There's an old truism put into memorable words by Zig Ziglar, aim at nothing and you'll hit it every time. But there is no similar memorable quote about aiming at the wrong goal. Some churches aim at nothing, and they hit it every time. But many more churches aim at the wrong goal, or at least an incomplete goal. In many Bible-believing churches, their goal is getting soul saved. They gauge their success or failure in terms of the number of converts they see. And that's not a bad goal. It is indeed part of the right goal, but it's an incomplete goal. Other Bible-believing churches, particularly Baptist churches, gauge their success in terms of baptisms. The Southern Baptists, in particular, document their baptisms in their entire denomination each year, and they measure the health of their denomination by the baptisms. Again, it's not a bad goal, but it's an incomplete goal. Other Bible-believing churches, set goals in terms of the number of people who join their church, their membership. Some, even more simply, it's just their average Sunday attendance. Even worse, the real goal of some churches is the size of the offering. Underneath it all, they gauge their success in financial terms. Now, last Sunday, we discovered that God has a plan for the church, for the local church. He tells us here in Ephesians 4 how the church is supposed to work. That is, God has a strategy for the church, a step-by-step strategy. Step number one, as I said earlier, the strategy begins with Christ. All is of Christ. He must have the preeminence. His victory is the victory of the church. He builds the church. Step number two, Christ gave spiritual gifts to the church, including gifted leaders to lead the church. In particular, pastor-teachers. Step number three, the pastor-teacher equips the saints for the work of the ministry. It's not the job of the pastor to be the minister. Every member is to be equipped to be a minister. And then step four, every member minister edifies, builds up the body of Christ. That's the strategy that's outlined in verses 7 through 12 here in Ephesians 4. But God not only has a strategy, He has a goal, the right goal for the church. A strategy is incomplete without a goal, without a vision. Those who execute the strategy of the church need to know where they're headed. They need to know what they're aiming at. They need that goal. They need that vision. And that's what we find here in Ephesians 4, verses 13 through 16. Here is the goal that God sets for every local church. Here is the vision that God has for the universal church. So let's read those four verses together. Ephesians 4 beginning in verse 13. Till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes the growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love." Now that is a mouthful, and I don't think we're going to be able to chew it all up and swallow it today. So, hopefully we can digest the first half of this passage, verses 13 and 14, but we're going to begin with just a nibble. just the first four words, because those first four words suggest my theme and my title today, Goal and Vision. Now, several of the reliable modern versions, like the ESV, like the Numerican Standard, translate those first four words until we attain to the unity and so forth. So in certain contexts in the New Testament, this word that's translated attain in these versions speaks of a goal to be attained. And that goal is spelled out in the next three phrases here in verse 13. Notice the repetition of that little two-letter word to, T-O. To the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God. To a perfect man. Two, the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. You can see those three in my outline there under my second major point. And we'll unpack each of those three parts of this overall objective in a few minutes. But first of all, we need to understand that this threefold objective is something that we need to deal with on the personal level. It is our personal goal. Last Sunday we learned that each member is to be a minister. I challenged you at the end of the service that you need to be a minister. I hope that many of you made the decision last Sunday to be a minister. Well, as a minister, each of us is to build up the body of Christ. But what exactly does that look like? I mean, building up the body of Christ can be a lot like serving on a committee. How many of you have ever served on a committee? You look up the dictionary definition of a committee, here's what you'll find. Definition number one, a group of the unwilling picked from the unfit to do the unnecessary. Definition number two, a group that keeps minutes and loses hours. If you want to make sure that something does not get done, assign it to a committee. Why? Because when the job belongs to everyone on the committee, it belongs to no one on the committee. No one's really responsible. Well, telling believers that they're ministers who needs to build up the body of Christ sounds a lot like that, doesn't it? If we're all responsible to build up the entire body of Christ, then none of us are responsible to build up the body of Christ. And that's often how it works out. So we need to look at this in a different way. Truly, none of us is responsible for building up the entire body of Christ. At any given moment, how many persons in the entire body of Christ are you able to influence? With some of it, it's just a handful. It may be our children, a few friends that we have here at Midway Bible Church. If you teach Sunday school, you teach an adult class, you teach the children, it's probably a few more, maybe 25, maybe even 50. If you're a pastor, if you're one of the elders or one of the deacons, you may have an influence over the entire local church here, Midway Bible Church. But only a very few people have influence beyond the local church that they're a part of. Some may have an influence over an entire denomination. But think about it. The entire body of Christ at any given moment on earth numbers in the millions. How many of those people are