A precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard, that went down to the skirts of his garments, as the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion. For there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life forevermore. Let us join together in prayer. our loving and our gracious Father in Heaven, we would ask Lord to be reminded and to be given some kind of adequate conception of the fact that you are God. Lord, we do confess that so often we are like those who worship what they themselves create, that we, Lord, so often create a picture of God in our own minds, one that suits us, one that frees us to do the things that we want to do, one who is sympathetic to our priorities. And yet Lord, we realise from your word that, indeed as we have just sung, that your ways are higher than our ways. our gracious and loving father that your holiness is something that we find very difficult to grasp and to form an adequate conception of you and indeed Lord to live our lives in your presence and with a commitment to your glory is something that we find very difficult where we acknowledge that so often we want to live for the things that we want to do that we often turn away from the light. We love darkness because our deeds are evil. And our Father, we so often are prepared to fashion a God that will free us to engage in things that we ought not, not only not do, but also not even want to do. And our Father, we ask you to give us true humility as together we come into your presence. We realise, Lord, that we could not come to you but for the Lord Jesus Christ, for the fact that he identified himself with us and for the fact that for our sakes he made himself of no reputation. He was found in fashion as a man that he was the suffering servant of God who humbled himself and became obedient even unto death, the death of the cross. And Lord, we do acknowledge that our own hearts and our own lives are such that that was necessary. That the wrath of God had to be poured out upon our sins, but thank you Lord that it was poured out on the one who represented us. and our gracious and our loving father, we thank you that he came because he loved us, that he committed himself to that great work, that he didn't turn back from it. And even though when he was confronted with it, he did utter the words, let this cup pass from me. We thank you that he was able to follow that straight away with, nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done. We thank you our Father that it was your will, and indeed his, that we should be saved and that he should suffer. It pleased the Lord to bruise him. Our gracious Father, we realise that we have done nothing to deserve that. Certainly since we have come to know it, even to trust in Christ, we have not lived in a way that shows that we truly appreciate it. But Lord we thank you that your commitment to us is firm. We thank you Lord that your purpose to save us is sure. And our gracious Father we thank you that the Lord Jesus Christ was able to say while he was on earth and will be able to say on that last day that of all those who have been given to him not one has been lost but the son of perdition. And to our Father, we thank you for those things. We do thank you, our gracious God, for calling us to know you. We thank you, Lord, for granting us repentance. We ask, Lord, that we may know a deepening of those experiences. And our gracious Father, we pray that we might not be so attached to the things of this world and all that it offers, that we pray our gracious God that we would desire those blessings that come from your hand. Now Father we thank you that in so very many ways as we have lived the Christian life that we have discovered that you love us and that you care for us and that you answer prayer and that you organise and order our circumstances in the way that pleases you. So, Lord, we come with confidence in prayer to you this evening. We thank you, Lord, that our affairs, though really quite small in the overall scheme of things, nonetheless, Lord, they are large in our own lives, they are large to our own minds, and we thank you that we are encouraged to cast all our care upon you, because you care for us. And now, Father, we thank you that these things matter to you, And Lord we are amazed when we think really of the quantity of things that are being brought to your attention and the way in which you organise and order everything. We are amazed Lord nonetheless that these things should matter. And our Father we thank you that it is indeed a sign of your love to us that they matter because we matter. And our gracious God, we do, Lord, commit to you the things that are on our hearts and our minds. We commit to you, Lord, the things that distract us in our lives from being the people that we ought to be. We commit to you, Lord, major decisions which we have to make. Perhaps some of us, Lord, in this year are coming up now to the time of exams or making major decisions. We ask, Lord, that you would bless and guide us. We pray, Lord, that we would know what it is to commit our ways unto you. And, Lord, we thank you that your promise is that if we do that, that you will bring it to pass. And our gracious God, we pray, Lord, for those of us who have other matters on our minds. Perhaps some of us are concerned with our employment. Perhaps some of us are concerned with our health. or with our witness, either at work or perhaps to our neighbours, Lord, we would spread all of these things before you and commit them to you. Our gracious God, we would commit our land to you, Lord, we realise