Christ Loved the Church - August 25, 2024 - Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 16) - Text: Ephesians 5:22-33

Because of the gifts our Lord has to give to us in our text for this morning, I am compelled to begin with three points of introduction. First, although our text begins with verse twenty-two, I believe, as some commentators suggest, that verse twenty-one might be a better beginning to this text. You may, or may not remember, we ended last weeks reading with this verse, which were words that flowed out of Paul’s exhortation to be imitators of Christ. As Paul says, “21submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ” (v. 21). Second, I also want to begin with the last two verses of our text because I believe they will help us frame our Lord’s Words through Paul this morning. Paul concludes this section by saying, “32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband” (v. 32-33). Paul is giving us an image of how husbands and wives should be in the marriage relationship. He does this by giving us an image of Christ and His relationship to His Bride, the Church. So, as we will see, our relationship as husbands and wives should mirror our relationship as a Church to Christ. And third, I believe the word which is translated in many Bibles as “submit” and has been translated as “obey” might better be translated as “subordinate.” The word in our text is hupatasso and is a term of ordering. In other words, and this is why I believe verse twenty-one should be included. We might read verse twenty-one as, “ordering yourselves under one another out of reverence for Christ.” If we could each live our lives putting Christ and others first, what a joyous life we would have. If husband and wives could begin by putting each other first, what a joyous marriage they would have. My prayer, as I believe Paul intends, is that hopefully you get the idea that the purpose of our text is to show us how much our Lord loves us, enough to set up good order for us so that we will feel safe and secure as His dear children, in our homes and in our Church.
 

As we move into our text we see Paul first address wives, we read, “22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands” (v. 22-24). The first and main reason that wives are to be, and throughout our text this morning I will use the word subordinate, the first and main reason that wives are to be subordinate to their husbands is because of their love and subordination to the Lord. It is a response of faith. Logically then, the first reason for objection to this subordination is that the wife does not subordinate herself to the Lord.
 

The second reason wives are to be subordinate to their husbands is because the Lord has made the husband the head of the family. God did not do this out of meanness or chauvinism but simply for the purpose of good order. God knows that families, like businesses and governments, do not work well with two or more leaders. He also knows that good order is needed to prevent chaos and anarchy, thus in His infinite wisdom and love for us He has given to us good order and according to that good order He has placed the husband as the head of the family. The tough part is that even those husbands who give up that God given responsibility will still be held accountable for their families.
 

The good order which God has given to us is not just a random order, rather it is the order of creation. In Genesis God tells us that He created the man, Adam, then He made the woman as a helper suitable for the man, then He gave them children. God has made parents responsible for their children and He has given the husband the ultimate responsibility for the family as a whole.
 

One last reason Paul tells wives to be subordinate to their husbands is the example of how the church is subordinate to Christ, likewise he says, wives are to be subordinate to their husbands. When the church goes off doing things not in accord with God’s will, then it has problems as we see happening in many of the denominations of our world today, likewise, when a wife strays from God’s will and usurps the authority not given to her and is insubordinate, there are problems.
 

Next Paul moves to the duty of the husband, he says, “25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30because we are members of his body” (v. 25-30).
 

The first order for the husband is to love his wife just as Christ loved the church. At first this might not seem like such a tall order, but when we remember how much Christ loved the church we realize that this is a difficult thing, difficult because Christ loved the church so much that He died for her. Husbands, then, are to love their wives so much that they are willing to give even their lives for their wife.
 

Jesus died not only to bring forgiveness to the church, but also to bring new life and holiness to her. Paul is talking about our sanctification, our becoming holy and Christlike, which had its beginning at baptism and will have its completion in eternity. Jesus has given us new life and He sends us His Holy Spirit to work in us so that we might become more and more Christlike until we reach perfection in heaven.
 

Continuing with this washing imagery, Paul tells us that husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies because he knows that everyone takes care of their own body. The basis for Paul’s statement is from the quotation of Gen. 2:24 in verse thirty-one. When a man and a woman marry they become one flesh, thus as the husband takes care of his own body he is taking care of his wife who is a part of himself.
 

