“Getting their act together”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Monday, January 20, 2025
Ephesians 4: 1-16 (Forward, p. 83) CEV p. 1224
In today’s passage the apostle Paul takes great pains to address what must be a presenting problem with the Church, the Christians, in Ephesus. It is their disharmony, their lack of unity and their quarrelling. (Does this sound at all familiar? The same disease infests and infects many churches even today.)
In his usual practical approach, Paul explicitly identifies several things they can do:
They should always be humble and gentle.
They should patiently put up with each other and love each other.
They should try to live at peace with one another.
In this, Paul appeals to them to be unified, and bases his appeal on several things:
They, all of them, were expressly chosen by God to be His own. And
so, they should live in a way that is worthy of this calling.
They are all part of the same body, the Church.
God works by using all of them and lives in all of them.
God has deployed various ministries, ministry functions, in the church
with the entire intent of helping them to learn to serve, grow up as a
church body and be strengthened, coordinated, and unified as a
group.
And, as if this was not enough, he reminds them of the unity which
already exists among them: one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith,
one baptism, and one God who is Father of them all.
So, what is the point here? How can we encapsulate this message in just a few words? I would say that Paul’s point is not to advise them to think about themselves less, but not to think of themselves—and their desires, ambitions, and agendas—at all, but to think solely about God and others and how we can best please, help, serve and love them. And to think of this with each church member that we meet! Oh! Easier said than done.
Forward notes: “One God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all” (verse 6).
“The Message adds another sentence to this verse that helps me see the implication of Paul’s words: ‘Everything you are and think and do is permeated with Oneness.’ Imagine what our lives, and what the world, would be like if we truly believed this, knew this to be true, and lived this truth out every day.
“If those of us who say we know and love God acted as though God was Father of all, above, through and in all—all people, every living thing on earth, the very earth itself—and that we are permeated with Oneness, how would things change? I think we can begin living this out by offering everyone kindness and compassion. This, then, grows into dignity and respect, which eventually evolves into harmony and peace and ultimately becomes simply Love. This is a world I want to inhabit. It begins with me, now and in each moment. May I live into the Oneness I know exists with God, my neighbor, and all things, and may you, too.”
Moving Forward: “What step can you take today to living into this Oneness?”
A concluding note: I think that today’s author has made something of a mental leap, something that is contrary and unsupported by Paul’s words. She is suggesting that the entire world, and all its people, are one, whereas Paul is speaking only of the church. I think that it is stretching it mightily to suggest that all the peoples of the world are one when some, at least, are working for evil and not for good.