you able to influence? How many of those people do you have a personal relationship with? See, it's on that level that God has given us a goal as a minister. We need to aim at ministering to the part of the body of Christ that God has put within our reach. So this is not an unattainable goal. This is a very realistic goal. And by the way, next week when we look at verses 15 and 16, we'll see how God talks about this. So it must be the goal that every one of us as a minister aims at, that we build up the members of the body of Christ who are in our sphere of influence. But then these first four words can be taken in a second way. Our new King James translates, till we all come. And in the book of Acts, that word that's translated come is used of arriving at a destination. One of the modern versions translates, until we all arrive. Have you ever used those words? I've arrived. We've arrived. How many of you have ever said that sentence at some point? We've arrived. I've arrived. Yeah. Maybe years ago, you're traveling with your kids, long car trip, and the kids are always asking what? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? And at some point, you say, we're here. We've arrived. Or maybe you flew into GSP, International Airport, out here. And as soon as you got off the plane, you took out your cell phone, and you called somebody who was sitting in the cell phone parking lot, and you said, I've arrived. Pick me up. You know, sometimes we use those words, I've arrived. I've finally arrived in a bit different way. We can use those words of finally having accomplished a vision that we've had for our lives for a long time. I finally have my own restaurant. I'm finally the president of my own company. I'm finally fill in the blank, I have finally arrived. And so in the second place, this phrase has the idea of accomplishing the vision that God has for the entire church. These three phrases here in verse 13, to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, these are also the eternal vision that God has for the universal church of Jesus Christ. What we have in these three phrases is a vision of what the body of Christ will someday be. Someday, in glory, the church, the Bride of Christ, will finally be, as Paul describes her in Ephesians chapter 5, a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, holy and without blemish. Someday, the church as a whole will be glorified. And these three phrases are a description of the vision that God has for the universal church. So we're going to unpack those three phrases that each begin with that two-letter word, T-O. And as we do, we're going to look at them from two perspectives. First perspective is our personal goal as a minister of Jesus Christ, how we can minister person to person. with those that God has put in our sphere of influence. And then second, each of them is an aspect of the vision that God has for the church as she will finally be a glorious church, the church in glory. So let's turn our attention then to this threefold objective, both our personal goal and the eternal vision of God. The first statement of this objective is to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God. Now, as we minister personally to others, whatever that ministry may look like, we seek to build others up as the members of the body of Christ. We seek to move them toward the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God. Now, there are two parts to that goal. A few weeks ago, as we studied chapter 4, verses 4 through 6, we noticed that all genuine believers are united by one faith. You remember? We define that one faith around the Gospel. We become Christians by believing the Gospel. And there are core doctrines that must be true if the Gospel is true. Anybody remember them? There were five of them. Number one, the inspiration of Scripture. Number two, the sinfulness of man. Number three, the divine human nature of Jesus Christ. Number four, I think I skipped one. Yeah, no, I could go. The substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ. And then finally, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Listen, it's not just my job to inculcate these core doctrines into Christians. That's the job of every minister. And you're a minister. Research came out this week from the Pew Research Group that talks about how many young people are leaving the faith. We are not doing the job of communicating the faith to the next generation. And you parents, that's something that you do. Sunday school teachers don't just tell nice stories, Sunday school stories. They need to inculcate the core doctrines around the gospel. It's the job of all of us as ministers to pass the faith on to the next generation, to new believers. But that's only half the story. We're unified around that one faith. Remember, that's the goal, to bring all of believers into unity, the unity of one faith. But also, we're unified not only by believing those core doctrines, we're unified by knowing, really knowing Jesus, the Son of God. The word that's translated knowledge there in that first phrase in verse 13, That's an intensive knowledge. It's not knowing about, it's not knowing facts, it's knowing, really knowing someone on a personal level. So as we minister to others, here's the goal. We need to be drawing them to know Jesus Christ personally in a deeper and deeper way. Wow, that's a tall order, isn't it? I mean, many of us don't really feel like we know Christ deeply enough. So let me park here for a minute and give you four practical suggestions that each of us can take to know Christ on a personal level more deeply. Okay, number one, pray that God will enable you to know Christ better. Josh Duckworth made a great point in Sunday School last week, based on what Paul teaches us to pray back in Ephesians chapter 3. We're supposed to pray that we may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. That prayer That prayer teaches us that on our own we can't even know the love of Christ. So first of all, if you want to know Christ more deeply, pray