One Body, One Spirit, One Hope — Tim Conway

Father, I pray just now with the subject before us that You'd give me the right words to say, the words that we need to hear, the words that most accurately describe Your Word. I pray for words that would be so put together that would be faithful to bring forth the essence and the message, the heart of what it is that we should find in the verses before us.

I pray that You might use this sermon for good to Your people, and I pray in Christ's name, Amen. Ephesians 4. I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you've been called.

Walking Worthily Through Spirit-Wrought Unity

A worthy walk. Worthy of the calling to which you've been called with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

So, the first three chapters, remember where we came from. God. Rich in mercy. And remember what He did. Remember, these first three chapters are describing the glories of our salvation. What did God do?

Rich in mercy. He raised us up together with Christ and He seated us in the heavenly places with Christ. This is the Father. We find in these first three chapters the Son. What is He called? He is the Head of the church.

And then we find the Spirit of God. And what is He? He's the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it. And you know what else Paul tells us in those first three chapters? The Spirit of God strengthens us.

He empowers us. That Christ might dwell in our hearts through faith, but also that we might comprehend the love of Christ and the dimensions of that love in order that we might be filled with all the fullness of God.

And having lifted the believer up to His true position in the heavenly places, you know what He does in this second half in chapter 4, the second half of this letter to the Ephesians is He brings us down to the earth.

He brings us down to where we live. He brings us down to where we walk. Where we walk. The very first lesson regarding the worthy walk of the Christian is about the Holy Spirit-wrought unity in the body of Christ.

That is really what permeates verses 2 -16. So Paul comes to the life of the believer where we walk, where we talk, where we live, and his first care amidst whatever differences or whatever shortcomings we might have is to protect that thing.

To maintain that thing that the Spirit is doing among God's people. And what's that? It is to protect. It is to guard. It is to keep. It is to maintain the unity of the Spirit. We are to preserve it at all costs.

Strain every nerve in endeavoring to keep it. You know the picture that I have? It's that picture of Paul. It's straining every nerve. It's reaching out towards the goal. And it's like you bring the goal.

You know how it might be with just the way the wind blows. The wind blows the grass and it all leans. That's the picture. The wind. This is the kind of unity, the breath of God. It blows and we all bend the same way.

There's this unity. It's the goal. We're striving after the same things. The Spirit of God has done something in the life of every true believer here that there's earnestness, there's desire, there's a longing, there's a stretching after this same thing.

And what we're being called to do is maintain that. Not create it, but keep it. Seek to maintain it, to manifest it, to bear with one another in love. Take up the new commandment that the Scripture talks about.

Adorn yourselves with humility. But here's the thing, what verses 4 -6 show us is that in our humility, in our gentleness, in our patience, in our love, we don't pursue unity at any cost. It's not that.

The Sevenfold Foundation of Christian Unity

There is one body. Look at it. Ephesians 4 .4 There is one body and one Spirit just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all Who is over all, through all, in all.

What happens after Paul talks about the unity of the Spirit? This is where he goes. In these three verses, you see what Paul's doing. He's playing on the word one. It comes at us seven times. Seven is unique in Scripture.

We need to capture this. Here is what the fundamental unity of the Spirit revolves around. The oneness of the church. And do you see here in these verses? We sang, Holy, Holy, Holy. We were singing to the Trinity.

Do you see the Trinity here? All three Persons? You know what that means? Look, what's Paul doing? This is the practical walk. This is the practical life. And you see where he takes us? He takes us right here.

Our unity is found here if only we have eyes to see it. I mean, if you're looking for anything to lift us up above the mundane and the petty self-concerns and the trifling selfishness which so often corrupts our unity, what happens?

He's saying we need to stand face-to-face with the magnificence of the Trinity. Here is the Spirit. Here is the One Spirit. The One Lord. The One Father. And then it's interesting, it's like these other things that he brings in that have to do with the church.

The church's unity chiefly involves us all orbiting around the same Son. That Son being the Godhead Itself. We talk about being practical, but we can't be practical until we know how to be practical. You know what some people think is practical?

A list of rules. Well, that's practical. We'll never be practical if we neglect doctrine. If we neglect the glorious teachings of these things that are set before us. Think about it. Think about all the things that...

