"Christ Ascended = the Church's Provision" Part 7

Christ Ascended and the Church’s Provision in Ephesians 4

It is in him that you are satisfied. And I pray this morning as we hear from your word, as we consider the person and work of Christ, I ask that by the power of the Holy Spirit, by the grace that you give to us through him, that we too, in full faith, would give a hearty amen to your pleasure in Christ, that we too would confess our satisfaction in Christ.

I pray today that we would really, in good faith, commune together and confess our faith in Christ. And we lay hold of the promise that where two or three of us are gathered, there Christ is in our midst.

And so we give you thanks for this gift of communion. And we ask you to guide us and to give clarity to our minds and illumine the text to our hearts so that you would have your way, that you would accomplish your will in our lives.

We pray these things in the name of Christ, amen. Please open your Bibles and turn with me to Ephesians 4, verses seven through 16. Last week, we began to consider the impact of the second part of verse seven, which says, but to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift.

We thought about the measure of Christ's gift first, but now we're thinking about the grace that is given to each one of us. And we saw last week from verse 11, that Christ through his Holy Spirit from his ascended reigning position has given to the church apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers.

And this morning, we're gonna hear more as to Christ's intentions in giving us these servants. Would you please stand with me in reverence to Christ who is revealed in Ephesians 4, seven through 16. This is the word of the Lord.

But to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore it says, when he ascended on high, he led captive a host of captives and gave gifts to men. Now this expression, he ascended, what does it mean?

Except that he also had descended into the lower parts of the earth. He who descended is himself also who ascended far above all the heavens so that he might fill all things. And he gave some as apostles and some as prophets and some as evangelists and some as pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints for the work of service to the building up of the body of Christ.

Until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by every, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming.

But speaking the truth and love, we are to grow up in all aspects into him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

And this is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. My apologies to those of you who work in this field, but there are certain words that wash over me like nails on the chalkboard. So, customer service, product support, troubleshooter, F1 help.

The reason being, I think it's twofold. I cringe at the prospect of impersonal help, thoughtless aid, distant support, but I also loathe the prospect of having to wait and not only just waiting, but what if they tell me something?

What if I'm given instructions to go do something I don't wanna have to do? What do we think about relying upon Christ for help? Christ's help, his support, his aid is not impersonal because he has given us himself by giving us his spirit.

Chapter three says that Christ dwells in our hearts through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. His help, his aid, his support is not thoughtless for all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Christ.

And the support that he offers us is not distant, even though he reigns far above all the heavens, yet the spirit he has descended so that we may be in communion with Christ. Why would we not continually wait upon the Lord?

Why would we not continually seek, actively search and wait upon Christ and his support, his aid, his help? Possibly because we don't like to wait and possibly because if we pay close attention to what we are told about who Christ is and how he helps and what he would like us to do, we might find ourselves going in a direction we did not prefer to go.

We have to keep this in mind as we look at this verse 12, for Christ has given support to the church through these servants, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers. He has given us help, he has given us support.

Do we welcome this support? Do we wait upon the Lord and what he has offered to us? Just remember that the church's provision, the church's provision flows from Christ ascended. Will we wait upon the Lord?

Will we receive the support he gives us with the right heart, the right approach? If we're gonna think about verse 12, we have to keep in mind three contexts. And the first is that it is a transition between verses 11 and 12 that as we think of the servants that Christ gave to his church, to be a support to his church, this is ultimately for the solidarity of his church.

We gotta keep verse 12 in mind, the two verses around it. Also, we need to keep in mind what is said to us in Ephesians one. We must keep in mind the hope, our hope of Christ's calling. We must keep in mind the riches of the glory of Christ's inheritance in us.

The surpassing greatness of his power toward us who believe. We have to remember that these are in accordance with the working of the strength of his might, which the father brought about in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.

And he put all things in subjection under his feet and gave him as the head over all things to the church. God gave Christ as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

In other words, the support that Christ gives to his church, his own body must be understood as him reigning over us in his glory, reigning among us in his love and reigning within us by his spirit and his word.

The third context we have set before us is the unleavened bread and the fruit of the vine. Food and drink, which compel us to remember at what cost Christ purchased the church and at what cost he supplies our needs.

