Life in the Church

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

Life in the Church: The Church as Christ’s Gift and the Call to Ministry

All right, good afternoon everyone. I invite you to turn with me to Ephesians chapter 4. As we continue our series through the book of Ephesians, we'll pick up where we left off last week. Ephesians chapter 4, we'll be looking at verses 7 through 16 today.

Now it is likely that most, if not every, professing Christian desires to see the church built and functioning in the way that Christ intended it to. Yet, I think what exactly that looks like many do not know, much less how we are to get there.

The ministry of the word has lost its value and importance as the precious gift of God that it is to his church and its purpose of equipping the saints. Somewhere, somehow, in the history of the church, we have developed this tradition, almost written in stone at this point, that ministry is to be done only by a select few while the rest of us get to sit back and enjoy the service they receive.

Ungirding all of that at the foundation is the fact that the church, I believe, is no longer truly seen as the body of Christ, as divine, truly divine organism that he has established and his headship over.

And even for us in our circles, it is easy to lose sight of the preciousness of the church and quickly becomes a place where we simply meet on Sundays for a couple of hours, enjoy good biblical, perhaps even edifying conversation, but then we're more than happy to part ways for another seven days before we return.

Likewise, I think many of us see and recognize areas in the church, even in the lives of our brothers and sisters that need to be ministered to, but we are quick to tell ourselves that that requires the work of an elder.

And so we never do anything about it. We are apprehensive about getting involved in the lives of others, and at the same time, we do not want to be bothered ourselves. And as a result, the true unity in the church, as well as the individual and corporate maturity of the body, are stagnant if they're not, in fact, actually regressing.

But Paul, in our text today, reminds us that the church has been, in fact, given a great gift of grace in the ministry of the word, and that gift serves a greater purpose. And as he explains that to us, we ought to find ourselves encouraged to commit, once again, to serving one another for the growth of the unity, as well as the maturity of the church.

We will also understand that the church itself is the precious gift and work of Jesus Christ himself. Our understanding of how the Christian life, of how the Christian is to partake in the life of the church, will be sharpened.

And so what I'd like us to see is, first, Christ's gifts of grace that we have received. And second, the purpose, the goal of that gift, how we to purposefully and intentionally live in light of it. And lastly, and thirdly, we'll see Christ as the head, as the source, if you will, of it all, as our motivation for meaningful life in the church.

And before we get into the text, let's go to the Lord in prayer one more time. Oh, Heavenly Father, it is a good thing, it is a blessing, a gift to come to your word as your people, to hear what you have said for the benefit of our lives and for the glory of your name.

We ask now as we work our way through this text that you would speak to us, that you would not starve your people, that you would not starve your sheep today, that you would feed them richly from the treasures of your word, that they would be built up, encouraged, exhorted, and that Christ would be rightly seated on the hearts, on the throne of their hearts for the sake of your name and your glory.

And in Christ's name we pray. Amen. With that, let's begin with reading verses 7 through 10. Paul writes,. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore it says, When he ascended on high, he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.

And saying he ascended, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.

Paul begins this section very plainly and simply by telling us that every, each and every Christian has been given a grace, and that grace that we've been given is a gift from Christ. Now Paul is not speaking about saving grace.

There is certainly something that every believer has received. Paul had, if you remember, addressed that earlier in Ephesians chapter 2. What he's talking about here, though very vague at this point in verse 7, we'll come to find out in verse 11, just a little down the road, is the giving of certain offices to the church.

But before Paul elaborates on this so-called gift, he immediately moves on, we'll see in verse 8 through 10, onto commenting on Christ ascending as well as descending. And at first glance it can almost seem like Paul is not making any sense and just leaves us scratching our heads and wondering what in the world is he going on about.

But what Paul is doing, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, is not abandoning his thoughts about these gifts of grace. Rather, he's so gripped with the truth of it, he's so in awe of what he says, that he says to us, by the way, before I move on, before I flesh this out for you, let me tell you how great Christ is.

He says, let me tell you why he is the one giving these gifts. Paul is establishing Christ's authority and right to distribute these gifts. And so, we'll see him in verse 8, in so typical apostolic fashion as we see so often, we see him quote from the Old Testament.