Whenever there was a mind that was gripped by the truths of God, the realities of God, it was Paul. And think about where his mind goes and all that he could say about the unity of the church. He goes to these seven things.

A number of perfection. He brings out this. One body. We may read across these things and not find a whole lot of significance, but that's not the case with Paul. He finds significance in these realities.

One body. One Spirit. One hope. One Lord. One faith. One baptism. One God and Father of all. This is what he finds to be practical. And we're never going to be practical if we neglect these things. He isn't talking about unity at any price no matter what we believe.

All the world is God's children and so we all need to get together. And there's that mindset, but it's not that. We never jettison the fundamental truths of the Gospel and of the Godhead to maintain the unity of the Spirit.

You see what he's saying? He calls us to maintain the unity of the Spirit, and then where does he go? He goes to these seven things. These are the bedrock. As the wind blows and we all bend, here's what we should be bending towards.

As there's an orbit around one common center, these are the things that he puts at the center. And people who are not orbiting here are not in the unity of the Spirit. That's the reality. So, to maintain the unity of the Spirit, we must know, we must embrace the truths that the Spirit loves.

You remember, Paul's being carried along by the Spirit as he comes up with these seven things. We need to embrace the truths the Spirit loves, the Spirit teaches, the Spirit emphasizes. You remember how it was back in that chapter 1?

Paul is praying. He said, my prayer for you is that the God of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, would give us the Spirit of wisdom and of a revelation in the knowledge of Him. You know what this Spirit of God is all about?

The Spirit of wisdom. The Spirit of a revelation of the knowledge of God. This is all about knowing God. And I'll tell you, as we move through here, this is all until we come to the unity of the knowledge and of the faith of the Son of God.

This is where we're headed. It's got everything to do. You want to get practical? It's got everything to do with what's happening in the mind. You see, we can sit here and you can hear the preaching. And if you were to look at a camera angle at everybody and you saw the heads nod, and you say, oh, there's unity.

They're all acknowledging the same thing. But what's really the issue is what's happening in the brain because you can be nodding that head, but inside your brain is somewhere else and your thoughts are somewhere else.

What this is, it's the thoughts that are in unison. They're hungry after God. They're reaching after God. They want to know God. Eternal life is to know God and to know His Christ. And there's this longing and hunger and there's this bending.

That's the unity of the Spirit. He bends us. He's going to glorify Christ. He makes Christ spectacular in our sight, in the mind. Not just we nod, not just we carry our Bibles, but in the brain, there's a hunger.

There's an earnestness. There's a stretching. There's a bending. Wraps around this. This is the unity of the Spirit. This is what we find. The Spirit of wisdom and the revelation of the knowledge of Him having the eyes of your hearts enlightened.

Your heart, your mind is where the heart is. It's the thinking. It's that they might be enlightened. To what? That we all, you see that? This Spirit, this one Spirit is at work in every true child of God here.

And there's this unison. There's this unity. There's this bending of the mind, the thoughts, the desires, the hungers. And these seven things are seven things that of all the things that could be said, the Spirit of God says write that, Paul.

Write those seven things. There must be some significance there. Before we can respond to all these personal appeals that come at us as to how to live this out practically, to do this or do that, or live in the life of the church, we've got to see what we are in light of these realities.

Who we are, where we are, who God is. And so to the text. One body. There is one body. What's that? Well, let's let Paul define it for us right here in this letter. Ephesians 5 .23. Jump over there just a second.

The One Body as Christ’s Church and Fullness

Well known. The husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, His body, and is Himself its Savior. Okay, just from that text, what is the body? The body is the church. But not only that, the body is that which has Christ for its head.

The body is that which has Christ for its Savior. No matter how you define body, if you're not saved, you're not in this body. Now let's look at another passage. Ephesians 1 .22 and 23. Back in the first chapter.

And He, that being God the Father, put all things under Christ's feet and gave Christ as head over all things to the church which is His body. And this may be one of the most glorious things said in all of Scripture concerning the body.

The body is the fullness of Christ who fills all in all. And I want you to think about the term fullness. Look, you can't get away from the meaning. Fullness is that which makes something complete. And you know right away, if you have only a head, something is massively wrong.

