Ephesians 4:13-16
Measuring Our Maturity (Part 1)
Introduction:
Illustration - Pediatrician Check-Ups: If you have or had young kids you know you have to bring them in for their checkups at certain ages. A couple weeks ago we had to bring Reese in for her 18 month checkup. I hadn’t been to any of her earlier ones. This one she needed to get a shot in the leg. I don’t mind shots, I watched Evan get shots, get IV’s, get stitches – you know, he’s a boy, it didn’t bother me. But, I learned that I feel different towards my little girl than my little boy. They pulled that shot out and it looked like a Roman spear. I winced when they impaled her, I wanted to cry like a ….. well, like a little girl. So on the way out we both got a balloon and Annie took us both out for ice cream.
What do doctors do at well checkups? They do more than give shots. They come in and they check circumference of the head, the height and weight, they look in their ears & check their eyes, check their heart rate, and their hips. Then the doctor wants to hear their lungs. Then the doctor wants to know how many words they are saying, and he asks how their skills are developing. Can they walk? Can they go up and down stairs with help? Then they let you know the percentile they're in. Jr. is in the 40th percentile in height. Or princess is in the 70th percentile of weight.
What are they doing?
Checking their growth. The doctor is making sure that the little ones are growing and developing properly.
Christians should be growing. And we should have regular checkups. We should take time to look into our ears, open our mouths and say "Aaah". We should check our spiritual pulse, and listen to our lungs. We should check our height and our weight. Is our speaking improving? Are our skills in righteousness getting better? Have we grown in the last year? Have we grown in the last 5 years? If we hear that our child isn’t growing properly from the doctor we get serious. We get whatever help is necessary for our child to grow. Are we serious about our growth as Christians? No growth is a real concern. Are you growing? In Hebrews 5 the author criticizes his readers for not growing spiritually. He says in verse 11-12, “We have much to say to you but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food!” If we’re not growing and we come across a passage like that we say, “Ouch!” The Bible never speaks graciously towards believers who don’t grow. Growth is expected because growth is normal. It is abnormal, and an indication that there is a problem when there is no growth.
Our sermon this week is titled, “Measuring our Maturity”. If we were going to have a spiritual “well-checkup”, how would we measure our maturity? Looking at Ephesians 4:13-16, I want to offer 5 questions the doctor could ask at this checkup.
Are we full of Christ? (v13)
So question number one when measuring our maturity is this: “Are we full of Christ?” You’ll notice in verse 13 Paul says, “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.”
Here is the purpose of Christ’s gifts (v7, 8). His gifts are given to us to produce likeness to Him. To be full of Christ means that His life is seen in us. It is interesting to see the ways the Bible talks about this. On one hand it says that the character of Christ is being developed in us. Paul said very graphically to the Galatians, “I am in the pains of childbirth for you until Christ is formed in you.” In other places though it refers to us being formed into the likeness of Christ, like in 2 Corinthians 3:18 where it says that we “are being transformed into Christ’s likeness with ever-increasing glory…” This is what Paul is getting at in Ephesians 4:13. The whole Church is to go on into the full measure of maturity, which means go on growing into the full measure of likeness to Christ. Is Christ seen more and more in you?
Illustration - Grass. I am currently in the process of rehabilitating my lawn. Weeds and dirt currently occupy more of my lawn than does grass. My lawn is full of weeds. All you have to do is look You don’t have to look hard to see weeds and dirt. You do have to look hard to see grass. Well, I don’t want to see weeds. I want to see grass. I want a lawn that is full of grass. You know, a nice thick lawn.
We’re like a lawn. And we start out with the weeds of worldliness and the dirt of un-Christ-likeness. But we are cleansed by His word. Christ is working on His lawn. He is spreading the weed & feed of His Word. He is taking the water of His word and He is He is watering His lawn. Pretty soon the bald spots start filling in. And pretty soon there is more grass than there are weeds. And finally His lawn is full of grass – nice thick, lush green grass. This is a lawn that is occupied by grass. There isn’t any room for weeds. No weeds can survive when the grass is growing strong. The Church is to be full of Christ. And when Christ is growing in us no weeds can grow up in us. They can’t survive. To be full of Christ means that He is what is seen in you. Everywhere someone looks at you they see Christ-likeness. He is what occupies your life.
