Growing Up Healthy
Ephesians 4:14-16
“Growing up healthy”
“I’ve learned much more from my students than they ever learned from me.” You can often hear a teacher say such a thing. But have you noticed that you rarely hear that statement from a mother regarding her children? That is because the things that mothers learn from their children are often hard to admit or too difficult to share. Listen, for instance, to this very abbreviated list of just some of the things mothers have admitted to learning from their young children.
A king size waterbed holds enough water to fill a 2000 sq. ft. house about four inches deep.
The motor of a ceiling fan is not strong enough to rotate a forty-two pound boy hanging from it with a dog leash—even if he’s wearing a Superman cape.
A ceiling fan, however, can hit a baseball a long way.
Double-pane window glass will not stop a baseball hit by a ceiling fan.
No matter how much Jell-O you put in a swimming pool you still can’t walk on water like Jesus did.
Swimming pool filters don’t respond well to Jell-O.
Despite evidence to the contrary from TV commercials, VCR’s do not eject PB&J sandwiches.
The spin cycle on a washing machine does not make earthworms dizzy.
The same spin cycle, however, will make cats dizzy.
Cats have a very similar response to extreme dizziness as most children do.
And then, one final recommendation or point of wisdom to new or eventual parents: if you ever find yourself wondering, even mildly, just know that you probably do want to find out where that odor is coming from.
The mother’s place in the home is well-established, and has been compellingly articulated by many who are far more eloquent than I. I most admire those who are able to capture it in one sentence. There are two such efforts that hang on our refrigerator at home. I believe it was Elisabeth Eliot to said, “Mothers are the shapers of destinies, the molders of eternal souls.” I like that one. You could also come at a very similar idea from a bit more cynical angle, though. I don’t know who first said it, but he was on to something when he said, “If Mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy!” Both are saying that the mother has an undeniable influence in the home—for good or for ill.
And that reminds us, doesn’t it, that Mother’s Day is not an entirely easy holiday. Some women who have born children just don’t conform the stereotype of a mother’s love. Several tragic news stories have reminded us recently of just how fallen this world is—as a mother’s heart turns evil and violent. The hardest cases, though, are the ones that don’t make the news—when suffering continues on in unrelieved silence. For people who have lived in those scenarios, Mother’s Day is beyond difficult. For others who long to have children, but are unable to do so, Mother’s Day can be a painful reminder of an impossible dream. Still others who have not yet found a spouse can feel equally deprived. But it’s not as though happy Christian family members don’t struggle with any part of life. We all need to hear God’s word to Paul (2Co.12:9a), “My Grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
Paul went on to write regarding his own struggle (2Co.12:9b-10), “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may rest on me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” How was he able to say this? He was mature in Christ. He was characterized by humility and gentleness, by patience and loving forbearance. He was well-grounded in his faith and his knowledge of the Savior so that he wasn’t thrown off-balance by the toughest experiences of life. Many of the qualities a loving Christian mother seeks to disciple into the minds and hearts of her children were not only articulated by the Apostle Paul on the pages of Scripture, but modeled by him in his life. And it is just such qualities that he wrote about here in Eph.4:1-16—instruction that we’ve been unpacking in recent weeks; instruction on growing up healthy. But Paul argues that these qualities develop within us not so much by individual effort as by meaningful interaction within community—within the body of Christ! In the final three verses of this paragraph (14-16), God enlightens us to three pieces in the puzzle that pictures our progress toward spiritual maturity.
Piece #1 – The Perils of Youth – 14
Paul presented this piece of the puzzle in such picturesque language that none of us misses the point. Young believers—spiritual children—bob about like a row boat on the churning ocean. My family and I have the privilege of vacationing with my sister and her family at the beach in Emerald Isle, NC each summer. We always look forward to it. One of the things kids love to do most is play in the waves. But regardless of whether they’re body-surfing, boogie-boarding, or kayaking, there is never any doubt that waves are bigger and stronger than children. Even on a calm day the waves that roll up on the beach at the ocean’s shore are powerful and relentless. You have to grow in your ability to work with them before you can truly enjoy them safely. And some of the more humorous scenes on the beach come as you watch newcomers start fresh in their attempts to master the waves. You can often see feet and toes where you saw head and hair just a split second ago—as an unanticipated wave seizes the advantage. If you’ve had such an experience you know that afterward you can find sand worked into places where you didn’t even realize you had places! I played competitive sports through most of my childhood, adolescence, and young adult years, yet I have never ached so completely as after a day “playing” in the ocean—tossed to and fro by the waves.