If you see only a head, it's not complete. In fact, it's appalling. Only a head. The body completes the head. And you know what you have here in these passages? You have this idea about the power of God at work in us and it's the same power that raised Christ from the dead and God seated Christ at His right hand in the heavenly places.

What you need to recognize about this is yes, there is the risen Christ. There He is seated at the right hand of the Father. But you know what? He is not complete. That resurrected Christ sitting at the right hand of His Father is not complete.

Because it's that old Moravian mission call. May the Lamb who was slain receive the reward of His suffering. I'll tell you this, He was raised from the dead for the justification of God's people. That's what the last verse in Romans 4 says.

He was raised victorious, but there's no victory unless all of those for whom He died and suffered and was victorious are fully saved and safe and at His side. He said, Father, His desire was that they be where He is.

Until every one of them is there, this thing is incomplete. We fill up the fullness. The fullness of Him who fills all in all. I'll tell you this, nothing is said like that about anything else that God created.

Nothing. When we start defining the body of Christ, whatever else can be said, the body of Christ is the highest revelation in Scripture of the glory of God in all of creation. Hear what I'm saying. Creation.

Creation of all that God created. This is never said of anything else in His creation. In fact, in Ephesians 3 v. 9 -10, God created all things so that through the church, the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.

God takes a creature. Think about this. He takes a creature made from dust. A creature He spreads Eden before. And He listens to the devil and He comes under the power of sin and Satan and death and He's got to be banished from the garden.

And He hates. He hates. They hate one another. The children of Adam. They hate. They kill. They're in constant strife. And God takes this. He takes this. We read in Scripture about the potter from the same lump of clay.

It's this lump. They hate. Hating and hated. War. Strife. And He pulls off and He says, I'm going to make this the body of My Son. I'm going to make this to be the one who fulfills the fullness of My Son.

This is the body. One body. So what and who is this body? Years ago, I heard all sorts of discussion and argument about the church. The emphasis on the local church. It was extreme. I was taught that every place in the Bible where you find church or body, it's local church, local church, local church, local church.

It was like this idea of universal church was abhorred. And it's like, well, if it's not exactly the local church, it's church used in an institutional sense. You know what that means. Like marriage as an institution.

But you don't really have marriage as an institution unless you have the individual marriages. You don't really have the church as an institution unless you have the local bodies. The independent, local New Testament Baptist church was everything.

The universal church was denied. I even heard it suggested that if you belong to a Baptist church, then you were the bride. Maybe it was a specific kind of Baptist church. You were the bride. And basically, imagine it like a football game.

Get to heaven. If you were the Baptist bride, you're like a football player. If you're George Whitfield or Jonathan Edwards who wasn't part of the Baptist bride, you're just a spectator. Or it's like the marriage supper of the Lamb.

If you weren't this Baptist bride, then you're probably one of the guests or one of the servants when we all get to heaven. But I'll tell you this, that sort of talk, it creates the very type of division that Paul abhors here.

Of course, listen, Paul recognizes we practically live out our Christianity in local churches. He's writing to a local church. He's writing to the church in Ephesus. But when Paul speaks of one body here in chapter 4, he doesn't mean many local churches.

He's not even talking about local churches. That's not what's in his mind when he talks about one body. Listen, you don't say one body and have that mean one local church because there's many local churches.

That doesn't even square. We don't want to say, well, it's the institution of the local church being spoken of. I mean, what's that? You might as well say it's the institution of one spirit. That's the institution of spirits.

So it doesn't really mean one spirit. It means that there's a lot of spirits. Or it's the institution of faith where it doesn't really mean one faith. It means that there's a bunch of faiths. Well, that's ridiculous.

You don't want to do that with any of the rest of these. Don't do it with body. There's one body. One. People who talk different, they tend to be narrow and exclusive. But Paul says one body. Now listen, go back to Ephesians 1 .10.

I keep taking you back there, but this is such essential truth to the message of Ephesians. If you're thinking about the plan of God, the purpose of God, the mystery of God, what is it? The plan for the fullness of time, Ephesians 1 .10, is to unite all things.

And as I've repeatedly said, the all things in heaven and on earth are the people of God. It's not rocks and stones. All you have to do is cross-reference this with the verse in Colossians and you see that this all revolves around the cross of Christ.

