Spiritual Maturity

Joel Hayworth

Sermon • Submitted 5 years ago

Ephesians 4:13–16

Mature

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Introduction

“I am not what I might be, I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I wish to be, I am not what I hope to be. But I thank God I am not what I once was, and I can say with the great apostle, “By the grace of God I am what I am.”—John Newton

Maturity can be a confusing subject to talk about. Everyone has different life experiences and everyone seems to mature at different speeds than others. We know that maturity has nothing to do with your age. We have all met people who are mature well beyond their years and we have met people who are much older and far less mature. Psychology today listed 7 marks of mature people: 1- A mature person is able to keep long-term commitments. 2- A mature person is unshaken by flattery or criticism. 3- A mature person possesses a spirit of humility. 4- A mature person’s decisions are based on character, not feelings. 5- A mature person expresses gratitude consistently. 6- A mature person knows how to prioritize others before themselves. 7- A mature person seeks wisdom before acting. Psychology Today is certainly a secular site, however these attributes are true for Christians as well. Throughout Scripture, we see that mature Believers are called to remain faithful to Christ, even through suffering. They express humility, they remain truthful even when they are persecuted, they praise God even when things get tough and they put others first while seeking wisdom, not their feelings.

It can be easy for us to buy into the lie that we must be totally mature to serve in the church - that is far from the truth. Certainly, we must be a part of the family of God and growing in our faith, however if we all had to be the “perfect” Christian before we could serve, there would be no one eligible to serve in the church! Service is a means of growth in maturity and we see the apostle Paul talk about service often in the letter of Ephesians, and he certainly hits on this topic in our text today in

Ephesians 4:13–16 NASB95

13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. 14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; 15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

Ephesians 4:13–17 NASB95

This passage of Scripture shows us the third mark of a healthy, active Church: being united in Spiritual Maturity. Not only is the church supposed to be united in faith and be diverse in gifting, but we are also called to grow up and give up our bib for a towel. To transition from milk to meat! In this passage, Paul gives us four traits of a spiritually mature person.

Maturity involves Christlikeness (13)

In a world that says to do whatever is right in your own eyes, being united in our faith in Christ and to be filled with the knowledge of God represents a stark contrast. While there can certainly be mature non-Christians, a mature Christian is one who strives to be Christlike. This means that they put silly things to the back-burner and they focus primarily on the Kingdom of God. This individual is united in faith with other Believers and recognizes this fact. Because of this, they do not cause disunity, but instead they try to stir up others to the work of the ministry.

We have all witnessed a mature Christian who does exactly this, have we not? Maybe it was a mother, father, friend, pastor or even a child who demonstrated spiritual maturity by acting Christlike instead of “getting even”. This certainly makes sense because this is what Christians are called to do, is it not? We are called to represent Christ on this earth and we are united to Him by faith. Whenever we are united with Christ, we realize that we are also in unity with one another. Just as we see in the illustration of pianos being tuned to a tuning fork, Believers are to be tuned to Jesus Christ. Whenever this transpires, we are also tuned with those around us because of the Holy Spirit. Praise God for this, because if we were not filled with the same Holy Spirit, it would be impossible for us to carry on the work of the ministry because we would have 100 different ideas and opinions going on! However, because we are called to be mature and to be Christlike, we are able to be tuned to Christ and tuned to one another because of the power of the Holy Spirit. We must strive to be like Christ if we want to be a mature Christian, today. This means that we must know our Bible. This means that we must know who Jesus Christ was. This means that we must know who Jesus Christ wasn’t - which leads us to the second point of our outline this morning...

Maturity involves Doctrinal Stability (14)

Whenever we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, our new life begins! We are quite literally a new creation, the old has gone and the new has come. This is great news, however we cannot remain as infants in our walk with Christ. Paul calls us to not be like little children tossed here and there by waves and carried about every wind of doctrine. Certainly, there are some things out there that we can have a difference of opinion on as we talked about a couple of weeks ago. We don’t all have to believe that Christians are going to have to live on the earth during the tribulation and we don’t all have to believe in the 5 points of Calvinism in order to be a Christian. We can have some difference of opinion on secondary theological points, however we cannot be like children who believe absolutely everything that we hear! Children are gullible and they are easily deceived. False teachers can creep in and toss them around. They can corrupt their minds and lead them astray! As your pastor, it is my job to protect the flock! This means that we can’t stay as children but we must grow in our walk with the Lord together.

