The sermon by James Lundquist titled 'Grow Up Into Christ-Our Head' focuses on the spiritual maturity of believers in Christ, using Ephesians 4 as a foundational text. Lundquist emphasizes the importance of growing beyond spiritual childhood, where believers are vulnerable to unstable doctrines and deceit. Through humility and reliance on God's Word, believers are urged to mature into the fullness of Christ, who is the head of the church body. The sermon highlights the roles of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers in equipping the saints for ministry and edifying the body of Christ. A key point is the interconnectedness of truth and love, which fosters genuine growth and stability within the church. Believers are encouraged to be rooted in Christ's love, truth, and to work together as a unified body, each contributing their unique gifts for the growth and edification of the church.

I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with long suffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit just as you were called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore, he says, when he ascended on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men. Now this, he ascended.

What does it mean but that he also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the one who ascended far above the heavens that we might, that he might fill all things. And he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effect of working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love. Amen. Well good morning.

Continuing going through Ephesians Ephesians four Today we're going to be finishing up a sentence that started in verse 11. Let's pray first. Our God is, we look at these verses, it's one way, it can be easy to think this is not me, I'm not a child anymore. And you tell us to no longer be children, but God we're not what we will be. So humble us.

Humble us to hear what you are teaching us. And God please grow us. Christ our head please nourish and feed us during this time. God, please, I beg you to overcome any deficiencies in my notes, anything that may come to mind that doesn't need said, and bring words that need said. And please, Holy Spirit, no words can be preached without your power for them to be effective.

So please, make these words effective, especially what we read from your Word, which is pure truth. Effective for growing your body. Thank you. Jesus' name. Amen.

So in verses, like I said, we're finishing a sentence. In verses 11 through 13, one of the focuses was how Christ has provided people to equip the saints. Saints are Christians. People that God has given. As we saw, He has given apostles and prophets through the Word of God.

He's given us the Word. He's given pastors. He's given teachers to the saints to equip them for the work of ministry and the edifying of the body of Christ, the building up, the growing of the body, which is really the focus of this section, the maturing of the body, the maturing of all of us who are saying to our Christians, that's His body. And In verse 13 last week where we ended, we read, "'Till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.'" We are to have unity of faith through our maturing, through our growing in Christ by our perfect God who we are being conformed to. And today in verses 14 through 16, we finish this sentence and we see the danger in not growing up, the danger in remaining children and not maturing.

We see our perfect God that we are being conformed to. We see how to grow up and the source of our growth. So you see there I've got three points. Let's look at number one. Let's look at verse 14.

Verse 14. That we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. We have a first here. Not many of you noticed this, but after several months in the first three chapters and through almost half of four, we have a first. We have our first do not.

Our first no longer. That's significant. Look at all the foundation that's been laid by God through Paul to get us to this point. This is the first time and we're going to get plenty more after this. But this is the first time we have this.

Now this no longer be children. This is about spiritual children. I think we should know that. It's about spiritual children, not about physical children. Although this example of physical children is going to help us look at what this means to no longer be spiritual children.

Now, you say this, although it says no longer be children, it's a great thing to become a child of God. All of us, if you're a Christian, All of us were saved, when we were saved, we were saved as babies in Christ. As children in Christ. And that's a great thing. It's a great thing to be a child in the faith.

It means you're saved. But it's just the beginning, it's not the end. That's what God is telling us here. And it's a danger to stay there. We're being warned and we're being exhorted for our safety, for our growth, for the safety and growth of others, for our brethren.

Remember John 3? I don't know how long it's been since we've been in John now, how long ago John was. But John 3, Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. You had to start off as a baby in Christ. This imagery of a new birth, this little babe in Christ.

When we think of babies, we've got babies here, fantastic, amen, but that's what we tend to think of. When we're talking about babies in Christ, hey, it could be a 10-year-old, it could be an 80-year-old, it could be the person who thinks the most well-off, the most famous, the most intellectual. When you become a Christian, you are a baby in Christ. And you have to be humble about that. Know where you are.

And it takes humility. Especially if you're around a lot of other mature people, if you're wanting to get up there and wanting to do this and do that, but one, you need to be warned who you are in Christ, but you also do want to mature. You want to mature. You've been born again. You've got this new life, you've got this new heart, You've got this new soul, you've got this new mind, new attractions, new motivations, you're a baby in Christ.

