Grace to Each for All

We continue on in our study of Ephesians this morning. We are at one of the most important passages in the Bible when it comes to those of us who are ministers of the Gospel.

Understand Grace:

"But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift." — Ephesians 4:7

Grace is one of the most enticing aspects of Christianity. All religions say do this and then you will be right with God. Jesus says receive the free gift of grace, and go and serve me. Do you see the difference? One is based on our effort, and Christianity is based on Jesus’ effort.

People can’t get past this sometimes, however. They’ll say, “what’s the catch?” “It can’t actually be this easy can it?” “I must have to do something right?” Yeah you do have to do one thing, acknowledge Jesus as Lord, confess your sin to him, strive to turn away from that sin, and then follow after him.

We are professional grace seekers, but are we professional grace givers? Ah. You see that is the hard part. It’s extending that grace to others that trips us up a lot of times. And every time we neglect to extend grace to others, we undercut the Gospel. You can’t receive the grace, and then deny it to others.

I have told you before that I am a recovering Pharisee. I got no problem speaking up and saying this is not what God’s word teaches. I got no problem judging people in my heart, but then I remember the words of Jesus judge not, lest you be judged. I need to remember God extended grace to me.

Now what I just unpacked for you was saving grace, but what Paul is actually talking about here is a grace gift. A gift given to you by Jesus for his kingdom. Those of you who are believers in Jesus Christ have a grace gift. A gift specifically given to you by Jesus for the building up of His church.

• How many of you have taken a spiritual gifts test? There are lots of different ones out there. Here at FBNO we take the PLACE test. I would encourage you to find me after the service, and I can make sure you get access to take the spiritual gifts test. Once we have your scores we then want to follow up with you and place you in a ministry where your gifts can best be utilized. If you have any interest in learning more about the spiritual gifts, we offer a class periodically called Grace Works where we talk about the different spiritual gifts and how you can be used in this church.

Those of you in this room who are followers of Christ whether you know it or not have a gift to be used in this church, and WE want you to use it.

 Be Thankful He Descended:

"He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things." — Ephesians 4:10

Paul references Psalm 68:18 in v. 8. We see many of the New Testament writers referring back to the Old Testament scriptures. And of all the Old Testament books that are referenced, quoted, or alluded to in the New Testament Psalms tops the list.

So here is what Paul does here: He references Psalm 68:18, and then in vv.9-10 he interprets what those verses mean to his audience. Paul is talking about Jesus here. Jesus left his home seated at the right hand of his father and descended to earth.

There is no greater sacrifice in the history of the world then Jesus leaving the comfort of Heaven to descend down to this fallen world. To be among a group of people who were not worthy to even be in his presence. He left the comfort of Heaven to struggle on Earth alongside of us. Tempted every way we were tempted, experienced fatigue, hunger, pain, and ultimately death. Every single thing that we experienced Jesus experienced. His descension into earth is the ultimate example of the grace that we do not deserve.

In the same way, his ascension back to Heaven is just as important. In Acts 1, he tells his followers that they will be his witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. If Jesus does not ascend back to heaven, then his Spirit does not descend in Acts 2.

• If you ever want to see the church at its finest, then you need to go read the book of Acts. They were so in tune with the Spirit that in the middle of Acts 5 we read about the disciples going and doing signs and wonders among the people. And Luke tells us that Peter was so full of the Spirit that people wanted his shadow to fall upon them. Even if they couldn’t get to him, if they could just be in his shadow that would be enough. What a picture of a spirit-filled life. That’s the new prayer for my life. When I read this a few weeks ago, I was so pumped. That we would all be so filled with the spirit that people would just want to get a glimpse of our shadow! That’s the goal right there brothers and sisters.

 Trust the Plan:

"And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry for building up the body of Christ." — Ephesians 4:11-12

Now Paul is very intentionally talking about those that are called to be in leadership in the church. God designed the church to have evangelists, shepherds, and teachers.

Let’s make sure that everyone is on the same page here. The church of Jesus Christ is the avenue through which God wants to bring glory to himself. There is no backup plan. The church is designed by God to have leaders that are called for the purpose of equipping the saints (those that come to church).

Here me loud and clear this morning if you do not feel equipped as a believer in Jesus Christ there are only two reasons for that

1. We as a leadership are failing you, or
2. You are not taking advantage of the equipping opportunities we provide.

Did you notice what word is left out of Paul’s description of leadership in the church? The missing word is disciple. I don’t know if this is intentional or not, and I think it would be stretch to say that Paul meant to do that, but I’ll make application of this on my own. I believe that Paul left this word out because everyone is supposed to be a disciple.

