SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/4/2019 12:04 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1 “Unity”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Ephesians
4:3
Message of the verses: “3 Make every
effort to keep the unity
of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”
Once
again I want to remind you about the different characteristic elements that
begin with humility and then it goes to gentleness, patience, and forbearance
and not comes to unity as seen in verse three.
It all begins with being humble, and then you can get gentleness,
patience, love, and then this last element will result which is unity. The Greek word for unity is “Spoudazo” and
this means to be diligent. John MacArthur
says that it “basically means to make haste, and from that come the meanings of
zeal and diligence. One commentator
describes it as a holy zeal that demands full dedication. Paul used the word in telling Timothy, ‘Be
diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to
be ashamed, handling accurately the word of truth (2 Tim. 2:15; cf. Titus
3:12-13).” “11 For the grace of God has
appeared, bringing salvation to all men, 12 instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires
and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, 13 looking for
the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior,
Christ Jesus, 14 who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless
deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for
good deeds” (Titus 3:11-14 [12-13 highlighted]).
What
is Paul talking about here? John
MacArthur tells his readers what he is talking about, but before that what he is not talking about,
and what he is not talking about is he is not speaking of organizational unity,
such as that promoted in many denominations and in the ecumenical
movement. So what is he speaking
of? That would be the inner and
universal “unity of the
Spirit” by which every true believer is bound to every other true
believer. Paul is making sure that this
is the unity of the Spirit
working in the lives of believers. This
does not come from the outside, for that would be worthless, but it has to come
from the inside, and this is manifested through the inner qualities of
humility, gentleness, patience, and forbearing love. This is what we have been looking at for, not
just a few days.
I
believe that I have mentioned that what we find here in Ephesians chapter four
is similar to what we find in Romans chapter 12, and that is that in both books
Paul begins to explain how to live out the doctrines that he has been talking
about in the first part of the book, in the case of Romans it covered the first
eleven chapters, and in the case of Ephesians it covered the first three
chapters. Also in both books we see that
Paul begins the next chapter by talking about humility as he will then go on to
talk about Spiritual gifts. Also as
mentioned Spiritual gifts are also mentioned in 1 Corinthians chapter 12, and 1
Peter chapter four, and the purpose, or at least one purpose of the Spiritual
gifts is for the building
up of the church, to keep the church united as we see in our verse for
today. As mentioned it has to come from
the inside through the working of the Holy Spirit, and not from the outside as
we try to do it on our own. We have to
depend on the Holy Spirit to do the work that God has called us to do as we
have mentioned so many times, as we look at Ephesians 2:10 “For we are His
workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared
beforehand so that we would walk in them.”
God chose us in eternity past, and then Christ came to earth to die in
our place, and then the Holy Spirit of God gave us an effectual call that we
cannot say no to, and also He gives us the Holy Spirit to live in us to guide
us to do the work that He chose for us to do in eternity past as Eph. 2:10
shows us. So the end result is that God
receives all of the glory, as well He should.
Now going back for a moment to talk more about how we cannot do this
work on our own without the Spirit of God I want to talk for a moment about the
different churches that are found in the second and third chapters of the book
of Revelation. While studying Revelation
a number of times I have learned that there are two churches that Christ writes
to that He has nothing bad to say about, and then the one church where He has
nothing at all good to say about and for with mixed reviews. If you take away the two that Christ has
nothing bad to say about you will find that in the order that they are in, it
presents a downward spiral in spirituality.
The point that I want to make comes from the first church which is
actually Ephesus the church that Paul is writing to in the letter we are
studying. Paul even told the leaders of
Ephesus in Acts chapter 20 that they were going to run into spiritual troubles,
and by the time that Jesus, through John writes to them in Revelation some 40
years later the downfall had begun. What
was their problem? Jesus tells them that
“they had left their first love,” and that first love was Jesus Christ. How did this happen? They started doing things in their own effort,
and were not depending on the Holy Spirit to lead them which caused disunity to
come about in their church and eventually the church fell apart. If you look at
the place where Ephesus was today in modern day Turkey there is nothing left
but ruins. This is how important
depending on the Holy Spirit to give us the bond of peace, causing churches to
depend upon Him to lead and guide us into what He desires us to do.
I
prayed diligently before beginning this SD as not only because of the subject
but also because there were times when I have to admit that I did some of these
SD’s on my own strength, and I want that to stop.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: All of this begins with humility, for I
cannot have unity of the Spirit without first beginning with humility and so
through the power of the Spirit I believe that this will come about in my life.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Continue to trust the Lord to teach me
humility as seen in Romans 12, and Ephesians 4.
Verse that goes with yesterday’s
quotation: Proverbs 1:7 “The fear of the
Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.”
3/4/2019 12:51 PM
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