"The Fruits of Unified Diversity"

Ephesians 4 and the Call to Unified Diversity

Would please take your Bibles and turn to Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians chapter 4 a scripture reading you want to read verses 7 through 16 and the message will focus on verses 11 through 16. Get the context of that passage for our message.

Beginning in verse 7 Paul writes. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Wherefore he saith when he ascended up on high he led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men.

Now that he ascended what is it? But that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth he that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things.

And he gave some Apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the ministry. For the edifying of the body of Christ. Till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God.

Unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. That we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro carried about with every wind of doctrine. By the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive.

But speaking the truth in love May grow up into him in all things which is the head even Christ. From whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part.

Maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love our Father and our God. We pray that as we are challenged by this passage this morning we would see the kinds of fruit That a local church ought to be producing within itself.

We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. The Heaven's Gate cult celebrated meticulous meticulous unity but it knew nothing of it knew nothing of meaningful diversity. One surviving former group member said of the Heaven's Gate cult.

Everything was designed to be an exact duplicate. So when the cult members were found on a March morning Every one of the members was wearing the same black track suits and black and white Nike sneakers in order to get into the group all Family members had to be abandoned if you were married and your spouse did not want to become a part of the group.

That spouse was to be abandoned parents were to be abandoned children abandoned if you had any money when you came into the group it all had to be turned over to the leader of the group. They practiced religiously a Master cleanse they all practiced it at the same time and they used the same stuff a mixture of lemonade cayenne pepper and maple syrup.

When men joined the group they all had to be castrated and they even had to shave exactly the same way every day. For breakfast when they had pancakes. Those pancakes had to be made exactly the same size and They had to be cooked the exact same length of time on each side and flipped at the same time the night before they were found.

They had a last supper together. They all went to a restaurant. It was pre-arranged and there were 39 of them meeting together for this meal. They all had exactly the same food. Same salad with the same dressing the same beverage the same main course and the same thing for dessert.

But the thing about this meticulous unity is that it allowed absolutely no room for any meaningful diversity and this meticulous unity that allowed for no Diversity produced some pretty horrific terrible tragic fruit over a three-day period in March of 1997 those 39 active members in that cult all living in the same house.

They were found and they had all committed suicide together and they did it in exactly the same way. They took the same concoction of poisons. They laid themselves down covered their heads with Plastic bag laid themselves down on a bed and covered their faces with a shroud.

Until they died and they were all found in exactly that same Posture. Yeah unity can be good, but it can also be very very bad and produce terrible fruit on The other hand we're seeing in our day today.

Are we not some rather? rabid form of Diversity. It's a kind of diversity that is more of a selfish insisting on having my way on getting what I want and having things done the way I want things done and How I want things done and what I want it must not it must not only be tolerated but it must be accommodated and even Celebrated and If your way of doing things or your way of thinking happens to offend me.

Well, you have to stop. Needless to say the fruit of that kind of diversity is Already showing itself and it's showing itself to be quite rotten and it's only going to get worse. In Ephesians chapter 4 the Apostle Paul is calling the church.

To be.

Unified.

But a unity that appreciates diversity.

It's a holy.

Unity that appreciates diversity and with this kind of unified diversity It will bring forth good fruit the right kind of fruit. Oh. Going back to the beginning of this chapter notice how Paul Clarifies that we are called to a unified diversity That is to produce the fruit that we're going to talk about this morning individually in verses 1 2 We are called to walk a worthy walk Says walk therefore a walk of worthy of the vocation the calling Wherewith you were called.

And that worthy walk that he describes in verse 2 With all lowliness and meekness long-suffering forbearing one another in love that kind of worthy walk It ends up sanctifying the cultural differences.

That should be a part of any local church. When we're walking in this way, then we don't demand things to be done our way. We don't demand that our cultural Preferences and predilections be those of everybody else.

This kind of walk that is worthy of our calling a walk with lowliness and meekness and long-suffering and forbearance in love is a kind of walk That will sanctify.

Those.

Shall we say cultural differences. And it ends up creating a unity in the church a unity of character. Where God's people are walking in the same sort of way? But then in verses 3 through 5 notice how he calls us to Maintain in that in the church with that walk that unity of character.

We need to maintain the spirit given unity that is us. It's more of a theological unity. He goes on to say we are endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace and he talks about The sevenfold nature of that unity in verses 4 5 6.

But then in verse 7 he shifts gears to talk about the diversity and It's a diversity that we need to appreciate because it is a Christ given diversity in verse 7 He says but unto every one of us. So while we are all to walk with the same walk walk worthy of the calling with which we've been called and we are to Maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.