that there is never an indication, Lord, of any increase in godliness. We realise, Lord, that we're like those who are described in your word, that when you looked upon the earth to see if any did seek God, that, Lord, it is true of us that we have all together turned aside. We've all become corrupt. And our Father, we realise that spiritually, that our land is like that. That in many ways, Lord, we acknowledge that it's not the worst place in the world to live, and that we as your people are not persecuted here, as your people are in some places. And yet, Lord, we realise that all of the trends in society are away from you, and that those who oppose you are confident, in their assertions and in the way in which they seek to govern our nation's approach to ethics, to education, to health, to all sorts of things, and to government. and that those in government, Lord, though they will make a kind of acknowledgement of you and bring your name into situations when it suits them, nonetheless, Lord, do not seem to govern in the spirit of dependence upon you and of humility before the teaching of your work. So our gracious God we would ask that you would be gracious to us. We thank you Lord that as we look in the past we see times when your spirit has really blessed this land and moved across this land and turned many people towards you. And we realise Lord that there is nothing that men can do that will bring that kind of effect about. And our Father, we realise that the returning to you can only come from you. And so Lord, we plead to you to pour it upon us. We ask you Lord to pour it out upon us. We pray Lord that you would bless particularly the preaching of your word. We thank you Lord that you love your word. We thank you that it doesn't just get read and sounded out, but we thank you Lord that you send it forth. And we thank you, Lord, that it always accomplishes the purpose for which you sent it. And we do pray, Lord, that you would bless in particular the preaching of your word. We ask, Lord, that you would help us, Lord, to be more effective in gossiping the gospel. And we pray, Lord, that you would help us, Lord, to feel a great burden for those who are lost. And, Lord, may we want to share with them the things of your word and understand how to do it. in a way Lord that touches their hearts. Our gracious God and our loving Father, we pray that you would bless each of us as we continue in this service before you. We ask, Lord, that you would bless the reading of your word and the preaching of your word. We pray, our gracious God, that you would bless us as we take up the words of hymns, Lord, and as we sing them. May they not be just words, but, Lord, may they be the means also through which you speak to us and through which, Lord, we do express true heartfelt praise. Our Father, be with any who have particular needs, perhaps particular sorrows, particular spiritual struggles. Lord, help us at a very fundamental level to think right thoughts and to seek to glorify you in every way. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you very much for the opportunity to be here again and to invite you to turn with me to Ephesians chapter 4, please, for our reading. And we'll read the first 16 verses of Ephesians chapter 4. I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called. with all loneliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling. one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Wherefore he said, when he ascended up on high, he laid captivity captive and gave gifts unto men. Now that he ascended, what is it? But that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth. He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things. And he gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers. for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slate of men, and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive. But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things which is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supply, according to the effect you are working in the measure of every part, make an increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love." We do trust that God will bless that portion of his word and help us to understand it and to apply it in the way that he desires. A few visits ago we began to look at the petitions that Jesus I've said the things that he paid for in John Chapter 17, and I'd like to ask you to turn back to John Chapter 17 this evening. And I suppose the matter that we'll be looking at this evening is is the thing for which this particular chapter is most well known in these days. It's most often quoted, it seems to me, or the passages where the Lord Jesus particularly prayed for the unity of his church are the ones which are most often quoted. Whether they're quoted with justification, that's because another question, and we'll be giving that some thought, although I don't really want to make you on the controversial aspects of this. Now John chapter 17 divides up into three parts. At the very beginning Jesus prays for himself. He prays because the hour has come that he would be glorified and so on and that's how it is at the beginning. And then in verse 6 down to verse 19 he turns to the apostles and prays for them. And we were thinking last time we were looking at this passage in particular verse 11 and what it means when the Lord Jesus prayed, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me. And we saw that what that meant in fact is not so much keep through thine own name but keep in thine own name. And in verse 6 he