Keeping the Unity of the Spirit — Stephen Kaung

Reading Ephesians 4:1–12

Will you please turn to the letter to the Ephesians. Ephesians chapter four. Ephesians chapter four. We read from verse one through verse twelve. I the prisoner in the Lord exhort you therefore to walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye have been called.

With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, daring with one another in love, using diligence to keep the unity of the spirit in the uniting bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit as ye have been also called in one hope of your calling.

One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in us all. But to each one of us has been given grace according to the measure of the gift of the Christ.

Wherefore he says having ascended upon high he has led captivity captive and has given gifts to man. But that he ascended, what is it, but that he also descended into the lower parts of the earth. He that descended is the same who has also ascended up above all the heavens that he might feel all things.

And he has given some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some shepherds and teachers for the perfecting of the saints with a view to the work of the ministry with a view to the edifying of the body of Christ.

May we look to the Lord in prayer. Our Heavenly Father how we praise and thank Thee that it is the pure grace of Thine that gathers us together in Thy presence this morning. O our Heavenly Father how we praise and thank Thee for the finished work of Christ who opens such a new and living way for us that we may enter into Thy very presence to behold the glory of the Lord with unveiled face.

O how we praise and thank Thee for what Thou hast accomplished and done for us. And we are in the good of all that Thou hast done and for this we are grateful. As we humble ourselves before Thee this morning we pray that Thou would breathe upon Thy Word and make it living and operative in our lives.

That these may not be just words but they may be life and spirit to us. We ask in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen. The subject that we have before us for these mornings is Christian unity. The subject that we have before us is Christian unity.

Christ’s Prayer for the Unity of His People

Our Lord Jesus on the night of His betrayal He poured forth His heart to His Father. He prayed on behalf not only of those disciples who were with Him that evening but all those who believed in Him through their words.

That is to say He prayed for all those who are His. And the one burden that was upon His heart during that time was that they all may be one as He and the Father are one. Sometimes we call this, John chapter 17, the high priestly prayer of our Lord Jesus.

And we pray that and we know that today our Lord Jesus is our great high priest. He sits at the right hand of His Father making intercession for us. And He is able to save us to the uttermost. And what is the burden of our great high priest in heaven today?

What is it that He intercedes for us? What is it that He wants to save us to the uttermost? I believe His burden has not changed. He is the same yesterday, today and forever. His burden for His people today in heaven is just the same as His burden for His people during that last night before His crucifixion.

And His burden is that we may all be one as He and the Father are one. And this prayer is still going on in heaven. Our Lord Jesus is still praying for us even today. And He will be praying until that day when this shall be the last day of His life.

And eternal reality. That we may be one as He and the Father are one. This oneness is an inward reality. This oneness is based upon inness. As He is in the Father and the Father is in Him. So we are in Him and He is in us.

And we are in Him and He is in us. And we are in Him and He is in us. And it is on this that our oneness, our unity is possible. This morning we would like to continue on with this matter of keeping the unity of the Spirit.

We know that the will of God is that we may be one. We know that the hard desire of our Lord Jesus for us is also that we may be one. And because of this the unity of the Body of Christ has become our calling.

Our calling is none other than the will of God. Our calling is none other than the hard desire of our Lord Jesus. If God wills it if Christ desires it, then we are called to it. We are called to be the Body of Christ.

This is our calling. We are called together to be that Body. The will of God is a corporate thing. The desire of our Lord Jesus is a corporate body. He wants a body. He wants a body. He wants one body.

Not many bodies. One body. And this has become our calling. If we read Ephesians chapter 1 through chapter 3, we find that this is revealed to us very clearly that we are called to be the Body of Christ.

Paul prays for the Ephesian believers in chapter 1. He says that God will give the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of him, being enlightened in the eyes of your heart so that you should know what is the hope of his calling.

And then in verse 22, God has put all things under the feet of Christ and gave him to be head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. And then in chapter 2 verse 15, having annulled the enmity in his flesh, the law of commandments in ordinances, that he might form the two in himself into one new man, making peace, and might reconcile both in one body to God by the cross, having by it slain the enmity.