We are nevertheless to appreciate this Diversity that he describes in verse 7 but unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. So each one of us that comprise a church are given gifts according to the grace of Christ and they're going to differ from one another and in Nature and in quantity and so forth.

And he goes on to talk in verses in verse 11 about what those foundational gifts were for the church the Apostles and prophets and then the ongoing gifts that exist in the church today in terms of these Teaching if you will leaders and there these are not the exclusive list of gifts by any stretch of the imagination.

He's focusing first of all on those who are in a responsibility who have the gift of teaching and preaching have those responsibilities evangelists as in church planters and Pastor teachers as in the the office of the pastor of a local church.

So there is this diversity of gifts and that's the focus here. He's not talking about a diversity of Cultural preferences or backgrounds or any of that? That's all a given. That's all a given in fact earlier in the book of Ephesians Nepal has talked about the fact that some of you you are Gentiles.

You have been brought in and joined together with those who are Jews and Jews and Gentiles were all worshiping together Through Christ, we've been brought together with our different backgrounds and ethnicities and all of those kinds of things.

We've been brought together in Christ. And that's what our where our unity. Our unity focuses in the person of Christ the diversity that is going to exist Culturally is a given here, but that's not what Paul is focusing on.

He's focusing on the diversity of our giftedness. Now this kind of unified diversity. This kind of unified diversity Will bear good fruit and I want us to see in verses 11 to 16 Three fruits that grow from this kind of this wholesome.

Unified.

Diversity. Notice, first of all in verses 11 through 13 that a wholesome unified diversity Yields maturity. It yields maturity. God gifts Particular leaders to equip God's people. That's the emphasis of verse verses 11 through 13.

Verse 11 through the first part of verse 12. He gave some apostles and prophets and evangelists and some pastor teachers for the perfecting or for the Equipping of the Saints. A word perfect in the King James should be translated better perhaps.

Equip.

It's a word that is used in Matthew chapter 4 of The fishermen disciples who are called to follow Jesus as they are mending their nets. They are they are equipping their nets they're taking the holes and repairing the holes that are in the nets and so forth.

And the point that Paul is making here by using that word of the role of the pastor teacher in particular is that he engages in a healing a restorative ministry Using the Word of God As he's teaching the Word of God.

So the the gifted leaders equip God's people and those people then the Saints. That he goes on to talk about or he talks about at the end of the first part of verse 1 the perfecting of the Saints those Saints then serve.

The pastor teacher equips the Saints so that the Saints can then Do the work of the ministry. This is what the verse says he equips the Saints for the work of the ministry in other words as Christ gifts the church.

The as he says in verse 7 unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ as Christ gifts the church. The pastor teacher is involved in equipping the Saints for the utilization of those gifts.

So they are then deployed To employ their gifts from the Savior. This is what you are to do as part of a local church. You're not to just be a spectator that comes and sits on a Sunday morning and gets up and goes and says, okay I'd done my church duty but you're to be part of the work of the ministry and The pulpit ministry and the Sunday school teaching ministry and the Bible study teaching ministry those ministries are Designed or are intended to equip to help the Saints to be able to better Employ their particular area of giftedness in the course of a given week.

One of the commentators on this passage says I mentioned this last week I believe He says quote. God has given the ministry of his word to his church in order to transform it. That is transformed the church to heal it of its various Spiritual sicknesses to make it whole and restore it to a fit working order.

Thereby enabling it to exercise a work of ministry that will build up the body of Christ. So Gifted leaders as Christ gifts these different leaders to equip the Saints. They equip the Saints and then those Saints turn around and serve for the work of the ministry.

The fruit of all of that is the maturity of the body. The maturity of the church sees this at the end of verse 12. Pastor teachers perfect to equip the Saints who do the work of the ministry and what is the what is the fruit of it all?

The edifying of the body of Christ the building up of the body of Christ. It's another way of talking about a spiritually mature church. Now as he goes on in verse 13 notice how he Describes what that maturity looks like and suggests that maturity a Spiritually mature church will show itself and evidence itself in these three overlapping areas.

Verse 13 he says till we all come in the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God. There's one thing secondly unto a perfect man and Thirdly under the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

All right. So what are those evidences of maturity? First of all Doctrinal unity. Doctrinal unity. We go back to the idea of unity again. One of the fruits of.

This.

Sanctified diversity if you will is Unity. A fruit of unified diversity is unity, but it's it's a it's a kind of unity. It's a focus it's a unity of doctrine notice till we all come in the unity of the faith and Of the knowledge of the Son of God.