says that he has manifested thy name, he had taken these people and he had taught them about God and he is now praying as he is leaving them and he is not going to be there to do that anymore, that God himself through the work of his Spirit would keep, that the Father would keep them even though Jesus is not going to be with them. In those doctrines that he had taught them in the name of God that he had manifested as he says in verse 6. And then he goes on to add, keep them through thine own name, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me that they may be one as we are. And then in verse 20, remember he starts by praying for himself and then he prays for the apostles and then in verse 20 he prays for us. He says, neither pray I for these alone, not just for the apostles, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word. Well that's us, and many others of course as well, but it does include us. And he comes back to this same thing again, that they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory. which Thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one. I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that Thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as Thou hast loved me." When in verse 20 the Lord Jesus turns to pray for the whole church, in fact most of the remainder of the prayer is taken up with this subject, this subject of oneness among Christians. Now of course we live in a day in which this has become quite a theme for the church in general. not just what we would recognise as the true church, the evangelical church, but for many organisations that call themselves churches. This whole theme of oneness has become really a very, very strong theme. It's the sort of religious Christian, I'm using the word Christian loosely here, but it's the kind of Christian equivalent of political correctness, isn't it? Whatever else you do, you must be ecumenical. And indeed that's the name that's given to this movement, the ecumenical movement. And it comes from a Greek word which really describes the whole inhabited world. And so this is the vision that these people had, that somehow they would be able to break down barriers and structures and really sweep away quite a lot of human history and in its place put a kind of one world church. And what they quote so often as a kind of justification are these verses that we have just read and they say this is the prayer of Christ. Now I imagine, well I hope I can even go further than imagining, I hope it's definitely a fact, that you have a problem with that movement, I have a problem with that movement. And the problem of course that we have with the movement is that to achieve the unity, the structural unity, they compromise the Gospel. And instead of maintaining, you know, the distinctiveness of the Christian message and of the need to actually know Christ personally, they sweep all that to one side. And, you know, you would think really that if you're going to pull this kind of world movement together and get all these leading people and all these leading thinkers and you are going to do all that, you think you would have tremendous doctrinal statement, after all that's how a lot of these people make their living, by teaching theology and so on, and you would expect that. But the funny thing is, when you actually get to the World Council of Churches, which of course is a kind of globalised expression of this movement, when you get to the World Council of Churches you find a statement of faith which actually consists of no more than about two sentences. And that really is all the statement of faith that the World Council of Churches consists of. And it's simply a statement that Jesus is Lord. And they've had to get rid of everything else because they can't agree on anything else. They've had to sweep everything else away. And so we have a problem with a movement like that. We have a problem with a movement that does away with so much of scripture and does away with the distinctiveness of Christ as the only way to God, because that movement does do away with that. And as I say, we have a problem with that. And because we have a problem with that, very likely it sort of translates over into not a lot of interest in the whole subject of Christian unity. You know, it's one of those things that's been hijacked in our day. And because it's been hijacked by these people and by this kind of non-evangelical agenda, it tends to be something, perhaps a subject in which we don't give a lot of thought. But as I say, when the Lord Jesus Christ turns in this prayer to pray for his church, it's a major thing for him. He pays for it over and over. And sometimes it helps us really with the Scriptures if we can at times lift passages out of the controversy in which they tend to get kind of dragged in. Because even if there wasn't such a thing as the World Council of Churches, even if there wasn't such a thing as the Ecumenical Movement, even if none of those things existed and we didn't have any problems with anything like that at all, these verses would still be in the Bible. So they've still got something to say to us. And it seems to me that there are a number of passages like that that we could, at times, consider not in terms of the controversy that surrounds the issues that they raise in our time, but just remember that they would still be there, and were there, before these controversies arose. They've still got something to say to us, as Christians. And so we ought to be challenged, don't we, by this? We ought to be challenged by the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ made this such a prominent feature of this prayer. And we ought to be challenged by it to consider it and to consider what it means and whether it's as prominent a part of our own thinking and our own aspirations of the way in which we try to live the Christian life, whether we're really one with Christ in this matter or not. We ought to challenge ourselves along those lines. Now what I want to really do is ask just a couple of questions of this subject of unity and seek to answer them from this passage and also from Ephesians chapter 4. And really the first thing that I want to ask, the first question is what actually characterises this unity? If I've said, as I have said, that what claims to be Christian unity is in fact not the Christian unity that Christ had in mind, well what is it that characterises this unity? And then the second question is really where is it seen? Because at the end of the day it should be a visible unity. The Lord Jesus in this passage speaks about the world. That this unity, if it can be expressed in the way in which it ought to be expressed, will in fact give credibility to the Christian message in the eyes of the world. That the world may believe that thou hast sent me. So the world can only believe what it sees, so obviously this is meant to be something which is seen. What is it that first of all characterises the unity for which Christ prayed? Well, the first thing is that Christ is very specific here about the people for whom he is praying. Obviously these are the people that he is praying will experience his unity and he is very specific about who they are. At the beginning of the prayer we read these words, Father the hour has come, glorify thy son that thy son also may glorify thee, as thou hast given him power over all flesh that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. And this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. So in these verses the Lord Jesus is giving us really his definition, or one definition of a Christian. He says that he has come into the world and he is now coming to the very climax of why he came. It's the hour, the hour is come. This is what it's all been leading up to. And what he is going to achieve in this hour will enable him to give eternal life to certain people. What is eternal life? Eternal life is to know God. This is really something very fundamental, isn't it? We can't get beyond this in terms of building a foundation. Jesus speaks of those who are going to benefit from his work as those who come to know God. that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." Now obviously, knowing God includes knowing him as he is described here, as the only true God, and that they might know Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. So these are the people for whom Christ is praying. So what characterises this unity for which he prays is first of all that those who seek to work it out, who seek to maintain the unity that he creates, have this thing in common that they all know God. This is the great distinguishing mark, isn't it, of the New Testament age. They shall all know me from the least to the greatest. And this is the Christian message, isn't it? The Christian message is not just that God is to be believed in, in the sense that yes, I believe that there is a God out there, that he exists, and all of those kind of things. But that he is actually to be known. That we are to seek to enter into a relationship with God. That is the Christian message, not just that we acknowledge that he exists, but that we should come to know him. And where that is absent, where there is no experience of knowing God, there is no eternal life. We cannot have eternal life in any other way. Now that's not what people generally believe, is it? People generally believe that if we live our life in a certain way, then hopefully when we die, we'll go to heaven. But that isn't what the Bible teaches. The Bible teaches that we have to come to know God here on earth and here in this life. And that unless we do know him, that we have no hope of going to heaven after we die. So that's the first thing then, that everybody involved in this must know God. The second thing is, that as well as this common knowledge of God, there are shared doctrines. And we looked, as I said before, at verse 11, the last time we looked at this passage. And in verse 11, this is where Jesus prays that the disciples, the apostles would be kept in the name that he had revealed to them. Now you remember, just a quick sort of recap, you remember that what Jesus was saying was that he had been with them, He had revealed God to them, he had kept them when they had wandered in their thoughts, when they had wandered in their actions, when they wanted to do things that were wrong. He had been there to keep them, to bring them back and he had so taught God to them that they themselves had loved God, that they themselves had really been so absorbed by the things that Jesus taught them. And then as he says in verse 11, he is about to leave them. He says, I am no more in the world. And that was about to happen, he was about to be arrested, he was about to be crucified. And he was no longer to be with them, but they were in the world. And the world was going to be a very hostile place. And it would give them plenty of discouragement, plenty of encouragement to stop believing what he had taught, to stop living for him. But he praised that they wouldn't lose anything that he had shared with them, anything that he had imparted to them. And so he prays that they might have these common