with some words, not full sentences, but she can walk and she's starting to run, and it's it's honestly pretty cute. She's like the crown jewel of our family. It's like it it's weird. She's the she's the crown jewel. It's Kenzie, Kenzie videos, pictures in our family group chat. It's gonna be like that until you know her brother is born here soon. And then it's gonna be all about Grayson. But Kenzie's literally sitting in in this big girl chair, and she's like still pretty small, so she's sitting trying to eat, and the table's probably like like right up below her eyes, okay? Right there. And as little kids do, she's eating, and then all of a sudden, unprompted, I kid you not, she just literally just goes like forehead right into the table, and then she starts crying. I'm like, Kenzie, what are we doing here? Like, are you serious? We're just trying, I'm just trying to eat now. You now you're crying and everything. But it's seriously, like sometimes the weight of her own head is like almost too much for her, okay? She's clumsy. She really is. Okay, we also have a dog, her name's Hallie. She's old and she's a she's a grumpy woman, but Kenzie really likes dogs. Okay, so Kenzie will will kind of go up to her and she doesn't know how to pet it up. I'm like, Kenzie, you gotta be nice to Halle, gotta be nice, pet, soft. And what she does, and she literally, she literally goes and and she just points at her and then runs up in just two full like hands of fur, and like Hallie doesn't like that, she's an old dog. But it's too little good to get in her face and she'll just bark at her, and then Kenzie's falling down crying, and it's like, oh my gosh, Kenzie, we like, did we not learn from the first time we did that that uh that's not gonna work out? Right? But if you really look at it, man, Kenzie is very, very similar to what we are, right? As young believers. Man, reckless. Sometimes we can't even carry the own weight of our head. We don't have good decision making in whether to pet the dog or to grab it, okay? That's how Paul compares us. That we often are tossed to and fro by life, by the teachings that we see from different people. Right? The wolf that's in sheep's clothing, the cunning teachings and the techniques of deceit, that's what it says. I mean, that's that's that's often us. Gospel community enables us to go and to serve, but also to grow into maturity.

unknown 31:03

Right?