Let's use though the physical, what we know about babies, what we know about children, to help us understand what it is to be a spiritual child and why it's dangerous to be in that position. So start thinking about children. Consider what characterizes babies and children. How much discernment do they have? None.

None. They don't have any discernment. They really don't know what's dangerous and what's safe. They're easily influenced, right? Easily influenced, easily deceived.

They're unstable, especially when they're, right? When they're a newborn, we have some newborns. They're newborns, they can't even keep their head up, they hold their head for them. Then they start to crawl but they want to walk and how many times do they fall over? Even when they're trying to crawl or walk, they're unstable.

Even as they get into one, two, three, four, five or so, they think they can do some before they're falling off a bike, they're running off things, they're unstable, They don't have self-control. You start off with no knowledge or you have very little knowledge, but even the knowledge they have, They don't know how to apply it. They don't have wisdom. It's dangerous to stay in that state, isn't it? For a child to stay in that state.

Think of this also about children. Everything's about them. So selfish, so self-centered. They need to be the center of everything. Entertain me, I need to entertain.

Oh, who's gonna play with me? I'm so bored, who's gonna play? I need to play, I need to do this, I need to do that. They're attracted here and there, right? Oh, here's something good and attract, Oh wait, wait a second, I got this over here.

Oh wait a second, they just go here and there. They're attracted left and right to other things. What's going to give me happiness right now? Huge swings in temperament. Huge swings.

One moment the world couldn't be any better. How great it is and they're going to tell you how awesome it is. With the snap of a finger, the world is just awful, horrible and they're crying and wailing. We know this about children. We know this about children.

And children face dangers, unawares, and so do spiritual children. God, like physical children, put parents, Lord willing, spiritual Christian parents that want to train their children the way they should go and help mature them, mature them as they grow. And the same with spiritual children. There are dangers. And God as a kind Father is warning his children of the dangers of not maturing.

We see, first of all here, the danger of being tossed to and fro, as if on a rough sea. They're unstable. They do not have the experience of how to navigate that rough sea. They're just tossed to and fro. Wherever it takes them, they go.

It can be rough. They don't know where they're going. They may not care where they're going necessarily. They're being tossed about. And then he adds, with every wind of doctrine, carried away with every wind of doctrine, every teaching, every instruction, they have none or they're lacking the ability, these children of Christ even at this time, they are lacking the ability to discern what is truth and what is not truth.

They are hearing some new teaching over here, oh that sounds good, oh no, now some instruction over here, now maybe that is what I need to dig into, no that is what I need to dig into, And they can be all over the place. And they can be up here. Oh, life is so great. I'm saved. Oh, wait a second.

These trials. Man, oh, what do I do with that? They're tossed to and fro with all this doctrine. They can be tossed to and fro with all kinds of diversions. And it can be very easy.

And churches, There are churches out there that recognize this, so what do they do? We need to make it more attractive for these people. We need to make sure we entertain them. We want to make sure the sermon is not too long, where they don't get too bored. Instead of maturing them, we need to go down to their level.

God says that's dangerous. That is very dangerous to stay there that. And it's very dangerous. Specifically, it gives us reasons why. Tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting.

There are people inside and outside of churches that are scheming how to use trickery, how to use cunning craftiness and deceitful plotting to take advantage of you. There are. There are. And this is a father being so kind to warn his children, no longer be children. You must mature, or you will be taken advantage of.

Now he's writing to the Ephesians, right? This isn't the first time that Paul has warned the Ephesians. You can turn to Ephesians 20. You want? Ephesians 20, Paul is saying his goodbyes to the Ephesians and especially the Ephesian elders.

He's been exhorting them. And then he gets to verse 28. He says this to the elders of this church in Ephesus. Therefore, take heed to yourselves and to all the flock. He's not putting the elders any higher than the rest of them.

He's saying, you need to take heed of everybody. Take heed, I'm going to warn you, be careful. Among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to shepherd the church of God, which he purchased with his own blood." So Paul is laying out why, the importance of this. Who are these people? They're not just any people.

The church is people that have been redeemed, purchased by the blood of God. What a high price. You need to take heed to them. And now he warns them, for I know this, that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock, so that's coming from outside. Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after themselves.

These wolves will infiltrate the church with their friendliness. They may be well liked. They can be pastors. They can be members. While inside, they're ravenous wolves just waiting to pick off the weak.