doctrines, these common beliefs, the things that he had shared, that they may be one as we are. And then in verse 22 there is a similar statement. He says, And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them, that they may be one even as we are. It's interesting the way that different commentators interpret this in different ways, but what it seems to me that this means is that the concept of glory is that there is a day coming when those who are Christians will be like Christ in every way. They will actually not just be with him but they will be like him. They will know what it is not to have indwone sin and temptation that comes from the flesh. They will be brought really to what we should always have been and what we were made to be. And he says, he has given us this glory and we are not like him now. But we have it in a measure. We change from one degree of glory into another continually by the working of the spirit. We know a progress in these things. What we are is something which isn't immediately visible. When Jesus Christ comes we should be like him for we should see him as he is. And so we have this also in common. Because this isn't something which is just given to some Christians, all Christians host this. All Christians expect this, all Christians are pressing forward and seeking to make this more and more of a reality in their lives. This also is something that we have in common. So this unity is characterised by a shared knowledge of God, A shared relationship with God is characterized by shared doctrines. And it's characterized by relationships and activities which arise out of that. Because we are Christians, because we are members of a Christian church, we are members of a campaigning organization. We are members of the body of Christ. And of course it is the body through which the person expresses himself. And the church is the body of Christ, and it's that through which Christ expresses himself to this community. And this unity manifests itself not just in the fact that we come together and then go apart, but that we do things together. We do things for each other, but also we do things to bring the gospel to the world. that a Christian church is not meant to just be something to which people come. And then they go, you know, the building. That isn't a Christian church at all. We could not have this building and we would still be a Christian church. But if none of us knew the Lord, although we could gather in this building, that wouldn't make us a Christian church and this building wouldn't make us a Christian church. The church is the people. And I often find it surprising, you know, when you get even some evangelical publications, you know, you get articles about particular churches, and there's often a picture of the building. You know, so that's the church. And no pictures of the people. Or perhaps somebody standing outside, normally facing the camera, like he's about to be shot. But, you know, that's the sort of quality of picture, isn't it? But, I mean, that isn't the church at all. The building. It's just something that's owned by the church and is yours. But the church is the people. When God, as it were, thinks of a particular church, this church or any other church, he doesn't think of the building, surely. He thinks of the people for whom the Lord Jesus Christ died. And surely that's what the Christian church is. And so there are relationships and activities. which are wise out of the fact that we know Christ they are wise out of the fact that we have got these doctrines that need to be believed on in the world they need to be believed on for people to know the truth about God God needs to be known about in the world they need to be believed on for people to be saved and so we take them and so these things find an outworking so these are the things that characterise Christian unity It isn't to do with structures, and committees, and all of those things that so often people seem to want it to consist of. It is to do with relationships, first of all with God, and with the things that we believe, and with each other, which leads to us engaging in activity in which we support and encourage one another. Now, where is this unity seen? I want to ask you to turn to Ephesians chapter 4, the passage that we read together. Now, Paul is working this out here. And again, I just really want the Pauls to notice this. Paul was writing these letters. We find it so easy, don't we, to write letters. We dash them all around the world with email and everything, with letters all going all over the place, replying to them and everything the very same day. And even before that, pen and paper, it's not a problem for us. But in Paul's day, it was not easy to do this. Not everybody certainly could read or write, and even the resources, the materials on which to write and so on, they weren't just in abundant supply in the way that we are used to. And it's very instructive for us to see what the space is given to, because the space was precious. And again, a lot of space here is given to this subject of unity, and how it is actually worked out. So when is this unity seen? Well obviously here, Paul is writing to a local church. And that is really where this unity ought to be seen. I'm not saying that it's wrong for churches to unite with other churches to do things. I'm not saying that things like associations and GBM and all those kind of things are wrong. They're right. And in the scriptures we find sometimes more than one church cooperating to do something. When Paul took a collection for needy Christians in Jerusalem, he didn't