The 10W-40 of Unity

If you have your Bible with you, and I hope you do, I want you to turn to Ephesians chapter four.
Last Sunday we began what I told you is gonna be a slow stroll through the second half of the book
of Ephesians. We did one verse last week. We're gonna do one verse again this week.
I promise we're not, there are 89 verses in the second half. We're not gonna spend 89 weeks in
this. It's not just gonna be one verse a week, but. Here at the beginning, we just need to slow
down and see how Paul is setting up this second half of the book.
This is a turning point. Chapter four is a turning point, as I told you. Chapters one through three
are about what Christ has done for us. Chapters four through six are about how we respond to what
Christ has done. Chapters one through three are primarily what are called indicatives.
what the Bible indicates is true about God. Chapters four, five, and six are the imperatives.
So you have indicatives and imperatives. You have this is what we believe, this is how we behave.
Two ways of thinking about it. And in chapter one, verse one of chapter four,
there's the thesis statement that sets up the whole second half of the book. As followers of Jesus,
we are to walk in a manner worthy of a calling by which we've been called. The rest of the book is
about how we walk with a worthy calling. And this morning,
I want us to see the link between verse 1 and verse 3. So verse one says, walk in a manner worthy.
Verse three says, be eager to preserve the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace. And there's
this link in between that takes you from, here's what it looks like to walk worthy. And here's how
you preserve the unity of the body. To help us understand verse two,
we're going to look at this worthy walk and preserving unity. But I want to ask you a question as
we start. Do you know why you put motor oil in your car?
what the oil is there for. Now, I pulled up this picture of this old can of Mobile Super 10W40
motor oil. This is what I used to put in my car back in the day when I used to change my own motor
oil in the car. It's true. I would climb under there. I would unscrew it. I would drain the oil
pan. I would screw it back in. I would put the oil in. So, in order to explain why you have oil in
the car, Let me just explain how an internal combustion engine works.
And I have no business telling you how, because I have a minimum of an idea about how this works.
But I do know this. I know that you put gas in your tank,
and there are spark plugs in the engine that take the gas, and with the spark,
they ignite it and make a little explosion in your engine. These explosions are happening all the
time in your engine, and those explosions are causing pistons to go up and down, and as the pistons
go up and down, they're turning the crankshaft, and the crankshaft is what makes the car go. How
about that? That's about as detailed as I can get. Thank you very much.
Now, here's what's amazing. When you're driving down the highway, going at highway speeds,
like that, okay? And with all of that motion, there's a lot of heat being built up,
and the piston, there's friction as it goes up and down, and that's why there's oil in your car.
because oil reduces the friction when those pistons go up and down. It carries some of the heat
away as the oil circulates through the crankshaft, and it cleans the engine.
It cleans out impurities caused by the friction. In fact, that's why you have an oil filter,
because that filter cleans out some of those impurities. Now, what does that have to do with
Ephesians chapter four? Some of you are wondering. Well, In order for us to preserve the unity of
the spirit and the bond of peace in the church, in the home, in marriage,
in all of our relationships, you're gonna need those relationships to be friction-free and you're
gonna need oil to be present in those relationships to reduce the friction, to carry away the heat,
and to clean out the junk that shuts the relationships down. And in the Bible,
oil is a symbol for what? The Holy Spirit. The Bible talks about the Holy Spirit as oil.
And in verse 2 of Ephesians 4, it's pointing us to the fact that the Holy Spirit will produce in us
certain character qualities that are going to reduce friction. lower the temperature,
and cause the relationships in the church and in the home to run smoothly.
Four essential ingredients. I thought about calling them essential oils, but that would have given
us a whole different direction. So four ingredients that are necessary if we're gonna preserve the
unity of the spirit and the bond of peace. And we won't get all the way to verse three this
morning. As I said, we're gonna focus on verse two, but I wanna start by reading verses one through
three. And before we do that, let me pray for us. Father, again, we need your spirit just as we
sang this morning, all is vain unless the spirit of the Holy One comes down. So Lord, would you
come, be in our midst, speak to our hearts, soften our hearts, prepare us to receive from your word
this morning and speak to us through your word by your spirit, we ask in your name, amen.