The only way this can happen is by making Him the aim of our lives. It means that we become assimilated into Christ.
Are we gullible? (v14)
When measuring our maturity, we should also ask the question: Are we gullible? Do I believe everything I hear that sounds Christian? In verse 14 Paul says, “Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming.”
I want us to see something very important here. When Paul says “we will no longer be infants”, he is saying “we will no longer be spiritually immature”. His point is very important, and it is this: One of the most recognizable characteristics of spiritual immaturity is gullibility. When he says “we won’t be tossed around by the waves and blown about by the wind” he is not referring to the troubles and trials of life. Don’t think he is talking about hard times. You have to read the last part of that verse: “blown here and there by the wind of teaching”. He is talking about the susceptibility of immature Christians who do not have a handle on God’s Word and who are therefore easy prey for these false teachers. They gulp down whatever they hear.
Illustration – Get that out of your mouth! Feeding babies and little kids is a lot of work. But every mother knows the need to be watching everything that goes into their kids’ mouth. Why? Because they put everything in their mouth! They pick up rocks, or dimes, or sidewalk chalk, or ants and up goes the hand to the mouth. If you’re a parent then you know the first few years are spent yelling, “Get that out of your mouth!” Why? Because babies don’t know what they should and shouldn’t eat. The rule during those little years seems to be: Eat what you shouldn’t and don’t eat what you should.
And that is true of us as we are little in Christ. We can’t tell the difference between what teaching is good for us and what isn’t. Romans 16:18 says, “For such people [false teachers] are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. By smooth talk and flattery they deceive the minds of naïve people.” When we are not grounded in God’s Word we are naïve and easily deceived by the smooth talk and flattery of people. We are unstable and easily blown around by all the waves and wind of everything we hear in books or on the radio or on TV. “Well it was on the Christian radio”, or “It was in the Christian bookstore”, or, “It sounded Christian”, or, “He says he’s a Christian so he must be right”, or, “Doesn’t it say somewhere in the Bible?” In Acts 20:30, Paul warned the Ephesians about false teachers and said, “Even from among your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them.” In 1 Timothy 4:1-2 it says, “The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.” I am not making this stuff up! Here it is! When you hear things like, “Jesus isn’t the only way”, “Jesus didn’t really die”, or, “He didn’t rise from the dead”, or, “Jesus is not God’s Son”, do we really believe that these false teachings originated with men? Our battle is not against flesh and blood, but, against the rulers, principalities, authorities, and powers of this dark world” (Eph. 6:12). We do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. (2 Cor. 10:3-4a)
That’s why we talk about getting “grounded” in the word. If you let the world around you, or even your own opinions, dictate your convictions, you will go astray. Get your convictions anchored in Scripture. Get your senses trained so you can learn to distinguish. In Hebrews 5:13-14, it says, “Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.”
When measuring our maturity we must ask, “Am I gullible?” And in doing so, let us develop a stronger reluctance to accept everything we hear, and put everything to the test.
Do I love the Truth? (v15)
Thirdly, when measuring our maturity we must ask, “Do I love the Truth?” Verse 15 says, “Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into Him who is the Head, that is, Christ.”
Notice that word, “instead”. Paul is showing us a contrast. He doesn’t want us to be liars like the men of verse 14, the men who do their “deceitful scheming”. There should be a night and day difference in our integrity. Our integrity should be plain, and, thorough. I want to suggest 3.5 areas I think we can apply this point about “speaking the truth”.
First, it means Truth in our Teaching and Preaching. The truth of God’s Word must be pre-eminent. There should be a demand for God’s truth and an intolerance for lies.
Second, it means that the topic of our conversations should include God’s Word. What do you talk about with other Christians? Do you ever talk about God’s Word?
