Eph6:10-24
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- Written by: Chris Appleby
Be Strong in the Lord & in his Mighty Power audio Eph 6:10-24
Do you remember when we looked at Paul's prayer in Eph 3 that I commented how difficult it is to achieve the sort of unity that God wants from his church. In fact I pointed out that that's why Paul prays the way he does: because only by God's power can this miracle come about. Paul knows that apart from the problem of our own weakness, our hardness of heart, there are forces in the world that'll try everything they can to stop us showing God's wisdom and glory to the world. The reality of life for the Christian is that we face opposition from the spiritual forces around us every day. We have an enemy whose sole aim is to ruin our efforts at every point. So Paul warns us. He says "our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places."
Eph5:21-6:9
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- Written by: Chris Appleby
A New Way of Relating - Mutual Submission audio
God has instituted an amazing plan, a plan that involves you and me in showing the world how great is his wisdom and glory. Not only has he instituted this plan but he's carried it out and continues to carry it out generation after generation. He's restored our spiritual life. He's put us in churches where the gifts he's provided for growing those churches will build us into a unified body as we become mature in our faith. Those gifts will provide us with stability, he says in Eph 4, so that we can grow up into Christ and build up one another in love as we each do our part.
Over the last two weeks we've seen a little of how we can do our part. We can learn to speak the truth in love. We can learn to put away falsehood, wrath, anger and malice. We can earn a living so we can give money away. We can tame our tongues so that everything we say is gracious, uplifting, life giving. We can live lives that are counter-cultural, in that they shun immorality, obscenity and greed. Instead we can seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit so that others are blessed by our presence among them. And today we discover how we can do our part in the context of our household and work settings.
Eph5:3-20
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- Written by: Bill Stewart
From Darkness to Light
by Bill Stewart audio
1 LIGHT OR DARKNESS? (Let no one deceive you!)
"For once you were DARKNESS,
but now in the Lord you are LIGHT.
Live as children of LIGHT
– for the fruit of the LIGHT
is found in all that is
good and right and true." (Ephesians 5:8-9, NRSV)
Light or darkness? It couldn't be more appropriate to today's reading from Ephesians that overnight we've begun "daylight saving". Have you ever thought about how much light and darkness still influence our lives – even in the age of electricity, with sources of light being available 24-hours a day? One writer (Craig Koester) has this to say about it:
"…the interplay between light and darkness is a fundamental feature of human existence. Day and night, brightness and shadow, establish the contours of the world we see. … Light comes gently with the promise of dawn but glares down from the noonday sun; it gives the assurance of vision yet threatens exposure. Darkness may fall quietly around two lovers while cloaking the movements of the thief; it can lull the weary to sleep but also awaken the terror of the unknown.
Eph 4:17-5:2
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- Written by: Chris Appleby
A New Set of Clothes Audio
If you haven't been here for the full six weeks of sermons on Ephesians, you missed out on a lot, But we don't want you to miss out so let me fill you in on the story so far. We've been discovering the amazing secrets of God's plan, prepared before the beginning of time, brought to fulfilment through Jesus Christ and now awaiting its conclusion. This plan was that God would restore humanity to the way we were meant to be. He'd restore our human nature, restore our human relationships, bringing us to unity under Christ, as part of his body. What's more he'd do that by creating a people for himself, a family in fact, that draws its identity from God himself. He'd do that by adopting us as his sons and daughters, joint heirs with Christ to the kingdom of God.
We discovered that God has done this by sending Jesus Christ to take on human flesh and in that human form to die and rise again; that God has raised Christ to sit at his right hand in the heavenlies. What's more he's also raised us from death and incorporated us into Christ. So we too have been raised with him and have also been seated with him in the heavenlies.
Eph4:1-16
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- Written by: Bill Stewart
UNITY AND DIVERSITY IN THE CHURCH
by Rev Bill Stewart audio
vs. 1-3:
"There is ...
one body,
one Spirit,
one hope,
one Lord,
one faith,
one baptism,
one God and Father..." (see Ephesians 4:4-6)
We get the feeling that Paul is trying to make a point, don't we? And in theory at least his point is simple: "maintain unity":
"I therefore ... beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called,
- with all humility and gentleness
- with patience,
- bearing with one another in love,
- making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (vs. 1-3)
I ask myself, what is driving Paul here? Is he just playing "happy families"? I don't think so. Paul begs the Ephesians to "maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace". Have you noticed how often Paul refers to "Spirit" and to "peace" in his letter to the Ephesians? Paul mentions the "Spirit" 14 times, at least twice in every chapter [read 1:13, 17; 2:2, 18, 22; 3:5, 16; 4:3, 23, 30; 5:9, 18; 6:17, 18], and he refers to "peace" 7 times [read 1:2; 2:14, 15, 17; 4:3; 6:15, 23]. And later in his letter in chapter 6, verse 15 – in that famous passage about putting on the whole armour of God, Paul says to the Ephesian Christians: "As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace". The gospel of peace! For Paul the gospel itself, the "good news" of Jesus is about the creation of peace.
Eph3
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- Written by: Chris Appleby
Paul's Prayer for his Converts audio
Have you noticed how the more you want something the more likely you are to pray for it? And to pray for it consistently. That means if you want to know what someone is really passionate about see what they pray for regularly.
Well Paul is about to let us in on the great desire of his heart. He's about to tell us what it is he prays for the church. He begins, "For this reason ..." Then he stops. He'll continue his prayer in v14, but first he wants to reinforce what he's been saying. He wants to make sure that they understand the significance of 'this reason'. Remember last week we read "you were [once] without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ." Once there were two nations: Jews and Gentiles, separated by a dividing wall of hostility. But now an amazing thing has happened. Christ has broken down that wall. Christ "has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace." (Eph 2:12-13 NRSV) And Paul has been given the ministry of the gospel to bring this change to fruition.
Eph 2:11-22
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- Written by: Bill Stewart
A Single New Humanity audio
"Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" These famous words were spoken by the American President Ronald Reagan in June 1987 during a speech given near the Berlin Wall. They were intended for the ears of the Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev. At that time almost no one expected that the Berlin Wall would be torn down without a fight. Many of us believed that only World War III could tear down the Wall and that because thousands of nuclear missiles were lined up on both sides of the Wall, all of us might die in the process. You may not have heard Ronald Reagan's speech, but most of us here today will remember – and those of us who don't remember may have seen images on TV – when just two years later in November 1989 over a million people came together to begin to tear down the Berlin Wall.