Would you stand together with me as we read God's word? This is the word of God for the people of
God. Ephesians four, beginning at verse one, Paul writes, I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord,
urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called with all humility
and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love.
eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.
Amen. May God bless this reading of his word. The grass withers, the flower fades, the word of our
God will stand forever. You may be seated. So let me give you an overview.
of where we're gonna go as we look at verse two this morning. First, I want us to see from this
passage that when it comes to living a life that glorifies God, a life worthy of the calling by
which you've been called that leads to the goal of unity, it starts on the inside. It starts in
your soul. It starts with being before doing. That's the first thing I want us to see in this.
Unity involves being before doing. Secondly,
I want us to see the four essential attributes necessary, and that's humility,
gentleness, patience, and forbearance. We're going to look at those four words,
what they mean, and how we cultivate those attributes. And then finally, I want us to talk about
how we all need an oil change in our lives. So let's get to this idea of walking in a manner worthy
of our calling. If we're gonna do that, we have to begin with behavior, not with our behavior,
excuse me, but with our heart or with our soul. We begin with being before doing.
This is the message, by the way, of the gospel. The gospel is not clean up your act.
Don't you know what Jesus did for you? Clean up your act. No, the gospel is that God is both the
creator of all things, but he's also a master remodeler. When we begin to wrap our heads around
everything we read in Ephesians. one through three, what God has done for us in Christ, which is
the articulation of the gospel. When we submit ourselves to him and surrender our lives to him,
here's the promise he makes to us. He's going to make all things new. He's going to make you a new
creation. He's going to move into your life and begin a lifelong remodeling project on your soul.
It starts with God the Holy Spirit coming in and taking a broken, corrupted, sin-sick,
self-centered heart out and giving you a new heart. The Bible calls it taking out a heart of stone
and giving you a heart of flesh. And then once you have the new heart in you, the transplant has
happened, God... goes to work reshaping and remodeling your life,
putting off old things, putting on new things, producing in you what's called the fruit of the
Spirit instead of the fruit of your flesh.
See, there are a lot of people, I think, today who get this wrong. They think that being a
Christian means you must try to live according to the Christian ethics, but you don't have to
surrender to Jesus to do that.
Just think about that. People who would say, I try to live a good life. I try to live the way the
Lord wants me to live. I try to live according to the Ten Commandments or the Sermon on the Mount.
They'll throw out Christian ethics, but they don't recognize or they won't go to the place where it
must begin with the new heart and with the surrender. You try to live the Christian life out of the
old heart, it won't work. I mean, you can fake it for a while. But it's not going to be pleasing to
the Lord.
Why won't people surrender to Jesus? Here's why. It's scary. You're giving up control.
You're letting go of your authority over your life. You have to trust him.
You have to follow him. You have to live obediently to him. And he may call you to do hard things.
He will call you to do hard things. But surrender means you're the boss.
By the way, Following him and doing hard things even when it doesn't seem right to you, that's
what's called walking by faith. It's trusting that God knows what's right for you and you're going
to follow him rather than following your own impulses. And I think there are a lot of people who
would call themselves Christians today, maybe even some of you here this morning, who are trying to
follow the commands of Jesus but don't want to give him control of their lives.
And if that's you, listen, it's all of us to some extent, right?
This is the daily battle I face. The daily battle I face is, am I gonna follow Jesus or my own
plan? Am I gonna do what he wants me to do or do what I wanna do? So I think there are two kinds of
people here this morning, those who would say, I have surrendered my life to Jesus, but I have to
keep surrendering every day, moment by moment. That's how I walk, and I don't always do it
perfectly, but I'm trying. And then there are others who would say, I think the Christian way of
living is the right way to live, and I'm going to do my best to try to live that way, but I'm not
going to give Jesus control of my life. No Jesus take the wheel for me, all right? I'm happy to
have him along for the ride, but I'm staying in the driver's seat.
So which one of those two is you?
Because here's the thing. With that first group, God becomes the remodeler. When you surrender to
Jesus, he becomes the remodeler of your life. He's in charge. He says, we're going to do this.
We're going to do that. We're going to knock this out. We're going to reshape your life. With the
second group, you're the remodeler.
You're hoping God might show up as a subcontractor, but you're the general contractor.
