Ephesians 4.1-16

"Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God. 2 Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. 3 Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. 4 For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future. 5 There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 and one God and Father, who is over all and in all and living through all.

7 However, he has given each one of us a special gift through the generosity of Christ. 8 That is why the Scriptures say,

“When he ascended to the heights,
he led a crowd of captives
and gave gifts to his people.”

9 Notice that it says “he ascended.” This clearly means that Christ also descended to our lowly world. 10 And the same one who descended is the one who ascended higher than all the heavens, so that he might fill the entire universe with himself.

11 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. 12 Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.13 This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.

14 Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. 15 Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. 16 He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love."

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Lead a life worthy of our calling. That's a pretty heavy statement with some pretty heavy implications. There are a lot of times that I don't live up to a life that would seem worthy of my calling. Can you relate? It really starts to hit home when I read Paul say 'be patient with each other, making allowance for each other's faults because of your love." Patience is not something that comes easy. But in the next section of verses, he explains the importance of doing that very thing. This is where you're favorite topic of 'unity' re-enters the picture. =) We are all given gifts that contribute to the edifying and function of the body as a whole. This is pretty sweet. Those of you who were in our guy's Bible study this past semester might remember our conversation about that, about how cool it is that in the body of Christ, even the seemingly unimportant part of the body is important. This section is so full of stuff, I don't have the time or the focus to type out all that you can get out of this, so I'll let that become a group activity. What sticks out to you guys? =)

"Father unify us! May the walls separating us from our brothers and sisters be knocked down and may we honor You by living in unity with those who belong to You. We love You and we desperately need You each and every day! It's in Jesus' name that I pray, amen!"