Sermons on Ephesians (Page 3)
When we speak of the mission of Christ, our minds most often turn to the end of the Gospel of Matthew or the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles—“The Great Commission.” All four of the gospel accounts provide passages that clearly teach the mission of Christ. Dr. Luke also makes this mission crystal clear in Acts 1:8. In a nutshell, Christ’s mission was to seek and save the lost. But Christ’s mission is not found only in these books—His mission is found throughout Scripture. Our focus for this sermon series will be Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus. Today, we will take a moment to explore Paul’s understanding of the mission of Christ and how that His mission should also be our mission!
Our journey through the One Another statements of the New Testament takes us today to Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus. In order to fully understand the original intent of this passage, we must consider the context–or the text that goes with our text. When we do this, we discover that Paul is focusing…
In our study together last week, Paul had just arrived in Ephesus on his third missionary endeavor. As was his custom, Paul began teaching and preaching Jesus of Nazareth as the promised Messiah in the synagogue there in Ephesus. In our study today, we’re going to take some time to note the impact that Paul…
How can we achieve a family life that always brings honor to God—a family life where God has no rivals? I believe that the book of Ephesians gives us six suggestions for how to keep God as our priority in our day to day family life. They are: 1) watch our walk, 2) steward our time, 3) understand God’s will, 4) submit to God’s Spirit, 5) focus on family worship, and 6) submit to one another.
Tolerance has become a buzz word in the twenty-first century. In a study prepared by Probe Ministries International, Scott Scruggs wrote, “In response to a survey concerning beliefs about God, a sixteen-year-old girl replied, ‘In my mind, the only people who are wrong are the people who will not accept different beliefs as being, well, acceptable.’ This girl believed that the only real sin is to not accept or tolerate other people’s beliefs.” If tolerance is respecting someone’s beliefs, does that mean that we are being intolerant if we attempt to convince someone to be a Christian? Does the Bible teach us to be intolerant?
In this message, we will take some time diving deeper into the fourth chapter of Ephesians. We spent a great deal of time focused on the single phrase “speaking the truth in love” in this morning’s message entitled, “If Christianity is all about love, why are Christians so intolerant?” So tonight, I hope to take a wider view of Ephesians 4 to discover some of the values that define the Body of Christ.
Today, people are constantly saying things like this: “That may be true for you, but it’s not true for me.” In postmodern society, God has been removed as the foundation for morality, human dignity and truth. People in a postmodern society determine/create truth that promotes their agenda. There is no right or wrong—true or false. They do not have any moral absolutes; rather, postmodernists believe that all different perspectives should be celebrated. With this kind of worldview, how can we communicate the truth of God’s Word to them?
We will be looking again at Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus this week. Last week, we studied from Ephesians 2. Today, we will focus our attention on the last half of Ephesians 3 and the first part of Ephesians 4.
Part 3. Our mission is to…Unite People to One Another. We have been reconciled to God and other believers, brought near to God by the Spirit, made citizens in the kingdom of God, being built up together as a holy temple in the Lord.