SPEAKER_00 31:05

We're once a small child, now in community with older adults, right? When Maggie and I are around her and when her mom's around her, we say, hey, Kenzie, you know, don't attack the dog. Don't smack your head against the table. Or you get wise counsel. You get you get people in your community that'll kind of come along you and help you mature. Okay, Kenzie will grow up someday, I mean she will, to like be able to do adult things. She's gonna learn. It's not gonna just she's not just gonna learn from all the other babies in her life, but she's gonna learn from her parents, right? From her aunt and uncle who love her, from her family that's gonna teach her how to do things. Right? This is us. Rather, we need to be surrounded by gospel community that we might lean into it to grow and to mature in every way. Okay, even just this past weekend, a guy asked me, hey, advice for a guy like me, uh, right now in this life, he's a you know, fairly young guy in his 20s. He's like, hey, any advice? I was like, dude, surround yourself with people who are older and holier than you. That's literally like all I did. And it's and it worked out. And he was like, okay, cool. But seriously, like it's a cheat code. You've you surround yourself with people who are older, who have gone through more things, who are holier than you. I mean, you will you will become like those people. There's an old quote, not an old quote, but there's a you know, fairly popular quote. It says, Show me your five closest friends and I'll show you your future. Who are the five people that you hang around most, and I'll show you what you're gonna become? Or hang around the people who you know can't control their tongue, have poor decision making, aren't living in and aren't rooted, have a firm foundation in Christ, that's probably where you're gonna be ending up. Show me your five closest friends, and I'll show you your future. Who we surround ourselves with is what's important because it's who we will become one day. A truth that I have found in my own life is that maturity comes from community. If you want to become a mature Christian, a more faithful Christian, I mean surround yourself with people who are more mature, more faithful than yourself. Okay. Our goal is laid out pretty clearly here in this last word of uh grow. Our goal is laid out by Paul here as well. That we are growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ's fullness, right? That's what it says in Ephesians 4. We have this goal to become more Christ-like. Okay, that's pretty important. Hey, what's our goal in life? We want to be more Christ-like, more sanctified into the fullness of Christ. It's not, I, you know, I want to be more like Owen. I don't want to be more like Riley, okay? But we want to be more Christ-like. We have to be very, very focused on this. And Paul, he even he even points this out. Okay? He says, hey, be in community. Grow and mature into community. But it's very important that you don't grow into the people that you're around, but you grow into Christ. You keep your eyes fixed on Christ. Here's what it says, verse 16. That's where we read it. From him, the whole body, fitted and knit together by every supporting ligament, promotes the growth of the body for building itself up in love by the po by the proper working of each individual part. Okay, so so far I've literally preached this. I've preached, preached, and preached. Community, right? Community within our community, or unity within our community. Sorry, that's a lot of unities. Right? Unity within our community. But Paul, right here, he wants us to slow down for just a second. Take a look into our community and make sure that's marked by unity, not uniformity. Okay, you know what unity is? Man, being together. Uniformity means we all look the same. Okay, that we all look the same. This is not what we want to be. Okay, we want to be together, but we don't want to be all the same. And to display this, he kind of uses a body as an example. He puts Christ as the head, the one commanding all the appendages, the ligaments, the muscles. And that's what we are, those things. It's actually not the first time that Paul brings up the body when describing us. Okay? He uses it again in 1 Corinthians 12. And I think this goes a little bit deeper than what he was just saying in Ephesians 4. So if you bear with me, I think this is going to be helpful. Here's what it says in 1 Corinthians 12, verse 19. Right? And if they were all the same part, where should the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, I don't need you. Or again, the head cannot say to the feet, I don't need you. On the contrary, those parts of the body that are weaker are indispensable. In those parts of the body that we consider less honorable, we clothe with great honor. In in our unrespectable parts are treated with greater respect, which our respectable parts do not need. Instead, God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the less honorable. Verse twenty-five, so that there would be no division in the body, but that the members would be the same concern would have the same concern for each other. So if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it. If one member is honored, all members rejoice with it. And then he sums it up, verse 27. Now you are the body of Christ and individual members of it. He makes a point. Can you see it? A warning from Paul against disunity in the body, but also a warning against uniformity. Saying that, hey, the hand is not the foot. In the hand, it needs the foot. It doesn't say, hey, bro, I don't need you. No, no, no. The hand does. That means that the head needs the leg. Okay? The head needs the ears. It needs them, yet they're not the same. Okay, imagine if our bodies were all the same, right? All legs, all ears, all eyes. We wouldn't be much of a body at all, okay? Seriously, we would not. Now imagine if this was like our ministry right here. Imagine if there's just a bunch of Rodericks running around, okay? Certainly we need the boldness of Roderick in our ministry, 100%. Okay, imagine if all of us just had the gentleness and kindness of Melanie. Imagine if all of us had the friendship and brotherhood of Josh Voland. Okay, these things are good things to go after. Yet if we were just a ministry full of Rodericks or a ministry full of Melanies, our ministry would suck. Like it would be it'd be like this is a terrible place, okay? Because we are not all the same. Just like the hand is not the foot. Right? I am not Roderick. There is a need for each and every one of us to be fully matured into being Christ-like. Yes, Roderick is a good role model. Josh is a good role model and D group leader. Melanie, Aaron, all of our leaders, great role models. Yet if we just all aim to be like them, we'd be selling ourselves short. Guys, we have an aim not for the people that are around us, but we have an aim for a heavenly, a heavenly goal, being more Christ-like. There's an importance for unity within our community, but not uniformity. Our aim in maturing in gospel community is to be more like Christ. So, guys, as I close for tonight, we've got to belong into this community. We've got to go and serve this community. We also have to grow in a certain way, focusing more on being more Christ-like and not like each other. But we've got one thing to really think about. Okay, as we think about unity within our community. I'll invite Ellie in the band to come back up real quick, and then we're going to close tonight. We've got to think about our community, okay? It's one of the strongest things that we have here on earth, okay, as believers, like tangible things in front of us. Uh I would argue maybe like the Bible and like the church, the two greatest things that we have in our life, as believers, these are the two things that you can lean on the most. The word of God and the people of God. This is something that we have to hold up, that we have to battle to keep united. Okay, I mean, I started with it. Paul kind of starts with like a battle cry. I mean, I'll end the same way. Okay? Our community is one of the strongest things that we have on earth. Believers doing life with believers. People to help us, to encourage us, to help us, to battle with us. And I hope that you would fight with me, that you would fight for me for unity. Right now. Because whether you think it or not, the unity of the church and the unity of this room is something that the enemy is gonna go after. Absolutely, I am guaranteed. Like I know it. The enemy does not enjoy people gathering on a Thursday night praising the name of Jesus. And one way to break that up is gonna be to break up the community of it. Just like Paul knows that if we want to take ground for the kingdom of God, we have to be all on the same side, fighting the same battle. The enemy knows that if the gates of hell are gonna prevail, then he's gotta break us up. He has to bring the book, the believers, the body of Christ needs to be broken. Or you can you can turn on your TV. You can turn on your phone, right? You can see it. Socially. Man, we're on crazy. Our culture's on two different sides. Politically, we're on two, like, at most, the most polarizing we've ever been. Morally, we can't decide on issues. In our culture, we are divided. Guys, I don't want our church to be like that. I don't want Salt Company to be like that. Over the next three weeks, over the summer, and as we go on into next year, we're gonna have to fight for unity within our ministry. We have to belong to each other, remembering that we have been brought close, that we've been brought together, not by our own will, but by Christ. That we have to go, and in order, if we're gonna stay together, we've got to serve one another. We've got to remember the gospel. We gotta say, I'm sorry. We have to seek intentional time with each other. And then lastly, we need to grow up. We need to mature in Christ so that we might fight for unity. Guys, here's how I want to uh just end uh tonight. And I just want to pray for this. Guys, prayer is our is our greatest weapon, okay? I just want to pray. Just you guys, you know, in your seat for a minute, for 30 seconds, whatever it is, that this room would not be broken apart by the enemy, by any tactics of this world, because you know Satan's gonna come after it. Guys, could we just pray for 45 seconds in our seat right here? That this room would be unified in Christ.