just take it from one church. He went and he took an offering from a number of churches and churches cooperated. Sometimes they would cooperate and you see in the Acts of the Apostles, people who were working together in mission coming from different churches. And that's quite a biblical pattern. There's nothing wrong with that at all. I think it can go wrong. It can go wrong if instead of cooperating to do something, you just cooperate to form an organisation. And if the word, say, association, becomes a noun instead of a verb, then it's gone wrong. But there's nothing wrong with doing those things, it's perfectly biblical. And of course sometimes we can give our emphasis to doing things among the churches and between churches, so much so that we're not actually doing what we ought to do in our own church. And that's wrong too. I used to be the pastor of the church at Tottenham, as you know, and that church in fact a previous pastor was there for nearly 50 years and he was secretary of what is now the Trust Corporation and for many years he gave all his energies to the work of the Trust Corporation and he was responsible apparently for keeping a number of church doors or chapel doors open that would otherwise have closed. But his own church did close. And we mustn't be so fond of things in the bigger church movement and the wider world and so on, that we don't do what we ought to do in our own locality. So, I don't want to knock those things or say they're wrong, but in the New Testament the focus of this is very much in the local church. And this is what Paul is speaking about here, he says in verse 3 that we are to endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. So unity is not something that we are to create, but we are to maintain it, we are to endeavour to keep it in the bond of peace. And how do we do that? Well first of all we do it by expressing the graces of humility and love. Paul says, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with lot suffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Now, church membership is a bit like your family, isn't it, church membership? You know, you can't choose them. You can't choose who is a church member. It's often said, isn't it, you know, you can choose your friends but you can't choose your family. It's exactly the same with the membership of the church, isn't it? And we sometimes find with church members that they're not always the people that we find the easiest to get on with. Well, how are we to respond to that? Well, we're told here how we're to respond to that. We are to respond to that with loneliness and meekness and with long-suffering and we are to forbear one another in love. That is our calling. That is what God has actually called us to do. If we don't do that we are not walking worthy of our calling as church members. The church consists of people who are sinners but who are brought together very deliberately by the Holy Spirit because they have a vital ministry to perform to one another. We need each other and we often need the very words that we don't want to hear. We often need the very insight that somebody brings that we would never bring ourselves. We often need the very thing that we find annoying. We're not meant to just sort of get the bit between our teeth and have everything our way. And we're not to just sort of impose our own agenda on the church. If we've got particular feelings about the way things ought to be done and we can express them and support them biblically, well then the opportunity ought to be there for us to do that and others ought to listen. But at the same time if somebody else points out that perhaps we are not interpreting the scripture fairly or it draws something to our attention, we have to listen. And we must never approach a situation with the attitude which says now God has kind of made me a prophet on this issue and you just listen to me. We come with our understanding of scripture and it is a very imperfect understanding and we should come with that awareness. We share it and maybe others have a different understanding and we have to listen. And this is how we are to conduct ourselves. It's also expressed in terms of order as well. When we read in these verses, we read about the Lord Jesus Christ that he ascended on high, we read in verse 8, he led captivity captive and he gave gifts unto men. And it speaks about the gifts that he gave in verse 11, some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists and some pastors and teachers. Well we know nowadays we don't have apostles and we know we don't have prophets. We may have specifically evangelists, but we know we have pastors and teachers. Why has Christ actually given these people? Well, we read that it is for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Now, people who have the gifts and abilities, the gifts to pastor, the gifts to teach and so on, they are given to the church by Christ. It's right, you know, that you are not just content to say, well, you know, we don't need a pastor. We don't need anybody to pastor this church. You know, we're getting preachers in and they're preaching the Bible and all that kind of thing. What do we need a pastor for? That's right, that you don't seek to stay like that. It's right that you seek God for a pastor. And that you seek Christ for the person that he has given to you. at this time to do this work. When you find him and you appoint him and he agrees as well that it is what he ought to do, you must realise that although you support him, there is a sense in which you don't employ him. You do employ him legally