December 30, 2018 Ephesians 4:11-16 How Do We Know If We re Growing? It was He who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, 12 - to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 - until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. 14 - Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. 15 - Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into Him Who is the Head, that is, Christ. 16 - From Him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. When our children were little their pediatricians watched their growth and development very carefully. If you're a parent then you know what I'm talking about. This careful observation began the moment they exited the womb as nurses weighed them and measured their length. In subsequent check-ups they were measured again and again. And weight and height weren't the only things they looked at to see if our children were developing properly. They also monitored their reflexes, muscle development and coordination, vocabulary, etc. I remember that at each check up the doc would enter all these measurements into a formula that compared our kids to the development of other infants their age. 1
After this calculation the doctor would say something like, "April s doing great. She's very healthy. Keep doing what you're doing because she's in the 90th percentile for her age." This of course meant that she was farther along than 90% here infant peers, which was a good thing. It meant she was growing right. She was maturing properly. I bring all this up because the New Testament says that in a very real sense all Christians begin their spiritual lives as "babies." Our Lord was teaching us that no matter what our physical age, when we become Christians we experience a new birth, a spiritual birth. It follows then that, just like physical children, once we are born spiritually, we should grow and mature. 1 Peter 2:2-3 refers to this when it says, "Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation..." But you need to understand: our standard of spiritual growth and development isn't other believers. We can t compare ourselves to the development of other Christians and say, "I'm in the 90th percentile so I'm doing okay." No, our standard is Jesus Christ Himself. As verses 13 of our text says, we are mature when we attain, "...the whole measure of the fullness of Christ." Well, the question I want us to answer this last Sunday of the year together is this: "How do we know if we are maturing-growing-developing as we should? How do we gauge our personal spiritual growth as Christians?" How do we know if we are "putting away childish things"? The beginning of a new year is always a time of evaluation and goal-setting, so I thought it would be good for us to take this four-fold criteria for spiritual growth and use it as a sort of spiritual health check-up as we begin 2011, our 10th year as a church family. 2
My thought is that after this morning's time of spiritual examination and evaluation we can each work to get back on track in those areas of our spiritual development where our growth has not progressed as it should. So let's get started. (1) The first evidence of developing spiritual maturity is doctrinal stability. This is what Paul is talking about in 1 Timothy 4:16 when he says, "Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers." In this verse Paul is reminding us that one way we know we are growing in Christ-likeness is if we have a settled knowledge of His written Word. If we are indeed maturing, we have to have studied the Bible enough to have a firm grasp of the basic, essential beliefs of the Christian faith. We've read the Bible not just for information but for transformation such that these Scriptural truths become part of our way of thinking-our convictions-and as a result we are maturing, or as Paul puts it in our text, we are "no longer children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming." (Ephesians 4:14 NASB) Paul uses the example of children here in Ephesians because as any parent knows, when we are little, when we are physically immature, we are notoriously fickle. Kids will be interested in one thing for five minutes; then they change their minds and focus on something else entirely, and five minutes later they move on to a third thing. The focus of their attention changes with the wind-if you doubt this then notice how many different toys your kids have. This is because whenever something new comes out they forget their current favorites and long for this new toy. Paul also reminds us that children can also be 3
easily fooled. It is fairly simple to deceive them. Please understand, I'm not putting kids down. This "immaturity" is part of what it means to be a child. It's why they need mature parents to guide them and protect them! I saw a cartoon recently about a pastor who sat behind his desk with a look of utter disbelief upon his face. Standing in front of him was church member who said, "Pastor, according to my horoscope this is a good week for you to preach on false doctrine." All kidding aside, the adversary has people with cleverly disguised but heretical beliefs all over the place these days, so doctrinal stability is very important. I'm reminded of Paul's warning in 2 Timothy 4:2-3 where he says, "the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear." Well, how are you doing when it comes to this first measurement of maturity? Would you judge yourself as someone who is doctrinally stable? Are you well-grounded in the Word of God? Do you regularly, systematically study the Bible alone in your personal devotions, and as I said a moment ago, not just for information, but also for transformation? Secondly, evidence of spiritual growth is authentic relationships. Paul refers to this aspect of our "spiritual check up" in verse 15 of our text when he says, "Speaking the truth in love we are to grow up in all aspects into Him Who is the Head, even Christ." Don't miss this very important word combination here. Paul says that authentic relationships involve speaking the truth in love. It's loving someone enough to tell them the truth, even when it's painful for us to do so. And understand, it is indeed loving to 4