And here we are invited to commune with Christ together, confessing our faith in his living provision. So let's think of this verse, first of all, in its context. Verse 11 says that he gave some as apostles and some as prophets and some as evangelists and some as pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry to the building up of the body of Christ until we all attained to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.

In verse 12, Christ calls us to an accountability. We are held accountable in verse 12 concerning our equipping, concerning our exertion or our work, our service, and also our edifice. What are we building?

First of all, the equipping of the saints. Who are the saints? They are not football players from New Orleans. They are not especially religious miracle workers canonized by the Roman Catholic Church.

Who are the saints? Very often in Paul's introductions, we are given this clarity about who the saints are. The saints are those who are born again. The saints are Christians. Christians are saints. We are told in Paul's many introductions in his letters that this idea of sainthood or being saints, that this is our identity in Christ, this is our citizenship with Christ, and this is our calling from Christ, that we would be a holy people, part of a holy kingdom, that we are set apart unto God in Christ.

So if you are a Christian here today, you are a saint. You should identify yourself as a saint, as one who is in Christ. Now, it says that Christ is equipping his saints through the gift that he has given.

That grace is given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift is ultimately translates into him giving these servants to the church so that we would be equipped, that he supports us in this way.

What does it mean that Christ equips us? That he prepares us, that he fully trains us, that he mends us, he restores us, he completes us. That's what the word means when it says equips. How does he do all of that?

Well, consider these servants, these servants that Christ gave. Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers were given for the equipping of the saints. How do the apostles and prophets equip us?

How do the evangelists equip us? How do pastors and teachers equip the saints? They all do so through the ministry of the word. The word of scripture, the word of God, holy scripture was established by the apostles and prophets.

The scripture was extended to new places, even ours, to new people groups and new languages, even ours, by the evangelists. The word that was established was then extended by the evangelists to start new gospel works.

And then the scripture is expounded by pastors and teachers within the local church. And all of this, this ministry of the word, the word established, extended, and expounded equips the saints for the work of service.

This is how we are equipped. 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17 says, as Paul is encouraging Timothy in the importance of the scriptures, he says, all scripture is inspired by God, breathed out by God, and therefore is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.

In other words, all scripture is the very, is breathed out by the very breath of God, by the Holy Spirit. Every single word is superintended with the truth of God. It is all complete and accurate, trustworthy, sufficient, and authoritative.

And it is useful, it is profitable to tell us what is true, where we're wrong, how to get right, and how to live God's way. So that, verse 17 says, so that the man of God may be adequate, and here's the word again, equipped for every good work.

How are the saints equipped? Through the word, the word that was established by the servants that Christ gave to the church and extended and expounded. That's how we are equipped for the work of service.

It's no wonder that just after Paul says this in 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17, verse two, Paul tells Timothy in the psalm way to preach the word, and he says in verse five, to do the work of an evangelist. Christ has called us to follow him.

He has commissioned us to go and make disciples of all the nations, teaching them to observe all that he has commanded. And he reminds us that he's with us even at the end of the world. Christ has equipped us for this calling, and Christ, he supports us in our commission by the word established by the apostles and prophets, by the word extended through the evangelist, by the word expounded by the pastors and teachers.

Christ gives grace to each one of us, equipping us as the saints for his service. We have to make this very clear connection between the ministry, what John Calvin calls the external ministry of the word, and our being equipped to do what Jesus tells us to do.

How are you going to live the life that Jesus Christ has called you to live? The Bible says through the ministry of the word, through the scriptures, that Jesus prays to the father concerning his followers and says, please don't take them out of the world, but leave them in the world, and protect them from the evil one, and sanctify them in your truth.

Your word is truth. How are we equipped to live the way that God wants us to live? To follow Jesus through the scriptures. That's how we're equipped. This is the, by the work of the Holy Spirit through the scriptures in our lives, we are equipped to do what Christ has called us to do.

We have to specify that because so many today crave the sensational. So many today would prefer a mystical vision and a private interpretation to the clarity of Christ revealed in the word of God. So many today are so tired, so tired of man.