But that's not how God works. God does not come in as anyone's subcontractor.
He does not ride in the passenger seat with you in the driver's seat. When God comes in,
he takes control.
We surrender to him and give him control because, listen, he's God.
You're not.
God, by definition, is in control.
So if you're in that second group where he said, I'm trying to live as a good Christian, but I
don't know about, I'm not doing this surrender thing you're talking about. I just have to say,
you're not a Christian.
That's, the Bible defines being a Christian. as being surrendered to Jesus. It begins,
your Christian life begins with, I surrender, I'm not my own, I've been bought with a price,
I'm letting go of my agenda, my priorities, I'm gonna trust you and your purposes for my life,
and this is the being that has to come before the doing. This is the mindset,
this is the life change that has to come before you try to live anything out.
If you turn to Ephesians chapter four and ignore chapters one through three and say,
I'm gonna try to do what it's called me to do, if you do that with the old heart, it won't work.
Success, whatever that word means, in life, in marriage, family, child rearing, finances,
it all flows from character. If the heart is right, eventually everything else will fall into
place. If the heart's not right, nothing else will become or remain right. That's why Paul tells
these Christians to walk in a manner worthy of their calling. He first places, the first place he
takes us, when he looks at here's how you walk worthy, he takes us to the engine.
He takes us to the heart. He takes us to the motivations that are going to power our behavior.
He wants to make sure that we've got the right oil in our engine before we try to turn things on.
Because if we don't, if we try to run our engine as Christians, we try to apply the right virtues,
I'll call these relational lubricants that we're gonna be looking at, if we try to do that without
surrendering to him, the friction will be there, we will overheat, the whole thing shuts down.
So here are the four essential attributes that we need to look at. that make up this relational
motor oil that will preserve unity in the spirit. The first is humility.
That's the first ingredient in your 10W40 to make your oil work.
The text says to walk in a manner worthy of our calling to which we've been called with all
humility. That's where it starts. You can't walk worthy of your calling. You can't preserve the
unity of the spirit and the bond of peace unless you have cultivated a heart of humility. So what
is that? What is humility? Well, let me start with this. Humility is the opposite of pride.
It's the opposite of arrogance. It's the opposite of self-centeredness or self-exaltation.
Tim Keller famously said that gospel humility is a state of radical self-forgetfulness.
That's just a good phrase. Humility is radical self-forgetfulness.
He says it's not thinking more of yourself or less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.
That's humility. Here's how Paul defines it in Philippians chapter two.
He talks about the priority. of unity. He says, be of the same mind, have the same love,
be full accord, one mind, unity. And then he says, do nothing from selfishness or from selfish
ambition or conceit, but in humility, self-forgetfulness, count others more significant than
yourself. Let each of you look not only to your own interest, but also to the interest of others.
That's what humility is. You're counting others as more significant than yourself. Their needs come
before your needs. And our model for humility, Paul goes on to give it to us.
He says, have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the
form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped,
but humility emptied himself, taking on the form of a servant.
Being born in the likeness of man and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming
obedient to God. There's a part of humility. I've emptied myself. I'm obedient to God.
He did it to the point of death, even death on a cross. When the Bible tells us to have in
ourselves the same mindset that Jesus had, here's what he's talking about. Emptying yourself of
yourself, taking on the form of a servant. Being obedient to what God's called you to,
that's humility. That takes humility. That takes self-emptying, self-forgetfulness.
Alexander Strzok says, hardly anything is more contrary to the example of Christ,
the message of the cross and Christian love, than arrogance and self-importance.
An arrogant Christian is an oxymoron.
Amy Carmichael, God bless her, said, those who think too much of themselves don't think enough.
Contrary to the opinion of some, humility is not some kind of false modesty.
Humility means having a correct self-assessment. So to be humble,
we understand that we've been given gifts and abilities. We understand that those gifts and
abilities come from God. We understand that each of us has value, has worth, has dignity,
that we're image bearers of God. At the same time, we understand clearly about our fallen nature.
We understand when Romans 3 says there is none righteous, no, not one, it's talking about us.