Because Christ loves the church He gives it good order, likewise because He loves the family He gives it good order. A marriage has one head. If a marriage had two heads it would make a monster, a freak. Please understand, there are two orders going on in God’s Word. There is the order of creation and the order of redemption. According to the order of redemption, male and female are equal, in other words, God has redeemed men and women equally. Both were sinners and now both are saved. Yet, according to the order of creation, the husband remains the head of the family for the purpose of good order. And he will be held accountable as such.
 

In verse thirty-one Paul says, “31‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’” (v. 31). Paul’s quote from Genesis reminds us of God’s gift of marriage, that it is a gift of one man and one woman who are united for life. Marriage is not two men or two women. Marriage is not one man and two or more women or one woman and two or more men. Marriage is not a group activity. Marriage is one man and one woman. A man will leave his father and mother, which is usually easier for the man than the parents, and he with his wife will form a new family unit.
 

He will be united, joined or, glued, literally yoked, like a pair of oxen, to his wife. Specifically, Paul is speaking about a sexual union which is between a husband and a wife and only between a husband and a wife, with this union making the two one flesh. Within and only within the bounds of marriage has God given us this gift of sex. When sex is kept in the bounds of marriage then it is a good thing, it is a joyous thing, and it gives glory to God.
 

There is a stress on the two becoming one flesh. This is for the purpose of chastity, fidelity, enjoyment, and procreation. Unfortunately what God has given us in good order and for good has become something very misused and abused in our world today and we can easily see where things have lead. This misuse and abuse of God’s gift of sexuality is easily seen in the facts of the AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases epidemic, the number of illegitimate children being born, the number of unborn children being killed, the LGBTQ and trans-sexual agendas, and the complete disrespect of Holy Scripture itself.
 

Is it possible for us to renew the sanctity of marriage in our world today? How can we put marriage and family back in its proper place? Well, as always, by ourselves we cannot do any such thing. It is only with the Holy Spirit working in and through us that we can even begin to make an effort at returning to the good order our Lord has given us. We begin by realizing that God gives us all things, spiritual, physical, and emotional, including marriage. Everything that we have is a gift from God. Because everything we have is a gift from God we use it in such a way as to give glory to His Holy Name.
 

We realize that one gift from God is the gift of good order, not chaos and anarchy. We shun this gift when we make excuses for our behavior such as, “We’re living in the twenty-first century,” as if that makes a difference, or changes how God gives us His gifts. We shun this gift when we simply ignore or refuse it. We shun this gift when we think that a person’s job or the wages they bring home is what gives worth or value to that person, rather than Jesus’ blood purchasing us and giving us our value. We shun this gift when we throw out the Bible as a gift from God and teach some other value system based on our own human opinion. We shun this gift when we make any excuse, and all kinds of excuses, as to why God and His gifts are irrelevant in our lives today. What is so interesting is that after we have shunned His gifts for so long He may just give us what we want, and unfortunately, it is when we get what we want that we realize that it is not what we want and then we blame God.
 

Thanks be to God that He gives us His Holy Spirit in order to throw off the ways of this world and helps us to follow His will. It is the Holy Spirit who moves in us to help us to realize that God’s Word is just as relevant and just as important to us today as it was when He gave it. He moves in us to bring us to faith in that Word. He moves us to see how He gives us good order because of His great love for us, not because He is prejudice against one sex or another. He gives us blessings upon blessings because of His great love for us, a love that had its completion in Jesus giving His very life for us so that we could be given all these other good gifts and blessings.
 

And so, in His gift of marriage, God gives us an image of the relationship of Christ to His Church and in Christ’s relationship to the Church He gives us an image of marriage. As the Church, we are the Bride of Christ, thus we are not to go awhoring after other gods, which is adultery and which is idolatry, but we are to be and remain in a one flesh union with our Creator, Redeemer, Preserver, God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Christ shows His love for His Bride, the Church, by giving His life for us. He washes us through the waters of Holy Baptism. He robes us with His robes of righteousness. He makes us His own and strengthens and keeps us in faith through His means of grace.
 

Today our text celebrates God’s gift of marriage and Church and His many gifts to us. In the church Christ gave us His example in that as its leader He humbled Himself to being its servant. Likewise, in marriage we are to humble ourselves as husband and wife and we are to humble ourselves to being given God’s gift of good order for our lives and our families so that we might ultimately give glory to His name. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Personal Renewal - August 18, 2024 - Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 15) - Text: Ephesians 5:6-21

Our text for this morning is a part of what my Bible titles as “Practical Ways to Fulfill God’s Purpose in the Church,” and subtitled, “Renewal of Personal Life.” Paul’s theme in his letter to the Ephesians is best summarized by chapter two verses eight and nine, “8For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Eph. 2:8-9). And with that stated, Paul moves on to talk about the complement of that, which is how that is demonstrated in our lives in verse ten, “10For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10).
 