What are they doing? In church, we're a body. Talk about this more later. We are a body to help one another. I don't want you at this point to think, boy, if I'm mature people, you need to grow up.

You need to grow up. And we're a body. We're going to get to that. We're a body. We're here to help one another, to care for one another.

Just like we would watch out for each other's children. There was somebody out here, somebody in here getting ready to pick off one of your children, any one of us would be right there to protect them. You'd be thinking the same thing to help mature them and grow them. And I also want to be clear, I'm not talking about people, right? Let's just not get a mindset where if somebody's questioning or somebody's arguing about something, all of a sudden in your mind you're like, I wonder if they're a wolf.

No, we need to be able to have good, hard conversations. You need to be free to ask questions of one another, especially your pastors. Hey, I don't understand this. Hey, I'm trying to learn this. I'm trying to learn how to apply this to get wisdom.

Those are not the people, the people that are earnestly trying to learn, even though the conversation may sound hard or harsh at times. We need to think the best of one another. Not looking out for wolves and thinking that everybody's a wolf around a corner. I just think back on our ten years here. I may not be thinking deep enough, but there have been a couple times, but there's no time I can really think that there was a wolf in our midst, that any of the pastors ever had to just go and kick out.

I don't think that's ever happened. There's been some protections of the flock here and there from books and other things that we've talked about, that we've warned about. Jason and I were in homes, and I know there's a couple times I've been in people's homes where I saw a book they were reading and said, hey, here's what's wrong with that book. It's not just that it's slightly off. No, this person's a heretic.

Let's get that influence out of the house. I highly encourage you to. And some books from the pulpit that have been mentioned. And of course pastors are the easy ones to talk about out there. Joel Osteen is the world.

That's not what we're talking about. Joel Osteen is not going to come in here and sway anybody. I hope not. That's not what we're talking about. These are ravenous wolves, cunning, cunning to deceive.

You just look over back in Ephesians 6 verse 11, part of the beginning of the armor of God, put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil, the scheming of the devil. You need this armor of God. Now, as a child, what do I do with this armor? What do I do with this armor? You need to mature to even know how to put on this armor, how to use this armor, how to apply this armor.

You need that wisdom. You've learned a lot about scripture, But you need help on knowing how to apply it. There's so much here you may have memorized a ton of it growing up even. But you need to mature in how to use Scripture for protection of you and the rest. Because he's sitting there scheming.

Scheming. This is intentional trickery. This is intentional cunning craftiness. Deceitful plotting. Lying in wait to deceive to hunt you down.

Now For a healthy church, there should be children. There should be children, spiritual children. There should be this nice cycle of spiritual children, of people being saved. We pray for it every week here on a Wednesday night. You pray for it in your own homes, for your own children, for family, extended family.

We're wanting spiritual children. And then people that are on the path, as they're getting mature, none of us will be complete until we die or Christ returns. So there's always a level of maturity that's coming along. And we need this cycle. Jason and I and our elder means more often than not lately, we are praying.

One of us is going to pray For whoever else is going to be elders in this church, because I guarantee you, 10, 15 years from now, we're both not going to be preaching. Pretty confident of that. Who are the ones being matured to become those preachers, those teachers, those pastors? Who's going to be those? And so we're praying for the maturity.

We're praying for that. But it is healthy that there are children. We want children. We want new converts. 1 Peter, 1 Peter 2 and in Hebrews 5 have a similar theme.

1 Peter 2, verse 2, As newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby. Then in Hebrews 5, 12-14, for though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracle of God. And you have come to eat milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness and in truth, for he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who are full age, mature.

That is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. It takes a mature person to get weaned off of milk. Milk is good for the child. The child grows a lot, especially in that first year, primarily on milk. That's good.

They may even learn, a spiritual child that first year, you may come in with a lot of head knowledge, you may learn a lot of knowledge about the truth, the truth comes from God, we'll get to the truth here in a little bit, but they need to learn how to apply, they need to learn how to get understanding, get wisdom, think Proverbs 4 when you hear that. One of the benefits of sequential exposition that we do going through books of the Bible is nothing is skipped. It helps mature all of us on seeing these connections, hitting all these topics, seeing these connections, learning how to apply, and you mature then in the whole counsel of God. So there we see it is dangerous to remain children. Point number two.

Point number two. Just the first part, first phrase in verse 15. Go back to 14. We should no longer be children, tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking the truth in love." I titled this point, How to Grow by Truthing in Love. I'll get to that real quick where I got that.