The Bible wants us to make sure we're not thinking too highly of ourselves, but also not with false
modesty, thinking too lowly. The Bible wants us to have a correct self-appraisal, to understand
what's our true worth and value, and at the same time understand what's true about our sinful
nature. And the more we understand the reality of our corrupted nature, the more we understand...
that this will produce humility in us. In fact, it was Jonathan Edwards who said that the key to
understanding, or the key to humility is to understand your corrupted nature. He said,
humility is ultimately a habit of the mind and heart corresponding to our comparative unworthiness
and vileness before God. Just pause there. Is that how you see yourself?
That apart from Christ, you are unworthy and vile before God?
We sing that sometimes, things like, what a wretch I am, guilty, violent, helpless, we.
We sing those lines, but do we really? Most of us, I mean, that's me. I think, I'm not vile.
I'm a nice person. I mean, with a few bad things, but I'm mostly nice. No, the Bible says that
apart from Christ, apart from his redeeming work, you're a stench in the nostrils of God.
Edwards goes on, he says, a truly humble man is sensible of the small extent of his own knowledge
and the great extent of his ignorance and the small extent of his understanding as compared with
the understanding of God. That's what makes you humble. You go, I'm not that smart. I'm not as
smart as I think I am compared to God. My wisdom is small. His wisdom is great.
Humility is essential for us to walk in a manner worthy of our calling.
It's essential. for unity to exist. Humility directs our focus away from ourselves.
The more you're paying attention to yourself, the less attention you're paying to God and others.
So get your focus turned around. The less attention you pay to self, the more capacity you have to
pay attention to others. I'm going to read a long quote from Ligon Duncan. I know I've read a lot
of quotes, but I love this quote from Ligon Duncan. He says, is what will ultimately bring you joy.
He says the key to a life of joy, the kind of life that Paul's talking about,
not superficial joy, not trivial joy, not joy in sunsets,
not joy in a wife, not joy in children. Not joy in cars, not joy in football,
not joy in money, not joy in beauty, not joy in esteem, not joy in influence,
not joy in anything that the world can give, but joy in Christ. The key to a life of joy is a God
-centered, gospel-based, grace-enabled, shifting of our attention away from ourselves and onto
others.
You want joy in life? then you need a God-centered, gospel-based,
grace-enabled shifting of your attention away from yourself and onto others.
So all of us battle with humility. All of us are infected with pride.
How do you become the new creation God wants you to be? How do you grow in humility? How do you
become less arrogant or less prideful or less self-centered? Well, here's where you start. You go
back and reread Ephesians 1 through 3.
You go back and read what God has done for you in Christ. Who you were, dead in your trespasses and
sins. What God did made you alive in Christ. What you didn't deserve. You go back and let your mind
just soak on that truth.
It will humble you. The more you understand the gospel,
the more it humbles you. Re-believe the gospel.
Meditate on the gospel. and let it have its humbling effect. I know I've quoted a lot of people
here, but one more. Thomas Manton, the Puritan, said, you cannot cure your spirits of envy,
pride, self-confidence, or vainglory, but God gives more grace. You can't do it.
You can't say, I'm gonna be less humble, but God can do it in you, and the work of the gospel will
do it for you. You humble yourself by relying on grace, reminding yourself of who God is and what
he's done. Recognize that all you have in this life is a gift from him. Teach your soul to trust in
God and not in yourself. Boast in him, not in yourself. Humility is expressed when you ultimately
surrender, like we talked about earlier, when you give up, when you let go, when you confess your
total dependence on him and ask him to pour grace into your soul.
because God gives grace to the humble. All right, so humility is where you start.
It's the essential, first essential ingredient. You can't walk in a manner worthy without humility.
You can't have unity among the brothers without humility. Humility is essential. Here's the next
essential. Gentleness. Now you recognize that as a fruit of the spirit.
In fact, let me just say this. There are lots of lists like this in the Bible where it talks about
godly character and virtuous character. All of these lists are fruit of the spirit.
We often think the fruit of the spirit are these nine things in Galatians chapter five. And some of
you have memorized those verses. Good verses to memorize. Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
patience. You've got the list. Well, yes, that's true, but that's not the exclusive list because
humility is not in that list, but it's a fruit of the Spirit.
Forbearance, which we're going to look at here, is not in that list, but it's a fruit of the
Spirit. Any virtue that is produced in your life, you didn't come up with that.