Now, what's the difference between those two things? Well, I would I would think of it this way. The faith is that body of Objective truth that we all need to learn and to know. We all need to learn it and know it.

Now when you come to faith in Christ You will know a Measure of truth there. There is a there is a very very foundational rudimentary Degree or element of truth that you need to know. You need to know.

That you are a sinner. God reveals that to you in the word. You need to know that Jesus is God that Jesus as God came into this world. As a man humbled himself and became a man and he did so to deal with your sinfulness.

He did so to die on a cross to pay the penalty of your sinfulness because your sin the Bible reveals demands a Punishment of death. The wages the the paycheck of sin is death. Your sin demands death. What is the answer to that?

That need that debt that I owe.

Christ.

Christ is the answer. So the word reveals that truth that Jesus God who became flesh died on a cross. To atone for to pay the penalty of your sins. You have to believe that before you can ever become a Christian and you have to believe that Jesus didn't just die or he would Just be nothing but a man but that he rose again from the dead and he rose for your Justification that you might be just before God that he ascended and that you by calling upon him in repentant faith Can be saved.

Now those are very important crucial Foundational truths that you need to accept to be to be a Christian. And so when you're birthed into the family of God and you become a child of God There are some very basic foundational truths that you need to hold but that's not all.

Can a person come to faith in Christ? Who at the moment of his conversion Still believes in the theory of evolution. And the answer is yes. He hasn't been confronted with what the scripture teaches about creation and the details of creation.

But as he learns the scriptures and grows in the scriptures he goes understand it. Oh, no, no, no that evolution thing. It can't it can't be both and it's got to be one or the other and you know, I believe this book and and so that and so it goes and so it goes there is an ongoing learning of objective truth and and mature a spiritually mature church will be one where God's people that comprise that church come to a place of holding in unison and in unity.

This objective truth that must be learned and there must be known and held to by everyone. But what about this? Knowledge of the Son of God we come to a unity of the knowledge of the Son of God. I Don't think that's talking about Some of those very rudimentary truths about Jesus, you know about his deity and his virgin birth and.

And all of those details those things. I think those things fall under the.

Faith.

That we must hold to. I Think that the knowledge of the Son of God here is is more of that experiential knowledge that we come to as we grow in our relationship with God through Christ. Where we experience that.

We experience that conviction of sin and then we experience the the joy of forgiveness of that sin. That's something you didn't know before you came to faith in Christ or you experience the knowledge of the Son of God.

You have that experience of the Son of God as You you learn to you come to rest in him and you learn what that's like to to be going through a difficult period in your life and Then yet coming to rest in Christ and his truth and his presence.

The comfort that he offers the peace that he gives and so on and so forth. So one of the one of the Evidences of maturity is a doctrinal unity where we come to a unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God.

A second evidence of maturity is practical godliness. Practical godliness described by Paul here as coming unto a perfect man a perfect man now sometimes in our English Bibles the translation the word man is The general Greek word.

The Greek word is anthropos. We get the word Anthropology from it and it's just a general word for mankind for humankind. But other times the word is the gender. The the male and that's the word that Paul uses here.

So in what sense then does the church grow in its unified? Diversity and experience maturity and evidence that maturity in being a perfect man. Well, I briefly skimmed at this last Lord's Day and let me take you back to it to Titus chapter 2 and look at verse 2.

Is in Titus 2 verse 2 Paul talks about the qualities of a quote-unquote perfect man a fully mature Fully mature man. What is he like? Paul is telling Titus to preach the things that become or are Appropriate to sound doctrine and then in verse 2 he says that the aged men Live up to their age.

Basically is what he's saying that the aged men be.

Sober.

Grave temperate sound. Excuse me sound in faith in charity in patience. Now you look at those qualities and you realize you know what these are not qualities that ought to be limited to old men, I Mean they ought to have these qualities just by virtue of their age and having lived through the experiences of life.

These are not qualities that ought to be limited just to old men. The qualities of the qualities that he mentions here of sobriety and Gravity, you know that you know, life is not a lark. Life isn't a party.

Life is a serious matter to be lived. Gravity sobriety being aware of what's really going on in this world. Sobriety gravity temperance or self-control. Is self-control only something for old men or is it something that is it something that a 22 year old ought to have?

Absolutely a mature 22 year old will have developed a sense of self-control. Sound and faith we've already talked about. Sound in charity, we're gonna get to and then lastly Patience or long suffering or endurance.