Scientists spend a great deal of time and a lot of money to research where we came from and how life came about. Scientists search the heavens above, the seas below, and the fossil remains of long ago looking for the answer to the question of how life began. Anyone who can read can pick up a textbook today and read how plants germinate, how animals reproduce, and how humans are conceived, but all of these explanations merely explain the process of what is happening, what is going on today. None of these books tell where life comes from, or how or why life began. For those answers one must read the Bible where it is simply stated that God created all things. Life is no mystery, life is a gift from God. We may never fully understand the how, but we can know the who.
 

In our text for this morning Paul does not even address the issue of how, where, who, why, or even what, probably because for him that is a given. Paul does, however, allude to the fact that this gift of life here on earth is not for an eternity, but is in fact for a very short time. Putting our time spent here on this earth into the perspective of eternity, we begin to see and understand that we are here on this earth for only a very short length of time. The average life span is about 70 years. Some people do live to be 100 or a little older, the earth has been around for over 6000 years, and compared to eternity, we can begin to see that our time on this earth is very short indeed.
 

Paul begins by reminding us of how we were, at least how we were from conception and before being given faith, and how we are now that we have been given faith. He says, “6Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. 7Therefore do not associate with them; 8for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light 9(for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), 10and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. 11Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. 12For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. 13But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, 14for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, ‘Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you’” (v. 6-14).
 

The Christians at Ephesus were sinners and we have a hint at some of their sin, especially as Paul talks about exposing the things done in secret. How true it is that most often sin is done in secret, or in what is perceived as secret. Sin is done in the dark in order to hide the sin. Paul reminds the Ephesians and us that we cannot hide our sin. Understanding that God is light and as John tells us in His Gospel that Jesus is the Light of the world who came into the world to shine in the darkness, certainly we understand that all sin is exposed by God and even judged by God.
 

Yet, even though we know that sin is sin. Even though we know that God will expose our sin, still, the Old way of life continues to be an attraction. Temptation and sin abound in our world and continue to attract us to itself. Paul exhorts us to not be smooth talked into sin. In the Old Testament reading for today we hear Solomon personify wisdom. In other places he personifies evil and sin and warns against falling for the smooth talk of such evil.
 

Paul warns us against temptation and sin and even more he exhorts us to rebuke those who do sin. This does not mean we are any better or to think of ourselves as any better than those who sin, simply that we are to care and love others so much that, recognizing sin, we are to rebuke such sin. And as we have said before, there is a difference between recognizing and even rebuking sin and judging someone. We can and should recognize sin because God tells us what is sin, but we are never to judge and really we cannot judge, only God can judge.
 

As Paul says, the ultimate exposure of sin will be by God on Judgement Day. And on Judgement Day God will indeed judge sin and unbelief. With this ultimate exposure of sin in mind, Paul tells us how we are to live.
 

Because Paul knows that we are here for a very short time he tells us in verse fifteen, “15Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise” (v. 15). What is unwise living? Let me say that I am not here to judge anyone on whether they are living wisely or unwisely, because I know that I do not always live wisely, but I would like to give you a couple ideas to think about. Do you have a goal for your life? What is it? What is your purpose for being here? Or are you living life aimlessly, one day or one week at a time? It is unfortunate, but many people in our world do live one week or should I say, live for one weekend at a time. For many people life means making it to the next weekend. For some people, and there are times when I must include myself in this category, some people live as if life will begin when I get through a certain stage of my life. For some people, especially those who are suffering from some long term illness the thought is that “if I can just get through this illness then I can live my life again.” What we forget when we have such thoughts is that each day is precious and is a gift from God and should be lives as such, even in times of suffering.
 

