This weeks scripture for lesson is Ephesians 4 1-24, so lets read the scripture, then we'll talk.
1As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called— 5one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
7But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. 8This is why ita says:
“When he ascended on high,
he led captives in his train
and gave gifts to men.”b
9(What does “he ascended” mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? 10He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.) 11It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, 12to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
14Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. 15Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. 16From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Living as Children of Light
17So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. 19Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.
20You, however, did not come to know Christ that way. 21Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.
So weve talked about love in two different ways, weve LEAPed into all of this, and now it's time to start building from the foundation of love. We start by using the spiritual gifts that weve all received. I mentioned this in the LEAP piece but let take it slightly further here.
YOU are good at SOMETHING - period. What that is, the world may or may not know. I will talk from a little experience that I have so it is slightly more relatable. I found myself, early on in life, doubting why I was here or what my place was in this world. I also found myself doubting my faith and whether God even existed. As i tumbled through this period, I knew that I enjoyed making music. I grew up around it in my family, and sang in choir through middle school. I started my first band when I was 14. As time went on I went to form a metal band, but that comes later in this story.
Through my journey to that point I also identified my educational goals and began going to Arnold R Burton Tech Center for electronics and Computers, because I enjoyed that and had a fairly decent grasp on the roots of them, again through family.In my time @ Burton i became involved in a student organization called SkillsUSA - VICA. Through that organization, I received a lot of experience and training in speaking, and business. This is also the period of time I really started re-finding my faith. This is when I realized that my abilities in music and leadership, were God-given gifts.
I used my experience in SkillsUSA to really build a lot of relationships and learn a lot about how to run business. That business experience brings me back to the band. I started a metal band and was searching for a name, when I ran across a poem I had wrote through finding my faith. The name of the poem was Blood Fed, and it was about how the blood of Christ had been the one true nourishment I had ever needed to move forward in my life, and through that, everything was given to me, and all was possible. To make it look cooler we changed the spelling to BluDFeD, but the foundation was still the same. As I began writing the songs for BluDFeD I found myself writing a LOT about my journey to faith, and the feelings I had in that journey. These were words that were absolutely given to me by God. As I sat and thought about that, I realized EXACTLY why I was here.
This was a very heavy thing to come to realization, but it was also very awesome to know. I was here to bring the word of God to the world through music and through my connections with people. That's why I am still a huge fan of music, even though my life right now has brought me away from being in a band for now, and that is why I work with the youth and post these blogs for you all to read each week. These are MY gifts that were given to ME.
What is your gift? Are you good at Art? Maybe sports? Maybe your good with your hands or even a musician such as myself. Either way, this is a GIFT that was given to you by God! Heres where the building comes in. Your gift may just be small in your eyes, but, if you use it in the right way, it can be a HUGE thing in someone else's life and can build not only your personal faith journey, it can help build the church you go to or Christianity as a whole.
You hear a lot about the "Christians" that do things to land them in the news in a negative light, but you dont hear about the good things quite as much. There out there, but its our job to get them out there some more. Headlines these days are about the economy, and job loss, and politics, but if were doing what we are supposed to be doing we can change those headlines. We can show anyone and everyone that our gifts were given to us by God through Christ, and as the first verse of this states, we are prisoners to God, bound to get out there and show the world so we can further the cause of Christ. I also previously stated that Church Of The Brethren believes in the ministry of all. That means, that you ARE called to do something, and that thing is probably something to do with one of your gifts. So think about those gifts and what you can do to apply them in the world in a positive Christian manner...THEN DO IT. Its that simple, no catch, no fine print, no if-then. Just get out there and do what your good at and know that you can do it because God gave you that gift just like he gave you the gift of salvation through Christ.
1As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called— 5one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
7But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. 8This is why ita says:
“When he ascended on high,
he led captives in his train
and gave gifts to men.”b
9(What does “he ascended” mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? 10He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.) 11It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, 12to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
14Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. 15Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. 16From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Living as Children of Light
17So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. 19Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.
20You, however, did not come to know Christ that way. 21Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.
So weve talked about love in two different ways, weve LEAPed into all of this, and now it's time to start building from the foundation of love. We start by using the spiritual gifts that weve all received. I mentioned this in the LEAP piece but let take it slightly further here.
YOU are good at SOMETHING - period. What that is, the world may or may not know. I will talk from a little experience that I have so it is slightly more relatable. I found myself, early on in life, doubting why I was here or what my place was in this world. I also found myself doubting my faith and whether God even existed. As i tumbled through this period, I knew that I enjoyed making music. I grew up around it in my family, and sang in choir through middle school. I started my first band when I was 14. As time went on I went to form a metal band, but that comes later in this story.
Through my journey to that point I also identified my educational goals and began going to Arnold R Burton Tech Center for electronics and Computers, because I enjoyed that and had a fairly decent grasp on the roots of them, again through family.In my time @ Burton i became involved in a student organization called SkillsUSA - VICA. Through that organization, I received a lot of experience and training in speaking, and business. This is also the period of time I really started re-finding my faith. This is when I realized that my abilities in music and leadership, were God-given gifts.
I used my experience in SkillsUSA to really build a lot of relationships and learn a lot about how to run business. That business experience brings me back to the band. I started a metal band and was searching for a name, when I ran across a poem I had wrote through finding my faith. The name of the poem was Blood Fed, and it was about how the blood of Christ had been the one true nourishment I had ever needed to move forward in my life, and through that, everything was given to me, and all was possible. To make it look cooler we changed the spelling to BluDFeD, but the foundation was still the same. As I began writing the songs for BluDFeD I found myself writing a LOT about my journey to faith, and the feelings I had in that journey. These were words that were absolutely given to me by God. As I sat and thought about that, I realized EXACTLY why I was here.
This was a very heavy thing to come to realization, but it was also very awesome to know. I was here to bring the word of God to the world through music and through my connections with people. That's why I am still a huge fan of music, even though my life right now has brought me away from being in a band for now, and that is why I work with the youth and post these blogs for you all to read each week. These are MY gifts that were given to ME.
What is your gift? Are you good at Art? Maybe sports? Maybe your good with your hands or even a musician such as myself. Either way, this is a GIFT that was given to you by God! Heres where the building comes in. Your gift may just be small in your eyes, but, if you use it in the right way, it can be a HUGE thing in someone else's life and can build not only your personal faith journey, it can help build the church you go to or Christianity as a whole.
You hear a lot about the "Christians" that do things to land them in the news in a negative light, but you dont hear about the good things quite as much. There out there, but its our job to get them out there some more. Headlines these days are about the economy, and job loss, and politics, but if were doing what we are supposed to be doing we can change those headlines. We can show anyone and everyone that our gifts were given to us by God through Christ, and as the first verse of this states, we are prisoners to God, bound to get out there and show the world so we can further the cause of Christ. I also previously stated that Church Of The Brethren believes in the ministry of all. That means, that you ARE called to do something, and that thing is probably something to do with one of your gifts. So think about those gifts and what you can do to apply them in the world in a positive Christian manner...THEN DO IT. Its that simple, no catch, no fine print, no if-then. Just get out there and do what your good at and know that you can do it because God gave you that gift just like he gave you the gift of salvation through Christ.
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