And again you'll find in verse 19, so then ye are no longer strangers and foreigners, but ye are fellow citizens of the saints and of the household of God. Verse 22, in whom ye also are built together for a habitation of God in the spirit.

Then in chapter 3 verse 10, in order that now to the principalities and authorities in heavenlies might be made known through the church the all various wisdom of God, according to the purpose of the ages which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

So here you'll find what the will of God is, what the desire of the Lord is, and what the calling of his people is. We are called to be one body. We are called to be one man, one new man. We are called to be one family, one household of God.

We are called to be one habitation, holy temple of God. This is what we are called into. A calling is a vocation. This is our vocation. Our vocation is to be one body. This is our mission. Our mission is to be one body.

This is our destiny. This is our purpose. This is our destiny. Our destiny is to be one body. Dear brothers and sisters, I do hope that the spirit of God will impress upon our heart that this matter of the unity of the body is our calling.

And because it is our calling, we have to be fully involved in it. We cannot be careless about it. We must look to the Lord that we may fulfill our calling. That our calling may really be a vocation to us.

And it will be a testimony to the world. When we look into the history of the church, the early history of the church is recorded in the book of Acts. And if you read the book of Acts, you find how on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down upon the hundred and twenty who gathered there together for ten days, giving themselves with one accord to continue prayer.

And in one spirit on that day, they were baptized into one body. They were no longer one hundred and twenty members of a congregation, but they became one hundred members of one body. A wonderful thing happened on the day of Pentecost.

Not only one hundred and twenty, but immediately you'll find three thousand were added to that body. And all those who were in the body, as we find in chapter two in the book of Acts, how they continued in the fellowship, in the teaching and the fellowship of the apostles, in prayer and in the breaking of bread.

One thing you will notice with the early church, and that is how they were one. And all that believed were together. And their togetherness was not just a physical closeness. And had all things common.

They were so together. They were so one. And they were so one. And they were members of one body. So they had everything in common. My hand has everything in common with the rest of my body. My foot has everything in common with the rest of my body.

The reason why they had everything in common is because they are one. They are one body. And every day being constantly in the temple with one accord, and breaking bread in the house, they received their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God, and having favor with all the people.

And the Lord added to the church daily those who were to be saved. And again you will find in chapter 4 of the book of Acts, and with great power did the apostles, go back to verse 32, and the heart and soul of the multitudes of those that had believed were one.

That included not only the hundred and twenty in the beginning, that included the three thousand on the day of Pentecost, that included those who were added to the church daily, and that included those who were again added until the number came to five thousand.

And all of them were of one heart and one soul. And not one said that anything of what he possessed was his own. They were all delivered from their self-possessiveness. You know the spirit of self-possessiveness is tremendous in our natural life.

But they were all delivered from their spirit of self-possessiveness. But all things were common to them. And with great power did apostles give witness to the resurrection of the Lord. And great grace was upon them all.

The resurrection of the Lord was not only what was preached, but the resurrection of the Lord was what was visible. For neither was there anyone in one among them, for all or for as many as were the owners of lands or houses selling them, got the price of what was sold and made it at the feet of apostles, and distributing what was made to each according as anyone might have need.

The one thing that impressed upon the world during those early days were, look how these people loved one another. They were one. The unity of the believers was the testimony of that time. Professor F .F. Bruce, when he wrote the history of the early church, he concluded with this comment.

I'll quote him. The church in the first century A .D. The churches in the first century A .D. were closely linked together in Christian fellowship, but they were not united in any federal organization.

There was no idea that the church of one city was subordinated to the church of any other city. The relationship between the churches was primarily one of fellowship and charity. The churches united by this kind, by this kind of bond, came in the second century to be denoted comprehensively as the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church is not the Roman Catholic system. The Catholic Church means the Universal Church. And the Universal Church at that time was represented by the local churches in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria, in Antioch, in Asia, in Europe, in Rome.

And when you come to the beginning of the second century, you find that all the churches of God were joined together in one. Not by any federal organization, but it is bond of fellowship. And love. That is the church.

Historical Attempts to Create Christian Unity

But unfortunately, gradually, schism, parties, divisions, sects, schools of opinions, heresies, these things began to come into the church of God. And God's people began to be divided into opinions, separated into groups and parties.