By truthing in love. We're not to remain children, but, so there's a contrast here on what we are to be. I'm going to answer this in three questions. First is, what does it mean to speak the truth? What does it mean to speak the truth?

So although this includes actual speech, that doesn't get to the heart of the word. Remember when we were in the Ten Commandments. You see the Ten Commandments, it would be, Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not covet. And we always started each one of those by, okay, here's the surface, Here's the surface. And then there was always something deeper.

As you learn through scripture, you look through scripture and saw the heart of God with the complete holiness of God's command meant by that. It's the same here by speak the truth. It's the same thing here. Now every translation says speak. Every translation says speak.

It's interesting, but every commentator that knows Greek says, it needs to be tightened up a little bit or expanded. Harold Hohner, you've heard Jason quote him many times, a Greek scholar, for every verse he gives a literal translation, which can be helpful. I've read some literal translation Bibles, they're tough to read. That's why we don't have literal, why we don't use that. It's tough to read hard.

But it's helpful. The literal translation right here is, but rather being truthful with love. But rather being truthful. It also means, but rather be true. But rather being truth, but rather truthing in love.

The word literally means, The word speak literally means truthing. And so if you were to read this, but truthing the truth in love is the literal translation. But truthing the truth in love. Right, this is speaking, thinking, doing, being truth, and motivated by truth to be truth. So there it is.

What does it mean to speak? Let's broaden our thoughts on this. Question number two, what truth are we then to speak? What truth are we then to speak? What is this truth?

In John 17, Jesus prayed, sanctify them by your truth. Who is he praying to? The Father. Sanctify them by your truth. Your word is truth.

That sets the standard right there. Sanctify them by your truth, your word is truth. Truth is defined by God through His word alone. Word alone. It is the standard for truth.

This phrase, my truth, is a lie. We hear it a lot these days. There is no such thing as James' truth, Jason's truth, your truth, anybody's truth. There's only God's truth. That is the standard.

My truth, your truth, we can disagree, but if we disagree with God then neither of us has truth. There's no such thing. God's truth is the standard. When you hear the phrase, my truth, run, or argue it with the person, let them know, what's the basis of that standard? We can't live with seven billion standards of truth.

There's one standard of truth. Sixty-six books of the Bible. Our standard of truth must start and end with the word of God or you will be tricked and carried away. You will be. I don't care how mature you are.

You will be tricked and carried away. We talk about truth just to be a child of God, just to be saved. At the minimum you know the truth of the gospel. Repent and believe that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and no one comes to the Father but through Him. You need to know the basis truth that you have to know and everything, I'll just give you some basic ones and everything comes off of this, that Jesus is God, that He came to life as a man, He's eternal God, came to life as a man, to live the perfect life in our place that we couldn't because we were told to live perfect as He is perfect, and then He died the death we deserve, taking the wrath of God for our sins, a complete sacrifice acceptable to God, died, was buried, rose from the dead, ascended to heaven, and is returning again.

You must know that basic truth. Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, none of my works is a gift of God. Christ is our solid rock, sure foundation, chief cornerstone that is critical to stability." I just said a bunch of things about truth there. None of them, I don't think none of them you can accuse me of promoting reform theology. You should be able to get to the bottom of the truth of scripture, especially in evangelism, without even having to have any kind of reformed doctrine necessarily come out of your mouth.

And telling people they have to think about the sovereignty of God and things like that. But you get there. You can get there eventually, right? But still, Listen to the basic truth. To know truth.

To really know the truth. I don't care how long you've been in the faith. We all have to humble ourselves. To be taught by the apostles and the prophets. When we think apostles and prophets, you must think the Bible.

You must think the Bible to be taught by God through His Word. Paul tells Timothy, hold fast the pattern of sound words which you have heard from me in faith and in love which are in Christ Jesus. Hold these fast. What truth are we to truth? What are we supposed to be living?

What are we supposed to be speaking, thinking, meditating on? This truth. The truth of the word of God. 2 Peter 3, 16-18. Starts here, backing up a little bit into 15.

Paul, as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him has written to you, as also in all his epistles speaking in them of these things in which are some things hard to understand. I'm not standing here saying it's all easy to understand. There are some hard things to understand that we need to discuss, that we all get matured into. There are things hard to understand which, listen, which untaught and unstable people, now you can be taught and still unstable because you refuse to listen, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction. As we saw in verse 14, there are people very willing to help you twist to your own destruction.

