Unity of the Spirit

In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. Next on In Touch, unity of the Spirit. Sin divides, it separates, and it splinters. If you look in the very beginning of the Scriptures, what do you find? You find sin separating the first family from God. Then you find it separating that first family from the Garden of Eden. And all down through the centuries, from the very beginning of time, sin has been a separator, a divider, and a splinter. And that is exactly what salvation is all about. Because it is God's purpose in life to reunite mankind with himself and with each other. In fact, when you talk about reconciliation, for example, when the Bible speaks of reconciliation, Paul said that God was, in Christ Jesus, reconciling the world to himself. Reconciliation means bringing back into a right relationship that which was estranged and separated from God. And I want you to turn, if you will, to Ephesians chapter 4. And I want you to notice what he says, and we'll read these first six verses. He says, I therefore the prisoner, chapter 4 now, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord entreat you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you've been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing forbearance to one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Then he says, there is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were 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 all. Now, there's some other verses throughout verse 16 that he deals with the same subject of unity and the Spirit. Now, sometimes the word unity can be a bad word or misused,

and sometimes it can be a good word. If unity means that everybody agree about every kind of thing, no, that's not what we're talking about. And in the very beginning, I want to be clear about something here. First of all, all of us know that we live in a fallen world. And that is we have the awesome power of God on this side, and then we have the great power of Satan over here. And God and Satan are at odds and are in a battle for humanity. And Satan, with all of his powers, doing everything he can to wreck this world and to wreck God's kingdom and to wreck God's program. God will absolutely conquer. But until the day when Jesus Christ comes and wraps this whole thing up and cleans up all the mess that Satan has created, we're going to live in a fallen world. And we're not only living in a fallen world, but we live among evil and wickedness and violence of all types. Not only that, all of us who are the children of God have been saved by the grace of God through the shed blood of Jesus, also are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and therefore we have a different nature. And so when we are born again, we became a new creature in Christ. But what that does not mean, it does not mean that God took away all of our naturalness. That is, when the Bible talks about flesh, if a person, for example, maybe you're a new believer and you wonder, what in the world do you mean flesh? Is that flesh and blood? No. When the Apostle Paul talks about flesh, he's talking about that humanness, that is, that naturalness. We have five senses. We can still be tempted. That is, it's that part of us that has a feeling at times that we want to do what we know is not right. The other part of us wants to do what is right.

And so that part of us that does not want to do the right thing and be obedient to God is what we call our naturalness. And so all of us have that. So in light of what Paul is about to say in this passage, you have to remember two things. We live in a fallen world, number one. Satan's always working. He's working not only among lost people, but he's also working among saved people. He's working in the business world. He's working in politics and education and science. He's working in every aspect. He's working in the church. He's working in everybody's life he possibly can. And in light of all that, the Apostle Paul says in this verse, he says, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Now, let's look here and see the basis of all of what Paul is saying here about being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit. He says, now, one body. What in the world does he mean by that? When the Bible talks about the body, except when it's referring to a physical human body, it is referring to the church. Here's what he's saying. In the local body, that is in the church, in the body of Christ, the body of Christ cannot function properly unless each part of it is doing its part. Here's what that means. There's no such thing as an unimportant member of a church. Every single member is important. And you'll notice that there are three locations discussing the gifts. First Corinthians chapter 12 happens to be one of them, talking about the gifts that God has given to us and that each person is to function according to their gift. And so the body is to function together, oneness of mind and heart. It does not mean that we'll always agree about everything,

but it means in our spirit, we are marching together, walking together, the same sense of direction and the same purpose. That's what he talks about when he says one body, that's what we are, one body. Then if you'll notice how else he says, go back to that same list again now. He says that we are one body in Christ. Then if you'll notice, he says we are one spirit. Now, what does he mean by one spirit? Simply this, that does not mean that there are not lots of spirits out there, there are lots of evil spirits. And you recall that in the second chapter of Ephesians, in the second verse, Paul talks about the spirit of this age, the age in which we live, it is an evil spirit. And listen carefully, people can have evil spirits, believe me. They can have evil spirits and no person can be, no person who is a believer, who's in development of the Holy Spirit can be possessed by the devil. You can't be possessed by the Holy Spirit and possessed by the devil. They may be harassed by the devil, they may be agitated by the devil, they may have all kinds of problems in spiritual warfare, but you can only be possessed by God, not God and the devil. Now, there are many evil spirits,