But in the hearts of God's people, everyone knew that they should not be divided. There was a built-in consciousness in all believers. They knew that they were not alone. They knew that they were meant to be one.

They were called to be one body. And if they were divided, something was not right. Everybody knew about it. And yet, there were divisions. There were parties. There were schisms, rants and rifts among God's people.

So some people tried to unite the church. Not only because there was that inward consciousness that we must be one, but also there were ambitions. Therefore, some people tried to unite the church. And when you come to the sixth century, you find the Roman Catholic system was finalized.

On the one hand is trying to unite all God's people into one. But it was a union. Not by the Spirit. It was a union through power politics. So the Roman Catholic system was able to put under its system many churches, many groups.

But we know at the same time, there were the Greek Orthodox Church that claimed to be the Orthodox Church. So God's people were still divided. With all these outward efforts of joining them together, God's people were not one.

And this continued on until the sixteenth century. Now thank God, in the sixteenth century, God raised up these reformers. Reformation. Reformation was coming. And during the Reformation, we find that the justification by faith was being preached.

Because during the Dark Age, people who were called Christians, they did not know that they could be justified by faith. The common notion was they had to accumulate merits. Justification by work. If you accumulate enough merits, then you may be able to go to heaven.

But except a few saints who accumulated more than enough, that after they died, they went directly to heaven. All the rest had to go to purgatory. And because these saints, they had more merits than they needed to go to heaven, therefore if you pray to them, they will share their merits with you, and you got some indulgences.

And you could get out of purgatory quicker than you will be. So you find all these abuses and all these superstitions came into the church. It was really dark. But thank God, God reacted against that situation.

And a raise of Martin Luther, John Calvin, and all these people, Zimbley and so forth. And the justification of faith was proclaimed. And many came to a real knowledge of salvation. Not only there was the teaching of the justification by faith, but there was the open Bible.

Because during that time, you know, the Bible was chained. Printing press was not invented before that time. So the Bible had to be copied. And it was very expensive. And very few people had a Bible. And even where there were Bibles, they were usually chained in the monasteries.

And even the monks did not read these books. But here, during the Reformation, thank God in His providence, the printing press was invented at that time. So the Bible was being printed in vernacular languages, in the languages of the people.

And an open Bible was available to God's people. A great movement from heaven. But unfortunately, during that time, even though the great doctrine of the justification by faith was recovered, an open Bible was in the hand of many people.

And yet, the oneness of the body of Christ was not emphasized. The unity of the believers was not being stressed. And because of that, you find out of Reformation, you came all these state churches, all these national churches.

On the one hand, God's people still had the feeling that we must be one. We should not be divided. So when they came out of the Catholic system, and international system, or out of the Orthodox church and international system, you find with the prostitutes, you find they are all being organized into state and national churches.

The idea was still there. We should not be divided. We should be one. But how? A state church, a national church, limited to a state to a nation. And in a state church, or in a national church, anyone who was born naturally to that country belonged spontaneously to that church.

The membership was the nationals. That was not what God desired. Out of these national churches and state churches, you find there were dissenters, separatists, and in church history you find all kinds of groups, all kinds of denominations began to appear.

Usually centered upon a certain doctrine, or a certain form, or a certain way of organization, or following certain people, certain leader, and you'll find denominations after denominations were produced.

There was unity in, within the denomination, but there were divisions between the denominations. When it came to the 20th century to our time, especially during the last 20 or 30 years, we thank God that the Spirit of God had been moving among God's people.

Why? Because the time is close. Do you find that among God's people during the last decades or so, there had been an increasing desire, an increasing longing, since, among God's people. Why? How could we be divided?

Why are we divided? And there you'll find in the heart of God's people there's a growing desire that we should come together. But how? How are we going to be one? Let me read to you something that is written by Lord Jones.

He said, No question is receiving so much attention at the present time in all branches and divisions of the Christian Church as the question of church unity. There are many divergent views with regard to this.