He says, therefore it says, when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives and he gave gifts to men. Paul here is quoting from Psalm 68 and verse 18. Psalm 68, if you don't know, is a song of great triumph, a song of triumph about God defeating his enemies as well as the enemies of his people.

It speaks about God delivering his people. He's giving the spoils of his victory to them and his ascent to Mount Bashin to dwell with them and his being enthroned in his sanctuary. It speaks about the whole world being called to worship him and his bestowing gifts of power and strength to his people.

It was ancient custom that after a leader had succeeded in warfare, in battle, he would return home in great triumph with chariots, a great procession following, bringing spoils from his victory and being followed by his captive enemies and or those that he brought back out of captivity.

And what would usually happen is that those spoils would then be distributed to the people and the soldiers as gifts. And Paul, when he quotes from Psalm 68 here, he's saying that all of that, God defeating his enemies, delivering his people, giving them gifts from the spoils of victory has ultimately and finally been fulfilled in Christ.

One commentator calls Psalm 68 a preliminary announcement of the gospel and that announcement has now been fulfilled in Christ. Verses 9 and 10 expand on the idea when Christ descended from heaven, when he left the glory that he had before the world existed with a father, when he became man, lived a perfect life in full obedience, fulfilling all righteousness, when he died and resurrected, he triumphed over Satan, death and sin.

And the host of captives that he's now said to be leading are his delivered people who were once slaves of sin and bondage to it but whom he has redeemed in his triumphant ascension presents to the father.

The apostle tells us that this grace, these gifts of grace that he's about to talk about, they're not just from anyone. They're from the one who is seated above all rule, authority, power and dominion, from the one who humbled himself to the point of death on a cross.

And then he gloriously ascended to the right hand of the father. They come directly from the one who is the head of the church, Jesus Christ. And he's the one distributing them accordingly to his will, plan and purpose.

And with that foundation laid, we see Paul move on in verse 11 and he expands on this gift and tells us what it actually is. In verse 11 he says, and he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers.

I don't know about you but when I read this it is so ordinary to me that it ought to be fascinating to us. Christ doesn't give the church material riches, wealth, safety or security. If anything maybe we would have expected another spiritual blessing type of gift like the ones we read about in Ephesians 1.

Instead the gift of Christ that he gives to the church are groups of people. Christ gave certain offices as gifts to the church, offices to be occupied by people. Now the question is what are these offices?

First he gave the apostles, that being the 12 apostles as well as Paul even though as he himself says was one untimely born. And we know that of course to be an apostle you have had to have been personally chosen by Christ for this role as well as personally sent by him.

It's like the 12 disciples were in Matthew chapter 10. But most importantly an apostle had to have seen the risen Christ. It's the most important qualification that we see even in Acts chapter 1 verses 21 and 22 when the disciples choose another apostle to replace Judas.

Now having received direct command by Christ their teaching carried divine authority and was the foundation on which the early church was built and on which the contemporary church continues to stand.

Secondly you see Christ gave the prophets. Prophets here in our immediate context is not referring to the ones of the Old Testament rather to the ones of the New. Paul had already mentioned them earlier if you remember in Ephesians 2 verse 20 where he said that the apostles and prophets are the foundation on which the household of God is being built.

And then he continues to elaborate elaborate on it in chapter 3 verse 5 where he notes that the mystery of Christ that had not been made known to previous generations had now been revealed to the apostles and the prophets and now they're said to be a gift to the church.

These New Testament prophets were very closely linked with the apostles. They could sometimes foretell, predict the future. We see Agabus do that in Acts 11 as well as predicting Paul's imprisonment later in Acts 21 verse 11.

And they also as mentioned in chapter 3 deceived, received, had received some degree of divine inspiration but would more generally encourage, strengthen, and build up the local church. They fell under the authority of the apostles and their teaching was not considered infallible and was to be tested according to the truth.

Now what's important with these two offices as the mystery of the gospel has been revealed to us and the foundation for the church been laid by them there are no remaining apostles and prophets in our day.