Such is the experiences of immature believers as they come in contact with the waves of spiritual alternatives available to us in this deceitfully degenerate world. But the image doesn’t stop there. It’s not just like a cork in a Jacuzzi, it’s also like a wind surfer in a hurricane. The course of life is altered by every gust of teaching that meanders through the vicinity. What Paul is saying, then, is that the believer who is sitting under the instruction of the those whose gifts are given by God for that purpose (11). Such a believer begins to cooperate with the body of Christ through the exercise of his own gifts (12); he is sharpened in his knowledge and experience in the faith and, as part of the body; he grows into a maturity that appropriately images the fullness of Christ himself (13). And as that happens he is no longer tossed to and fro by the waves. He’s anchored like a concrete piling. The perils of youth are surpassed. The truth we know will be the truth we experience and no one will be able to convince us otherwise—and this will not occur because we are closed minded. It will occur because we are wise and discerning—we’re becoming mature.
The image does not stop even there, though. So far the picture has been of the potentially fun waves of the ocean. But the second half of vs.14 talks of the cunning, craftiness, and deceitful scheming of the opposition. Cunning refers to dice-playing—seeking to defraud even if only by introducing an element of chance. Craftiness means almost the same. O’Brien (309) observed, “The second phrase … intensifies the first. It literally means a ‘readiness to do anything.’” Deceitful schemes moves even further yet. There is now intent to deceive. The false teachers are working against the truth with knowledge and targeted effort to lead astray those who believe it. In Act.20:30 Paul warned the Ephesian Elders that there may arise from their very number “men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them.” He called them fierce wolves! (20:29) We’re talking about more than just ocean waves at this point. We’re talking about the motives of false teachers—and perhaps even more than that. Listen to these words from O’Brien (309-10): “In addition to this, the apostle may have had in mind another source of that seductive ‘cunning’ which preys on human weakness, namely, the evil one himself. Paul employs the same word with reference to the serpent deceiving Eve ‘by his cunning’ (2 Cor. 11:3), while the synonym, which appears in the next phrase, denotes a ‘crafty scheming with intent to deceive’ that describes the intrigues of the devil (Eph.6:11). Satan’s machinations have ‘method’; his aim is to mislead the immature who are not grounded on apostolic doctrine. If this connection is in view, then behind the false teaching are not simply evil men and women who pursue their unscrupulous goals with a scheming that produces error. There is also a supernatural, evil power who seeks to deceive them with devilish cunning; his ‘intrigues’ are to be resisted energetically with the aid of God’s armour (6:11).” The enemy was afoot among them, seeking to destroy the body by any means available to him. And it was the spiritually immature among them, those isolated from the body, who were most susceptible to his attacks. Such are the perils of youth.
Piece #2 – The Principle of Growth – 15
In the place of the immaturity that would succumb to such deceptive instruction, Paul introduced the integrity and growth which are at the heart of Christianity. This doesn’t refer so directly to a confrontation of a brother or sister as is often thought; though it doesn’t exclude that. Rather, it is talking more about one’s whole lifestyle. Paul is contrasting the life of the maturing believer with that of the false teachers—where they are cunning and deceitful, the believer speaks truth in love. And it is not just truth-telling that is in view—honesty in relationships. No, it is telling of the truth. Back in 1:13 Paul wrote that the Ephesians believed when they heard “the word of truth, the gospel of (their) salvation.” This is the same truth they are to speak—to live. Some even suggest that Paul’s word choice would best be translated doing the truth—implying more than just speech. I believe speaking the truth is still better, but we cannot deny that it is out of the fullness of the heart that the mouth speaks (Mat.12:34).