They do also the rest of scriptures. You start twisting one piece, that's a slippery slope and you twist it all. You tell me what you can take out of here and you'll be fine. As soon as you start taking one piece out, then that gives you complete ability to take anything out. You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, since you've been warned, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked.

But, here's how you protect yourselves, how you protect your brethren. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and forever. Amen. Grow in the grace and knowledge, the truth of Jesus Christ.

And where do you get that? From scripture, from the Bible, from the Bible alone. Then back in Ephesians, back in Ephesians 6, I don't know when we'll get there, but we'll get there eventually, but in 614, stand therefore having girded your waist with truth. What's the importance of girding your waist, whatever you gird your waist with. That's where you have your sword of the Spirit.

What is the sword of the Spirit? The word of truth. We see later on in Ephesians 6, you're girding yourself with truth, with the word of God, and that girding is where you hold the sword, right? You're holding the sword, which is the word of God, the word of truth, and it's holding everything together. It's keeping everything where it needs to be.

Gird yourself with truth. And he specifically points out, is the word of God. You are girding yourself. Not my truth, not your truth, not your neighbor's truth. It's the Word of God, God's truth.

That is the standard bearer for this. To do this, we must hear the Word. We must hear truth preached. We must trust the Word of God, read the truth, study the truth, memorize the truth, meditate on the truth, pray the truth, sing the truth. We all know singing is such a great memory aid.

Seeing the truth, how many of us know so much Scripture because of Steve Green, right? It's fantastic. But anyway, seeing the truth, obey the truth, talk about the truth, be truthing. Be truthing. Be truthing.

This is our protection. This is how we mature. This is how we grow. So then question number three. Now, how do we speak?

How are we to be truthing in love? Lay the foundation now. So what does it mean to be doing this in love? Speaking the truth in love. We all know how misused that is.

Hey brother, hey sister, you know I love you, but I have some hard things for you, but I'm just speaking the truth in love. I'm just speaking the truth. I do love you. I'm just speaking the truth and love. And there is some of that sometime that's needed.

But we need to know how to do that well. Usually that's not well. Martell Lloyd-Jones, I think helps us here, I believe helps us here, because I'm going to quote him. It says, the truth must never be approached with intellect only. If my heart is not moved by the truth, if I do not feel it and its power, my spirit is wrong.

Something in me that's wrong. If all I'm doing is I'm just trying to correct or help people based on my pure intellect. Oh, look how smart I am. Really, it's a selfish motivation. He continues, truth must produce passion.

Now, I almost took that out just because when you hear that truth must produce passion, what are you thinking about? We can be thinking about lots of different things when we talk about or pray about. Would people have this passion for Christ or be a passionate Christian? What are you thinking? Martin Louis Jones, I would not call a passionate man by that he was just flamboyant or voiceless or raising his hands and all that.

No, he was very calm. He was a doctor. He was a medical doctor. He was very just level-headed. Right?

He could raise his, we hear his preaching. He can raise it a little bit, but it's not much. Right? But so be careful with that passion word and what you think that means. We're all different.

Truth must produce passion and in a truly Christian profession there is emotion and feeling. A truth which is only held in the intellect becomes hard and arid and dry. And a man of whom this is true can never speak the truth in love. In love is done, that ends the quote, In love is done with humility and compassion. You were a baby once.

You may still be and think you're mature. In all areas, there are some areas where we're closer to being a babe than we are mature. You are a babe, you've been wrong, you've had major blind spots revealed and it will continue. Paul prayed for this, prayed for us in this, prayed for the Ephesians. If you want to flip over to Ephesians 3, 14 through 19.

For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with might through his spirit and inner man." Think growth, that you would be growing, that you would be matured in your innermost being. That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith that you being rooted and grounded in love." See how these are so tightly interconnected. So tightly. Truth and love. I want you to see this.

And love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height, to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." So we are to no longer be children, but rather grow and mature in speaking truth and love by feeding on God's Word of truth, being rooted in Christ's love. I want to make this connection between truth and love and give you some help on speaking in love. And of course, I can't leave this section without quoting something from 1 Corinthians 13, right? So let's look at 1 Corinthians 13, 4 through 6, where this connection is made so obvious for us. Love suffers long and is kind.