The foundation is laid once and that foundation that has been laid has been preserved for us in our Bibles. Paul considered himself to having laid that foundation and by the end of his life he tells Timothy in his second letter to continue in what Timothy had learned and firmly believed and not to trust in any new continuing revelation that was to follow.

And so these offices though they're no longer active in the church today they remain gifts to us because we have their inspired words and teachings preserved. Thirdly we see that Christ gave evangelists.

Of the four offices listed here this is the one that we have the least amount of scriptural references to. Evangelists are only mentioned two more times in the entirety of the New Testament besides here in Ephesians and even in those instances where they are mentioned no precise description is given to the exact nature or role of this office.

So when we look at the word itself we find that it simply means that it is one who announces, who preaches, who proclaims the gospel. Philip you remember Philip from Acts chapter 6 was one of the seven that was chosen.

He's called an evangelist in Acts 21 and verse 8 and he had gone around Samaria proclaiming the gospel there. Likewise Paul in his second letter to Timothy again calls Timothy to devote himself to the work of an evangelist in the preaching of the word.

Eusebius a third century early church historian tells us that the early church understood the office of evangelist to be tasked with the proclaiming of the gospel in places where it did not had gone for the purpose of planting new churches.

In other words it'd be similar to what we understand today to be missionaries who go into the world where there is no church. They preach the gospel and as the gospel bears fruit churches are being formed.

Lastly we see the church is given shepherds and teachers. That's probably the office that we're most familiar with today in our day. Shepherds as we know refers to the exact same office as elders and overseers.

It just simply describes another aspect of the ministry of elders. Paul as well as Peter use all three of these terms interchangeably throughout the New Testament. So there's much debate about this particular office in terms of if Paul here is referring to one single office or if he's referring to two distinct offices one of shepherds and one of teachers.

They are to be taken in unity forming one and the same office. Paul is simply outlining a spectrum of functions. If we look and we consider the entire teaching of the New Testament on the topic of elders it's very difficult.

We'll find it's very difficult to separate shepherding and teaching from one another. Paul you remember tells Timothy and Titus that teaching is a core must have qualifications for the office of an elder.

An elder must be able to teach and give instruction. That's exactly what makes the difference between an elder and a deacon. In first Timothy 5 17 Paul says that the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor especially those who labor in preaching and teaching.

For Paul the two were clearly connected. An elder could not do the work of shepherding without teaching. One scholar said it this way. There is no evidence from scripture that there was a set of men authorized to teach but not authorized to exhort.

The thing is well nigh impossible. The one function includes the other. The man who teaches duty and the grounds of it does at the same time admonish and exhort. Again Paul never separated the two and by combining them here he's simply giving us a full picture a summary statement of what we would nowadays call a pastor.

And so now by this point what was vaguely referred to in verse 7 Paul in verse 11 has made clear the gift of grace was given to each and every one of us that is every believer in the church are the offices of apostle prophet evangelist and shepherd teachers.

However Christ has not given us these gifts for no reason. He has a definite purpose a goal and effect there to bring about. We'll see this in verse 12 and 13. Paul begins to lay out for us in our second point but we will find now some points of application what the purpose and the goal and effect is.

Equipping the Saints for the Work of Ministry

In verses 12 and 13 Paul writes to equip the saints for the work of ministry for building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of God to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

If we were to find one commonality in all these offices we could say that it is the ministry of the word and the ministry of the word we see in verse 12 equips the Christian which is the upbuilding of the body toward the goal of unity and faith and knowledge of the son of God as well as maturity measured according to Christ likeness.

I believe the NASB translated verse 12 just a little bit better here than the ESV when it says for the equipping of the saints for the work of service to the building up of the body of Christ. What we see here what Paul is showing us is how Christ is building his church.

Christ of course being the cornerstone the apostles and prophets having laid the having received revelation laid the foundation for us for us which God has graciously preserved for us in his word and now the shepherd teachers teach that word and shepherd God's people so that they can in turn minister and serve each of each other which builds up the church.

What we have to realize is that this means that you cannot be sitting on the sidelines. We're not talking about service what we might think of when it first comes to mind like setting up tearing down running sound greeting leading worship whatever it might be those are all important things and they're a great blessing to all of us.