Growing into the head doesn’t mean we will become Christ but that it is in likeness to Him that we’ll grow. Finally, there is the key phrase, in love, which we can’t look past. It occurs six times in Eph., and three of them are in this one paragraph on unity, diversity, and maturity in the body of Christ (4:2, 15, 16)—one at the beginning and two at the end. This is certainly no accident. As the believer is rooted and grounded in love, so must be his experience with the body of Christ. When the greatest commandment is to love, there can be no Christian maturity that is lacking in love.
Piece #3 – The Precision of Maturity – 16
Vs.16 clarifies the thought in vs.15 that Christ is not only the object of our growth—our target, but the source of our growth as well. Our growth is from him. Joined, held together, and joint are all medical terms. We are growing as a unit, as a body, in strength and unity but only as each part, each person, is working properly. Notice that Paul’s focus is still on the growth of the body as a whole more so than on the individuals within it. Granted the one can’t happen without the other, but the focus is on the corporate. The notion of believers’ unity and their growing together as a collective whole is underscored by the two verbs: the first, joined together, has already been used back in 2:21 regarding the unified construction of the church as a holy temple in the Lord; the second, held together, appears in Col.2:19 where it refers to the body knit together as a unit by the head. We are a body, a unity, each of us here—you and me. We are a family, but we are more than that. We are the body of Christ. And any of us being off on his own makes no more sense that seeing some body part separate from the whole. What a disgusting thought that is—a severed body part! The body is handicapped and the part dies!
The way Paul worded it here it also sounds as if he is maintaining that distinction between the gifts of vs.11 and the gifts of vs.7—or the gifts of the equippers and gifts of the rest of the body. Again, he’s not elevating one over the other, but it appears as though the joints refer to the equipping gifts and each part refers to the rest of the gifts. The intent is to get every part working properly, and the goal is, yet again, for the body to grow up healthy—to build itself up in love.
Conclusion
What an unspeakably miraculous entity is the body of Christ—a living, breathing, eternal organism made up of sinners, redeemed by the blood of Christ and reconciled to God and one another. Do you grasp what an awesome privilege it is to be a part of such a body—even one small part of it on a local level here at Grace Church?! Are you daily grateful to God for the body of Christ of which you are a part, designed by him to fit, to belong, to contribute?! Do you rejoice in him that you are a member of his family—now and forevermore?!
As we go from this place this morning, free to enjoy the rest of this day in honor of our earthy mothers, I’d like to deliver one final challenge that is both rooted in this passage and acknowledging of this day. I challenge each of us to look for one opportunity before this day is done to express our love for this body, and for its head, by using one of the gifts he has given for that purpose. Beyond that, I urge you to do that each day, just once each day: look for one opportunity to express your love for this body (or the larger body of Christ) and for its head by using one of the gifts he has given you for that purpose. Today, perhaps it could be an expression in honor, or in memory, or in acknowledgement of your mother. Even if she was not a believer, you are still instructed in God’s word to honor her—I’m sure God could lead you to some appropriate expression that could be made.
Each of us is likely aware of several people whose chosen profession or involvement is due to a mother’s struggle more so than her virtue. The man who works at the mission because of an alcoholic mother; the woman who is a psychologist because of a mentally ill mother; the man who supports cancer research because of a mother who died of that terrible disease. And then there are the rest of us—those who have godly mothers who prayed with us as children and still do as we’re adults. Can we express our love through our gifts to the body of Christ today in honor of our mothers? But what is more, can we make this the first day of our remaining lifetime on which we seek to express our love to our heavenly Father and to the body of Christ in just one intentional way each day? In light of the magnificent grace which he has lavished on us in this life, and the certain hope with which he has filled us for our future life with him—in light of the eternal significance of such acts in comparison to the very temporal involvement which often fill our days—what better activity could we possibly give ourselves to than this?