Love does not envy. Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in truth. Truth. Say this first, if you're having a hard time on either side of this, if you're having a hard time with joy in your life, rejoicing, might be because you don't know the truth that you should be rejoicing in. It might be because you just don't know truth well enough, and you need to grow and mature and get help on that.

And humble yourself that that might be the source of your lack of joy, lack of rejoicing. It's right there. You're rejoicing truth, wherever truth is. Whether the truth is from a new Christian, from somebody who has been a Christian for decades and preaching for decades. You are rejoicing the truth wherever it comes from, especially from the Word of God.

Truth and love are so intertwined here. He has love and rejoicing in truth. So how do you know if you're speaking the truth in love? Start with your motivation. Why am I talking to this person?

I'm going to use this primarily as how we're speaking, but how we're acting, how we're living, how we're being, how we're proving truth, how we're truthing. What is your motivation? Is it just to stop people from annoying you with their questions, with what you think they should be doing or acting, because you think their growth is too slow, to show off your knowledge of what you think you know? Are you too easily offended? That might be the problem.

You're just too easily offended and you don't want to give time to this. You're not thinking the best of others. You're not trusting the Holy Spirit with their trajectory. That's especially true between husbands and wives. There's a lot that husbands can come down hard on wives on, instead of gently leading and trusting the Holy Spirit, trusting God with His daughter.

It's his daughter. Husbands are his son. Wives that make nag. Before you speak, what does your heart, mind, soul, strength say about your love of God. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.

Before you're going speaking and as you're observing and looking at the way you're truthing, the way you're living, look at your motivations of your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Is it to God first, then love of others? We must desire the good of others. Before you ever correct somebody, have you ever encouraged that person before? Before you think you've got, well, I'm going to protect this person.

What have you ever done to encourage them, to build them up, to edify them? We're talking about brethren here. Brethren. It's going to take time for them to trust your observations. So prove your love through careful care.

Have you ever wept with that person? Have you ever rejoiced with that person? Where's that been? It takes practice. When I say practice, I don't take practice on me speaking to you.

It takes practice on me speaking to me, truthing to me. That's the practice I need first. It takes practice. Does your life demonstrate truth or just how to speak it? You've got this knowledge.

Are you praying for them? There's several times in the last several months that especially some men have come and asked for some advice, some counsel, and you hear what they're doing. And the question that comes out of my mouth is, have you prayed for her? Have you prayed for him? Have you prayed for yourself?

How much of you are depending on God? Sounds like you may just be depending on you. You're frustrated and you're annoyed. Maybe God's really working on you. It is a real situation.

Let's start there. Start there. Sometimes hard speech is necessary. We know that. Rebuke, correction.

We see that from Jesus. Yeah, we see it to the Pharisees, but that's not the point of this. Point is to Christians. We see Jesus to Peter, we see Paul to the Galatians, we see these things, but don't be known for it. Be known mostly for encouragement how God is growing others for loving truth.

Now let's take this last section, verse 15, the end of 15 through 16. Labeled as the source of growth, Christ our head. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body join and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effect of working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love." There's a lot of phrases here. Martin Lloyd-Jones, I'm thankful when a guy like Martin Lloyd-Jones says this is one of the toughest passages in Scripture. So I'm just going to unwind it a little bit, try to be short on this, and be concise to help us here with all these phrases.

What belongs to what and how do we think of it? Let me just give you an upper level summary here. We are the body of Christ, knit together by Christ, growing into Christ, who is our complete life to mature and mature one another. The focus of Ephesians has been In Christ, in Christ, in Christ, and it doesn't change here. Although we see us here, we see us fitted together, we see us nourishing one another, joined together, this is still not about us.

This is about Christ. What He is doing and has done. So this first phrase here that we may grow up into all things into Him who is the head, Christ. He's the head from whom the whole body. Now think about your physical body.

Without a head, you have no life. You have no life. Your body can go just fine, relatively fine, without an arm, without a leg, without some parts of your inside even, right? When it comes to the head, your body can function without even some of the eyes, right? Without your eyes functioning, your taste, your smell, and without your hearing, you're not able to talk.

But you get rid of your head, your brain, your spinal cord, you're dead. You're not alive. Same with the Christian. You're only alive because of your head, Christ. That is it.

That's why you're alive. The head is the source of all knowledge, all feeling, all activity. It directs every part of the body and coordinates every part of the body. If your head's not working well, if my left hand said, I want to be a right hand, that doesn't work too well. If my left foot said, I want to be a right foot and I'm going to work, and they fight with one another, It doesn't work too well, does it?