It's a fruit of the Spirit.
So gentleness is one of the things, one of the fruit of the Spirit that is going to be necessary.
for you to walk worthy, and for you to preserve unity. Gentleness, sometimes this is translated
meekness, and those two words are cousins, not exactly synonyms. Jerry Bridges in his book,
The Fruitful Life, says gentleness is the active trait. It describes the way we should treat
others. Meekness is the passive trait. It's the proper response to what we should do when we are
mistreated by others. So a meek person, responds in meekness when he is offended.
A gentle person is proactively expressing gentleness and treating others with gentleness.
A gentle person will actively seek to make other people feel relaxed and restful in their presence.
That's what a gentle person does. He wants you to feel relaxed and restful.
A gentle person... is not so strongly opinionated or dogmatic that others feel afraid to express
their opinions in his presence. Think about that in our current culture.
And a gentle person will be sensitive to the opinions and ideas of others. I saw a little video
clip this morning. Amazing clip. This young woman who had just come from a debate on abortion.
The young woman is a... a debater. She goes around and debates on abortion. Her opinion is that
abortion needs to be preserved. It's right. It's a good thing. And she was debating people who are
pro-life. And she said the debate went very well. She said it was one of the most respectful
debates she's ever been a part of. At the end of the debate, they came to her and they said,
we heard that you're moving and you were having trouble. You needed money to help with your move.
And they handed her an envelope with $550 in it. She said, I've never had anything like that happen
to me. She was blown away by these people who are her ideological opponent demonstrating that kind
of kindness and treating her with gentleness, having a gentle spirit toward her.
And it shook her. You could tell from the video.
A gentle person will take care that they don't cause a bruised reed to break.
or a smoldering wick to go out. A gentle person will demonstrate respect for personal dignity of
another person, will seek to change a wrong opinion by kindness,
not by domination or intimidation,
will not threaten another person either directly or indirectly.
Gentleness will also avoid blunt speech or an abrupt manner. This is all from Jerry Bridges.
Instead, gentleness seeks to answer everyone with sensitivity and respect and show consideration at
all. And when you find it necessary to wound someone with your words,
you seek to bind up the wound with encouragement. That's what gentle people do.
Finally, a gentle person will not degrade or belittle or gossip about a brother who falls into some
sin. Instead, he will grieve with him and pray for his repentance.
Gentleness is an essential for unity. Gentleness invites people to draw near. Who's our model for
what gentleness looks like? Huh. Any ideas? Jesus.
How did he describe himself? What two words? I am gentle and lowly of heart.
That's humility and gentleness.
How did Jesus interact with the woman caught in adultery? With gentleness.
How did he interact with the woman at the well? He confronted her, but he was gentle in how he did
it. He's the model for us. The only people Jesus wasn't gentle with were the religious hypocrites
of his day, the false teachers. And by the way, I will give you permission not to have to be gentle
when you're confronting a false teacher.
Are you a gentle man or a gentle woman? Would people describe you that way?
In a culture that rewards boldness and confrontation,
owning your enemies, are you gentle? 2 Timothy says it this way,
the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone,
able to teach, patiently enduring evil,
correcting opponents with gentleness.
Again, does that sound like you? Are you harsh? Are you easily angered?
Do you have a sharp tongue? Are you abrasive in relationships?
Are you the kind of person that other people don't really want to be around very much?
Unity does not happen without humility and gentleness. Those are essential oil ingredients to
reduce the friction and the heat. And unity won't happen without patience. That's the third thing.
Do you know what patience is? Patience, again, listed in Galatians as one of the fruit of the
Spirit. In the King James, the word patience is translated what? Long-suffering.
A patient person suffers for a long time. Endures. Here's how Jerry Bridges puts it.
He says, patience is the ability to suffer a long time under the mistreatment of others without
growing resentful or bitter.
See, patience is not just I endure. Patience is you don't grow bitter and resentful even when
you're being mistreated.
All of us have triggers, things that trigger us, that cause us to be impatient. For me,
it is the 18-wheeler in the left lane on the highway going 67.5 miles an hour next to an 18
-wheeler that is going 67. and three quarters of mile an hour. This picture of here,
my wife sent me this on Facebook yesterday. The truck in the left lane is going 65 miles an hour.