Third, it means speaking the truth into each other’s lives. Particularly, it means if there is an issue that needs to be addressed. If you have been injured by someone, go to them. If you can’t or won’t go to them then you need to forgive them. There is never a permit for unforgiveness in Scripture. Nursing a grudge is sin. And it makes us into liars. How does it do that? Proverbs 10:12 says, “He who conceals his hatred has lying lips.” We act like everything is okay and it’s not. The success that gossip and criticism and back-biting has enjoyed in the Church is because God’s people do not go to each other and tell each other the truth about issues in their relationships with each other. Speak the truth to each other, and do it in love.
Point number 3.5: speaking the truth in love means being willing to hear the truth spoken into your life. Being a part of Church means opening yourself up to others in such a way that they can speak truth into your life when there is a need for it.
No one here would say they are perfect. And many of us in conversation will tell others we’re not perfect, “Yeah, I’m not perfect, I’m just a sinner saved by grace”. But then if someone were to ever speak to us about an imperfection we get all offended as if they have insulted our perfections.
But, saying we are poor sinners saved by grace and saying we are imperfect is not the true mark of humility. The real mark of humility is a willingness to let someone speak truth into our lives about a sin or about an imperfection in an effort to help build us up. If we really believe we’re sinful and we’re imperfect, then we should expect that there will be times when we need a loving brother or sister to have a voice into our lives.
The wise among us will recognize the value of correction. Proverbs 9:8 says, “Rebuke a wise man and he will love you.” The wise recognize they grow wiser when from time to time they get some admonishment from a brother. Proverbs 19:25 says, “rebuke a discerning man and he will gain knowledge.”
I’ve been on both ends of a rebuke. It’s not what we would call “fun”. But, it’s necessary. Keeping in mind that God has something for us at those times will help us benefit from a rebuke. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness. Do not resent the rebuke of a wise man or woman.
Conclusion:
We will look at the last 2 questions next week. So, as we are measuring our maturity, let us ask ourselves 3 questions: 1) Am I full of Christ? 2) Am I gullible? 3) Do I love the truth?
Come on. Let’s all press on towards maturity and pursue these things for ourselves and our brothers and sisters here at EFC.
Measuring Our Maturity (Part 1)
Introduction:
Illustration - Pediatrician Check-Ups: If you have or had young kids you know you have to bring them in for their checkups at certain ages. A couple weeks ago we had to bring Reese in for her 18 month checkup. I hadn’t been to any of her earlier ones. This one she needed to get a shot in the leg. I don’t mind shots, I watched Evan get shots, get IV’s, get stitches – you know, he’s a boy, it didn’t bother me. But, I learned that I feel different towards my little girl than my little boy. They pulled that shot out and it looked like a Roman spear. I winced when they impaled her, I wanted to cry like a ….. well, like a little girl. So on the way out we both got a balloon and Annie took us both out for ice cream.
What do doctors do at well checkups? They do more than give shots. They come in and they check circumference of the head, the height and weight, they look in their ears & check their eyes, check their heart rate, and their hips. Then the doctor wants to hear their lungs. Then the doctor wants to know how many words they are saying, and he asks how their skills are developing. Can they walk? Can they go up and down stairs with help? Then they let you know the percentile they're in. Jr. is in the 40th percentile in height. Or princess is in the 70th percentile of weight.
What are they doing?
Checking their growth. The doctor is making sure that the little ones are growing and developing properly.
Christians should be growing. And we should have regular checkups. We should take time to look into our ears, open our mouths and say "Aaah". We should check our spiritual pulse, and listen to our lungs. We should check our height and our weight. Is our speaking improving? Are our skills in righteousness getting better? Have we grown in the last year? Have we grown in the last 5 years? If we hear that our child isn’t growing properly from the doctor we get serious. We get whatever help is necessary for our child to grow. Are we serious about our growth as Christians? No growth is a real concern. Are you growing? In Hebrews 5 the author criticizes his readers for not growing spiritually. He says in verse 11-12, “We have much to say to you but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food!” If we’re not growing and we come across a passage like that we say, “Ouch!” The Bible never speaks graciously towards believers who don’t grow. Growth is expected because growth is normal. It is abnormal, and an indication that there is a problem when there is no growth.