to know Christ more deeply. Lord, may I be able to know what is the length and breadth and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. God will honor that prayer. Number two, focus on Christ in the word. We find the knowledge of Christ in the Bible, but you know what? It's easy to read the Bible and not get to know Jesus. You can check that off every day, reading the Bible and never really get to know Jesus deeply. So wherever we read in the Bible, one question ought to be top of mind. What does this passage teach me about Jesus that will help me to know Him more deeply? See, there are things that we find in the Bible that we ought to respond to so that we experience Christ more deeply. Things that we ought to talk to Jesus about. See, I like to look at devotions, I don't really like that word, but I like to look at this as a two-way conversation. If I learn something about Jesus in Scripture, then I need to talk to Him about it, I need to respond. And that brings me to the third suggestion, pray to Christ. Now, the norm for prayer is to pray to the Father in the name of the Son in the power of the Spirit. Jesus caught us all to pray, Our Father who art in heaven, right? So, the norm for prayer is to pray to the Father. But listen, the New Testament also talks about praying to Jesus. In John 14, Jesus promised, And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do that the father may be glorified in the sun. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. Jesus says we can ask him in prayer. Now, I think a lot of Christians are confused about exactly who they're praying to when they pray. I think they're not real sure about whether they're praying to the father or they're praying to Jesus. I hear a lot of Christians who start out their prayer, dear heavenly father, and then they end their prayer in your name. Are you praying to Jesus or are you praying to the father? Because praying to Jesus is a very different thing than praying to the father. The father didn't hang on the cross for you. I try to illustrate this when we come to the Lord's table. I often make sure that at the Lord's table, I pray directly to Christ. See, I have this idea that one of the reasons that we don't know Christ personally and deeply is that we never talk to Him. So talk to Him. And then number four, and this is one that the Lord has only taught me perhaps in the last 10 years, and that is see your painful experiences through Christ. When you suffer, translate that suffering into knowing Jesus better. In the book of Philippians, Paul says that he was willing to flush all of the advantages that he had as a Jew right down the drain for the sake of knowing Christ better. And then he described how he came to know Christ better. He talked about the fellowship of his sufferings. And Paul suffered a lot. Imprisonments, beatings, several times he nearly lost his life. And he looked at all of those things as something that he shared with Christ. Listen, anytime you suffer, Anytime God brings that suffering into your life, if it doesn't have any other purpose, it has this purpose, that you share that experience with Jesus Christ. And here's what I mean. You know, when we're in pain, we feel something we don't feel in any other way. And part of what we're meant to understand is that we feel some measure of what Christ felt on the cross for us. I'm not just talking about the physical agony of the cross. I'm talking about the psychological, emotional pain that Christ felt when He was separated from the Father, the Father whom He had loved from eternity past, and He cried out, My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me? when we can feel what Christ felt and then realize that in his huge soul, his infinite eternal soul, he felt it a thousand times what we would feel, but he did it for us. This is part of the beauty of Christ. This is part of the glory of Christ. sharing in his sufferings in a way where we see our pain through Christ-colored glasses. So in these ways, we can come to know Christ more deeply, more personally. And when we do that, we're unified, we're drawn together with others who come to know Christ more deeply, more personally. And remember what Paul is talking about here in verse 13. This isn't just what we're supposed to do for ourselves. When we come to have this kind of a relationship with Christ, then we're supposed to draw others to have that same relationship with Him. That's part of our ministry. But then this phrase in verse 13 is not only our personal goal for how we minister one to another, It's also part of the eternal vision of God for the church. Someday in glory, the body of Christ, the universal church, will be 100% united in the faith. Now think of all the doctrinal differences that divide denominations today. I'm not talking about core doctrines. I'm not talking about those doctrines, those five doctrines that I listed a few moments ago. But think of all the differences that we have. Calvinist versus Arminian, dispensational versus covenant, continuationist versus cessationist. I could go on and on and on and on. Someday in glory, all those differences are going to be resolved. And there's going to be 100% unity in the faith. I had a co-worker At Bob Jones University, years ago, I worked with him for many years. And this always really bothered him. From time to time, he would ask, why are Christians divided over so many issues? And I could never give him an answer that satisfied him. But it never really concerned me that much, because I said, someday, all of this is going to be taken care of. The Universal Church of Jesus Christ is going to be 100% unified on THE faith on what we believe. And also, in glory, our personal knowledge of Christ is finally going to be complete when we see Him face to face. 1 Corinthians 13 puts it, now we see in a mere dimly, but then face to face. Now we know in part, but then we shall know just as we are also known. Faith will finally be sight. And as the hymn writer put it, oh, that will be glory for me. And again, this is not just on a personal level. The entire body of Christ will be united to our bridegroom as a bride. Our personal knowledge of Christ at that point will be so complete, so wonderful that the marriage relationship is the only metaphor that scripture can use in this to communicate this. we finally will have that complete personal knowledge of Jesus Christ as we are part of the bride. The second part of this objective is stated simply in two words. This goal is to a perfect man. Now, our New King James Version retains the translation from the Old King James Version, the word perfect. But you need to know that the word here that's often translated perfect in the Old King James and in our New King James, it doesn't really mean what we mean by perfect. I mean, when we talk about perfect, we mean perfectly perfect, right? 