Saturday, September 17, 2022

 

Saturday, September 17, 2022


Psalm 40

Nahum 1:1-14

Ephesians 4:1-16


Observance: Hildegaard of Bingen, abbess and spiritual writer (d. 1179)


The gifts he gave were... to equip the saints for the work of ministry.


Just like last time the lectionary gave us a reading from the Apocryphal writings, this morning we will skip the Nahum reading, simply because there is already enough in the inspired Word to try and get through in our devotional time. Besides, the vision of how “church” works that Paul is trying to teach us is worth spending time on.


Humility (and gentleness with patience), bearing one another in love, and making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace: these are the three foundational attitudes we should hold towards one another. Paul emphasises the ideal of church unity by quoting Psalm 68:18 and adding a dash of logical reasoning: Christ ascended, therefore He ascended from somewhere, which means at one point He had to descend; therefore, in that process (of ascending from the deepest depths to the highest heights) Christ is in everything. In the same way, the whole church is in Christ. There is nothing we do away from God.


But this is no lazy vision of the church where everyone is an equal, amorphous blob. Christ has given everyone a gift. We are equal in the Spirit, yes, but we all have our own job to do. This message might clash with our modern culture (and seemed to be an issue for the church in Ephesus for Paul to have to write to them about it). Hence Paul's instruction (or, “begging”) that we behave with humility, patience and gentleness. God made it this way, there is no point grumbling about it. Besides, the whole point of making things this way was so that we would bear one another in love, promoting the growth of the body of the church. We each have a task, specially given to us to complete, and have been given God's grace to complete it. The ultimate objective of the task is so that the “body”, or, the family of God into which we have been adopted, is a happy, loving family.


Paul gets a little Johannine towards the end here. To “speak the truth in love” is actually quite difficult. But we cannot be united in the one body, the one Spirit, the one God, with people who disagree with what “truth” is. But we must also love one another. Being a member of the church is difficult. But the unspeakable glory and riches of being in the body of Christ is more than worth it.






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