And what controls that? My mind. Now, when we look at our body, we know there are diseases, there are illnesses, there are all kinds of things that would make that out. But when one's working well, right? So then we look at Christ, who is perfect.

And He moves His body perfectly, matures His body perfectly, has His body exactly the way he wants it. Perfectly. There's no life-giving head, there's no church, just dead people headed to hell. Eternal wrath. From our head we're all joined and knitted together.

Back in Ephesians 2, we've seen this, 2.21, and a different analogy with a building in whom the whole building being fitted together grows into a holy temple of the Lord. Paul is continuing this teaching. Now this being joined together, from whom the whole body is joined and knit together, it's joined, I love the KJV here, fitly joined. Not just joined, but fitly joined. And we see this knitted as well, right.

You, this gives the idea that you are being shaped, you're being molded, you're being crafted to fitly join with the rest of the church. Not just rubbing in a tough rub, no, you're being fit together, Knitted together. You've seen something that's knitted. There's a lot of people here that can knit. You've seen things that are knitted together well.

Wow, beautiful. Beautiful. It's held together. And you take any one of those stitches out, you cut one of those out, the whole thing is gone. It unravels so fast.

They've been knitted, you've been formed, you've been shaped, knitted together. Jesus saves you, He shapes you, He puts you into the body where He wants you knitted with others. He doesn't save and wait for your maturity to knit you. Understand that. You are saved and you are immediately, Just like we talked about the Holy Spirit a few months ago, you're immediately sealed.

Here you are immediately fitted, knitted into the body of Christ. Every saint, every Christian is in the body where he wants you. Christian, you're not your own, nor are you to be on your own. For yours and others, good. You have gifts and you are a gift to the church for maturity, everyone.

Now I was so tempted, I'm not doing it, but I really believe this is a strong passage for church membership. You can look at this in two ways. You can look at the body of Christ definitely as the church body, the universal church body, but we also know there's little bodies, right? Part of the big body, right? Am I knitted with Mala in Malawi?

Yes, I am under Christ. But how well are we able to encourage one another right now? Or let's just go somebody I don't even know that's in Afghanistan, or in England, or in Mexico, or in California, right? Right? Not the same way I'm knitted with you.

You're knitted with me, us with one another. Anyway, that's enough on that, but I believe we can make a real strong application for church membership here. Let's continue. By what every joint supplies, by what every joint supplies, the NIV I think gets us closer to right to the literal translation. When we think about every joint supplies, I might think, okay, I'm supplying you, I'm supplying you, I'm supplying you, it's up to me, all that.

The NIV, every supporting ligament, every supporting ligament supports every part. We know that Colossians is a great complementary book to Ephesians. And we see this also in Colossians 2.2 and 19. So let me start in 2.2. That their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love.

So now we're back to love. Now we're back to this love. And attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding. Now let's bring in the unsearchable riches of Christ to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ. Let's bring in truth now.

We have love, We have truth, we have the riches of God's grace. And in verse 19, and not holding fast to the head from whom all the body nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments grows with the increase that is from God. So what are these ligaments? What joins? What supports?

What unifies us? It's the truth of the Word. It's the truth of the Word. It's this love that we have for one another because God loved us first. And it's also the source of nourishment that's coming from our head, coming from our head to each of us through his word, but also through the people that God mentioned in Ephesians 4 verse 11, right?

The truth of his word, apostles, prophets, your pastors, other teachers. And we have the phrase, according to the effect of working, by which every part does its share. Each part, each person, knit together, has a place, has work, and needs to do their part. No matter how old you are in the faith, no matter you are saved right now during this message, during this church service, whether you've been saved for decades or anywhere in between, you have a place in the body of Christ. You have work to do in the body of Christ and You need to do your part.

You are formed and fitted for your place as a gift to the body for the growth of the body by Christ. He has given you a function and equipping you for the work of ministry, for the edifying, for the growth of the body of Christ. We saw last week in verse 12, you are being equipped to serve, you have a part, no matter your maturity level. Do you know that? Do you believe Because Christ says that about you.

He says that about you. I said it a few weeks ago when we preached on this. If you're struggling with knowing, where do I fit in? Where do I help this church? Come ask me.