Bread from heaven, same thing all the time. So tired of man. I want the cucumbers, and the leeks, and the melons. I want the garlic. I want the meat from Egypt. It's the complaint of the Israelite in the wilderness.

I'm so tired of manna from heaven. And yet it's exactly what they needed. God gave them exactly what they needed. And he is so faithful and such a good God, he gave it to them over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over again.

And they got sick of it. Many today are sick of the scriptures. So tired of the same old, same old. Want something sensational, something far more exciting. But the confusion of Babel itself rains in the minds and spews from the mouths of those who would advocate that the saints of God are equipped for service in some other way, by some other kind of special revelation.

In every generation, there are those who despise the authority and the clarity of the scriptures, and chafe at the preaching of the word within the accountability of a local church. They prefer secret revelations and private interpretations to the regular equipping of the saints to the expounding of scripture.

And Calvin warns those who neglect or despise this order choose to be wiser than Christ. Do you know better than Jesus Christ? Do you? You think you know better what you need more than Christ, your shepherd, who gave himself up for you?

Woe to the pride of such men. Jesus knew exactly what we needed, and he provided for us. He went to heaven, he went to the above all highest heaven, he's been thrown on high, and he gave the gift of the Holy Spirit.

And by the gift of the Holy Spirit, he gave apostles, and prophets, and evangelists, and pastors, and teachers, so that we would be given what we need to be equipped for his service, the ministry of the word.

May our song be that of the child who spurred on Augustine at his conversion. Tole, lege, tole, lege. Take up and read. Take up and read. We must be a people of the word, not a people of a vision, or the people of the experience, or a people of the rumor.

We must be a people of the word. And as the scriptures are preached and taught, and as they find a warm welcome and an extended stay in our hearts, something wonderful will happen. As we are equipped, we will engage in the work of service.

If we're truly born again, if we're truly alive in Christ, if we truly have the gift of the Holy Spirit. Nine times we read of the salt sea in the scripture. And soon after the scripture was completed, the term began to be called this, the Dead Sea.

50 miles long, 10 miles wide at its widest point. The sea has no outlets. Everything flows in, but nothing ever flows out. The surface of the sea is 1 ,292 feet below the surface of the Mediterranean.

And the deepest point of the Dead Sea is another 1 ,300 feet below that. The Jordan River alone empties an average of 6 million tons of water into the Dead Sea every day. But it's so hot, the sun evaporates all the excess water so it never ever overflows.

And since nothing ever flows out of the Dead Sea, all the mineral deposits and all of the salt remains producing a salinity five times that of the ocean so that no marine life, in fact, nothing can live in that kind of environment.

It is a Dead Sea. Christ has been preached here since 1952. And week after week, month after month, year after year, some of us have been here since the beginning. Some of us have grown up in church. Some of us have been blessed to hear anointed expository preaching all of our lives.

Some of us listen to extra sermons and scripture audio throughout the week. The external ministry of the word keeps pouring out into your lives. Let us not be a Dead Sea. The equipping comes in, the gifts, the blessings come in for the purpose of equipping us to do ministry, for the work of service.

The saints are equipped for the work of service. Look at the text. Who are the saints? We are the saints. The saints are equipped for the work of service. So to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift.

To each one of us has been given the gift of the Holy Spirit. Each one of us is to be a part of the work of service. Being filled with the Holy Spirit. Each one of us is equipped by the external ministry of the word made effective by the Holy Spirit.

Therefore, each one of us must labor in ministry. Remember Moses, he's trying to do it all on his own. Led the people up out of Egypt, wandering through the wilderness, comes into the area where his father-in-law Jethro lives.

Jethro comes out to see what Moses is up to. Watches him for a day. And at the end of it, sits him down and says, boy, you're not doing it right. Son, you're doing it all wrong. It can't just be you alone.

And suggests this manner of dividing up of responsibility and authority and representation that our American forefather is employed in our own system of government. But then we also keep reading about Moses and how he was still the anointed one trying to do all of this until God says in the scriptures, took a portion of the Holy Spirit and gave the Holy Spirit to 70 others who would also prophesy, who would also preach the truth to stir up the people of God, to the work of God.

