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The Unity of the Body
Ephesians 4:1-16
Good News Translation (GNT)
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1 I urge you, then - I who am a prisoner because
I serve the Lord: live a life that measures up to
the standard God set when he called you.
2 Be always humble, gentle, and patient.
Show your love by being tolerant with one
another.
3 Do your best to preserve the unity which the
Spirit gives by means of the peace that binds
you together.
4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as there
is one hope to which God has called you.
5 There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism;
6 there is one God and Father of all people,
who is Lord of all, works through all, and is in
all.
7 Each one of us has received a special gift
in proportion to what Christ has given.
8 As the scripture says, "When he went up to
the very heights, he took many captives with
him; he gave gifts to people."
9 Now, what does "he went up" mean?
It means that first he came down to the lowest
depths of the earth. (a)
10 So the one who came down is the same one
who went up, above and beyond the heavens,
to fill the whole universe with his presence.
11 It was he who "gave gifts to people"; he
appointed some to be apostles, others to be
prophets, others to be evangelists, others to
be pastors and teachers.
12 He did this to prepare all God's people for the
work of Christian service, in order to build up
the body of Christ.
13 And so we shall all come together to that
oneness in our faith and in our knowledge of
the Son of God; we shall become mature
people, reaching to the very height of Christ's
full stature.
14 Then we shall no longer be children, carried
by the waves and blown about by every
shifting wind of the teaching of deceitful
people, who lead others into error by the tricks
they invent.
15 Instead, by speaking the truth in a spirit of
love, we must grow up in every way to Christ,
who is the head.
16 Under his control all the different parts of the
body fit together, and the whole body is held
together by every joint with which it is
provided. So when each separate part works
as it should, the whole body grows and builds
itself up through love.
Footnotes
Ephesians 4:9 the lowest depths of the earth;
or
the lower depths, the earth itself.
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Commentary taken from
'The Applied New Testament Commentary'
(Kingsway)
The Unity of the Body of Jesus
Ephesians 4:1-16
Paul writes about how we should live our daily lives.
Since we have been called to be God's children, Paul exhorts us to live
lives worthy of the calling.
He says, in order to maintain unity in the church and with each other,
the first thing we need is humility.
How can we test our humility?
The test comes when someone else calls us a sinner - especially in front
of others! How do we accept it?
Do we accept it happily and graciously?
If we do not, we are not humble. We have failed the test.
Every one of us has faults and weaknesses.
We naturally want others to be patient with our defects.
Therefore, we need to be patient with others and to accept them
in spite of their defects.
Our work and manners and customs may be different, but in the Spirit -
we must be completely one. Jesus is our peace; He binds us together. Let us, therefore, bind
ourselves together in him.
We were called to one hope.
Our hope is that, as God's children, we shall receive an inheritance
in heaven and live forever with Him.
Because we have one Lord, we have one faith -
we also have only one baptism.
Just as division in a family is distressing to a human father,
so division in the church is distressing to our heavenly Father.
To each one of us a gift has been given as Jesus apportioned it.
The gifts referred to here are special skills and abilities, such as
the gift of preaching and teaching, the gift of healing, the gift of
hospitality, etc. Jesus has apportioned these gifts to us in order
that we might serve others.
Here Paul quotes from Psalm 68:18.
Jesus made captives of all those things that formerly made us captives -
such things as sin and death.
And when He reached heaven, He gave gifts to men - to the church.
When Jesus died, He first descended to the lower regions.
And after three days, He ascended higher than all the heavens,
where He now rules with God over all things in heaven and on earth.
The five "gifts" listed here are for the establishing and building up
of the church. These gifts are not given to us primarily for our
individual benefit, but they are given for the common good.
These gifts are given to us so that we might use them to serve others.
If we do not use the gifts we have received,
then we are misusing our gifts, and God will not be pleased.
In this life we are growing, always growing.
We must keep moving toward attaining the whole measure of the fullness
of Jesus We must keep on growing more mature.
Don't be like immature children, says Paul, who are like leaves blown
here and there by the wind.
The truth that makes us stable, must be spoken in love.
If there is both truth and love in a church, that church and its members
will be able to grow up into Jesus.
All of the body's parts are to be under the control of Jesus,
Each supporting ligament joining the parts of the body together
helps the body to grow in harmony.
Each ligament is like a bond of peace between members of the body.
And as with an ordinary body, if the members of a church are not joined
and held together in peace, the church cannot function properly
and it will cease to grow.
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