It is especially during these difficult times and times of struggle that we need to be reminded of Paul’s words in verse sixteen of our text, “16making the best use of the time, because the days are evil” (v. 16). Now most of you have heard this motto in our world today, but spoken slightly different. It first hit the scene in the old Schlitz beer commercials of, “You only go around once in life so you have to grab for all the gusto you can,” or something like that. But the idea is still there, make the most of every opportunity. However, I do not believe that the beer commercial had the same thought in mind about what the opportunity was that Paul had in mind. In our world, many people believe in only one existence, the one on this earth, which means that after death you are nothing so you had better do something in this life to make your mark, to make a name for yourself, or simply to enjoy yourself, because there is nothing after death. But for us Christians we understand that there is life after death and that making the most of every opportunity means something different than going for the gusto. Making the most of every opportunity for Christians means bearing witness of our faith with every opportunity. You may have read it put this way. “Pray like everything depends on God, then work like everything depends on you.”
 

In verse eighteen Paul goes on to contrast being filled with the spirit, small “s”, and being filled with the Spirit, capital “S”.  Paul says, “17Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. 18And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit” (v. 17-18). Lest we misunderstand and think that Paul is prohibiting the drinking of wine, let me remind you that it is this same Paul who tells Timothy that a little wine is good for the stomach. What Paul is saying is that wine to the point of excess, drunkenness, leads to debauchery. And so we do not think Paul is merely speaking of drunkenness in this text, if we look at the word debauchery and its intended usage, we can see that Paul is speaking of anything to excess. So, with drunkenness we could include one of our favorites, gluttony, that is, over eating, and we would include sexual immorality, and in general any lack of discipline or self discipline.
 

Contrasted with being filled with debauchery is being filled with the Spirit, that is with the Holy Spirit. Being filled with the Holy Spirit leads to living a life to the glory of God. Being filled with the Holy Spirit leads to what Paul describes in the last three verses of our text, “19addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with all your heart, 20giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, 21submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ” (v. 19-21).
 

Life is our gift from God. That is how it all begins. Remember when we have talked about our purpose in life. God created us for a purpose, in order to love us. Now, think back with me for a minute if you will. Remember that big word from catechism class, the word justification. Justification is a very fitting legal term used to describe our relationship to God. Before God, in and of ourselves we are guilty and deserving of eternal life in hell. But, by God’s grace He sent His Son, Jesus, to live for us, to take all our sins upon Himself, to suffer and die for them. He then rose victorious over sin, death, and Satan. Now by faith in Him, faith which the Holy Spirit works in our hearts, we are justified, we are made just and right before God. Again, borrowing an idea from a friend, being justified means that by faith we stand before God “just as if I’d” never sinned. That is what justification is all about and it has already all been taken care of in Jesus.
 

God created us to love us. We mess that up, time and again. God stepped in and in the person of Jesus and in the power of the Holy Spirit, giving us forgiveness and faith, He has recreated us for a purpose and that is to do the good works which He has prepared in advance for us to do. So that we might well say that what we do with our life, our gift from God, is also His gift to us. Think back again with me to confirmation class of another big word, sanctification. Unfortunately, it was too often implied that sanctification is something we do. Justification was said to be what God does and sanctification was said to be what we do. Actually, again, understanding our nature, understanding that every inclination from our heart is evil, we cannot even do sanctification by ourselves. Thus, we rightly understand sanctification, and for that matter, we rightly understand Paul’s words to us this morning by understanding that our sanctification is also a gift from God. Sanctification means the act of becoming holy. Because of our justification we are no longer what we were before, completely lost and condemned creatures, but we are not yet what we will be in heaven, complete saints. We are in the process of becoming holy each day. We become holy as Jesus has His way with us. And Jesus has His way with us through means, namely through our daily family and personal devotions, through our daily prayers and reading of God’s Word, through our attending Divine Service and Bible class, through our coming to the Lord’s table as often as we can to be strengthened in our faith. We do this as a response, because of, all that God has done for us, not because we have to, but because we want to, because the Holy Spirit moves us to.
 

Living in the sanctified life we are careful how we live, we do live wisely seeing every opportunity as an opportunity for the Holy Spirit to work through us because there is evil in the world around us. Living the sanctified life we are not foolish, but we do understand what the Lord’s will is, that is that we do not live undisciplined lives of debauchery, drunkenness, gluttony, or immoral, but we live lives filled with the Holy Spirit. Living the sanctified life we worship together regularly building one another up through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. We sing and make music with our hearts always giving praise and thanks to the name of Jesus. To God be the glory for Jesus’ sake. Amen.

