You Can Make a Difference! (3)

Ephesians 4:11-14

God has designed His church to function like a loving family that you can invite people into. Church is not a place to issue edicts; church is a place to nurture growth. Church is a place that exists for the purpose of helping people grow and mature from being spiritual babies to being spiritual adults.

Let me ask you a question? If you are on the path to spiritual maturity then a legitimate question for me to ask you is, "How’s your ministry going?" Do you see it? God’s plan is -- "to prepare God’s people for works of service". The word for "service" or "ministry" in the Greek is diakonias, which is where our word "deacon" comes from.]

And the goal of your service for God is, stated in verses 12-13, --It is "so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ."

God wants to grow Believers that are strong spiritually, and that process requires time. It takes time to practice what we’ve learned before we can really claim to know it. Simply accumulating more knowledge in your head is not enough; only when you are able to apply your knowledge in your experience can you say that your knowledge is mature. That’s the journey of faith each of us are on.

Example: when you receive the gift of a prophet you don’t get it all at once. You must listen to God and practice listening so you can hear from him and speak for him.

Think about that. Look at your kids as an example: If you had a young daughter, would you teach her to swim by having her take a correspondence course in swimming? Ok go on the internet and practice. Would you teach your son to drive by tossing him a driver’s manual and saying this is how you are going to learn to drive? That’s a good start. To really learn, she’s got to get down into the water; he’s got to get behind the steering wheel and practice so you can scream yell stuff like God save me, I’m going to die.

In a similar way, the only way that you and I can ever grow spiritually mature is by putting our biblical knowledge into practice in the daily experiences of our lives. [As Hebrews 5:14 says -- "solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil."] It’s getting increasingly harder to distinguish that these days. What was evil is good and what is good is now evil.

So, what does maturity look like? It looks like Christ. If we are growing in maturity, our character is becoming shaped to be more and more like Jesus Christ. God’s goal is that through our mutual ministry to each other, we will each grow up to become like His Son, Jesus Christ. By serving each other in the church; we become strong through both unity in our convictions and though maturity in our character. We learn to love one another.

This is critical for your spiritual growth. When Todd asked last week what has changed over time, my immediate thought was the church. The American church has gone from a place of serving each other to grow spiritually in the local church, to how I can best be entertained. Church growth statistics show us that in the Tri-Cities that we have a 1% salvation rate but a 54% transfer rate. What does that mean? It means that over half of the Christians in this area are moving from church to church instead of staying put in one church so to grow spiritually. So spiritual growth isn’t as important as much as what can you do for me. What has happened is we have a group of Christians that are in a perpetual place of immaturity.

We can’t we just stay immature forever because in verse 14 Paul contrasts maturity with immaturity by drawing a stark contrast between baby Christians and mature Christians.

Look at verse 14 -- "Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming."

In vs. 14, this word "infant" refers to a small child who is not yet old enough to speak, perhaps someone of toddler age. Paul points out the fact that there are some evil people out there who desire to lead young Christians away from the truth. These people are cunning, crafty and deceitful.

Paul warns us to watch out for them so we can avoid falling into their traps. Every new believer begins the Christian life as a born-again baby, and often, it is in that first year or so after salvation that a person is an easy mark to be fooled by false teachers. False teachers come in many forms; on Christian TV, radio, thru cults.

Paul describes baby Christians as those who are wavering and vacillating, "tossed back and forth by the waves." On the other hand, mature Christians are resolute and determined in what they believe. Baby Christians are gullible, "blown here and there by every wind of teaching", whereas mature Christians are more grounded and steady and rooted in the truth. Baby Christians are easily deceivable, led astray "by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming", whereas mature Christians are discerning and cautious to study the Scriptures for themselves. Do you see that contrast?

How can we keep growing up in God’s ongoing plan for our spiritual growth? In verses 15-16, Paul lists out three ways that God grows up strong Christians, and every one of these three ways takes place in the context of our being involved in a local church.

He says, "In speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work." How does all this work? More tomorrow...you are loved!