The truck in the right lane is traveling 64.999 miles per hour. Neither driver has any intention
of changing that before crossing at least three counties. Behind them, an Oklahoma driver has
already finished entire Sonic drink, questioned every life decision that brought them here, checked
on Google Maps 17 times, and is now seriously considering whether the dirt road beside the highway
might be faster than traveling behind these. Says Oklahoma remains one of the few places where
gaining .001 miles per hour is apparently considered a perfectly reasonable reason to have a 40
-mile passing maneuver taking place. When I see these truckers doing this and I'm behind them,
I talk to them.
They can't hear me talking to them, but I am talking to them. It's a good thing they can't hear me
because the things I'm saying, I'm a pastor and it would look bad.
But as impatience goes, being irritated by truck drivers is a pretty low level issue.
Not that I shouldn't be dealing with it, but it's a low level issue. I'm the only one in the car
who knows it's an issue unless Marianne's in the car with me like she was this week.
What about when you're impatient with your spouse or
your kids or your coworkers?
What about the root of resentment or bitterness that can happen in your own heart when you're
impatient with others?
I mean, you can see how impatience does not promote the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace,
right? How patience is essential. You can see how being impatient does not make you worthy of the
calling with which you've been called. You know why? Because what does God abound in?
Patience. Nine times in the Old Testament, God is described as being slow to anger,
merciful, gracious, abounding in steadfast love. We walk in a manner worthy of our calling when we
are merciful to others and gracious, when we are slow to anger. and abounding in steadfast love.
The Bible says be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger. A patient person is someone who is
slow to anger. And the fourth virtue that's listed here,
the virtue of forbearance, bearing with one another, is a cousin to the word patience because it
means literally you put up with things. That's what forbearance means. You bear the weight of a
burden. of an issue without buckling or caving.
You put up with things without expressing anger or irritation. Forbearance means you graciously
tolerate someone else's faults or flaws. You graciously bear with the weakness of another person.
You cover another person's flaws with grace. It demands glory to overlook an offense for the sake
of peace and unity.
Now, again, think about how you respond to others. Would you be described as long-suffering? Would
others say that you put up with a lot without buckling, that you're able to do that?
And I know some of you are thinking, but wait, isn't there a limit to this, this patience and this
forbearance? I mean, I'll do it for a little while, but there's a point where it's got to stop,
right? Well, let me give you a few thoughts. If someone is sinning against you, if someone has a
destructive behavior pattern that is infecting a relationship, the most loving thing you can do is
help that brother or sister who's caught in a sin get free from it. So that may mean calling the
police if you have to. That may mean calling a friend. That may mean some accountability. It's not
accountability and trying to help someone get free from a sin does not make you impatient.
or doesn't mean you're not forbearing. But the motive for all of this is always a motive of love
for the other person, a desire for that other person to be restored and brought into peace and
unity. Here's who, guess who our model for forbearance is. You have any ideas?
It's Jesus.
In 1 Peter chapter two, just look at this. Peter says,
this is a gracious thing. When, mindful of God, one endures sorrow while suffering unjustly.
That's patience and forbearance. For what credit is it if when you sin and are beaten for it,
you endure, but when you do good and suffer for it,
you endure? This is a gracious thing in the sight of God. For to this you've been called.
because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you might follow in his steps.
He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled,
he did not revile in return. When he suffered, he did not threaten,
but continued trusting himself to him who judges justly.
Patience, forbearance, modeled by Christ, who was suffering at a level that I would suggest none of
us have ever had to suffer, and he bore it, and he endured it with patience,
and kept, this is key, he kept entrusting himself to the one who judges justly.
God, what I'm dealing with is unfair, it's a burden, it hurts, it's hard, I'm having a hard time
bearing it. I'm gonna keep trusting you and trusting that you will cause all things to work
together for good.
Now, that's hard, right? Maybe impossible. No,
not impossible. Why? Because with God, all things are what? Possible. And as we'll see next week,
God cares so much about the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace in the home,
in the church. That's why he says we must cultivate. Humility and gentleness and patience and
forbearance. These are the oils that keep the engine of relationships running smooth and safe.