speak the truth. Love without truth condones sin. It's actually unloving not to tell someone truth they need to hear. Love without truth is wishy-washy and unbalanced. Some call it "sloppy agape. Mature believers are lovingly committed both to people and the truth, not just to people and the truth when it's convenient. And one thing that makes believers mature is the fact that they welcome people who speak the truth in love to them. They cherish the truth of Proverbs 27:5-6 where it says, "An open rebuke is better than hidden love! Wounds from a friend are better than many kisses from an enemy." The third evidence of spiritual maturity is full participation in the Body of Christ. Look at verse 16 where Paul says that the whole body-the church-is, "joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love as each part does its work." Please note three key words that stand out in this verse: "whole," "every," and "each." Maturing believers understand the importance of these words. They know they are one of the each individual parts and their every relationship fits into the whole called the body of Christ, the local church. As most of you know, my daughter, Katie is an occupational therapist, and one thing I'm learning from her is how vast and complex the human body is. It contains an almost endless list of organs and cells and systems and subsystems, each of which fulfills a vital function when it comes to keeping the body healthy. How anyone could believe that we humans just accidentally evolved is beyond me! The older I become spiritually the more I understand that the local body of Christ is just as complex. 5
The comparison doesn't work on all levels, but in a very real sense this church has parts that resemble those in an actual physical human body. For example, there's what I think of as our "digestive system," those body parts who feed us nutritious Scriptural truth in Sunday School and worship and the small groups that meet on here and in homes during the week. Remember, as Jesus said in Matthew 4:4, "Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God." And to be healthy this church needs to be "fed" Scriptural truth so this body part is vital! I could literally go on and on and on and on. I mean you would not believe all the different things that have to be done in order for this church body to function and be healthy. But mature believers understand this principle so they are fully involved! They know that as members of the One Body-the local churchwe belong to each other; we affect each other; we need each other. They know that this "body" didn't just accidentally evolve, but that God specifically designed us, gifted each individual body part, and because He did, each believer, no matter how insignificant he may appear, has a ministry to other believers. Maturing believers know that the Body grows as the individual members grow, and they grow as they feed on the Word and minister to and with each other. They're not just hearers of the word, they're doers as well! In my opinion, this is part of the problem with the "mega-church" mind set. It almost encourages people to think of church as a place you come to watch a show of sorts instead of a local body to belong to. It makes it easy for someone to slip in and slip out unnoticed instead of getting involved and investing their lives in a local ministry. 6
Well, let me ask you. Are you involved? Are you using your giftedness or are you just a spectator? Are you just dating the church or have you made a commitment to it? Remember, the whole body the whole church is healthy if it is "fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies according to the proper working of each individual part." You are each one of those parts! The final test for spiritual maturity is a growing capacity for love. Paul refers to this in the last part of verse 16 when he talks about the church, "building itself up in love." The caliber of love he's talking about here is one that always looks at people and responds to people in love. Let me put it this way. When immature people are hurt by others, when people intentionally wound them with their words and actions, their response is to get even, to hurt back. They classify people who hurt them as "the bad guys" and want nothing to do with them. But not spiritually mature people. No, when they go through times like this their response is to love that person all the more and to wonder, "Why are they this way? What made them into this kind of person?" In other words they display a maturity that expresses itself in empathy and compassion instead of revenge. How many of you watched ABC s hit show LOST? It was about the survivors of a plane that crashes on a desert island. If you watched it you know it wasn t easy to decipher all the mysteries of the plot. One of the key characters was a guy named Sawyer and it became very easy to dislike this guy. He was always out for number one. After the crash while others were helping the injured he went through all the luggage and hoarded all the supplies, including medicines and other necessities like bottled water, and he wouldn't 7
share any of his stash unless paid or forced to do so. He was slick, selfish; his comments were usually insulting. He was a bad guy. But as you watched flashbacks you began to realize how he came to be the kind of person he was. You find out that his mom had an affair with a con man. This con man not only ruined his parent's marriage, but he stole all their money. And his actions caused his dad to kill his mom and then to take his own life. In fact he shot himself while sitting on Sawyer's bed unaware that his 9 year old son Sawyer was hiding underneath. And as you see all this, you begin to have compassion for Sawyer because you understand why he does what he does and says what he says. Maturing believers are always wondering about what a flashback would tell them about someone that does them wrong. They always look at people through the eyes of love, wondering what choices, what situations make people the way they are. Mature believers are like this; they reach out to all people in love, doing all they can to help mend their woundedness and bring them to faith in Jesus. Let me ask you: is this aspect of spiritual maturity seen in your life? Do you follow our Lord's command and, "love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you?" (Matthew 5:44) Well, as I take this spiritual maturity test from Paul, I realize that I have some growing to do, what about you? Maybe we can grow up a little more together in 2019. I hope so. 8