This gathering into one all things. Well, the cross of Christ is about redeeming men, not rocks, not stars. One. In heaven. That can't be the local church. In heaven. This is the mystical church. What term are we looking for?

Let's just watch how Paul himself defines the term. This one body is that which completes the head. And the imagery is destroyed if you want to have one head and many bodies. There's one body. Look at Ephesians 2 .16.

Here we see the one body. "...And might reconcile us both...". That's Jew and Gentile. "...to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.". The one body is not distinguished by location, but by reconciliation.

Do you all see that? That's the reality here. Or look at Ephesians 3 .6. Tremendous truth. You see what Paul has in mind? He's got in mind this glorious reality primarily that Jews and Gentiles are being brought together into one redeemed people of God.

And you see it here. What's the mystery? Ephesians 3 .6. The mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body. Partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the Gospel. Gentile inclusion into the same body.

That's the great mystery. Look, there is one true people of God. That's the issue. The dispensationalists are dead wrong. There are not two people of God. There is not Israel and the church. Those holding to covenant theology that would have their unsaved children part of the covenant, that's a lie.

That's not true. There are not two people of God or two people of the covenant, the saved adults and the unsaved children. One body is a reconciled church no matter if you are Jew, Gentile, black, white, young, old, but you're reconciled.

What is true? The church. The body. His body. Christ is its Savior. These are saved individuals. It's anybody and it's everybody who has ever been saved. That's the reality. Look at 1 Corinthians 12. Jump over there.

Paul says something very similar. 1 Corinthians 12. He says, for just as the body is one. The body is one. One body. For just as the body is one and has many members in all the members of the body, though many are one body, so it is with Christ.

Notice v. 13. The unity of the Spirit. For in one Spirit... I mean, he's throwing these ones at us here too. One Spirit. We were all baptized into one body. Baptized. That means to be immersed into. You baptize somebody in water, what happens?

The water swallows them up. You are immersed into the body of Christ. That's the picture here. Baptized into one body. Jews or Greeks. Same thing. Now, he goes beyond that, but that's where Paul's... this is the mystery that they're all in one body.

And not just Jew or Greek, but slave or free. And all were made to drink of one Spirit. You see, if you're in this one body, you drink of this one Spirit. To fight for anything but this one body is to attack the very unity Paul is fighting for.

Listen, if there were two Spirits, yes, we might concede that we'd have two sorts of people. If there were two lords, we might be divided into two parties. If there were two hopes, two faiths, two baptisms, we might have two people of God.

But in the one true church of Jesus Christ, there is one Spirit. There is one Lord. There is one God and Father of all Who is over all, through all, and in all. And I want you to see. Go back to Ephesians.

Ephesians 4. Verses 4 -6. These are declarations. Paul called us to do something. He called us to maintain the unity of the Spirit. But when he gets to v. 4, this is not an exhortation. This is a declaration.

This is what's true. There is one body. There is one mystical body of Christ. All believers are members of this one body. Every true believer makes up not one of many lesser bodies. That's not the issue.

But they all make up one body. You don't need to turn to this one, but listen, Romans 12 .5. So we, though many, are one body in Christ and individually members one of another. The outward visible local church is not this.

Why? The outward visible local church is never pure. Jesus Himself says there's an enemy that spreads tares among us. It's never pure. That's not what's even in mind here. This is one body reconciled to God through the cross.

Paul has in mind a spiritual body of which all are in Christ. All are spiritually connected parts of the same body. There are never to be two rival communities. Even if somebody is in another church, if they're genuine, there's not to be two rival communities.

Yes, there's a complex array of members, organs. You look at my body. I mean, you just look at the difference between an eyeball and a finger. They're radically different. There's difference in various functions among all of us.

Differing degrees of honor. But all are one. The eye, the finger, the church, no matter where it's to be found or in what age it existed, no matter what race, no matter what bloodlines, no matter what skin colors, whatever assortment of languages, it's all one.

And it's unaffected by distance, time, physical, intellectual, or social distinctions. Listen, obviously what Paul sees as essential to the unity of the Spirit is that we recognize what the one body is.

Can I tell you this? In the circles that want to stretch and manipulate Scripture to where ultimately, body means the local church, you know what you typically find? Local churches that can't get along.