And then two others also received a portion of the Holy Spirit and they began to prophesy. And this bothered, I think it was Joshua or Caleb, and they came running to Moses. So and so are preaching, they're prophesying, but they're not part of the official 70.

And Moses said, would that all Jehovah's people were prophets it's come true, it's come true. Every one of us in Christ, in the new covenant are called to proclaim the truth of God filled with the Holy Spirit.

We are to take up the scripture and speak the truth of the word of God into other people's lives. Every single one of us, we're building up the body of Christ. That's the edifice of the saints. The edifice is built up by the edification of Christians, each one of us.

Listen, the prayerful spirit empowered proclamation of God's word by Christ's servants equips all the saints for the prayerful spirit empowered proclamation of God's word to others. You see your ministry, people like to talk about my ministry but your ministry is not whatever you feel like doing in the name of Jesus.

But whatever Jesus tells you to do in his name which is make disciples. That's what he said. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. That's what he told us to do is to make disciples in the name of Jesus. That is our ministry. That every saint is called to that ministry to make disciples, to help everyone that we know and the people we are going to meet to help them follow Jesus, to make disciples.

It's clarifying I think and liberating to have that singular focus. Whose body is it being built up? What does it say? It's the body of Christ. That's whose body is being built. And it's only by the word in which Christ is revealed that Christians are being renewed into that same image.

The image of the invisible God, Jesus Christ. Attempting to build the body of Christ by our own means or for our own agendas to our own ends is spiritual malpractice. We are not building a community center.

We are not building a soup kitchen. We are not building a political action committee. We are not building an apologetics training center. We are not building a country club. We are not building a worship center, a spiritual community or a personality driven organization.

We're building the body of Christ. The bride of Christ has but one lover, one master, one husband, one savior. And it is by our singular devotion to Christ that we are delivered from whoring after a thousand tyrants.

Second Corinthians 11, two through three. Paul says, I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. For I betrothed you to one husband, that to Christ I might present you a pure virgin. But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, that your minds would be led astray from the simplicity and the purity of devotion to Christ.

Singular focus. Now imagine Christ on his throne to your right. We read earlier out of Ephesians, and we know this to be true from other texts. He is ascended above all the heavens. He has all authority.

He is a name which is above every name. He is king of kings and Lord of lords and he reigns. He's the one mediator between God and man, the only savior. What are you doing to help those in your life take the next step to the right, to Christ?

What are you doing to help the people in your life, the people that you, your own family members, the people sitting in the pew next to you, your neighbors, the people you work with? What are you doing to help them take that next step to Christ, who is king of kings and Lord of lords?

The one mediator between God and man. That's the question. That's the calling. Some are on the far side of the cross. They have not come to know Christ yet. They're not born again. They have not repented from their sins and trusted in Christ alone for their salvation.

And some are on this side of the cross. But no matter who they are, Christ is king, Christ is Lord, and every single person who has ever lived, whoever will live, who is alive today, must deal with the person of Jesus Christ.

Because he's king of kings and he's Lord of lords. The question is, when we are called to make disciples, all that means is that we are going to use in a prayerful, spirit-empowered way, we're going to use the scriptures to help the people in our lives one step again to Jesus, and again, another step towards Christ, and again, another step towards Christ.

What are we doing to do that? Because that is what it means to make disciples. That's what it means. And if you're born again today, if you're alive in Christ today, you can do that. You can do that. So here are some practical ideas.

Start with Sunday. Sunday's a great day to start with when it comes to thinking about, I'm called to be a fisher of men, I'm called to make disciples. Where do I start? Start with Sunday. A lot of this I've talked with the elders about, we've been brainstorming about it.

But think about this. You can take the lessons from Sunday school, you can take the hymns we sing on Sunday morning, the scripture reading, you can take the sermon that is preached, you can take it to lunch with you, and you can talk to each other about it.

And you can share scripture with one another and help one another on to Christ. You can bring discussion and questions to Sunday night and continue it. Start with Sunday, work with Wednesday. Even if you don't come on Wednesday night, the fiber verse, the memory verse is there in the bulletin, something for you to memorize, to meditate on, and then to share with others.