We should all strive more to serve in areas like that but what Paul here is speaking about is a spiritual service to each other. Paul is taking it to another level here the church and especially the local church is a living organism in which its people are to care for one another pray for one another encourage exhort and if necessary rebuke one another.

Ministering church is not something that is only performed by a handful of what we would call professionals. There's always a degree of counseling of comforting of walking alongside of holding accountable for each of us to do for one another.

That's why for example in our statement of faith if you've read it it says that we affirm the priesthood of all believers and the necessity of every Christian to be joined with and actively involved in a local church where they will find fellowship mutual upbuilding and accountability.

And if you're a member of this church or will be a member of this church in the near future you'll know you will know this from our membership covenant. We said we will walk together in brotherly love exercise and affectionate care and watchfulness over each other and faithfully encourage instruct exhort and admonish one another as occasion may require far too often we treat the church as some kind of social club that meets once a week when it's most convenient for all we come and we enjoy a program for an hour and so or so before we entertain ourselves with some friendly conversation.

The church is anything but a club. The life of the church does not consist merely out of sunday sermons that we consume and friendly chit chat about the weather politics work or whatever else. Brothers and sisters are you coming here on Sundays to receive service and entertain yourselves or to serve.

I know i understand there are days when we come here and we really need to be ministered to. But i submit that the general disposition of our hearts should be to come and seek to be of service to others.

Yes we come to worship. We come to bring honor and glory to god. Absolutely. But we should also come in order to serve to meaningfully intentionally minister to others asking them how they're really doing how their soul is doing to pray with them and for them to encourage each other with the word comfort those that are downtrodden to sharpen each other in good godly conversation and to rejoice with each other in god's many blessings.

So i want to urge you to come to come here on Sundays to come on Thursday to seek out fellowship throughout the week in order to minister to one another. We are called to serve for the upbuilding of the body of christ.

Christ wants the church to be more than just a sunday gathering and casual conversation. Now of course all that is supposed to serve to be the means of achieving two goals. Specifically again in verse 13 it says.

Unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of god and mature man who to the measure of the stature of the fullness of christ. Simply put christ's goal for the church is to be united in the faith and the things we know to be true and believe as well as personal you could say saving knowledge of jesus christ.

These two things together are the only fertile ground for true unity in the church a common assurance of things hoped for and conviction of things not seen mere intellectual knowledge of some of the beliefs of the faith and facts about the person of christ do not equal unity.

We all know that many demons know true things about god and know that christ is even the son of the most high. And likewise many unbelievers have tremendous knowledge of jesus christ but remain on the wide road that will lead them to eternal destruction.

Now some of you here i'm afraid might not know and understand what paul's talking about. Some of you cannot enjoy the unity that paul is speaking about. The unity that comes from faithful ministering of the word leading to a serving of one another and resulting in a knitting together of hearts around the faith and love for christ by god's grace.

You come here every week and you might be observing some of its tremendous blessings. But in reality you're far from experiencing true deep meaningful unity with the church. Because despite even knowing some of the beliefs and some facts about christ you are far outside the faith and do not only know christ as the one perfect sufficient faithful savior that he is and what you need to do.

If that describes you just to get right with god to confess your sins to recognize that you have sinned against them and stand condemned deserving of just wrath to be poured out on you or charged to use this to turn from your sins to repent and cling to christ for the forgiveness of your sins and to receive eternal life.

Only then can you be knighted to the church in faith and knowledge of jesus christ. Paul gives us a second goal for the church to attain through this gift as given in the second half of verse 13 through all the way through 15 we'll read it part of it again.

Paul writes. Mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of christ so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine by human cunning by craftiness and deceitful schemes.

Rather speaking the truth in love we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head into christ. Mature there in verse 13 could be also translated as perfect or complete and as the only truly mature perfect complete human being that's ever lived the church is to grow into christ.

He's the standard by which we measure christian maturity. And that's what paul means when he says to the measure of the stature of the fullness of christ we're to grow up in christ likeness much like humans.