but there is only one Holy Spirit. And that Holy Spirit is a person of the Trinity. When I think about some sect that I'm thinking of right now who does not believe in the Trinity and that does not believe in the Holy Spirit, how in the world are you gonna live a godly life when you ignore, ostracize an absolute and total unbelief about the person of the Trinity who lives on the inside of you to enable you to live the Christian life because there's not a single person who has within him or within her the strength to live the Christian life apart from the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit who came to enable us to live the life that we're to live and to do the work that God has called us to do. It's an absolute impossibility. So when I meet one of those persons, I said, I'm telling you right now, friends, you're doomed to failure. What do you mean? I said, you're doomed to failure. You can't live the Christian life because nobody can apart from the Spirit of God and you deny his presence, deny that he's deity, deny that he's a part of the Trinity. How are you gonna live the Christian life? Cannot be done. Listen, it's tough enough with him, amen? Imagine trying to live the Christian life without him. He indwells us, he has sealed us, he is our guide.

He is the one who has sealed us for all eternity. And he's our teacher. You couldn't understand John 3, 16 apart from the Holy Spirit. We can't understand anything apart from the Spirit of God. That's why when you get saved, you say, oh, is that what that means? My, my, my, this book becomes an absolute fascinating book. Why? Because what happens is the Spirit of God opens your eyes and you're able to discern spiritual things. So he says there's one body, we're all part of it. We all have the same Spirit, one Spirit. Then what does he mean when he talks about one hope of our calling? Well, our calling is to salvation. Our calling is to life of obedience. Our calling is to life of holiness. But when he talks about it here, he talks about our calling, the hope of our calling. What is the hope of the church? Well, let me tell you what it's not. The hope of the church is not that one of these days we're gonna finally evangelize so well and do so good that finally everybody's gonna get saved. Do you know there's some folks out there who believe that? They believe that Jesus isn't coming until after the world has been redeemed. Well, well, well, thank God I don't believe that. Well, first of all, the Bible doesn't teach it.

You gotta do some real stretching of the scripture to believe that we're gonna finally get this world straightened out and then Jesus is coming. No, the hope of the church is, listen, the hope of our calling is that the Lord Jesus Christ is coming and going to rapture out of this wicked, vile world all of his believers and take us home to heaven. Then is when the judgment is going to come. And when you read the book of the Revelation, the promise of the judgment of God upon this earth, it isn't while we're here, it's after he has taken us away. The hope of our calling as believers is the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and our rapture. Now, when we talk about the body of Christ, we say we're talking about all the believers all over the world. If Jesus Christ were to come right now, it wouldn't make any difference where anybody is. We're gonna all be caught up instantly. And you see, there's not gonna be any partiality in heaven with God. He's gonna see us all as his children. He's gonna love us all as his children because we are part of the body. He says, in hope of, we have one calling. Then if you'll notice, he says, one Lord. Now, if I should ask you how many of you have one Lord, probably everybody who's a believer in you would raise your hand. But let me ask you this,

is the Lord Jesus Christ ruling and controlling your life? I do not mean that every single moment. He is that you never sin. I don't mean that but that your life is committed to Jesus Christ is Saviour and Lord You see the disciples you won't find them calling him Jesus. They called him Lord. They acknowledged his lordship They acknowledged his rightful places sovereign the one who had the right to control now Look, if you will in first Corinthians chapter 8 verse 5 He says for even if there are so-called gods little G whether in heaven or on earth so-called as Indeed there are many little gods little G gods and many Lords There's a lot of people that they're calling themselves God and calling himself Lord Listen to what he says yet for us There is but one God the Father from whom all are all things and we exist for him and one Lord Jesus Christ by whom are all things and we exist through him There's only one Lord and that is the Lord Jesus Christ This is the same Lord who will sit at the judgment Before which you and I stand not to give an account for a life to see whether we are saved or not But he is the Lord before whom we shall stand and receive our rewards for all eternity There is one body. There is one spirit There is one hope and as he says here, there is one Lord and that person is the Lord Jesus Christ himself now Not only one Lord, but he says one faith. Well, what in the world does that mean? Does that I mean don't we all have our faith your faith my faith her faith his faith No, what he's referring to here He is referring to if you'll turn to Jude look at the next to the last book of the Bible turn to Jude if you will and in Jude he identifies what I believe Paul is referring to here because in the New Testament days They had when the Apostle Paul by the time he came along and began to write these letters and began to teach They had a system of faith now listen to how he says it in Jude He says beloved while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation. I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you

Contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the Saints. Now, what is he talking about here? Here's what he's talking about He's talking about What you and I believe that is by the time the Apostle Paul came along what they believed about who Jesus Christ was His death his burial his resurrection Paul taught he talked about Justification reconciliation redemption. He talked about the atoning death of Jesus Christ He talked about the church our relationship to the church our relationship to each other our belief system our behavior That is by that time. There was a system of belief that there was there was a deposit of truth And that was the truth that they lived by and yes what he was saying He says I am appealing to you that you contend you defend you stand firm for what you believe There is only one faith and if somebody says well, what is the Christian life all about the Christian life? It's all about Jesus Christ. It is about our faith in him and our faith in him governs everything else We do we have a belief system. And so he says you to contend for that defend that Proclaim that but do not give up and do not let someone steal from you the faith that you have So when he talks about one faith, that is what he is referring to here in Speaking of one Lord one faith one baptism and so forth. Then if you'll notice he says Not on that. He says one baptism is aha aha coming to that one because there's more than one baptism so you may want to turn to 1st Corinthians chapter 12 for a moment and look at that and it goes in this 12th chapter and The 13th verse here's what he says For by one spirit the Holy Spirit we were all baptized Into one body where the Jews are Greeks where the slaves are free. We are all made to drink of one spirit now He says one baptism Now, what does that mean? Here's what it means When you and I were saved the Spirit of God placed us as it were in Relationship with Jesus Christ so that we become identified with him. We are his followers. We believe in him We are a part of him and he's a part of us He said now I'm abiding in you and you're abiding in me And so that is our spiritual baptism and that is that that is baptism Now what we do when we take people and place them up here in this pool and we physically baptize

What that is that is simply a physical That is a visible expression of what has happened before and that is we die to our old way of life We were buried baptized by the Spirit into Christ Jesus and now we walk in newness of life That is simply a physical expression. The Spirit of God placing us in Christ. That's gets us saved. And so, we're not talking about two baptisms, we're talking about, we're talking about an expression of what the real baptism is, which is the baptism of the Spirit of God that's placed us into Christ. You and I did not get saved by something we did, we were saved by responding to what God has done at the cross, and it was the Spirit of God who sealed us and placed us into Christ Jesus. So, when you talk about one baptism, that is what he's referring to. Then, of course, he says one God. Now, look how he says this, look how he says it. He says one God and Father. Listen, if you were a member of any other religion in the world, you wouldn't be saying that. You'd be talking about your God, most of all, oftentimes fear and uncertainty. But you and I can say, my God and my Father. And notice what he says about him. He is one God, a Father of all, who is over all, the sovereign ruler and controller of the universe. And he is through all, all that, listen, what he is doing in this life, he's doing it through his children. And he says, and in all, he's living inside of every single one of us. Look at the, look at the tremendous emphasis that God is placing on oneness, unity of spirit. There is not, listen, there is only one body, the body of Christ. There's only one hope, one spirit. He says there's only one hope in this life, and that is the hope that God has given us. One spirit.

He says all this, all this oneness, what is this? This one God, one Lord. What is he trying to help us to see? That you and I are a personal, vital, individual, loved part of the body of Christ. There's not a single person in here that's unimportant and nobody in here more important than the other. Now watch this. Let's go back to a couple of verses you probably thought, well, I bet you forgot those. Look at this. Look in verse two. Because what I want to talk about now, I want to talk about now the whole idea of what is required of me if I am going, listen, if I'm going to walk and if I am going to help preserve the unity of the spirit. Now the unity of the spirit is what God creates, but I do have a responsibility or he wouldn't have said be diligent to preserve it. So listen to this now, watch this. Every single Christian, doesn't make a difference who you are and where you are. Every single believer has a personal obligation to contribute to, to help maintain the unity of the spirit, the oneness of the spirit in the body of Christ. We all have a responsibility. Now here's what he does. What he does in this passage is he lists four, listen, he lists four characteristics. Look at that in verse two, with all humility and gentleness, patience and showing forbearance to one another in love. Now let's think about this for a moment. Watch this. How can I live in this body in such a fact that is in the body of Christ in such a fashion as to promote oneness and unity of spirit? Well, he says there are four characteristics you and I need. Now watch these.