These are the qualities that mark a mature individual a perfected man. Practical Godliness really is what it amounts to. Practical godliness practical everyday godliness living a sober grave serious self-controlled patient life now the third evidence of maturity that Paul mentions back in Ephesians 4 13 is That measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

That's just another way of talking about Personal Christ likeness being like Christ and this is something that is An ongoing process in the life of the Christian from the moment. He comes to faith in Christ and God in his grace births him again.

From that point until he reaches glorification. He reaches eternity. He is in this growing process of Christ likeness. But as a church matures and is a spiritually mature church. It is going to more and more.

Be.

Characterized by this personal Christ likeness as the as the saints in that local assembly they interact with God's Word through the preaching of the word the teaching of the word and their own as Paul describes it in 2nd Corinthians 318.

Their own looking in the mirror of God's Word and as we as God's people are Are in are interacting with the Word of God and we see Christ in that word. We are changed from glory to glory. We are increasingly Conformed to the image of Christ and all of that will culminate as John writes of it in 1st. John 3 2.

When we see Christ. That's 1st. John 3 2 he says right now It doesn't appear what we shall be but we know that when we see him. When we see Christ We shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. Spiritually mature church is one that is that shows that maturity evidences that maturity in a growing personal Christ likeness.

So one of the fruits of.

This.

One of the fruits of this this unified diversity is spiritual maturity. A second fruit that we see in verse 14 is stability. Unified diversity yields the fruit of stability. Now look at this verse. I want you to notice some marks of stability.

First he he refers to children. He says when when we have when we have this unified diversity and we've reached a measure of maturity. Then that's going to yield the fruit that we are no more Children, we are no more children.

So one of the marks of stability is Shall we say an acquired development? We're no more children. That's really critical, isn't it. Some of you are parents with really really young kids and You listen, I'm telling you You do not want that two-year-old to be a two-year-old when he's 15.

He's gonna create his own Challenges when he's 15, you don't want to add the two-year-old temper tantrums and all that stuff. On top of that you want you want that you want that child to grow out of Childishness and the quality the characteristics of being a child.

So for example children and this is true of Spiritual children that don't grow out of childhood. Children can be shall we say?

Gullible.

Where they. You know, they believe just about everything they're told. For example Elias.

Bliss is.

He's gonna be four years old on February 29th. So I know technically we can make jokes about that. Technically. He'll only be a year old, you know. He hasn't had a birthday yet, but his birthday February 29th.

He'll be four years old. Now a couple of years ago when Elias was two I'd see him out here in the foyer and I'd go up to Elias and and I Kind of go like this with my my fingers, you know. And I go on his nose and I kind of tweak his nose a little bit and I just ever gently Pull it and then I'd stick my thumb between my my fingers like that and I'd say Elias.

I got your nose I got your nose and his eyes to get really big and he'd look at what he'd look at my hand and he's convinced I've got his nose between my fingers. And he'd say give it back give it back.

No, I.

Do that to Elias now and he'd say My nose it's still there. I feel it, you know, he's grown out of that. He's not quite so gullible anymore. But you know what Christians can be just professing Christians can be just as childlike gullible as as a two-year-old.

We've seen this guy on TV who's holding up a little vial that's got water in it and He's telling me as I'm looking at him on TV. He's telling me he says if you will send me your donation of any size.

I.

Will send you this little vial of water from the whole the holy a holy water From the Jordan River on my recent trip to the Holy Land. He's telling me I got some holy water from the Jordan River. And if you will send me a donation of any size I'll send you this little vial of holy water from the Jordan River and you With it will be a blessing to you.

Your life will be blessed in unimaginable ways through this holy water and I'm looking at this and I'm like Man, you are crazy. You probably just got that out of your bathroom sink. But you know what the sad thing is.

There are some other people on the other end of some television Screens who are looking at this same guy and said, oh man I got to get my checkbook and send this guy 50 bucks so I can get me a Vial of that holy water.

They really believe that that's holy Water, I don't know whether it's water that came out of the Jordan River or not. But I guarantee it's no more holy than the water that came out of your tap. It's probably full with a lot more bacteria if the truth were known.

But children can be gullible and believe anything that they're told but they can also they can also be quite vulnerable In that they will fall for almost anything if you've been reading about some of the stuff that that pedophiles are doing to try to lure kids and Kids are being lured Through things like online video gaming and and there's a kid's YouTube thing where kids will You know watch movie things on YouTube and and before you know it something's been uploaded and the kids watching this.

Saw an article the other day about a I think it was a seventh grader who who was being taught online how to commit suicide and she drew a picture of Presumably herself as a girl With a rope around her neck.

Hanging.

