I, therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.

Ephesians 4:1

Today, as I continue my sermon series on Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, my focus turns to Chapter 4, and especially to its opening words, quoted above.

That is our calling, Paul teaches us, as Christians, as followers of Jesus: To live a worthy life. But what does that mean? And how do we know if we are? 

The word that Paul uses for worthy is “axios” – it literally means to bring into balance, or to balance the scales. It’s where we get the word, “axis,” for example. So picture one of those old-fashioned scales, and place on one side your life as it currently is, and on the other side, the life God is calling you to live. Is it in balance? 

To help us think about that, let’s remember what that calling is. Our calling begins, as we looked at in the first of this sermon series, with being chosen in Christ. Being chosen in Christ, we have been saved by grace through faith – we have been brought into a community of faith, where we learn of God’s purpose for our lives, and where we are strengthened in faith in order to do the good works asked of us. 

That, according to Paul, is what it means to be called. And now, Paul is challenging us to lead our life in a way that is worthy of God’s grace, to lead a life worthy of our calling. of the great gift given to us in Jesus, the great privilege of serving in this world as followers of Christ.  And if that sounds kind of daunting, then we are probably on the right track. Paul intends to challenge us.

Because/Therefore

But this isn’t to say that our salvation depends on our living this life in this way. That is not what Paul means, and we see that by a simple but powerful word he uses at the beginning of this chapter: Therefore. 

This is always an important word in Paul’s letters, and it always marks a turn in his letter. The first part of his letter is the “because” – the second part is the “therefore.” And the order is very important. 

To understand any of Paul’s letters, it is crucial to get this order right. Think of a very simple example to see this: Because it is supposed to rain today, therefore I will bring my umbrella. The other way around doesn’t make sense, right? Because I will bring my umbrella today, therefore it will rain.

In Paul’s letters, the “because” is the good news of the gospel, of our salvation. And the “therefore” is how we should live our life. Not the other way around. 

So: Because God loves us and because we are saved by grace through faith, therefore we should live in a certain way: We should love God with everything we’ve got, and love our neighbor as ourselves; we should respond to God’s grace by giving back to God as much as we can and as often as we can, we should lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called. 

Think about the old-fashioned scale again, and put the “because” on one side and the “therefore” on the other side, and you get the picture. 

Today, and for the rest of these sermons on Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, we will be looking at Paul’s “therefore,” but it is important never to forget the “because,” and even more importantly, we must never forget the order. If we mix up the order, we completely miss what Paul is saying. But once we get the order right, then we can think of the “therefore” of the Christian life. 

So, with that said, let’s come back to the question I began with: What does it mean to lead a life worthy of the calling to which we have been called? 

Paul is going to spend the rest of this letter answering this question, but he gives a broad outline of an answer in the very next sentence. And in that important sentence, which is verses 2 and 3 of this passage, Paul identifies five essential characteristics of this worthy life.

Humility

And the first of these characteristics is as much a relief as it is an irony: The first characteristic of leading a worthy life is to recognize that we are not worthy. The first characteristic, Paul says, is humility. 

Having humility in this case means to recognize that we are not worthy, and that we never will be; that our life will never balance the scale; that our “therefore” will never be anywhere near to God’s “because.” That is humility, and that is where leading a worthy life begins. 

So, if you don’t think that you are balancing the scale with your life, then you are on the right track. It doesn’t mean that you should stay there, but it does mean that you realize that you can never really earn what God wants to give you freely. Grace cannot be earned; it can only be humbly received. And it is grace that makes us worthy. 

Gentleness

But there are other aspects to leading this worthy life. The second characteristic that Paul names here is gentleness, or meekness. 

So, what does it mean to be gentle, or meek? Well, if we want a picture of what it means, we can look at Jesus’ life. And we can see from his life that being gentle and meek is not necessarily what the world might think it is. It does not mean always giving in to others. Far from it. 

What it does mean is this: A meek person is willing to be led by another. Jesus was meek because he was willing to obey his heavenly Father. He was obedient to the Father’s will. He was willing to be led by his Father. Even when that meant standing up for justice and opposing evil, even when it might mean sacrifice. 

That is what it meant for Jesus. And that’s what it means for us, too. We are gentle and meek when we seek to do His will, not ours;  when we are willing to be led by the Father, and to do what He commands, not what we want; when we are more willing to pray, “Thy will be done,” than “My will be done.” That is what it means to be gentle, or meek.

Patience

The third characteristic is patience, or that great word from the King James Version: longsuffering. 

This word literally means to have patient endurance under injuries inflicted by others. To lead a life worthy of our calling means to be ready to endure injuries inflicted by others because of the life that we are living. It’s never easy to be a Christian, in other words, and to think otherwise is only going to lead us to be unprepared for what is to come. Martin Luther explains this in a very simple but powerful way. He says this: 

“Whoever has faith, trusts in God, and shows love to his neighbor, practicing it day by day, will suffer persecution. For the devil never sleeps, but constantly gives him plenty of trouble.” 

The devil never sleeps, and he hates people who are trying to lead lives worthy of the calling to which we have been called. So we need to be ready. We need patience, we need the ability to endure whatever he throws at us. And we can because of Christ who strengthens us. As Martin Luther also says of the devil in his most famous hymn, “one little word subdues him.” And that word is Christ.

Love

The fourth characteristic of the worthy life that Paul outlines for us is to “bear with one another in love.” You knew that one was coming, right? The worthy life of a Christian always comes back to love, as it must, for it is the greatest gift that God has given us, and the greatest gift we can give to each other: To love. 

But not just any love. As you may recall, the Greek language has four different words for love. And the love that Paul describes here is “agape” love. It is the highest, purest form of love. It is a love that is self-giving; a love that desires nothing in return. It is the word for love used in John 3:16, the most famous verse in the Bible. And it is the word used in 1 Corinthians 13, Paul’s great, poetic description of this love. And this is the love that we are to give to one another if we are to lead lives worthy of our calling. We are to bear with one another in “agape”, self-giving, selfless love.

Unity

You might think that love would be the last characteristic that Paul names here of the worthy life, but there is one more. As a reminder, the first four are: humility, gentleness, patience, and love. The fifth and final characteristic is to “make every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” 

To be one in Christ by being united with one another. Notice how many times the word “one” shows up in verses 4 and 5 of this passage: One body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all. 

Seven times Paul reminds us that we are one body, one church. We have one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. And we have one God and Father of us all. And our task, Paul says, if we are to lead a life worthy of our calling, is to work toward this oneness: to make sure that our oneness, our unity, is maintained in the bond of peace. 

And not to rest until all the world recognizes that there really is one God and Father of all, there really is one Lord, one faith, and one hope. And if the world is to recognize this, we must “make every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

Closing

So, let’s come back to my opening question: How do we lead lives worthy of the calling to which we have been called? How do we work toward balancing the scales, making sure that our “therefore” is right up there with God’s “because”? 

We do this with humility, and with gentleness and patience. We do it by bearing with one another in love, and by making every effort to maintain our unity in the bond of peace. 

Next week we will look at a few more ways to lead this worthy life, but I think we have enough to work on this week, don’t you? Let’s do so to the glory of God, trusting that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. Amen.