Our sermon this week is titled, “Measuring our Maturity”. If we were going to have a spiritual “well-checkup”, how would we measure our maturity? Looking at Ephesians 4:13-16, I want to offer 5 questions the doctor could ask at this checkup.
Are we full of Christ? (v13)
So question number one when measuring our maturity is this: “Are we full of Christ?” You’ll notice in verse 13 Paul says, “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.”
Here is the purpose of Christ’s gifts (v7, 8). His gifts are given to us to produce likeness to Him. To be full of Christ means that His life is seen in us. It is interesting to see the ways the Bible talks about this. On one hand it says that the character of Christ is being developed in us. Paul said very graphically to the Galatians, “I am in the pains of childbirth for you until Christ is formed in you.” In other places though it refers to us being formed into the likeness of Christ, like in 2 Corinthians 3:18 where it says that we “are being transformed into Christ’s likeness with ever-increasing glory…” This is what Paul is getting at in Ephesians 4:13. The whole Church is to go on into the full measure of maturity, which means go on growing into the full measure of likeness to Christ. Is Christ seen more and more in you?
Illustration - Grass. I am currently in the process of rehabilitating my lawn. Weeds and dirt currently occupy more of my lawn than does grass. My lawn is full of weeds. All you have to do is look You don’t have to look hard to see weeds and dirt. You do have to look hard to see grass. Well, I don’t want to see weeds. I want to see grass. I want a lawn that is full of grass. You know, a nice thick lawn.
We’re like a lawn. And we start out with the weeds of worldliness and the dirt of un-Christ-likeness. But we are cleansed by His word. Christ is working on His lawn. He is spreading the weed & feed of His Word. He is taking the water of His word and He is He is watering His lawn. Pretty soon the bald spots start filling in. And pretty soon there is more grass than there are weeds. And finally His lawn is full of grass – nice thick, lush green grass. This is a lawn that is occupied by grass. There isn’t any room for weeds. No weeds can survive when the grass is growing strong. The Church is to be full of Christ. And when Christ is growing in us no weeds can grow up in us. They can’t survive. To be full of Christ means that He is what is seen in you. Everywhere someone looks at you they see Christ-likeness. He is what occupies your life.
The only way this can happen is by making Him the aim of our lives. It means that we become assimilated into Christ.
Are we gullible? (v14)
When measuring our maturity, we should also ask the question: Are we gullible? Do I believe everything I hear that sounds Christian? In verse 14 Paul says, “Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming.”
I want us to see something very important here. When Paul says “we will no longer be infants”, he is saying “we will no longer be spiritually immature”. His point is very important, and it is this: One of the most recognizable characteristics of spiritual immaturity is gullibility. When he says “we won’t be tossed around by the waves and blown about by the wind” he is not referring to the troubles and trials of life. Don’t think he is talking about hard times. You have to read the last part of that verse: “blown here and there by the wind of teaching”. He is talking about the susceptibility of immature Christians who do not have a handle on God’s Word and who are therefore easy prey for these false teachers. They gulp down whatever they hear.
Illustration – Get that out of your mouth! Feeding babies and little kids is a lot of work. But every mother knows the need to be watching everything that goes into their kids’ mouth. Why? Because they put everything in their mouth! They pick up rocks, or dimes, or sidewalk chalk, or ants and up goes the hand to the mouth. If you’re a parent then you know the first few years are spent yelling, “Get that out of your mouth!” Why? Because babies don’t know what they should and shouldn’t eat. The rule during those little years seems to be: Eat what you shouldn’t and don’t eat what you should.