of course, but there is a sense in which you don't appoint him. Christ sends him. Now that doesn't give him the right to dictate and so on. These things are quite difficult, aren't they, in these days. But when a church has a pastor, and it is a pastor of Christ's appointing, then he comes into the church with the authority of Christ. He comes in as a gift of Christ. What does he come to do? Well, he is here for the perfecting of the saints. He is here for the work of the ministry. Now you could read that to say well he's here with a ministry. He's here to do the work of the ministry. That isn't actually what it says. It is for the perfecting of the saints for the work of their ministry. He's here to train you. And he's here to help you to identify what your ministry is. He's here to help you to develop it, to develop your abilities. That's what he's here for. Some churches, of course, have more than one. And that's what they're there for. And so, in a church in which there is a pastor, we mustn't have the idea that if we get a pastor, we can stop doing so much work. Certainly not. If a church has a pastor, and the pastor sees his role in terms of Ephesians chapter 4, verse 12, he should be making you work harder. He should be there seeing what the church ought to be doing. He ought to be there seeing who could do it, who could serve in certain roles. What do people need? What do they need to learn? What do they need to understand? How can they serve in these roles? And the church must be prepared to be led. This is very difficult, it seems to me, in these days, in our particular society. We live with such an anti-authority ethos in our society that life is very difficult, quite often, for people in positions where there should be some authority. And I shared with you how my son, when he joined the Territorial Army, was amazed. He said, the first time he'd ever seen authority. So he managed to get to 18 years of his life without ever seeing what started it. But that is the kind of day in which everything is questioned. And everybody has to justify themselves and all this kind of thing. And nobody accepts that not everybody can be a chief and some people have to be Indians. And this attitude creeps into the church. How is this unity expressed? Well it's expressed as we recognise the order that is there in the church, the leadership that Christ supplies to the church. And as we are prepared to work alongside and in support of the person in the lead. I know there are lots of issues here, I know the person in the lead is still accountable, The person in the lead is not a dictator, he has to be a man with tremendous wisdom. But at the same time, we do have to recognise that the church can't function if everybody wants to impose their own agenda on the way everything is done. And we need to accept that there are people in leadership, and they are responsible, and they are accountable, and we should be thankful it's them and not us. Like James, he says, don't be many teachers, because those who teach have got to bear a stricter judgement. Don't rush to put yourself in that position. In the letters to the Hebrews, it's written to those who are in leadership, and the Christians to whom the letter is written are exhorted to obey them. Those who watch over your souls, for they do it as those who must give an account. Really, we ought not to step in a position where we are accountable for what goes on in the church. They have to give the account and we should support them and willingly follow the lead that they give. So what do we have there? We have many things which Paul speaks about here when he speaks about the unity. There are many things which there is only one of. He says there is one body and one spirit. Even as you are called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. But then he brings in a but. And obviously, that indicates to us the thought's changing here. Now we're not talking about oneness, now we're talking about diversity. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. So this oneness, one faith, one church, one body, one God and so on, one baptism, although there's only one of all these things, but when it comes to us, we differ a lot. There's not one type of Christian. in terms of our personality, in terms of our gifts and so on, well then it's a bunch. We're many types of people. We're a very diverse bunch of people. And God has deliberately created it that way. But under the leadership which Christ has given, then the diversity can be applied and can work harmoniously to achieve the job in hand. What is, if you like, the outcome of all of this? Well, the outcome is the development of the church and of each of us as individual members. Verse 15, that speaking the truth in love we may grow up into him in all things which is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supply according to the effect you're working in the measure of every part, make an increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love. Individual members of the Church are only built up according to the extent to which we all do our particular work. The body builds itself up. It edifies itself. And it does it by what is described here as the effectual working in the measure of every part. That we each have a role to play. We each have a ministry. We each have particular insights. And we are to speak the truth in love. That we are to seek to be motivated by love. And out of the love that we have we are to speak the truth. And as we do that, we make that particular contribution, then the body grows. And we grow as individuals, as