These first verses of Ephesians chapter four, provide an environment that is crucial for understanding a Spirit-filled environment. And an environment is not so much a program that is needed but an atmosphere. An atmosphere is the sum total of physical, social, spiritual, and relational components that determine the overall health of individuals and communities (air quality can kill you but so can loneliness). And a key feature of that atmosphere, the Apostle tells us, is unity.
What brings unity? How do people become unified and what does that look like? The earliest Christians and even Jesus himself focused a lot on unity, which given the current state of disunity within the church and our world is both ironic and a pressing concern. It can feel so elusive. Well, the Apostle Paul believed whole heartedly that one of the main jobs of the Spirit was to make us one. And truth be told, that might be the greatest miracle that we might ever witness.
Be – When we are one, we all have things we need to be, vss. 1-2.
4 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
Our Spirit-filled ethic is itself unity and unifying. In other words, the Holy Spirit wants us to be one and seeks to transform our lives through relational practices. So our ethic isn’t gendered - men aren’t asked to behave in a way that women aren’t also asked to (though, it’s interesting how these behaviors might be classified as feminine). Both men and women are “called” to be this way and both have the same Spirit. Our ethic isn’t elitist determined by vocation or education. Paul isn’t here talking to one type of person or position. It doesn’t matter if you are an apostle, prophet, pastor, teacher, evangelist, welcomer, pew sitter, Ministry team leader, praise band member or deacon. He’s talking about a way of life in which we understand that we are all “prisoners of the Lord” and act like this: “completely humble and gentle, patient, bearing with one another in love.” Friends, that’s the what of unity and the how. The list isn’t meant to be exhaustive but it does clue us into what is significant (and perhaps to what isn’t). Humility, literally means “lowliness of mind” and reminds us of who we are. We are not the masters of our domain or our fate and we didn’t call ourselves. We don’t know everything, don’t have all mysteries figured out but surrender to the One who loves us and redeems us and to each other. The second disposition, gentleness, was the very pattern of Jesus’ existence (Phil. 2:6-11), and reminds us of how we enact change. We must be careful not to be abusive with the truth or what’s right. I know too many people who want to strap Bibles to their chest and blow stuff up for the sake of some holy thing. Our world wants to live by a terrorist ethic of enforced conformity, manipulation, and violence. But you will never be able to bring the kingdom through violence of any sort (1 Cor. 4:21). You can’t bring about what Jesus brought about by some other means than what Jesus used and Jesus was gentle. That’s not saying that you avoid conflict but that you are wary of ever harming your enemy. Zealousness is not our ethic. We need patience, literally “long-temper” because it’s so easy to get frustrated by the slowness of God, the slowness of others, and the slowness of ourselves. It’s the unifying reminder that while we have been redeemed we still must wait. And finally we need to bear with one another in love because we will screw it up. Friends, the attitude with which you create community will define the community that you create. Notice that these things are attitudes not actions, notice how forgettable they seem, notice what isn’t there. Notice how they orient us toward an inner disposition as the real fight rather than an external threat. This is how we are to fight and it matters because how you fight is what you become. The philosopher Nietschze rightly said: “Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster... for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into you.” If we are to unified, there is only one way we need to be: humble, gentle, patient, bearing with one another in love.
Keep – When we are one, we all have something we need to keep, vs. 3.
3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
Everything in this text aims to remind us that all of this work is fundamentally God’s action and initiative on our behalf. The “therefore” of vs. 1 clues us into preceeding chapters in which Paul speaks of what God has done for us through Jesus, the use of divine passive verbs (a theological-grammatical category which stresses that the action is solely dependent upon God, i.e. Eph. 3:17), and the command “to keep the unity of the Spirit,” are all about of a theology that grounds us in what the Father has done for us in Jesus by the Spirit. Before we are called to do anything, the Apostle tells us earlier in the letter, we are chosen, predestined, and redeemed as One (1:4-10). So we aren’t urged to create the unity of the Spirit, to solve, to orchestrate, or even to shore up the problem of our disunity.
While the calling must be lived, it’s true, it can only be cultivated in prayer. You simply can’t force your will to “be” these things but must surrender to them as “gifts” which come from the Holy Spirit who lives within you and grows them in your life. So, your effort is not one more thing to try really hard on. Your effort is to “keep” what’s been given to you, which means surrendering to the continual work of the Spirit in your inner being (3:16). That’s why Paul doesn’t say “keep unity.” No, he says, “keep the unity OF the Spirit.” It’s unity whose origins and source are the Spirit’s. On Friday I caught up with one my first students who is now forty with kids of his own. We had a great time sharing and catching up and then he told me something that brought me up short. He said, “It’s funny to see how much you’ve changed. You were the scariest pacifist I’d ever met. What has happened to you?,” he joked. I told him that I finally figured out that the fuel and force of the Christian life was a Spirit-filled life of gentleness. So the Spirit is the source – the energy, the life, of God-loving-unity growing us, shaping us to love one another. The soil is weakness and frailty – the recognition that I can’t do this on my own. And the effort – is the work of non-work. To make every effort is to daily recognize and surrender to a gentle God who is “over all and through all and in all.”
One - When we are One, it is because of the One God over all who makes us so, vss. 4-6
4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
All of this talk of oneness shouldn’t distract us from a counterfeit worldly understanding of unity as “conformity.” We are all clearly part of something that allows us to be ourselves because our oneness doesn’t come from us, isn’t orchestrated by us. In fact, Paul will name diverse and different kinds of people and gifts both in Ephesians as well as 1 Corinthians every time he speaks of unity. All of the one things of our text (7 in all) are God things (the church, God, hope, faith, baptism); that is, they focus on God, are animated by God, maintained by God, given by God. The One God loves to create, to be present, and work through diverse people. Our oneness is fundamentally and foundationally founded upon a kaleidoscopic God who is One within himself. Our oneness comes from the recognition of who God is as our creator and savior. “There is no godly imperative to be a homogenous group of people because God is the one who makes us One.” (Harris Long). We can let go of the pressure to conform and compare and rest in the reality that God is the weaver who stitches our lives together with love. We need to think about our identity – unity and diversity with the right analogy. I used to love the comedian Stephen Wright in the 80s who did his entire routine in this deadpan and monotone way. He once told a story about being somewhere and someone commenting that he was wearing mismatched socks. He replied, “No I’m not, I go by thickness.” He determined the unifying factor much like Paul is in our text. But I think an even better analogy for Christian unity is to consider the definition of a mammal. These are animals that are warm blooded, give birth to live young, have hair, and a backbone or spinal column. While the definition is certainly has concrete features, it, nevertheless, maintains an amazing diversity that would describe a horse, tiger, dog, monkey, elephant, or human.
One final remark that feels critical for any Christian understanding of unity though I didn’t know where to put it. There has been an effort among some Christians and copiers of the Bible to soften or restrict the Oneness of God over “all.” Later Greek versions of the New Testament, like the Textus Receptus, which makes up the King James Bible, tried to change the emphasis of vs. 6 by adding “all of you” trying to make the “all” only believers. But formulations about God which use “all” always have a cosmic reference in Paul. The one God proclaimed by Paul is the universal Father who is at work throughout the world and in all. This God aims to make creation one and will not be restricted. This means that our unity of Spirit must never be such that we erect strict borders and boundaries which exclude those outside of the church. Our unity must be guarded and Spirit-led and Spirit-filled but always kept as an open door policy which recognizes that God isn’t simply in here, in you, in us, but also out there, in them, making us one. Hallelujah.
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