First of all, he says humility. And that's the one characteristic. If you ever say I got it, you just lost it because you cannot have it and boast of it. Now what is humility? Well, this is the simplest way to describe humility, maybe so you can remember it. You know how to spell joy, J-O-Y. So let's make an acrostic, Jesus first, J, others second, and yourself last, J-O-Y. You know what humility is? Humility is that's the way I look at my life. It is Jesus first in my life, it is others second, and then myself is last. That is I put him first as a priority of my life, other people second, self last. Now a humble spirit says, well, Lord, here's my life and whatever you want to do with me, thank you for the sense of direction you've given me and I'll give my best and as diligently as I know how, and whatever you want to do with my life, that's up to you. If you want to exalt me, fine. If you don't, that's fine. And you see, a person who has the right spirit is never going to lord it over somebody. Listen carefully. Listen, if you do this, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. Anytime you do that to somebody, make them feel less than they are. If you think that that is good in any fashion, you've missed the point. God hates pride. He hates arrogance. He hates that kind of thing. We are all saved by the same grace of God and then do up with the same spirit and the spirit that hates pride in one person hates pride in another person. So he says, you know, if the, if the body is going to work together and the church is going to move forward, there's a spirit of humility. Then he says gentleness. Well, what in the world does gentleness mean?

Well, in some translations, the word is meekness and most people think meekness means what? Weakness. Where in the world did we get that? Because it sounds like. You know what meekness means? Here's what it means. It means strength under control. What is a gentle person? A gentle person is not a weak person. A gentle person is one who is strong and who is firm and who is not easily irritated, is not thrown off course, that can face difficulty and hardship and trial and scolding and criticism and false accusations and all the rest. And you know what? Not be blown off course, not be shaken, but stand direct and stand firm and thank God. Then he says not only gentleness, but notice what's the next word? Patience. Well, what in the world is he talking about here? We're talking about the body of Christ working together, moving together. What is he talking about when he talks about patience? He's simply saying a person who has the capacity not to rush in before God's timing, not to get ahead of God, to be able to stand the criticism, the hardship and whatever it may be and not retaliate, not take out vengeance, have the power to be vengeful if you wanted to, but you don't do it. Why? Because your faith and trust is in the Lord. Then when he talks about long suffering here, what in the

world does he mean when he talks about forbearance or which he's talking about here? Here's what it means. Let's put this in plain old Atlanta, Georgia English. You want to hear what that means? Here's what that means in plain Atlanta, Georgia English. It means put up with somebody who is obnoxious. That's exactly what it means. Put up with them. And all of us have seen people and met people, of course, not any time recently and naturally, but we've all seen people and met people who just somehow are just obnoxious. Well now, a person who is forbearing is a person who puts up with it. I think about, I used to have two little dachshunds and there was a big dog that'd come over in my yard. And my dachshunds, you know, they're just like hot dogs, and they were just about that high off the ground. And this huge dog with his big mouth, big Great Dane, he could have swallowed any one of them. My dachshunds would bark and just, I mean, just throw a fit. He'd just walk along and look at them like that and just keep going and just pay them absolutely no mind. That is being forbearing. Don't eat them alive, I mean, even though you could. And all of us know people like that. Well, how does the Body of Christ, how do we function and how do we protect the unity of the Spirit? We make sure that our own spirits is such that we don't think ourselves better than anybody else.

And that we're gentle in our responses to people and we're patient in whatever God's doing in the life of the fellowship. And we're forbearing toward others who are hard to deal with, hard to get along with. You can't, listen to this carefully, you cannot be in the will of God. And out of fellowship with a local body somewhere. Can't be. Because this is where we function together. This is where we encourage each other. This is where we become one. There are no lone rangers in the Christian life. I don't know about you, but I need you and you need me. We all need each other. And we join our hearts and our hands and our souls and our beings and our money and our time and our efforts and our gifts and our talents together and watch God do His wonderful work.