100% perfect. Some of the newer versions, the ESV, the New American Standard, the Net Bible, they translate this with the word mature. And I like that word a little bit better, but this is one of those words from the original language of the New Testament that you can't really translate with one English word. The word means something that has reached its goal. Now, you plant an acorn, When it reaches its goal, what will it be? Be a full-grown oak tree. Okay? Human being is conceived. When that human being reaches its goal, what will it be? Be a full-grown adult. See, this word that's translated perfect here, or mature, it asks the question, a believer in Jesus Christ, someone who's been saved, someone who is a follower of Jesus Christ, when that person reaches their goal, what will they look like? What will they look like? You know the answer. They'll look like Jesus Christ. You see, part of our goal as ministers on a person-to-person basis is to see every person that we minister to personally in the body of Christ be made more like Jesus Christ. That's our personal goal. Now, if you want to know what Christlikeness looks like, Go to Galatians 5, the fruit of the Spirit. Go to 1 Corinthians 13, Paul's description of agape lover. Just read the Gospels. But every one of us as a minister, here is our goal, that every person we minister to will become more like Jesus Christ. And then there's a second word in that goal. It's translated man in the New King James Version. But this is actually the word in the original language for male. M-A-L-E. Some versions translate this phrase mature manhood. But I don't think that God intended to discourage you Christian females. I don't think that was the idea. And so I think in English, the way we would express this, we would talk about a mature adult, a spiritually mature adult. Now, we live in a day in a society in which many individuals are postponing becoming adults. They want to remain adolescents with no responsibility right on through their 30s, excuse me, into their 20s, into their 30s, playing video games in mom's basement. I've read articles about colleges who are starting courses on adulting. But listen, this phenomenon doesn't just happen in society, it happens in the church. You can look around any church and you will find believers who want to remain spiritual adolescents. They're postponing becoming mature Christian adults. And part of our goal, the goal that God has set for us as we minister person to person, is to make certain that every believer matures to Christian adulthood. But then again, this objective is also part of God's eternal vision for the church as a whole. I indicated a few moments ago, in glory, the universal church will be the perfect, spotless, holy bride of Christ. Without spot or wrinkle, she will finally be worthy of the sinless, spotless Lamb of God who is her bridegroom. Just this week I read in 2 Corinthians 11 where Paul says, I have betrothed you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. Someday in glory, the universal church will finally be a mature adult chaste virgin ready as it were to marry the divine bridegroom. Right now we're in the betrothal period. But someday, the Church of Jesus Christ will be the perfected Bride of Christ, ready for the marriage supper of the Lamb. And then this goal is stated in a third way here in verse 13. And this third way seems to really just kind of expand on the second, a mature man or a mature adult. It says, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. And that just seems to be another way to talk about mature adulthood, but by means of a little bit different metaphor. Listen, how do you know that a human being is an adult? How do you know that a human being is an adult? Well, I can tell you one way. I was just at the DMV last week, and I saw a young man, looked like to be about 16 years old, taking his driving test. Always scares me to death that we let 16-year-olds have two-ton weapons. And they drive on the same roads as we do. So even our society at large defines adulthood based on age. And in fact, the word here that's translated stature can also be translated age. But that's not the only way to determine maturity. We also determine it by? What word does the phrase use? Height, stature, by inches. Now, if you're Kyle or Caleb, it's defined by more inches than some of the rest of us. But here's what's important. I think Paul definitely, the metaphor in Paul's mind is height. The rest of that phrase aligns with the idea that Paul is thinking spatially. He's thinking in terms of inches. That by means of stature, you can determine that someone is an adult. And I think it's important to realize that Paul is not thinking in terms of age. I think we make a huge mistake when we think, and it's easy to fall into this way of thinking, when we think the longer somebody is saved, the more mature they must be spiritually. It's easy to fall into that frame of thinking. Because unlike physical maturity, spiritual maturity is never a function of age. We must intentionally pursue spiritual growth. We must desire the sincere milk of the word that we may grow thereby. We must grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. We must go on from milk