That's not what's being emphasized here. Possessing the knowledge of what the body of Christ means is essential to maintaining unity. God, give us to understand. God, give us insight into the glory of this one body that we might be led in our own individual fulfilling of whatever place we have in the body.

Whatever calling God has upon us. Whatever ministry. Brethren, this has a deep connection with walking worthy. Because I'll tell you this, when our desire is to help other churches grow, our desire is to help other churches through the Internet ministry.

Our desire is to help people in other places no matter where they are as long as they're God's people. We want to promote that kind of unity. We want our church to be involved in that kind of unity. We want to be able to give to the needs of God's people.

You see that oneness, that bending when the Macedonians in all their poverty took what they had and gave to the church at Jerusalem? It wasn't, well, this is our church here and we're going to fend for ourselves.

Who are they? Way over there. Plus, they're Jews. That wasn't the mindset. They were bending in the same direction. What was that direction? Caring for one another. One body. We're one. One. We're connected.

The body. Just like the finger in the eyeball. What happens? The same blood flows through. The same Spirit is breathing life into all the different parts. That's what we have, brethren. This is a deep, deep connection practically with how we walk worthily.

Deep connection with our spiritual life to embrace the unity of the Spirit, the love of Christ. What? It means the death of every vestige of selfishness among us. We can't be all about our own church, all about our own little empire, all about us.

Brethren, there's a sense of laying down our life for the brethren that goes beyond these walls. We need to be willing to lay down our lives for the brethren in other places. And that's how I feel when Diego and I travel down to Nicaragua.

It's like, yes, I want to lay down my life for people in that place as well. I want to see God's people press on and make it and be victorious and grow. The body of Christ, the welfare of every member becomes the supreme object.

You remember what Paul said? He was willing to do for the sake of the elect. Let us try to realize what this body is in which the one blessed Spirit of God seeks to manifest Himself. You know, as I think about John and Judy and the team over in Nepal and they're up against the enemy, I mean, I don't want to feel like the wind of God simply bends us all for the stretching for the same objective for the salvation of the Nepalese people.

To hear that Max Church, that Charles Church, to hear that the church in Corpus or the church in Nicaragua, the church is in Nicaragua, they're bending the same way. Brethren, that is very encouraging.

Very encouraging. Brings us to the next thing. One Spirit. Here's the great eternal invisible. The term actually has to do with breath. Breathe on Me breath of God. It's this eternal invisible Person.

One Spirit as the Power and Presence of the Church

Jesus said when He comes, the Spirit of God... you try to wrap your arms around what He is, who He is, I'll tell you this, I'll tell you what He is. He is the power of God behind the church. You know what Jesus said to the disciples?

He said you remain in Jerusalem. Why? What were they remaining there for? What were they staying? Until they're clothed with power from on high. Listen, the strength of the church never, never has ever depended on its numbers.

The strength of the church has never depended on our bank accounts. Never. We desperately need Him. The Spirit of God. There's one Spirit. One Spirit works in the church and empowers the church. And because the power that empowers God's people is always the same power, the same Person, because He never changes.

Ever. It's always the same work. Look wherever you will and where the Spirit of God is at work. Well, there may be minor differences. There may be trivial variations. But by and large, you will see the same manifestation because it's the same Spirit of God always at work doing the same work.

You know what Scripture says? Beloved, do not believe every spirit. Have you ever read that? But rather, test the spirits. You know how that verse is even possible? It's possible because John writing that knows this.

The Spirit of God. There's one Spirit. Evil spirits? There's many. There's one Holy Spirit. And He is always the same. And so He always speaks the same. You know what He does? Jesus said He will exalt Me.

Wherever the Spirit is at work, He's about the business of exalting Christ. Be certain of that. What else does He do? Scripture says what no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, what no mind has imagined, what God has prepared for those who love Him, Scripture says these things, the Spirit of God reveals.

God reveals by way of the Spirit these realities. What's He talking about there in 1 Corinthians 2? He's talking about the realities of the Gospel. What does the Spirit do? Exalts Christ. What does the Spirit do?

Reveals truth to us that could not be seen, heard, or imagined unless the Spirit does that. The Spirit takes... you remember what Paul prayed for. He prayed that the Father of glory may give us the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him.