Because of what she saw online Now, you know, I'm presumably Adults here would see the same kind of stuff and they'd say well get out of here and they'd shut it off and they wouldn't Have wouldn't have anything they know what's happening.

But children can be a lot more vulnerable than that and fall for it, you know Christians can be too. They can be as well if they're not stable. We get a thing in the mail from some ministry somewhere and inside that mailing there's a folded up piece of paper on one side that looks like an oriental rug and you read the letter from this this Evangelist guy and he says I've enclosed in this letter a prayer rug if You will pray over that rug the the thing that you want from God and then send that prayer rug back to me.

With your donation of any size I will take your prayer rug and I will pray over that prayer rug and God will give you what you're wanting and again. Believing anything. Falling for anything some people obviously.

Because of the way that the life the lifestyle of the ministry that is sent the minister that sends it. Obviously enough people are falling for it that they put the money in the envelope and they throw the prayer rug back in the envelope.

And they send the guy back some money. No a church that is marked by this healthy unified Diversity is going to produce the fruit of stability and that stability is is marked by an acquired Development when we're no more children.

It's also marked by a settled Establishment a settled establishment. Look at verse 13 or verse 14 again. He says we're no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine.

No more. No more Vacillation in the storms of life when you're tossed to and fro you're not tossed to and fro by the storms of life. Here's what I mean by that and I've seen both sides of this in my years of ministry.

I've seen Christian people. Believers professing believers who when everything in life is going fine. You see them in church, they're in church, they're happy there they're part of it and everything but as soon as life throws them a curve and God doesn't treat them the way they think God treats should treat them.

You don't see them anymore. They're gone. They're gone. Until life calms down again, and then they might be happier. And once they're happy again, they might chill back up in church. What happened they got tossed by the storms of life.

I've seen the other extreme as well. When people are people in life is fine. He's professing Christians. Everything's going smoothly. You know jobs going well getting promotions funny money's enough and all the rest that stuff life is fine.

You don't see them at church. But as soon as life throws them a curve as soon as they get tossed on the storm of life. Then they're back at church and they're telling people you got to pray for me. I got this crisis.

You got to get. I got. God's got us. God's got to answer this thing. They're tossed by every wind that blows the storms of life and They no longer gravitate to the latest fad or idea or celebrity. They're carried about they're not carried about with every wind of doctrine those.

Those who comprise a stable work. There's a unified diversity that has produced the fruit of stability. They no longer gravitate to the fads and what's fashionable or to the celebrities. Carried about with every wind of doctrine.

Unfortunately too many young perhaps immature professing Christians. They flit from one TV preacher to another TV preacher from one church to another church. And they're always looking for something new something exciting something to get thrilled about some new spiritual adventure.

You know, there really is something to be said for just the faithful Week-in-and-week-out participation in the same local church under the same average everyday pastor. Week-in-week-out year in year out there is a stability that can come from that kind of established Christian life and then a third mark of that stability is seen at the end of verse 14 and That is practiced discernment practiced discernment so the end of verse 14 says, you know, I'm carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and Cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive.

The.

The the church that has. This that employs this unified diversity has a measure of maturity Is also bearing the fruit producing the fruit of stability. Where the Saints and that work are able to discern much better than the immature.

They're able to discern the tricks That are offered in the name of Christ. They see through the slight of men. That word slight is an interesting word in the Greek language. It's a. It's communicating dice tricks dice tricks.

I Suppose I don't know that much about it. Never been that and I've never been involved in gambling or any of any kind but I've heard about loaded dice. Now I suppose I'm presuming that what that means is that the person who's in charge of the game the gambling game Has loaded the dice so that the dice will never come up with numbers where you win.

The house always wins.

Well, if you're.

If you're not discerning. You're you don't see what's going on with those dice. No. You see through those tricks and you don't fall for the deception of the credit the cunning craftiness of these deceivers.

The.

Crafting is the cunning craftiness that says You give you give me $20 with your prayer rug and God is going to give you $2 ,000. No you you've grown enough and got enough sense through the through the discernment.

The.

Stability that flows from the unified diversity as God's people in a local church are using their giftedness. Together you've grown to just be able to discern that. You know what? I'm not gonna get $2 ,000 out of my sending in the 20 bucks.

The only thing that's gonna happen is that the guy who sent me this letter is gonna be $20 richer. That's it. You see that? You see that. And Then you can recognize the true character of the fraud. Now what these guys are really doing is just lying in wait to deceive.

Lying in wait to deceive. In other words you realize These guys are just using me To get what they want for themselves. You see that. Why is it that you see that? Well, you see that when as a fruit as the fruit of a unified diversity.