And deliver your devotions, liberate them. Don't keep it to yourself away from anyone else that doesn't ever do anyone any good. Set them free. Set it free. Talk to other people about some of what you've studied, some of what you've learned.

Liberate your devotions into meeting with others, to read with them. You don't have to have a special study. You don't have to go buy a Bible study book, workbook from a Christian bookstore to disciple people.

You could use the Bible. You could use the Bible. You could sit with them, having not even read the passage beforehand, sit with them, open up to Psalm 42 and read it together. And by doing this in prayerful dependence on the Holy Spirit, you are helping this other person on to Christ, and they're helping you too.

That's what discipleship looks like. You can also proclaim in prayer. Here's a good habit to take up. When you feel compelled to say to somebody, I'll pray for you, add two words. May and now. May I pray for you now.

And pray for them right then. And you know what you can do to help that person on to Jesus? You can pray in the scriptures that you've memorized. You can pray as you can quote those as you pray, and you can help those folks on to Christ.

And no matter what we're doing, if we're talking on the phone, conversing on the phone or corresponding versus letters and email or whatever else, those can turn into discipleship opportunities as we share the word of God with others.

Jesus tells us to host the hopeless. Jesus tells us to have people in our home, at our table who can never repay us, and banish every thought that the mere act of compassion is enough. Jesus was full of compassion, did many acts of compassion, but he never let it lie.

He always preached the gospel. He always spoke the scripture. It's not enough. Well, they can just sense and feel and observe my Christianity, and that's good. No, speak the scriptures. Read the word of God with them.

Make it a custom that when someone sits at your table, when you alone sit at your table, when others, your family sits at the table, it's prayer and a scripture reading. This is just what we do. This is part of our, this is what we do at our table.

And just optimize your opportunities. We are filled with opportunities in our lives where we can disciple others, but we need to prayerfully ask the Holy Spirit to make clear to us all the opportunities we have for speaking the word of God into the lives of others.

It should be our primary consideration. It is our penultimate calling to make disciples. That's why we're here. So at all times and in all places, in all contexts, we've got to be thinking about ways in which we can help other people take the next step toward Christ.

No matter who they are or where they're at, no matter how far away they are from him, no matter how close we think they are. If they're, oh, they're much closer than I am. I can never disciple them. Encourage them with the word of God.

And a babe in Christ can encourage a mature saint in Christ. Now, we have a really helpful opportunity in front of us with communion. In a moment, after we sing a hymn, and I read some scripture and we pray, we're going to be passing this unleavened bread and the fruit of the vine to one another and remembering Christ.

This is my body, he says. This is my blood. Presenting himself as the Passover lamb for our satisfaction, that we'd be satisfied in him even as God is satisfied in him. As we are passing these elements out and one person hands the next person over a plate of unleavened bread, or this, in this physical act, is an expression of what we ought to be doing as part of our Christian communion every day.

These elements are to remind us of Christ and as we pass it to one another, we're sharing our faith in Christ with one another. And this is exactly what we're supposed to be doing with the word of God.

This is the essence of our communion, of our faith in Christ, that we are sharing with those right around us, sharing with one another our faith in Christ, the truth of Christ in the word. And also, some of you are here, you have not come to Christ in faith, you're not alive in Christ yet.

I pray that you will be. But this meal, this sharing, what you're saying when you put the bread in your mouth and you eat it, when you drink the juice, when you take of these elements, you're confessing, you are professing in front of everybody that you are united to Christ, that you believe in Christ as your Savior.

If that's not true, if that's not true, there's no need to steal from Christ's table. He's invited you to sit with Him at His side. There's no need to steal from Christ's table and pretend like everything's okay when it's not.

So if you're not in Christ, if you have not trusted Him as your Savior, just let the juice and the bread pass you right by. It's okay. Let that help you think about the worthiness of Christ and the salvation that He offers you.

Let me pray for us and we'll sing a hymn and share a meal. Father, I thank You for the time You've given us in Your Word. I pray that it has stirred us up to share Christ with others, to speak Your Word into the lives of each other so that Your will would be done, so that Your work would be done in the building up of Christ's body here on earth.

Help us have that focus in all that we do. We pray these things for Christ's sake, amen. Jay, would you lead us in a hymn?