Bible Mastery
The Bible Mastery Podcast brings you verse-by-verse teaching that’s clear, grounded, and life-changing. We take the Bible at its word—interpreting it in a normal, literal way—so you can uncover its deep truths about salvation, spiritual well-being, and daily living. Our goal is simple: to help you understand Scripture and equip you with the tools to interpret it confidently, without getting lost in noise or speculation.
Bible Mastery
Bible Mastery - Ephesians 4:14-15
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Thanks for listening to the Bible Mastery Podcast, brought to you by Teleios. In this episode, William and Jeanette Stewart will cover Ephesians 4:14-15.
The Bible Mastery Podcast brings you verse-by-verse teaching that’s clear, grounded, and life-changing. We take the Bible at its word—interpreting it in a normal, literal way—so you can uncover its deep truths about salvation, spiritual well-being, and daily living. Our goal is simple: to help you understand Scripture and equip you with the tools to interpret it confidently, without getting lost in noise or speculation.
For show notes, visit https://biblemasterypodcast.com/.
To learn more about Teleios, visit https://teleiosresearch.com/.
Hello, and welcome to the Bible Mastery Podcast, sponsored by Telehost and hosted by co-founders Bill and Jeanette Stewart. Here, we give you verse-by-verse teaching from the truth of Scripture that's clear, grounded, and life-changing. Our goal is to help you understand the Bible and equip you with tools to interpret it yourself confidently and correctly. Thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_02Hello, I'm William Stewart, co-founder of Teleolis here with my wife Jeanette.
SPEAKER_03Hello, everybody. Nice to be with you today, Bill, and with our listeners and viewers.
SPEAKER_02Yes, thank you all for joining us. Well, we are in the book of Ephesians, chapter four, the lifestyle section of this book, between chapters four and six. And uh before we start, just a reminder, please go to our website, look at our bio and our disclaimer, and uh also uh like us if you can and give us a good review that uh helps us uh spread the word of this uh podcast. So, again, thank you for being here. Well, like usual, Jeanette, let's set the context.
SPEAKER_03So that's so always so important.
SPEAKER_02Always the context.
SPEAKER_03Because if you don't know the context, you're gonna make a lot of mistakes.
SPEAKER_02A lot of mistakes. So uh we are in chapter four, and after Paul uh finishes discussing the theological basis of the church, otherwise, our salvation, the structure of the church, the knowledge of the church, it's now how we live in the church. But even before he starts this, he gives more foundation that the church, and as we practice our faith in the church, is based on unity, all based again on our salvation in verse 7, and uh then based in scripture, and he addresses this in chapter in verses 11 to 16, which we are currently in the middle of this section, first saying at the beginning uh in the early New Testament period, which he was writing, when they didn't have the scripture, God gave uh some to special uh appointments, such as the original twelve apostles and prophets telling forth the truth of the scripture, evangelists, pastors, who I think they he speeded their maturity to help give a foundation to the church, all to the unity of the church and the maturity of the church, up through verse 14. So that brings us to Jeanette and verse up and now verse 14. How does this proceed from here? This amazing passage.
SPEAKER_03Yes, that's a great context, Bill, and and just to add to it that you know he said very clearly when he says in verse 13, unity of the faith and knowledge, it's for maturing us. And then he says in verse 14 that we be no more children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive. Okay, we have a lot to unpack here. Basically, when he says that he wants us to mature, just like a child, you don't want your kid to stay at age two, three, four. You want them to grow up, right? Become young adults, men and women who are a full maturity and can. Can I just add here?
SPEAKER_02Sorry to interrupt. That word for children here is nippios in the original Greek, meaning infant. So it's yeah, it's like where you said it starts, it even younger of a newborn.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, exactly. So just you know, as in human life, we want people to grow up and be functional in society, be independent, um, and and not dependent. And you know, babies need everything done for them, as do toddlers, right? So he says, uh, want you to don't be a child, a baby anymore. And then he describes what a spiritual baby is like, and he says, they're tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine. So the word uh toss to and fro is a very interesting word. And hold on just a second because I lost the view of my eesord here.