And that is true of us as we are little in Christ. We can’t tell the difference between what teaching is good for us and what isn’t. Romans 16:18 says, “For such people [false teachers] are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. By smooth talk and flattery they deceive the minds of naïve people.” When we are not grounded in God’s Word we are naïve and easily deceived by the smooth talk and flattery of people. We are unstable and easily blown around by all the waves and wind of everything we hear in books or on the radio or on TV. “Well it was on the Christian radio”, or “It was in the Christian bookstore”, or, “It sounded Christian”, or, “He says he’s a Christian so he must be right”, or, “Doesn’t it say somewhere in the Bible?” In Acts 20:30, Paul warned the Ephesians about false teachers and said, “Even from among your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them.” In 1 Timothy 4:1-2 it says, “The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.” I am not making this stuff up! Here it is! When you hear things like, “Jesus isn’t the only way”, “Jesus didn’t really die”, or, “He didn’t rise from the dead”, or, “Jesus is not God’s Son”, do we really believe that these false teachings originated with men? Our battle is not against flesh and blood, but, against the rulers, principalities, authorities, and powers of this dark world” (Eph. 6:12). We do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. (2 Cor. 10:3-4a)
That’s why we talk about getting “grounded” in the word. If you let the world around you, or even your own opinions, dictate your convictions, you will go astray. Get your convictions anchored in Scripture. Get your senses trained so you can learn to distinguish. In Hebrews 5:13-14, it says, “Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.”
When measuring our maturity we must ask, “Am I gullible?” And in doing so, let us develop a stronger reluctance to accept everything we hear, and put everything to the test.
Do I love the Truth? (v15)
Thirdly, when measuring our maturity we must ask, “Do I love the Truth?” Verse 15 says, “Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into Him who is the Head, that is, Christ.”
Notice that word, “instead”. Paul is showing us a contrast. He doesn’t want us to be liars like the men of verse 14, the men who do their “deceitful scheming”. There should be a night and day difference in our integrity. Our integrity should be plain, and, thorough. I want to suggest 3.5 areas I think we can apply this point about “speaking the truth”.
First, it means Truth in our Teaching and Preaching. The truth of God’s Word must be pre-eminent. There should be a demand for God’s truth and an intolerance for lies.
Second, it means that the topic of our conversations should include God’s Word. What do you talk about with other Christians? Do you ever talk about God’s Word?
Third, it means speaking the truth into each other’s lives. Particularly, it means if there is an issue that needs to be addressed. If you have been injured by someone, go to them. If you can’t or won’t go to them then you need to forgive them. There is never a permit for unforgiveness in Scripture. Nursing a grudge is sin. And it makes us into liars. How does it do that? Proverbs 10:12 says, “He who conceals his hatred has lying lips.” We act like everything is okay and it’s not. The success that gossip and criticism and back-biting has enjoyed in the Church is because God’s people do not go to each other and tell each other the truth about issues in their relationships with each other. Speak the truth to each other, and do it in love.
Point number 3.5: speaking the truth in love means being willing to hear the truth spoken into your life. Being a part of Church means opening yourself up to others in such a way that they can speak truth into your life when there is a need for it.
No one here would say they are perfect. And many of us in conversation will tell others we’re not perfect, “Yeah, I’m not perfect, I’m just a sinner saved by grace”. But then if someone were to ever speak to us about an imperfection we get all offended as if they have insulted our perfections.
But, saying we are poor sinners saved by grace and saying we are imperfect is not the true mark of humility. The real mark of humility is a willingness to let someone speak truth into our lives about a sin or about an imperfection in an effort to help build us up. If we really believe we’re sinful and we’re imperfect, then we should expect that there will be times when we need a loving brother or sister to have a voice into our lives.
The wise among us will recognize the value of correction. Proverbs 9:8 says, “Rebuke a wise man and he will love you.” The wise recognize they grow wiser when from time to time they get some admonishment from a brother. Proverbs 19:25 says, “rebuke a discerning man and he will gain knowledge.”
I’ve been on both ends of a rebuke. It’s not what we would call “fun”. But, it’s necessary. Keeping in mind that God has something for us at those times will help us benefit from a rebuke. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness. Do not resent the rebuke of a wise man or woman.
Conclusion:
We will look at the last 2 questions next week. So, as we are measuring our maturity, let us ask ourselves 3 questions: 1) Am I full of Christ? 2) Am I gullible? 3) Do I love the truth?
Come on. Let’s all press on towards maturity and pursue these things for ourselves and our brothers and sisters here at EFC.
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