to solid spiritual food. And none of that happens automatically with time. It's a matter of decision and it's a matter of training. And so again, remember, we're talking here about our ministry. You see, first of all, every believer needs to be a self edifier. What's a self edifier? You need to be able to build yourself up in the faith. Maybe a simpler word is to say a self feeder. How many of you are self feeders? Listen, I've been at the fellowship dinners. I know you're all self-feeders. I mean, this is one of the first milestones in the life of a toddler, right? When that toddler can feed himself, sometimes you don't want to watch. But it's great when a toddler can finally feed himself. Listen, it's also a milestone in a Christian's life when a Christian can learn to feed himself spiritually. But see, we need to go this step beyond that. It's not just a matter of you learning to feed yourself spiritually. It's then also a matter of making sure that you teach those around you how to feed themselves spiritually. That's part of your goal as a minister of Jesus Christ. Then, in verse 14, Paul includes a final contrast, and I'm not really happy about it because it completely ruins my outline. But Paul includes these words in verse 14 because they teach us what a spiritually mature adult is by means of a contrast. The opposite of a mature adult is a child. And Paul says there in verse 14, if we're mature Christian adults, then we should no longer be children. And then Paul defines a person who is spiritually a child in terms of two characteristics. Both of them have to do with the unity of the faith that we talked about earlier. First of all, a person who is a child spiritually is distressed by false doctrine. Paul says a spiritual child is tossed to and fro by false doctrine. Now that word, that's the same word that's used in Luke 8 of the winds and the waves that caused the disciples to wake Jesus up and said, we're perishing, this boat's about to go under. A spiritual child is a child who doesn't know how to handle the winds and the waves of false doctrine, of cults. Part of spiritual maturity is being, part of being a spiritual adult is understanding the core fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith and being able to defend them. holding them fast in the face of false doctrine. Spiritual children, when the Mormon elder comes knocking, they open up the door and say, oh, hi. And they engage in an hour-long conversation with that Mormon elder. And at the end of it, they don't know if the Mormon elder was right or their preacher. Even worse with a Jehovah's Witness. We had a Jehovah's Witness coming through my neighborhood yesterday. And then you got the latest fads. You know, when I was a kid, Herbert W. Armstrong. How many of you have heard of Herbert W. Armstrong? Yeah, you're old. You're old. If you just raised your hand, you're old. Herbert W. Armstrong had millions of followers. And after him came some young moon with the moonies. I mean, there's just the latest spiritual fads. Someone who is a spiritual child. does not know how to defend their faith in the face of that kind of cult activity. And that's why it's part of our spiritual ministry, our one-on-one ministry to know the core doctrines of the faith, to embrace them and to be able to teach them to others and to teach them to defend them. And then in the second place, a spiritual child is open to deception, to the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. Trickery, that word speaks of someone who is trying to con you. Somebody playing a spiritual shell game with you. Somebody who is trying to take you. And then the word craftiness is the word that's used of those who brought tough questions to Jesus, trying to trip him up. Now look, there are people like this. They're always around. Some of you, there are people like this in your families. They're always trying to trip you up. They're trying to ask you a question that you can't answer. And a spiritually mature adult knows what to do even if they can't answer the question. A spiritually mature adult embraces the faith with a grip that will not let go, that says, even if I don't know the answer to this question, someday I will. And you and I need to be spiritually mature but then we need to be ministering to others to make sure they are spiritually mature adults as well. Now let me close by linking our personal goal with this universal vision of the church. See, as ministers, as person-to-person ministers, with the people in the body of Christ that we know, if we are carrying out this personal ministry, what are we doing in the body of Christ? In our little part of the body of Christ, we are bringing that piece of the body of Christ more and more into line with that eternal vision that God has for the Church. See, it's parallel to the to the idea of sanctification. You and I are to be becoming more and more like Jesus Christ. Are we ever going to make it in this life? Are we ever going to be perfectly like Jesus Christ in this life? No. But when Christ returns, then we shall be exactly, perfectly like Christ. And right now, as we minister to others in the body of Christ, as we are building up our little piece of the body of Christ, we are taking it more and more in the direction of what the church shall someday be when Jesus Christ returns. That is your ministry and my ministry. That is the goal and the vision that God has set for us. And let me close with an invitation. If you're not part of that, you can be today. I've been talking about spiritual children and spiritual adults. Well, that all starts with spiritual birth. It all starts with coming to Jesus Christ. He died to bear your sin and its punishment so that you can trust Him. You can be forgiven and you can have new life. Born again is the the phrase that the New Testament uses. If you're uncertain today, come to Jesus Christ. He can make you new. You can become a spiritual baby, but we won't let you remain a spiritual baby. We have people around here who will minister to you, build you up.