• If I were to come up to those of you that are believers in Jesus Christ and told you I know of a person who needs to be discipled through the basics of the Christian faith could you do it? Could you sit down at a coffee shop and walk them through what it means to be a believer in Jesus Christ? If you can answer yes to that question, then I follow up with this question are you doing it? And for those of you that are believers and would tell me that you can’t do that or don’t feel comfortable doing that I would tell you that you are not taking advantage of opportunities to be equipped or we as leaders are failing you. The reason Paul didn’t include disciple in this list is because everyone is supposed to be discipling. It is not just the job of the ministers that work at the church. It is the job of every believer clearly explained in Matthew 28.

You concerned about the growth of this church or the universal church then what are you doing to change it? The days of “if you build it they will come” is over friends. Programs and attractions wont grow the church of Jesus Christ, and God never designed that to be the method through which the church grew. The only true measure of the church’s growth is new disciples. I am preaching to myself just as much as I am preaching to you on this. 2 Corinthians 5:16 Paul tells us that if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation. What the church of Jesus Christ needs is more new creations. People who are transformed by the Gospel. That is the building up of the body of Christ that Paul is talking about here. New Creations!

So now you are asking how to get equipped here at FBNO? I am so glad you asked that question. I have already mentioned a very important way to get equipped here and that is by going through our GraceWorks class. Another way to get equipped is to join a small group. I know how many people we have in worship every week, and I know how many people we have in small groups every week. There is a gap in those numbers. I cannot overemphasize the importance of being in a small group. You will be encouraged, you will learn the scriptures deeper, you will share one another’s burdens through prayer. Let me share with you a statistic those that join a small group, community group, or bible study group, are times more likely to stay in the church than those that do not. Another way to get equipped is to learn to serve. We have Care Effect groups that go out into our city every week we feed the homeless, we teach at the prisons, we pack food for hungry children, we teach English classes, and in a couple of weeks we are taking anyone who is interested in connecting with veterans to our state of the art VA hospital to fill out the paperwork for ministering to the many veterans in our city.

• I can remember the one of the very first nights we ever had Care Effect. Ashley and I were feeding the homeless at the Wall, before we got shutdown there, and they moved us to the mission, and then they moved us to the Oz and we led that group for a year or so. One evening one of the volunteers at the Wall said hey I need you to drive this guy to his car and jump his car off for him. So there I was new to the city, after dark, taking some dude I never met to a dark alley where I jumped his car off. And I look back on that experience and it was an equipping experience for me. This person taught me that when we are called to serve there are no conditions on it. We don’t just serve during the day in a crowed place. We serve Jesus even when it might be scary and we don’t know what will happen.

The church of Jesus Christ is not going anywhere friends. You can be critical of it, you can blame leadership, you can make excuses but there is not another plan for bringing people to faith in Christ. So you need to decide how important it is to you. No church is perfect. They all have their warts. I want you to be a part of what God is doing at FBNO.

Aspire Towards These Qualities:

"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." — Ephesians 4:13

“Until” is a conjunction. Meaning it connects one part of a thought to another. So the “until” in v.13 is connecting what Paul previously said in vv.11-12.

God gave all of the different roles in v.11 to equip you in v.12 until we accomplish everything in v.13.

The things that are important to Paul here are unity first. That is that we are on the same page in what we want to accomplish. Now the church was given a very clear mandate by Jesus himself in Matthew 28 so ideally we should all be unified to Go and make disciples, baptize them, and teach them.

Second is knowledge of Jesus. How well do you know him. We need to be really careful when we speak of Jesus in a general way. When you speak of Jesus back it up with his actual words from Scripture. Don’t just say the Jesus I know wouldn’t do that. Show me where you know that he wouldn’t do that. Everything that you say about Jesus or that you know about Jesus comes from the Gospels so if you are gonna say Jesus wouldn’t do this or that prove it. Line it up with what we knew about him from the Scriptures. Continue to grow in your knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Maturity with the measure being the fullness of Christ. In other words, we have an entire life to mature in Christ and even then we will never attain the fullness of Christ. So brothers and sisters in this room, no one has arrived. No one has nothing left to learn, no one has it all figured out.

I went to a football game last Saturday night in Atlanta, GA. I wont tell you who was playing for fear of persecution, but this was a game that was sponsored by Chick-fil-a. So because of that there was an opening prayer that took place before the game started. They do this at Pelicans and Saints games here too. The man who gave the opening prayer at this game was Ernie Johnson Jr. remember him? The man I told you about who adopted the kids from Romania. He gave a beautiful prayer, and often times when groups ask you to go and pray they tell you to keep it vague. Use the word God instead of Jesus things like that. Well, there were obviously no restrictions at this prayer because Ernie closed his prayer by saying “to the name that has saved so many people, including myself, the name of Jesus. Amen. And 72,000+ people that evening heard Ernie Johnson say that Jesus is the one who saves. A chill went up my spine as he said that. There is no other name by which we can be saved.