SPEAKER_02Sounds like me. So photon zombi.
SPEAKER_03Thank you for saying that for me. I should lose my view more often. You can do all the hard words.
SPEAKER_02I'm not sure I said that right, but yes, exactly.
SPEAKER_03So literally means um a surge of sea waves. So, you know, you're on the seashore and the waves are coming in and you see something bobbing. We would say they're bobbing on the waves, they fluctuate like an empty bottle, um, piece of styrofoam. That's what he's describing here is being tossed to and fro, so not anchored. And when he says carried about with every wind of doctrine, so carried about is the idea, also is you're not controlling your own motions. There's something pushing you around. And just as the wind would blow our empty bottle on the surf of the sea, that's what a baby Christian looks like. And he goes, I want to get beyond that. And then he says that this instability that is placed upon uh babies is by the slight of men, and the word slight is very interesting in Greek. It um is the word kubaea, and it comes to mean dice or playing dice, or remember a game of chance, but then it came to mean like trickery or fraud, so the uh the dice is weighted against you, basically. Um, he says, by trickery of men, okay, and cunning craftiness. Oh my goodness, isn't that great phrase? Cunning craftiness is really also just the word for shrewdness or crafty, uh, maybe unscrupulous. But then he says, whereby, and this word they lie in wait to deceive. This Greek word is methodia, which we would get our word methods, and it literally means to work by a method. So he's saying, this is not accidental. There are people out there who are planning cunningly, shrewdly, trying to um basically to do evil, but to keep people in this baby state where they're going to be pushed around by the false winds of doctrine. So they're going to corrupt the true doctrines around which we're united, which he stated plainly in all the 1-1-1s uh earlier, a few verses back. It's a verse here that kind of gives us insight into what these believers were up against uh before they had the completion of scripture. Bill, I'm sure you have a lot of things to add to this. Please, uh, please um add on.
SPEAKER_02So just to put this in historical context, it's interesting. You know, the Roman Empire basically surrounded the Mediterranean Sea. And everybody, even though going by ship could be the most efficient way of travel, people were afraid to travel by sea, especially the Jews who were not known as seafaring people. So these storms that rise in the Mediterranean and literally do what this verse says. Therefore, people kept close to shore. Their ships were not good enough, and their navigation was not good enough to go out of the side of land. And there were people who I think who had the shore memorized so people would know where they were, but they had to stay in sight. So the fear that this verse uh brings, I think to the reader, would have been very real. It would have been a fear of death.
SPEAKER_03Oh, that's an interesting point. Yeah, that's a good context to think about.
SPEAKER_02So if you can elaborate, but thank you for your good description. If you can elaborate, then how does this verse fit into the historical context over which we've been speaking for the early church?
SPEAKER_03So I think, Bill, as you nicely put it into context, before the written scripture was complete, and and Paul in writing this apostle is um starting to complete it, you know, with the other epistles, um, you know, everything was handed down by word of mouth. And as you nicely said, you know, God uh appointed special people to help with this, but he's basically saying you need to know the essential doctrines because there are people out there who are going to try and corrupt them. And when you succumb to that, then you're not grounded, you're not anchored, you're gonna fall into error. And I think uh that's what he's trying to say here.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I think we agreed to that when in in verse 13, when the perfect comes, the chance to be mature was when these Pauline letters arrived in the 50s, late 40s, early 50s, where the doctrine was written down, and a little later by John and Peter, uh James and Jude to provide that canon. And even though they weren't set in stone in the New Testament list uh as we know it till 397 AD, and the Christians could organize after they had become legal in the Christian Empire by the uh Edict of Balaan in 313, um, that canon was pretty well known. These letters were known and passed around and gave that stability. So then you also mentioned a very interesting thing, the methods of people who planned uh to make the Christians disperse and be tossed to and fro. How's that apply to the day? Who are these people and what are they planning?