The Roman Catholic solution of the problem of necessity, and in spite of what appears to be greater friendliness at the present time, is simply absorption into her institution and organization. The Church is always the same from her standpoint, and on the basis of her definition it must be, and therefore it is quite logical that her notion of unity should be that all other sections of the Church should return to her, who is the one and only true Church of Christ.

The so-called Orthodox Churches, Greek and Russian, hold the same view. But there are other views, some of which contrast sharply with this in their looseness. They maintain that what is desired is a visible unity, and coming together of all who call themselves Christians in any sense whatsoever.

Unity means all sections of the Christian Church, anybody, everybody, claiming the name of Christian, should meet together and should have fellowship together and should work together and should present a common front to the enemies of Christianity.

One other view must be especially mentioned at this point, as it seems to be becoming fairly popular in evangelical circles. This regard mostly in terms of coming together to form a kind of forum where various views of the Christian faith may be discussed, and people may present their different insights, hoping that as a result they may eventually arrive at some common agreement.

This is what people are doing today. The ecumenical movement trying to join all who are called Christians together, the Roman Catholic Church trying to call these who differ with them to come back to their fold because there is only one Church, and that is the Roman Catholic Church, and there is no salvation outside of the Church.

Absorption! And then you find among the Protestants something is going on through committees, through Congress, by negotiation and compromise, trying to find a common ground that they can put up a common front before the world.

But dear brothers and sisters, this is not Christian unity. Christian unity is something deeper than that. Christian unity is a spiritual oneness. It is something that is done by the Holy Spirit. It is not something created by man.

It is not something that man can make it. It is the operation of the Spirit of God. And therefore we come to Ephesians chapter 4. Now if you turn to Ephesians chapter 4, the key word here is this word, therefore, in verse 1.

I, the prisoner in the Lord, exhort you, therefore, to walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye have been called. Therefore. Whenever we find the word therefore, we know that it is to continue what has preceded it.

In other words, chapter 4 follows what has been described, what has been shown us from chapter 1 through chapter 3. And in the first three chapters of the letter to the Ephesians, we are shown what our calling is.

We are called to be the body of Christ. And having been called to be the one body of Christ, therefore, let us walk worthy of the calling wherewith we have been called. You know the word worthy in original has this meaning.

It means equal weight or balance. Now you have the teaching, the doctrine, the calling. Balance it with a walk, with a conduct, with a conversation that you may have equal weight. That it may not be just a teaching.

Dear brothers and sisters, during the last thirty years, there has been lots of teaching on the body of Christ. And the exhortation of the Holy Spirit is balance it with behavior, with conduct, with deeds.

Walk worthily of the calling wherewith ye have been called. And this word worthy also has the meaning of to become, to fit in with something else. Now you are called to be the body of Christ. Don't be in conflict with it.

Don't clash with it. Just try to fit in with it. To become what you are. We are exhorted to become what we are. We are exhorted to balance our teaching with our practice. Exhorted to walk worthy of our calling.

The Unity of the Spirit Is Given, Not Created

This unity is not something that we can create. This unity is not something that man can make. This unity is something that God has given. It's something that Christ has accomplished. It's something that the Holy Spirit has brought into operation.

So when we come to this unity of believers, we find that it is being lifted to the exalted level of the divine enabling. So here you'll find in verse four, verse three, using diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace.

This unity is called the unity of the Spirit. Why? Because it is the Spirit of God who brings to us that unity. And thank God it has already brought in. So the scripture says, keep diligently the unity of the Spirit.

Dear brothers and sisters, we are not to create the unity of the Spirit. Nobody can. The unity of the Spirit is already given. It is given to all who are the Lord's. The Holy Spirit has already done the work.

And all we need to do is to keep it. And to diligently, brothers and sisters, you do not keep what you do not have. You keep because you have it. You do not keep diligently. If what you have is of little worth, but if you watch what you have is of such tremendous value, then you have to watch it, guard it, very diligently.

If I have a few pennies in my pocket and I'm walking on the street, I will not put my hand in my pocket, because if the pickpocket shall pick it, let him have it. But suppose I have a million dollars in my pocket.

When I'm walking on the street, you know how careful I will be. Dear brothers and sisters, do you know what God has given to you? Do you know how much it cost the Lord Jesus to make it possible for you?