Ask Jason. I'll help you. I'm serious. I thought after I said it a couple weeks ago, I was just on the spur of the moment. I stood up and said something about it.

I actually went home and said, you know, I need to think about this in case people come and ask me, can I really pull this off? And I can. I'm confident I can pull it off. Anybody here that's a Christian, I am pretty confident I can pull off how you're a gift to this church, how you're a gift to the body of Christ. I'm pretty confident Jason could too.

You are. God didn't save you to not be a gift. He didn't save you because he didn't think you were worth saving. He didn't save you just to sit you on the sidelines. You can sit on the sidelines.

I've got James, I've got Jason, I've got other older men and women, I've got other people here and there. If your thought of being gifts to the church is only about preaching, no. Only about being a deacon, no. Different ages, men and women, different circumstances. We all have life experiences to help out.

We know some pieces of knowledge that we can apply with wisdom better than the others. We're all there. We're all there. Let me finish by going to 1 Corinthians, back to 1 Corinthians 12, in this case. We'll read verse 12 in the beginning of 13, then go to verse 22.

For as the body is one and has many members, But all the members of that body, being many, are one body, so also in Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body. All means all. We have all here twice. That's all of us that are Christians that have repented and believe in Christ alone for salvation.

All means all. You're part of the body. And then verse 22. Love this. So helpful.

No, much rather, those members of the body which seem weaker are necessary. You think you're a weak gift? You may be a weak gift. You may be a weak member. God just told you you're necessary.

God just told you you're necessary. God just told you you're necessary. Everybody here is somewhere between weak, new, mature, confident. Maybe they need to be a little more humbled. Right?

Everywhere here is somewhere between there. And God just said, the weakest of the weak is necessary. You're necessary to the body of Christ. He wouldn't have saved you if you weren't. We're all nourished from the same head.

I don't have any special nourishment you don't have. I don't have any special access to anything you don't have. I may have different giftings. I have some different giftings than you have, and I am so thankful you have different giftings than I have. This church would not function with a hundred elders very well.

Ask the deacons how it can be sometimes just two elders. You're so gracious. I've said it so often. You're so gracious with both of us. We're so thankful for how gracious you are.

He is the head from which is all of our sustenance. He feeds. He nourishes. He leads. He protects.

Christ teaches and grows each part in the right place to do its share, to edify and build it up in love. Application. Applications. It's application today. One.

One. Question or statement. Your spiritual growth is vital to you and for the body. You need to be thinking that way. I need to be thinking that way.

I need to be thinking about that way for myself and as the application that Jason raised last week, we need to be thinking about how we're equipping you to serve for the ministry. Because it's vital. It doesn't stand on any one of us. It's vital for the protection and the growth in Christ. All of us are still maturing, and we're going to continue to mature.

You're not going to be fully mature until you die or Christ returns. That's what it is. Understand that. Know that. Be humble about that.

Be humble and don't think more highly of yourself than you ought. Romans 12, don't think more highly of yourself than you ought. Which shouldn't be much, unless you're thinking about what Christ has done in you. Then you can boast in Christ, boast in your growth through Christ, boast in His cross, boasting in Christ, and be humble about what you brought to that. Nothing!

You brought your deadness. Be humble about who you may think you are, to help one another. You need to view each member of the body as a gift to you and you to them, as we are shaped and joined and grown by our head into our head who is Jesus, who is the Christ. And this will motivate us in our truthing and love to one another. We'll be protected.

We'll be no longer children. As God brings more children, they will be matured as well. By God's grace, by His care, by His protection. Next week in verses 17 through 19, we're going to see who we are not anymore. Who we are not anymore.

It's really a continuous theme of maturity, the new section. So let's pray. Our God, thank you for your Word, your truth. God, may your truth be our standard for everything. Without it, we have nothing.

We have no life without You. The truth of You, Jesus, You are the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father. There's no recreation. There's no babies in Christ.

There's no babies in Christ without you, O Christ. Much less talking about maturity. There's nothing to mature if we're not saved first. God, thank you for knitting and forming us together. What careful care you've given that you have paid the price to fitly join us together and knit us together.

And you feed us and you nourish us through your truth and through your gifts of one another. Oh God, help us to see, make us to see each one here as necessary. Each one you have saved especially, and save more. Build this body more God. Build this local body more.

Build your universal church more through saving more. Please, you have grace for grace and can nourish and strengthen them all. And you will. Thank you for your word. Amen.