SPEAKER_03Well, we don't know. We know that Satan is a schemer and an accuser, and we know from the scripture first Peter that he lies in wait like a lion trying to uh devour people, right? So there is a methodical plan of Satan against believers. I think you know he uses um what you and I often refer to as God haters. So people who are against God, they're against Christianity, they're against Christian principles, uh, they may be against uh family, uh marriage, uh, because God says that humans are created in his image, men and women. Uh so there are many uh false ideas that are being thrown around today to take people away from the truth of scripture. And I think actually today in our culture, these are truths that have been accepted for years, and there's an attack on them. And I think this is part of the methodical plan of Satan to push people away from the foundational truths of scripture.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, you said initially that we don't know, and yeah, I think we do know, and we're not going to name names here to trigger people, but some of them, you know, Satan is an angel of light, as it says in 2 Corinthians, and it comes, they he presents things in what are seemingly good sometimes, but yet the method is to tear down our Christian society and structure so that we would give up our freedoms to a larger, centralized, God-hating state. Otherwise, these people want to replace God and Christ, whom they hate, with a large state. Or in a sense, yeah, it becomes a state. Yeah. So it's very deceptive. In a sense, what they want to do is reverse verse 13, where we know and can come mature and have confidence in scripture. They want to make us be shamed and doubt what scripture says and take us back to verse 14, which you know, of course, we are to resist by faith.
SPEAKER_03Yes, and then really, Bill, when you get now here to verse uh uh 15, there's a great um there's good information here, a great way. Tells us what we should do about it.
SPEAKER_02Are you trying to move me on? Did it work? Such a slick transition.
SPEAKER_00We hope you enjoyed the Bible Mastery Podcast. We appreciate all likes, follows, and shares. To contribute to this podcast, please select support the show on the host page. Bonus material will be available on Patreon. For show notes, please visit our website, Bible Masterypodcast.com. Please send us your comments so we can make this time even better for you.
SPEAKER_02Okay, verse 15. But speaking the truth, this is actually one word, uh, truthify, uh, basically. It's a what it's a word we don't have in English, but it's in the Greek. And that concept's important. I I think sometimes as Christian Christians, we take it for granted that we have the truth. And you know, we'll talk about it in church and among each other. But it what we have is really true. And I mentioned that because sometimes we don't live like it. Again, we're shamed by the culture, making us feel bad about what we believe. One of their methods that shut us up, and uh it may be over um things related to sex or feeling like we or uh racism or things over related to um, so I'm sort of losing it now, but uh in terms of judgment, classically, as one way to make us be quiet. So it doesn't mean that things we can't be wrong in those areas sometimes or at fault, but what we have in scripture is true, and we are to live those out and to hang to it and know that we are right. It's like when people have a fact, they like to share it because they they perhaps feel proud they have that fact, and we have to think the same way about scripture. We have the truth, and we need to tell people about it. Jet, what do you think?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so you know, the word speak is actually not uh there, it's really truthing, right? So it's that we act truly or we're genuine, um, we're we're truthing in in love, and it's a great concept.
SPEAKER_02Yes, so that's um that is key. And it says then also in love. Oh, let me back up just for a second. You know, where this is important, where do we get this truth? And we have a couple of verses, 2 uh Timothy 3.16, uh, 2 Peter 1.21, and talk about scripture being true, 2 Peter 3.16 also, but the main reason we know scripture is true, and we have the truth, is from why we call uh our apostolic authority and how we got scripture. So we know from John 5, John 8, John 17, 1 John 1, the scripture and the word came from God originally. It's his word, and this truth was handed down to Christ, and he preached it while he was here, and then he gave it to the disciples, he gave it to us through the epistles, and it was handed to the the apostles, the leaders of the first generation church who gave it to us. So, this whole cascade of how we receive this truth, you know, we're really uh the same as the second generation uh Christians in terms of the epistles, and so this is how we know we have it through the authority of the apostles and received it from Christ and received it from God. Any comment on that, Jeanette?
SPEAKER_03No, agreed. And and then it goes on to say the purpose of all that, right?