Do you know what the Holy Spirit has done in your life? He has done a great thing. He has given you a unity, a unity with your brothers and sisters, a unity with all those who are the Lord's. There is a unity, not only in union with God, with Christ the Head, but a unity, a union with all those who are the Lord's, from the first century up to the twentieth century.

From the first one to the Lord. You have it, I have it, everyone up here who believes in the Lord Jesus has it. You have it. Do not say, how can I ascend to heaven to get it? How can I descend to hell to bring it forth?

It is already yours. You have it. And because it is such a precious thing, dear brothers and sisters, the scripture says, keep it, and diligently keep it. Why? Because even if it is yours, if you don't keep it, you may lose it.

If it is yours, if you do not diligently keep it, the enemy will snatch it away from you. And if you do look back into church history, or even you look into your own history, you will find how the enemy is trying every way to snatch this away from you.

If he can remove you from that ground of the unity of the Spirit, he succeeds in dividing God's people. By the grace of God, this is something that every one of us must diligently keep. The unity of the Spirit.

The Sevenfold Unity of the Christian Body

What is the unity of the Spirit? It is described in 7 .1, in verses 4 -6. There is one body and one Spirit, as ye have been also called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in us all.

One body. In Colossians chapter 3 we are told ye are called into one body. Whenever you think of the body, you think of the head. Why? Because the body comes from the head. Without the head, there can be no body.

The head. The fullness of the Godhead. Those in Him, and ye are complete of the head. The Godhead. Who can fathom the fullness of the Godhead? How rich is God! How full is God! How glorious is God! How full of love!

How full of righteousness! How full of holiness! How full of light! Nobody can measure the fullness of the Godhead. Yet the fullness of the Godhead dwells in the head, in Christ's body. And ye are complete in Him.

Hold fast the head, and then the body will be joined together into one. Dear brothers and sisters, we must see Him. It is only a when we focus upon Him, the head. Then the body is joined in one. And what is the body?

The body is to contain all the riches of the head. And the body is to express what the body is. Dear brothers and sisters, we are called to be that body. We are called to be the corporate expression of Christ.

We are to express Christ Himself through us. All who are born from above into that body. We may not live in the body, but we are in the body. In the body, therefore we must live in the body. Not by trying to get into the body, by living.

It is to live out from the body. We are all of one another in the body. Therefore live it out. One, one spirit. In 1 Corinthians chapter 12 verse 12 it says, in one spirit ye were baptized into one body.

Whether Jews or Gentiles. And ye were all made to drink of one. On the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came. And brothers and sisters, you know, when we read Acts, our attention usually is focused upon the fight against the fire and the sand.

Breathing from above. And there was fiery tongues appearing, falling upon the heads of the hundred and twenty people. You know, when we read, usually we are attracted to the sight and the sound. We thought that was spectacular.

That was wonderful. That was Pentecost. Brothers and sisters, that was secondary. What is Pentecost? What did the Holy Spirit do on the day of Pentecost? In one spirit they were baptized into one body.

Now that's Pentecost. Baptized into one body. The body of Christ. Now that is the miracle of Pentecost. But that was only half of it. And the other half, in Acts 10, there in the house of Cornelius, when Peter was preaching.

You know, Peter probably was a long wind preacher. And when he was just warming up, among these people. And in one spirit they were baptized into one body. Whether Jews or Gentiles. On the day of Pentecost, the Jews were baptized in one spirit into that body of Christ.

In the house of Cornelius, the Gentiles were baptized by the same spirit into the same body. Therefore in that body there is neither Jews nor Gentiles. It is Christ all anymore. In one spirit. Dear brothers and sisters, do you not know that on the day when you believe in the Lord Jesus, the Holy Spirit has not only begotten you, but He has also the baptism with the Holy Spirit.

You were baptized into that same body. That the people on the day of Pentecost were baptized into. The people in the house of Cornelius were baptized into. And on the day that you believe in the Lord Jesus, the Holy Spirit not only begot you, but He also, in the spirit, you were baptized into that same body.

And not only baptized, but we were all made to drink of the same spirit. To be baptized is something outward, external. But to drink is something within. The Holy Spirit from the day that you are saved is your drink.