members of the body. The whole body, fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supply, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, make an increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love. So again, in the local church, this is how this is seen. that as we each do what we are supposed to do, as we each say what we are supposed to say, we each maintain the attitude that we are supposed to maintain and play the part that we are supposed to play, with all of the diverse gifts which God has formed in us, before and after he draws us together into his membership, as we each make the particular contribution, the particular unique contribution that we can, then as individuals we develop and the body as a whole develops and grows and builds itself up in love. This is a great picture, isn't it? And if we see this picture and we have any idea in our mind of the kind of picture which is being presented here, we can begin to appreciate why the Lord Jesus Christ prayed so much for us in this prayer in John chapter 17. Why? He prayed that we might be one, that we might work together, that we might have that oneness just like the Father and the Son had. Previously we were thinking about the way in which the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit worked together to bring salvation about. And that's what Jesus is praying for, that we might work together, that we might have a tremendous oneness in the purpose which we have as a Church. I don't know how you would define unity. It seems to me that the scriptural definition of unity has a lot to do with activity, has a lot to do with working together, and it seems to me that really what is meant in the scriptures by unity is first of all that we share a vision, i.e. where we're going, and we also share a vision about how we're getting there. the various steps that we're committed to achieve the same things and we're committed to achieve them by the same means. It seems to me that that's really what the Bible speaks about when it speaks about the way in which this unity ought to express itself. It doesn't mean to say that we don't raise questions. It doesn't mean to say that we don't raise disagreements or express disagreements. It doesn't mean to say that providing our attitude is right that we can't speak very freely. and that we can't question, we can't exhort one another and even at times rebuke one another. It doesn't mean to say that those things have to be absent. In fact they have to be present because we have to help each other in our understanding of what it is that the will of God is for us in particular circumstances and particular situations. And as I say, sometimes it means that we've got to hear other people saying things to us which we don't welcome. And perhaps we've got to say things to other people which they don't welcome. And that, it isn't easy. You know, at a preface we would shy away from it and just tell people what we know they want to hear. But that isn't speaking the truth in love. That's just flattery. And although it's easy and it makes our life easy, Well, that's the reason why we do it, isn't it? Because it makes our life easy, not because it's the very best thing for them. And so we have to be prepared to play our part and we have to be prepared to receive the part that other people play in our own Christian lives as well and in our own relationships as members of the Church. Well, do we play our part? Is my attitude one of loneliness and long suffering and love? Do I share the things which I believe the scriptures teach me about the church or do I just gossip about them to one or two other people and sort of spread unhappiness in that way? When there is work to be done that I can do or that I am asked to do, am I willing to do it? Am I a person that somebody in leadership and in authority in the church is happy to have there? Or am I a person that every time somebody thinks about me they do it with a kind of heaviness in their heart because I'm a problem? Do I encourage? Do I love people enough? to tell them the truth even when it's not flattering, when it isn't encouraging. And if I do have to do that, do I do it not because I get a great deal of pleasure out of putting other people right, but because it is the loving thing to do, and in fact I find it difficult to do. What kind of person am I? Am I doing what Paul exhorts me to do? Am I endeavouring to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace? The unity for which Jesus prayed. He prayed for it. At a level it is there, but it's not one of the things that's there in the Christian life without me also wanting it and without me having a responsibility to play my part. I do have a responsibility and what I have to ask myself is really whether I'm facing up to my responsibility and whether I'm serving Christ and serving the Church in regard to this matter in the way that he wants me to. Well, if I'm not, I want to change, and I want to pray to be able to change, and to be quite different, and to be an encourager, and a uniter, and to be a person who plays my part. And if I am, well, then I ought to pray that it might go on like that, that I could maintain this, this unity which is created by the Spirit, and that it might deepen in the life of the Church, because it's not an unimportant thing, it's a very important thing. Now may the God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make us perfect in every good work to do His will, working in us that which is well pleasing in His sight. Through Jesus Christ to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.