Here are some horrifying stats: 45% of Christians polled said that they believe that Jesus Christ committed at least one sin. More than 40% of “born again” Christians said that the Holy Spirit and Satan do not exist. 40% of people polled agreed with the statement that “God helps those who help themselves”.

Church, these stats and results break my heart and they ought to break the heart of every Christian in this room! Jesus Christ never once sinned. If He did, then He cannot be our Lord and Savior, you MUST believe that He lived a perfect life in order to have any hope of salvation. The Holy Spirit and Satan certainly do in fact exist and God does not “help those who help themselves”. American Christianity loves to say that God is our assistant rather than our foundation - when in actuality that is a boldface lie. It sounds so good to our ears to hear that God wants us to be successful, prosperous and well off. It sounds good to our culture to hear that all religions are basically the same and that there isn’t a place called hell. It sounds good that you can get into heaven by being a “good person”. It sounds good to hear that Jesus isn’t the only way and that we aren’t sinners. Our world craves to hear that we are good and that we can earn our way into heaven! The fact of the matter is that from Scripture we see that mankind has all fallen short of the glory of God, we are all sinners - join the club! The punishment of our sin is eternal separation from God in a place called hell. That is where our works get us on our own. That is a message that is inclusive - everyone has messed up and stands guilty of treason before a Holy God. The great news of Jesus Christ taking our place on Calvary is that His righteousness becomes our righteousness! This is an exclusive message, though. This only happens for those who call upon the name of Jesus Christ to be the Lord and Savior of their lives. That is what Scripture tells us about salvation - not that everyone is fine as they are or that there isn’t a hell.

Our secular culture tells us a lot of things that are dangerous (whether it be that all religions are basically the same or that their good works will get them into heaven), however I would propose to you all that there is an even more dangerous belief in our world today that has deceived billions of people who profess to be “Christians”: the Prosperity Gospel. You might be thinking, preacher you’ve talked about the prosperity gospel a couple of times already, we don’t need to talk about it because we don’t believe in it. The problem is that there are millions of churches in our nation, including some of the fastest growing ones, that teach this message that God will keep you from suffering and that he wants you to be healthy, wealthy and prosperous.

They proclaim that God wills you from all suffering if you just have faith in Him. If you find yourself in a situation of suffering, return to God in faith and your suffering will end in a very short time. All you have to do is claim this and have faith because God wills us to prosper financially according to . David Platt boldly shared a message about this passage of Scripture last week, and I want to share part of what he had to say. tells us the exact opposite of prosperity teaching. The Israelites were in exile because it was God’s will. Their time in exile was not coming to an end anytime soon, either. Hmm, almost like the apostle Paul who was in prison as he was writing the letter to the church in Ephesus. Sometimes, God’s will involves suffering. That message doesn’t sound very appealing, though, does it? People in Jeremiah’s day flocked to the false prophets who said that the exile was coming to an end and people flock to pastors and churches who say that God wants you to be rich, healthy and for your suffering to end tomorrow.

THIS IS A LIE! Do not believe this teaching, church! Don’t put your hope in these crowd pleasing words. Jeremiah teaches that it is not God’s will to keep us from suffering but instead that God’s will is to bring us all through suffering. Suffering is a reality for our world and for the people of God. We will not escape suffering, regardless of what prosperity advocates might say, but according to , we know that God’s plan will prevail. That suffering will not have the last laugh! The problem for spiritually immature people who subscribe to this teaching is that whenever they claim healing or financial success, whenever they pray for the suffering to cease, for the marriage to be healed, and when it doesn’t happen, when the promotion goes to another person, when the healing doesn’t come and when the divorce papers are finalized, they cry out “Did I lack faith?” “God, are you even listening to me?” “God, are you even there at all?”

