Walk Worthy / Week 1 / Fight for Unity, Not Ideas

Fight for Unity, not our Ideas!

Ephesians 4:1-6 January 17, 2021

I. Introduction:

A. The pain of division is deep and the blessing of unity is sweet to the soul!

1. In 2020 and the start of 2021 our nation has felt the pain of division and it has

reached into the church, our friendships and families.

2. As I have sought to process this, I certainly do not have all the answers and to

be honest with you, I do not even know where much of the truth is with so

many lies, distortions, exaggerations, half-truths, withheld or censored

information, truth and views being promoted from personal agendas by

extremist politicians on both sides of the aisle, and by the media of every

type!

3. This I do know for sure – division should not have reached into the church as

the church is supposed to be the one place of unity in the world. The ultimate

answer to divisions comes from Jesus and His Word, which has no lies,

distortions, exaggerations, half-truths.

B. After Paul spent the first three chapters in the book of Ephesians teaching us

amazing truths about who we are as believers and as a church, now there is a

major transition where Paul distills all this truth into real life wisdom regarding

how these truths are supposed to work out in our lives.

C. Turn to Ephesians 4:1 where we see this major transition. Read v1a

1. Therefore, the first word in this verse is simply saying this – here is the

conclusion from everything that you heard in the first three chapters. So

chapters 4-6 become the “so what” of everything we learned in chapters 1-3.

2. He gives us the first “so what” in v1-6. As I read, it watch for what I believe

to be the heart of the passage: “a fitting lifestyle for believers is to fight for

unity by tolerating others!”

3. As I read this section, remember that the Jews and gentiles made up this

church with very different backgrounds and had a long history of hostility

towards each other!

4. Read v1-6

• Let’s look at this big idea a piece at a time! Let’s start with …

II. A fitting lifestyle for believers

A. Now he is talking about the way we walk as believers, our lifestyle.

1. Read v1a-b

2. He starts off with a serious plea to live our lives in a way that is worthy, that

is fitting, that is suitable,

B. He is talking about a life that is appropriate of the calling to which we have been

called.

1. Read v1c

2. That is what we learned in chapters 1-3, who we are as believers and as a

church!

• So he is calling us into a fitting lifestyle for believers and that consists in

III. Fighting for unity!

A. In verse 3, we are told specifically to work hard, to give intense effort to guard the

unity of the spirit.

1. Read v3

2. A great application of this verse is what my good brother Ron Benton has

said to me often– we need to fight for unity not for our ideas!

B. In addition, it will take a fight to be unified.

1. We in the church are different in so many ways: not only ethnic differences

but political, background differences, different degrees and kinds of

brokenness, age differences, gender differences, socio economic differences,

spiritual maturity differences, spiritual gift differences, etc., etc.

2. Add on top of this that in 2020 things like masks, racial tensions and politics

provided plenty of bait for us to create divisions.

3. Here is the worse part – sometimes we fight over interpretations of the Bible

like Democrats and Republicans fight in Congress!

4. All of these have the potential to rub against us in a way that can create

division within a church.

C. Then in v4-6 Paul shares seven unities that all believers share, this becomes the

basis of our unity, the foundation upon which our unity stands. For the sake of

time, I will read them but only illustrate two of these as to how they practically

become the basis of our unity! Read v4-6

1. Illustrate -

a) Lord – Jesus Christ is the Lord – if we want unity, we must seek the

lordship and will of Jesus rather than our own wants and ideas or we will

constantly be divided.

(1) This is about not my will but thine be done. It is about seeking and

fighting for God’s will over my best ideas or deepest desires!

b) Faith – there is one body of truth that God has given us that we put our

faith in and that is the Bible. It is our constitution, blueprint and owner’s

manual!

(1) If we want unity our decisions, beliefs, practices and ways must

come from the same starting point and authority – the Bible!

(2) We will never be unified if we look instead to how the business

world does things, how my political party does it, how psychology

does it, how other organizations do it, best practices of others, my

own best ideas, how my family did it, etc.

(a) There may be help with some of these things but they

cannot be our starting point or the foundation for our

discussions!

(2) 1 Corinthians 3 says that there are believers who are carnal. They

walk like mere men, nothing in their life or thinking is different

from those of the world!

(a) Your chances of unity in discussion with a believer like that

are about as good as a discussion with a person who does

not know the Lord or accept the Bible

II. Now we know that a fitting lifestyle for believers is to fight for unity, but how do we

get there? It is all in our attitudes, it comes …

III. By tolerating others!

A. To be honest with ourselves it is easy to be with people who are just like us but

people who are very different from us take a lot of work!

B. Tolerance simply means bearing with someone who is very different from me,

one who thinks very differently from me even someone that has opinions that

mine very different from me!

1. Most of the world today defines tolerance as choosing to love, accept and

treat with respect and kindness anyone and everyone, except for those who

disagree with us! Especially biblically minded Christians

2. Biblical tolerance is choosing to love, accept and treat with respect and

kindness anyone and everyone, even those who disagree with us!

C. In verse 2, he shows us the three attitudes that will be necessary to tolerate other

believers who are very different from you to fight for unity.

1. Watch for these as I reread v2 – 3a

D. Unity comes when we diligently watch over our own hearts and attitudes. So let

me ask you a few questions to consider before the Lord this week.

1. What do you learn about your own heart by the way you responded to people

and ideas that are very different to yours in 2020?

2. How closely did your heart match up to the three key attitudes in verse 2 that

are necessary to show tolerance to others in love?

a) Humility – means lowliness of mind, is just the opposite of pride where

deep down I think I am better than, and of greater value that other person

who is different from me.

b) Gentleness – this simply means you are not harsh, forceful, stern or

rough. Instead you are delicate, mild and tender with people and ideas

that are different than yours

c) Patience – this is the one of the three that challenges me the most when I

understand what it means. I love the way one Greek dictionary says it is–

a state of emotional calm without complaint or irritation when faced with

something or someone that provokes you or a misfortune.

(1) It goes on to say another way to say it is like this – “to remain

seated in one’s heart” or “to keep ones heart from jumping”

(2) That means that someone who is very different from me or an idea

that is very different from mine or one of the issues of 2020 comes

in front of me like bait. Either I can sit there in my heart quietly

and without complaint and respond with humility and gentleness or

I can take the bait and my heart jumps with irritation and harshly

respond to them.

E. Interesting to note that two of these three qualities (gentleness and patience) are

fruits of the Holy Spirit. That means I need to depend upon the Holy Spirit to

produce this in my life and when these attitudes are not present that is evidence

that the Holy Spirit is not in control of my life

II. Conclusion

A. I remember as if it was yesterday when God was first challenging me about my

impatience with those who had different ideas than mine. My heart was in the

habit of jumping up out of its seat and being irritated and sucked into a divisive

argument.

1. I remember going to a meeting knowing that ideas will be expressed that I

did not agree with and knowing the tendency of my heart to jump and be

sucked into a divisive argument.

2. I prayed for hours before that meeting that the Holy Spirit would control me

and I would not be sucked in and jump out of the seat of my heart.

3. God supernaturally did it and I remember coming home so excited because

the strong difference of opinion came but I did not jump out of the seat of my

heart. Instead, I responded with gentleness! The next morning I woke up still

amazed and rejoicing in what God did and I remember that God tapped me

on the shoulder and said, I do not expect that from you for just one meeting

but rather as part of your lifestyle every day when encountering people and

ideas that are different than yours!

B. That drives me to depend desperately upon the Holy Spirit moment by moment to

have “a fitting lifestyle that fights for unity by tolerating others!