It reduces the friction and the heat. If you don't have humility, gentleness, patience, and
forbearance, you will never have the unity that God wants us to have. With humility,
gentleness, patience, and forbearance, we can keep on loving one another even when things are hard.
And as the Spirit renovates your heart and your soul, This is what he has in mind.
He wants to replace the self-centered, harsh, irritable, impatient,
easily provoked self with a new heart where you walk by the spirit and you don't ratify the desires
of the flesh. So here's where we land. Do you need an oil change this morning?
I would ask for a show of hands. Do you need an oil change? But here's what would happen. If any of
you kept your hands down, that would show a lack of humility, which would show you need an oil
change. So we're all in the same boat. We all need an oil change.
So how do you do it? Well, if we're talking about your car, here's how you change the oil.
First, you drain the old oil out. Then you pour the new oil in. That's the Bible pattern for how
you grow in these graces. First, you have to put off. the pride and the irritability and the
harshness, but you have to replace it with humility and with gentleness and the other things.
So you have to put off, and by the way, as you're putting these things off, name them for what they
are and confess to God that they're wrong. So if you're an irritable person and you say,
I need to put off irritability. I need to drain the irritability oil out of my crankcase.
You go to God and you say, Lord, I confess to you I'm an irritable person and I need help.
And I need patience. And Lord, I need you to pour that into me. So this is the process you follow.
And putting on humility and gentleness, you don't have to just wait until there's a need for it.
Start to put it on as a, start practicing it. Start finding ways to practice gentleness or to
practice patience. Don't just wait to be provoked and see if you're any better. Okay?
How can I demonstrate gentleness today? How can I proactively show forbearance today?
And the only way you can do this is to walk with the Spirit throughout the day. Moment by moment,
you say, Holy Spirit, fill me now with your love, with your patience, your humility,
your gentleness, and then keep reminding yourself of what Christ has done for you.
Because that's the gasoline. The gospel is the gasoline that drives everything.
Reflect on how Jesus humbled himself for you, how gentle he is with you,
how patient he is with you, how much he puts up with from you.
And as we talked about last week, you make your life, your choices, make it all a thank you note to
him for what he's done for you. Imagine for a moment how our world would be different if...
is the thing that Christians were known for. If people said, you know those Christians,
the thing about them is they're so humble, so gentle, so patient and forbearing.
That's not our reputation in the world today. What if it was?
When we demonstrate these things, here's what we're doing. We're adorning the gospel.
We're putting the gospel on in a way that people look at it and go, that's beautiful.
Where'd you get that?
You know, if you were rich or powerful, excuse me,
let me say, back in Bible days, back when Paul was writing this, these virtues were not considered
noble. They were not sought after. If you were rich and powerful, you weren't humble. You showed it
off, and people expected you to. If you were upper class, you weren't gentle or patient.
You didn't put up with stuff. You didn't have to. But the Bible calls us as followers of Jesus to
embrace this new identity. Starts with surrender, with being before doing,
with rooting your new identity in Christ and what God has done with you in Christ, and then
choosing each day to walk in a manner worthy of your calling, which includes humility, gentleness.
patience, and forbearance. And as we'll see next week, we have to prioritize unity at home and in
the church and in our relationships because it matters a lot to God. But again, that's next week's
sermon. Let's pray together.
Father, thank you for the clarity of your word. And I pray, Lord, this morning that it has done
what a surgeon's scalpel is meant to do, that it has cut us where we need to be cut.
Lord, I pray that each of us would have the courage and the strength to challenge ourselves and
to ask ourselves if we are humble, gentle, patient,
forbearing people. And Lord, where the flaws are there, help us to turn to you and repent.
We pray that the remodeling work that we need in our lives would happen.
And Lord, we want to be a part of making that happen by walking with you,
believing the gospel, and beginning to practice these godly virtues.
Lord, I pray for anybody here who has, like we talked about earlier, who has been trying to live
out Christian virtues but has refused to surrender to you. I pray that this morning might be the
morning where they would say, I give up.
I'm ready for you to be my Lord.
I'm ready to follow you. and give up control of my life to you because it just doesn't work for me
to do it by myself.
Lord, I pray that you would draw them, that they would turn and repent and that they would become
Christians.
I ask all of these things in your name. Amen.