He’s there. Guess what? He never promised that your suffering would end in a short time. We began our study of Nehemiah last week and we talked about the nation of Israel being in exile for hundreds of years! Their suffering did not end in a day or a week. That’s our problem sometimes. We expect God to answer our request and bring in healing tomorrow, not in a century. Is it possible for God to bring in healing today? You bet it is because He is God and He can do absolutely anything! Is it required of Him? Is it guaranteed? Absolutely not. This message doesn’t sound as good as the alternative, however when suffering comes, sometimes suffering stays.

To someone who is an infant spiritually speaking, this message sounds great and is something that we grab ahold of and we treat it like Scripture. We are called to transition from milk to meat, to mature, to grow up, to dive into the Word! This teaching is not founded in Scripture, therefore we must dive into what Scripture does tell us about things like suffering. Places like , that God causes all things to work together for our good. Even suffering. Even a prison sentence. Even, dare I say it, cancer. The world tells us that this is silly and prosperity gospel advocates call us fools, however it is what Scripture says time and time again. We must acknowledge that Scripture comes first, not our emotions, feelings, or past experiences. A mature Christian dives into the Word to be nourished and to have doctrinal stability. To know what God’s Word says and to be able to share the truth of it with those around them. But the key in having this knowledge comes in verse 15, as we see in points 3 of our outline:

Maturity involves Truth joined with Love (15)

Are Christians called to share the truth with others? You’d better believe it. We are all called towards this goal whether you have been a Christian for 70 years or 7 months. Whether you have the gift of service or administration, this is something that you are called to do as a Christian - to share the truth of the Gospel to others. But, this must be done in love. If we claim to have faith in Christ but we don’t love our neighbor, how does that make our savior look? Just as Christ called out the Ephesian church in Revelation for forgetting our first love, we must not forget the love of Jesus Christ that has set us free!

There is a quote that is attributed to the great Indian leader, Gandhi, that reads “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Was the truth important to Jesus Christ? You’d better believe it was! Was loving your neighbor important to Jesus Christ? You bet it was. We must hold high the truth as tells us and we must remember the importance of love as shows. In the Greek text, the word in v. 15 is “truthing in love” - obviously this isn’t an English word so we smooth it out and say “speaking the truth in love” but the literal definition is so much deeper than just speaking. It is about telling the truth, maintaining the truth and showing the truth in acts of love.

In the book of James, as we’re studying on Wednesday nights, we know the importance of faith and works. How can we claim to be a people who worship a merciful and almighty God whenever we are never merciful or nice to those around us? Faith in Christ leads us to Christlike action. We speak the truth in love. As John Piper puts it, knowledge without love puffs us up, but love without knowledge is confused and aimless. That is why Paul prays in “that your love might abound more and more in all knowledge and discernment.” Love abounding in knowledge and discernment is what builds the body of Christ.

I pray that this is what people would say about our church. I pray that people, when they drive past our church on Highway J or whenever our name comes up in a conversation, that they first think “That church is faithful to preach and teach the Bible” and I also hope they say, “They love each other like family and their neighbors as themselves.” If there are people in our community who are not Christians or who believe things differently than we do, I pray that they know that we still love them. A spiritually immature person will tend to say that they are always right or that someone else is unlovable because of this or that. A spiritually mature Believer will instead say that this individual is created in the image of God and deserves love and respect, even if they smell a little funny or believe something that is way off base. Speaking the truth in love goes a long ways in the lives of people around us and you never know when doing this will allow you to have an opportunity to invite them to VBS or our fall revival. You never know when simply loving on your neighbor will give you an opportunity to share the Gospel with them, so I ask you, are you speaking the truth of Scripture to others in love? Is this something that our church does? We can certainly do a better job of this, but I think that we are headed in the right direction. We must do this, though, and we must encourage one another along the way which leads us to our final point in our outline:

Maturity involves Contribution (16)

We have spent the first 3 points of our outline talking about why we minister to others and why spiritual maturity matters, now we get to the “how” part. How are we to contribute and how do we minister to those around us? Paul returns to the image of a body and shows that every member is a “limb” in Christ’s body. You are a body part and you are important! We need one another and every member is called to contribute and use whatever spiritual gift(s) you have.