To Each One Grace Has Been Given - August 4, 2024 - Tenth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 13) - Text: Ephesians 4:1-16

In our Old Testament reading for this morning in the midst of the grumbling and complaining, in the midst of the sin of the children of Israel, we see God provide for them by raining down manna for them to eat. In the Gospel lesson we see God, in the person of Jesus, provide physical food for the people to eat, in order to satisfy their physical desire and hunger. You may have noticed the people were not too interested in the spiritual food the Lord was giving, simply in having their stomachs filled. In our Epistle lesson, our text for this morning we hear God provide for the distribution of spiritual food in the giving of the office of Holy Ministry for the distribution of the gifts of God through the means of grace as well as in the teaching of the saints in order that they might be able to be vessels for the distribution of the gifts of God through the means of grace. As we are reminded, every good and perfect gift comes from above. And we may notice that God provides these gifts, even in the midst of our sinning and refusing and rejecting the gifts He has to give. To each one of us God has abundantly poured out His grace on us, giving us all the good gifts and blessings He has to give, even giving us to be able to respond to that grace by, with the help of the Holy Spirit, living our lives according to His good and gracious will. With that in mind we move into our text and read how Paul tells us this bit of good news.
 

We begin at verse one of our text. Paul writes, “1I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—5one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” (v. 1-6). This is quite a tall charge Paul puts before us. As Christians we are to live as God’s humble servants. As Christians we are not to boast about our great faith, rather we are to humbly serve others while trying to help build each other up as brothers and sisters in the Lord. And of course, as Paul well knows, we fail miserably in this task. We simply cannot be the people God calls us to be. We are conceived and born in sin. We daily sin much in thought, word and deed. As our Lord reminds us, every inclination of our heart is evil all the time.
 

Paul also talks about the unity of the Spirt as well as the fact that we have one Lord, one faith and one baptism. There is much talk going on in our world today about denominations uniting with other denominations. Even our own Missouri Synod is continually in talks with other denominations in the hopes of reaching what we call altar and pulpit fellowship. And here I might add that the word fellowship has been so misused, even by myself at times, that it has become a misunderstood word, especially in the church. True Biblical fellowship is that fellowship which has its basis in faith in Jesus Christ alone. Outside of faith in Jesus Christ alone, we cannot have true fellowship with anyone. Getting back to our text, Paul does not tell us to go out and try to unite with others, rather Paul tells us that as Christians we are in union with one another. This fellowship is not something we strive for, it is something we have through faith in Jesus Christ. Notice that Paul says we are to “maintain the unity.” We are to work to maintain what is already there.
 

At this point two definitions are in order. The first is to define the word “orthodox” which means to be true to the faith and teachings of the church. The second word is “heterodox” which means to not be in agreement or parting from the true faith and teachings of the church. Because we are sinners and because we live in a sin filled world, there are no true, 100%  pure orthodox churches.  Not until we reach heaven will we again have true 100% orthodoxy. Meanwhile we strive to keep our teachings as pure as we can. Personally I believe that our synod, at least up until recent times, is the closest to pure doctrine, otherwise I would be elsewhere.
 

With those two definitions established we move on to see that Paul does not advocate unionism, which we might define as an outward human unity, rather he advocates that we have a unity in Christ. In other words, we have two things going on in our text. We can strive for a human unity, this is an outward unity, which is not necessarily a unity of teaching but instead is really a false unity. This is what we get when we have sinful human beings working for unity. On the other hand, we have what Jesus gives to us and that is a true unity. This true unity is not something that we see, but is what Jesus gives and is in our hearts. This true unity is based on a purity of doctrine, in other words, true unity is not based on human compromise and democratic vote, but true unity is given to us by Jesus and is maintained by, in as much as we humanly can as sinful human beings, working to keep the teaching of the Bible as pure as possible. Here again, apart from Christ, His Word and teaching, there is no true unity.
 

Continuing on with our text, Paul explains from where this unity comes, reading at verse seven, “ 7But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. 8Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.” 9(In saying, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the earth? 10He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) 11And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers” (v. 7-11). In these verses, once again Paul reminds us that everything comes from God especially all our spiritual gifts. God has given each one of us grace according to our need. Paul is not necessarily speaking of the grace of forgiveness, we all have that and more, rather he is speaking of the office of Holy Ministry. And notice here that there are not many ministries, but only one Ministry.
 