He is to be your very life, your very sustenance. You cannot live without Him. He is your drink. And you drink of Him. Dear brothers and sisters, is it not true that we have the same spirit? We were baptized in the same spirit, into that same body, and we had the same spirit who dwells in we all are.

And one hope of our calling. What is our calling? Our calling is to be the body of Christ. What is the hope of our calling? Hope is something that you look forward to. What is it that the body is looking forward to?

The body is looking forward that one day when the body is fully grown and mature, then the head will come back as the bridegroom to claim that body as his bride. That is the hope of our calling. Brothers and sisters, we have a blessed hope.

Our blessed hope is not just to walk on golden streets. Our blessed hope is that when the Lord shall come back, we are fully prepared, matured, grown up, so we can be His bride. Join with Him eternally in that youth.

That is our blessed hope. That is your hope. That is my hope. That is our hope. We are the same. One hope, all related to the Holy Spirit, by the third person of the Trinity. That is we were baptized into one body, we were made to drink of the one Spirit, and He gave us the hope of our calling.

Why? Because it is the Holy Spirit who is working in and among us to transform us, to conform us to Christ together, that we may be a matured body fit to be the bride of Christ. That is the work of the Holy Spirit.

And then you find, followed by the fourth one, one Lord, one Lord. In 1 Corinthians chapter 8 verse 5,. For if indeed there are those called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, as there are gods many and lords many, yet to us there is one God, the Father of whom all things, and we for Him, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom all things, and we by Him.

Even though in the world there are many gods and many lords, but with us we have only one God, who is Father of us all, of whom all things, for whom all things, and we have only one Lord, Jesus Christ, our Lord, by whom, and we, dear brothers and sisters, we who have believed in the Lord Jesus, we have not only a Redeemer who redeems us, but we have one Lord.

He is our Lord. He is the Lord, our Master. We belong to Him. We owe everything to Him. He has bought us with His own blood. One can say Jesus is Lord by the Spirit. So by the Spirit of God, we willingly and gladly, we confess Him, we share together.

God has anointed Jesus as Christ, and by the Spirit we call Him, and one day every knee shall bow to Him, and every knee confess that Jesus. But even before that day comes, we have already confessed Him as Lord.

We believe in the Lord Jesus, confess Him as Lord, but may that confession be true. May we not just say Lord, Lord, and do our own things. One Lord, one faith. The one person and the work of Christ Jesus.

Faith here is different from de-faith, as you will find later on in verse 13. The one faith here refers to that basic faith, without which no one is that justifying their own faith. We believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.

That faith that Peter confessed, when the Lord Jesus said, Whom do you say that I am? And Peter said, You are the Christ. You are the Son of the Living God. And the Lord Jesus said, Blessed are you, Peter Bar-Jonah, because this is not something shown you by flesh and blood, but my Father who is in heaven has revealed it to you.

Brothers and sisters, this is the one faith here. Unless by revelation from above, you confess, you believe, and you confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Anointed of God, the Messiah, the Saviour, the One who is sent to do the work, you believe in His cross, in His shed blood, in His finished work, and you believe as to His person, He is the Son of the Living God.

Brothers and sisters, that's justifying faith. And that is one faith. And that we all have. The Holy Spirit has given that faith to all of us. We share together. One baptism. It does not refer to the moods and manners of baptism.

It refers to the meaning of baptism. Why? Because if you read Romans chapter 6, you will find in Romans chapter 6, verse 3, are you ignoring that we as many as have been baptized unto Christ Jesus have been baptized unto His death.

What is the meaning of baptism? Baptism is not just a formality. Baptism is not a ritual, a ceremony. Baptism has a spiritual meaning to it, a spiritual significance to it. And baptism means we were baptized into Christ.

As the children of Israel were baptized unto Moses, so we were baptized by water into Christ. We were baptized into His death. We were baptized into His burial. We were baptized into His resurrection.

And in Galatians we are told that all who have been baptized into Christ, put on Christ. We are clothed with Christ now. Therefore in Him there is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither barbarians nor Scythians, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision, neither male nor female, but Christ is all and in all.