Out ultimate need is Jesus Christ. Each and everyone of us in this room today needs Jesus Christ. Our entire world needs Jesus Christ! We are dependent upon Him, certainly, but we are also dependent upon one another as v. 16 shows us, “the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.” - you matter. This is something, again, that we are all supposed to do as Christians - not just the teachers or the pastor or the ones who have grown up in this church. But everyone! As we grow into Christ and we use our gifts to love, the body becomes stronger and healthy! What a privilege it is to be united to Christ and to one another.

Whenever Christmas comes around, we all love to unwrap a present, right? Whether you are 7 or 77, unwrapping Christmas presents is one of those things that is always fun to do! Whenever you unwrap your present, especially as a child, what would you do with it? You’d show it to all your family members, you’d call your friends or text them and show them a picture of it and you’d try to find a time that they can come over and you can play with it. Whether it be nerf gun, barbie, video game or a golf club, you want to show your new gift to those around you… Why would we not do the same with our Spiritual Gift? We receive this gift from our resurrected Savior and we are called to use it to grow the Kingdom and help the body of Christ do the work of the ministry - why would we not use it? We play a role in the body of Christ. It is not the pastor or the deacon body that is the “head” but it is Jesus Christ. The living Christ gives us (through the Spirit) everything that we need to be ministers of the Gospel. We contribute by using our gift. We contribute by giving. We contribute by going out to our neighborhood and to the nations to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ. A mature Believer understands this and they are eager to contribute however they can to build the body of Christ and share the love of Jesus to the lost.

Conclusion

Maturity, as with humility, is not thinking less or more of ourselves, but thinking of ourselves less. This is something that is true for both non-Christians and Christians. You can possess maturity regardless of your relationship with Jesus Christ. With that said, you cannot possess Spiritual Maturity as a non-Christian. Only someone who has accepted Jesus as their savior and Lord and repented of their sin can experience spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity is vitally important for us as individual Christians and for the church as a whole! We must strive to grow in our walk with Christ. To know Christ better and deeper while also loving those around us faithfully and consistently. This is a difficult task and something that we will never be perfect at, however it should be our goal to become a more mature Christian each and every day. Just as tell us, we will never achieve “perfection”, however we should daily strive to be more Christlike and to deny ourselves and follow Christ wherever that takes us. Whether it be to the Middle East or to your neighbors front door, to follow Christ and to share the love of Jesus with the lost. It also means that we encourage those in our congregation. We share what Christ has done in our lives and we train the next generation to grow in their relationship with the Lord. We equip the body for ministry by doing ministry ourselves.

How can we be mature Christians: A couple of application points. We can be mature in our speech, our service and in our sensitivity. We speak the truth in love, we help one another out and we are aware of the needs in our congregation and in our community! We know the truth of the Gospel and we love others with the love of Jesus Christ.

To spell it out more plainly, in a letter to a friend, Columbine martyr Cassie Bernall said this, “I am just so thankful for everything He’s done for me, as well as for others. Even when things are bad, He’s stood next to me and things are a little less prone to becoming blown out of proportion by my emotions … You know, I wonder what God is going to do with my life? Like my purpose. Some people become missionaries and things, but what about me? What does God have in store for me? Where do my talents and gifts lie? For now, I’ll just take it day by day. I’m confident that I’ll know someday. Maybe I’ll look back at my life and think “Oh, so that was it!” Isn’t it amazing, this plan we’re a part of? …”

God has a plan for your life and your have a purpose. This church has a purpose to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with others. God’s will is that we be a healthy church. To be a healthy church, we must be healthy Christians. To be a healthy Christian, you must know Christ, truly, genuinely, really. Then and only then, can you play the part He has, just for you, in this grand plan of His.

Do you know Jesus Christ, today?

Let’s pray.

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