So Paul reminds us that our church workers are gifts from God. Our church workers are not people we hire and fire according to our own whims. Our church workers are not people we treat with disrespect and contempt, even if we disagree with them. Our church workers are people for whom we pray; they are people for whom we give thanks; they are people we support and encourage.
 

Moving on to verse twelve, Paul continues to tell us about our church workers and here I will just speak about pastors. Paul says that in particular, pastors are, “12to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13until 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” (v. 12-13). Our pastors, the pastors of our churches, are called to equip, that is to teach the members to do works of service. Yet, our pastors are not to merely teach others what to do, they is to work side by side with the members of the congregation. They are to lead by example and by on the job training.
 

And here, let me speak of myself as your pastor, I am to prepare you, God’s people, for works of service. This is like the old proverb which says that if you give a man a fish you feed him for a day, but if you teach him to fish you feed him for a lifetime. Likewise, if it is left up to me to do all the work then very little gets done, but if I am able to teach you how to do the work, then over 300 times as much gets done. And we can all readily admit there are those who are doing their part as well as those who are not.
 

Together Paul reminds us that we are to build one another up. Rather than wasting our time bad mouthing other members, especially those who absent themselves from Word and Sacrament, we are to spend our time building each other up. Instead of talking bad about the brother or sister who is not here, why don’t we call them and see how they are doing, or if there is anything we can do for them, again, as some of you are doing. And I will remind you, this caring is not the job of just the pastor or elders, it is the joy of us all to encourage and look after each other as brothers and sisters in Christ.
 

The ultimate goal Paul places before us is that we are to strive to attain the whole measure of the fullness of Christ, which we will not attain until we reach heaven. The whole measure of the fullness of Christ is perfection, that is why we will not attain it until we reach heaven. Until we reach heaven we do strive, with the help of the Holy Spirit to become more and more Christlike. We do this by being in Divine Service and Bible class, by having family and private devotions, by being in the Word and by partaking of the sacraments. And by encouraging others to do the same.
 

It is our being in the word which will move us to be as Paul describes in the last verses of our text, “14so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love” (v. 14-16). As we strive to strengthening our faith then we will not be confused by every nice teaching that comes from other church denominations as well as our society. Then we will be able to distinguish between what is from God and what is from the world. Then we will be better equipped to maintain a unity of faith that is a true unity, based, not on outward human thinking, but based on the pure teaching of Jesus.
 

We strive for strengthening of faith so that we will better be able to speak the truth in love to our erring brother or sister. We strive to strengthen our faith so that with the help of the Holy Spirit we might stand firm in our faith, so we do not falter, so we do not compromise our faith, and so that we might bear witness to the importance of our faith as a witness to our brothers and sisters in Christ, which, again, will help maintain a true unity of faith.
 

We strive for strengthening of faith so that we will grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. In other words, we work together as individuals to build up the body of Christ as a whole, not through compromise or democratic vote, but through the one true Word of God.
 

We strive for strengthening of faith so that we will be able to each do our part. As usual, by ourselves we can do no good thing. Thus, we continually pray for the help of the Holy Spirit to work in and through us so that with His help we might be able to do the good works which He has prepared beforehand for us to do, to the praise and glory of His Holy Name.
 

So, what does all this have to do with us? What does this mean? It means that first we realize that we are and continue to be sinners. It means that we realize that Christ has given us everything. It means that we especially realize that it was through the cross of Christ that He has given us everything, including forgiveness of sins, faith, life and salvation. It means that we realize that our unity of faith is only accomplished as Jesus has His way with us, not as we have our way with Jesus.
 

It means that we never compromise our faith nor do we ever flaunt it, rather we live it humbly to the glory of God, with the help of the Holy Spirit. And so, finally it means that we praise the Lord for all His good gifts and blessings.
 

Once again we see the hand of God moving in our lives. Once again we see that God is doing it all. God gives us life at our conception, He gives us faith and new life at our Baptism, He gives us forgiveness of sins, faith and strengthening of faith through His usual means, the Word and the Sacraments, and He gives us His Holy Spirit who works through the Word and Sacraments to  move us to do good works, to live our lives according to His good and gracious will so that God’s kingdom might be extended, so that we His people might be strengthened in our faith, so that we might be able to do good works, and so that praise and glory might be given to His holy Name, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.