SPEAKER_02Yes. Are you moving me on again? Uh get the study going. Love. So in we had we talk in love. This word is important, agape. I it's one of the most important words in the New Testament. Uh, it is love in a giving way with the recipient in mind, otherwise, your actions and your speech were for the need of the others. And I like to say we know that we have this agape love when we are obeying God, first John 5, 2 and 3. When we are obedient, we are loving our kindness and bearing one another's uh burdens, doing good, etc. And then also that we love out of knowledge, Philippians 1 9. Otherwise, this agape love might be emotional and with passion, but that's not its basis, it's based out of knowledge doing the right thing. Should I comment on love?
SPEAKER_03I think of it the same way as uh this kind of love, it's always the word that describes God's God's love for us, agape, that it's done for the benefit of the recipient. I don't do it for my own benefit, but I do it for the other person. And it is by obedience. You know, when I'm obedient to God, yeah, you know, sometimes you're like, well, no one sees this. Is there a reason to be obedient? There's always a reason to do what's right before God because that's how we love other people.
SPEAKER_02Yes, and it describes your love for me. So thank you, darling. Um, okay, so may grow up. This is the word agano in the original Greek. I usually think of it as like augment, so I could remember it, just means to grow. Uh, interesting that is it's used in chapter two where we talked about the growing of the church as a temple of the Lord. Here it reflects that growth in the same context, but more towards the individual, into him, which is Christ in all things. Otherwise, we become mature in Christ in all things, who is the head. And when we talk about head in the epistles, it's usually the boss and almost always the church. And the head of the church is Christ, where he sits at the right hand of God up in the heavens in glory, leading the church. And this is what he does, and he ministers to us through the church and uh directs us through the church. We serve the church. Now that is I say the church, I'm meaning primarily the church universal, the Holy Spirit places all into the church universal, 1 Corinthians 12, 13, and the local church, very important, is um a manifestation of that church universal. What would you add?
SPEAKER_03I I agree with that, you know, and the idea that when we live out and speak the truth, when we're truthing in in love correctly, then that causes us to mature, to grow up. Because remember, augment, you know, to make make bigger. Um, he's saying, I don't want you to be a baby. So grow up, mature, get bigger in Christ in all, in everything, in every aspect. So very important concept here that we are to be grounded in the scriptures, it will protect us from um you know, not being grounded. We want to be uh unwavering uh in these essential doctrines because that's how we mature and grow up into Christ.
SPEAKER_02Yes, so God gave provision with special people for the early provision of the church until we got the canon. Now we have that canon, we don't have to be afraid of being deceived and tossed to and fro, and we can grow into completion in Christ Jesus. Great, all right. So good verses. I think we should stop there and we'll continue. 16. Now, once we go past 16, which finishes this section, next time we'll come to the Christian walk section specifically. First with some negative commands and then with some positive commands. Do you have final comments? Yes, that will be fun. Uh, do you have final comments?
SPEAKER_03No, thank you each for joining us today. We do look forward to finishing this section, uh, leaving us with head as of head with Christ being the head of the church, sets up verse 16 nicely. So we'll finish this thought and and then move on. So thank you for being with us in this exciting study in Ephesians.
SPEAKER_02Thank you, Jeanette, and thanks to everyone from me. We'll look forward to seeing you on the next video.
SPEAKER_00Bye. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Bible Mastery Podcast. Join us next week for another exciting episode.
SPEAKER_01Disclaimer: this podcast is intended for listeners 18 and older and provided as information and for entertainment purposes only. The hosts are not trained as pastors or counselors and do not hold seminary degrees but are self-trained in theology. Some topics discussed may be sensitive, thought-provoking, or challenging. Listener discretion is advised, especially if you're navigating personal or spiritual matters. No podcast content should be considered as advice or recommendations for any personal or institutional situation, professional or spiritual-based decision-making, medical, legal, financial, or safety-critical applications, commercial purposes, replacing formal education or accredited training programs. The views expressed are those of the speakers and are not necessarily shared or endorsed by teleos. The podcast is subject to change at any time without notice. Although the podcasters endeavor to ensure current and accurate content, it may contain errors and is not presented as current, accurate, complete, or appropriate for your specific requirements. The podcasters do not accept any liability for the podcast or any other information, or the use of such information, provided.