There is revelation from this Spirit. He reveals what's in here. You know what else He does? You know what else the work of the Spirit who is the Lord? He's transforming us into the image of Christ degree by degree.

Glory to glory. And He's always doing that. You know what? If you go over and you find true brethren in Nepal, you go over and visit Andy, you find true people of God in China, if you go to Lebanon, if you go down to Nicaragua, if you go down to Monterrey, or you go over to Saltillo, if you go to Ecuador, you know what happens?

You go to Ireland. You go to Poland. You go to Manchester. Wherever you see God's true people, you're going to find the same thing happening. And if we could go back to those early churches in the book of Acts, you'd find no difference.

Sometimes we think of them as being different, but they wouldn't be different. You know why? Same Spirit of God. One Spirit. One Spirit. Brethren, there's a unity of sorts that revolves around other things.

There is a unity that revolves around the doctrines of grace. There is a unity that revolves around perhaps the Puritans or certain confessions of faith. Pet doctrines. But I'll tell you what, that unity is more of the flesh than it is of the Spirit.

Because you know what it does? It causes people to look down and frown on people that don't hold to exactly the same thing. That is not the unity of the Spirit. If you want a confession around which to revolve, go to Ephesians 4 .4 -6.

That is our confession around which this unity of the Spirit is orbiting, around which it revolves. The unity of the Spirit. Think about the Spirit. There's fruit of the Spirit. Look for where the Spirit is at work.

What are you going to find? The same fruit always. What fruit? Love, joy, peace, patience, the chiefly love, the bond between the members of the body. It's like the joints with which every member is connected.

We're going to get to that. All the parts connected. What is it that joins us all together? Brethren, we're held together. We build ourselves up in love. That's where He's at. He gets down close to 16 and He's bringing this thing to a close.

There's this unity of the love, the members of our body. I mean, this finger and this finger, there's a vital union. It's living. There's stuff flows through there. It's like the Spirit is at work and among God's true people.

We know that tears come in, but that's not part of the body. He's looking beyond that. He's looking at that which is essentially real and connected and held together by a real Spirit-wrought humility and gentleness and patience and forbearing, a bearing with one another in love.

There's an inner union. And it's real. And it's strengthened. By what? Lowliness. Meekness. We should be cultivating relationships not only with those who are basically of the same way we think. I'm not talking about these essential seven things.

I'm talking about you get people that didn't come from the same kind of lost lifestyle that you came from. We get people that are different. You don't want to just cultivate relationships with those people and get into your own little clique.

Lest your unity be more of the flesh than of the Spirit. Strive after the love that's demonstrated here. A love that connects us with anybody in the body. Now it's true, there are people in China that you can't reach.

We're talking about those within the body that are within your reach. And oftentimes, those that are most reachable are those that are in the same church, undoubtedly. Strive for that unity, that love that doesn't assume evil.

Strive after that unity, that love that never says an unkind word. If we just focus there, that love that never says an unkind word about another Christian, can you imagine if we as a church were able to accomplish that in any given week?

Love every believer. Not just for the sake of those who are agreeable or look nice or are pleasing or make you look good, but for the sake of the Spirit who is at work. Like I said last week, conspire with the Spirit.

Be about what the Spirit of God is doing. Give yourselves distinctively to this purpose of love to lay down your life for God's children who are within your reach. That's the issue. The work of the Spirit is to build up a unified habitation for God.

This dwelling place for God. That's what we found at the end of chapter 2. Yield yourself to the Spirit to accomplish this work. The whole body, this structure in which God dwells. It builds itself up in love.

One Hope and the Believer’s Confident Expectation

One last thing in v. 4. There's one hope. You see it. Why is this next? Why would you think? One body. One Spirit. One hope. It's a hope that belongs to our call. We're called people. It means we've been summoned by God.

Why is that next? I think in Paul's mind, the one body. Think of it. One body. And this one body is being led by, it is being guided by, it is being empowered by, it is being sanctified by this one Spirit.

Well, you know what's going on in Paul's mind where you've got the Spirit? It's the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it. That's what he said back in chapter 1. It seems like when Paul thinks of the body, body, Spirit, there's this hope.