The christian begins as a child comes with childlike faith and trust to god. But the christian is not to remain a child. The author of hebrews 5 of hebrews chapter 5 says. You need milk not solid food.

For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

The christian life is one of growth of constant progress toward christ likeness and holiness. And this growth in turn then leads to stability. It prevents us from being a ship without sails or rudder in the ocean at the mercy of the wind and waves and being tossed to and fro.

And notice how paul in verse 14 says. Human cunning craftiness and deceitful schemes. And the greeter. Paul uses the language that refers to a deceitful game of dice. Someone perhaps in our context at a fair or carnival who plays with loaded dice in order to make a living or profit by deceiving people.

And paul's mind not all false teaching is the result of error but can be purposeful evil in order to deceive god's people and cause shipwreck to their faith but by god's grace. Paul's saying because we have been given these gifts as a means to grow us and be able to recognize and avoid such schemes yet it remains our responsibility to to lay hold of those means.

The growing in christ likeness is not a passive act for us. He's given us these offices through them the preaching and teaching of his word the diligent study of the scriptures. And that's a solid food that we need to grow from child child likeness to maturity.

But not only that as we subject ourselves to it we are being equipped to minister to each other. Or we could say if we put it in a different way we could say as we obey the word as we apply it in our serving and ministering to one another in the life of the church we steadily cultivate and nurture a consistent growth in maturity individually as well as a unified body.

The only context that paul knows in which a christian can grow in maturity is the church. If you sit here and do you think that you can remain a child in the faith with without the need to ever actively and meaningfully studying the bible and applying it in the life of the church with and for one another.

You're gravely mistaken. What paul is saying here flies in the face of today's so popular individual childlike christianity that we're being spoon-fed at every corner. Christianity like that is nothing more than the type of human cunning and deceitful scheme that will eventually shipwreck your faith.

Christ has given gifts to the church for you to have a stable steady sure and mature faith. And so we have to use these gifts that christ so graciously has given us. And we need to strive for to actively pursue maturity holiness and growth in christlikeness.

How do we do this. By being an active member in the local church as it subjects itself to the word and then applies it in their members serving one another. Lastly and this will be very brief in verse 16 we see the source of the church's unity and maturity.

Christ the Head Who Makes the Body Grow

Verse 16 from whom the whole body referring back to verse 15 joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped when each part is working properly makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love in a way this verse summarizes everything paul has been speaking about up until this point.

Christ is where it all begins. As verse 15 says he is the head and without christ there would be no body there would be no church at all. It is christ who first redeems the people saves them from their sins and the coming wrath of god.

And then makes the many by nourishing knitting them together knitting them together one. We ought to marvel really at the power of christ when we consider the church. How in the world. How in the world could people from all sorts of different tribes tongues nations great variety of backgrounds and experiences people with all sorts of different interests.

How in the world can the rich and the poor for years for decades for a lifetime despite their sins and joy a closeness and unity with one another that is unheard of in the world. And the answer is so simple it's because the church with christ as its head is not an organism fashioned by mere weak human hands.

The church is the supernatural divine work of jesus christ and building his body and him being the cornerstone. And he builds it by equipping it with everything it needs to grow. And the people that he adds to it each with their individual gift that he's given them.

Paul says in first corinthians 12. Verse 21 the eye cannot say to the hand i have no need of you. Nor again the head to the feet i have no need of you. You have to understand that christ wants to use you in the lives of your brothers and sisters.

In the building up of his precious church he's designed it in such a way that every blood-bought saint is of great importance to it. And what we must do is let the headship of christ the price that was paid for the church stir our hearts to a more sincere intentional purposeful loving christian life within the body in sacrificial service to one another for the sake of his glorious name christ alone will close with.

This can be and must be the motivation for pursuit of unity and maturity. If we desire to see a church functioning the way that he intended.

It to function with that. Let's pray thank you for listening to another sermon from grace fellowship church. If you would like to keep up with us you can find us at facebook at grace fellowship church or our instagram at grace church.

Yeg all one word. Finally you can visit us at our website grace edmonton .ca. We pray that you have been blessed by this recording. God bless you and we hope to see you soon.