Good morning to everyone, beautiful morning, sun's shining, birds are singing. We are, we're waiting on the leaves here so I won't be glowing here in a couple weeks. 

But we're continuing our study in Ephesians chapter 4 this morning and a very interesting text. Paul's laid the truth foundation of our salvation, who we are, what we have in Christ in the first three chapters. And in 4.1 he began to exhort us to live out who we are, to apply these truths in our lives, to walk worthy of our calling. 

In the first six verses Paul emphasized the oneness of the church as a whole, having been built on the doctrine of Jew and Gentile as one new man in the church. And in our text this morning he's going to emphasize God's ministry to the individual in the body as well as the whole. 

And this by grace, grace gifts to each believer, every member of the body. Well God gives each believer gifts according to the richness of his grace, and these individual gifts he speaks of are meant to be used within the body to promote growth, to result in maturity and unity in spirit and in purpose. 

We will see in our text that God has a plan to equip each believer to grow him, to bring him to maturity so that we might each as individuals in the body go out into this world and do the work of ministry, that is to preach the gospel and to love lost men. These truths that we're going to study this morning go to the heart of the purpose and the function of the local body, the church. 

And my brothers and sisters, this is a vital truth for us to understand because there is so much confusion in the evangelical church today concerning this. What is our purpose? What is our function? What is our focus? What are we to be doing in the church? 

As Paul wrote to Timothy, how you should conduct yourself in the house of God. The church is not primarily an outreach or an evangelistic effort. In our meetings and our services on Sunday mornings and Thursday evenings, our primary purpose is not to reach the lost. The numerical growth of this body of believers is not really a great concern of mine, but rather the spiritual growth of those who do believe is the primary concern of our church and the meetings that we have. 

We are very pleased to have visitors, to have the opportunity for them to come and experience the love of Christ, the glory of the gospel, the message of God's word on a Sunday morning. And it's great if you bring a friend to visit our church. 

But my preparation, my study of the word of God, the design of our worship, the preaching of the word is never geared toward reaching the lost. Because, my friends, as we will see in our text, this is not the plan of God for His church, His body. 

This place is an equipping center. It's an encouragement for the believers through the word of God and the love of the saints. It is a place where we learn and grow and fellowship and worship together, so that we might become mature and we might be refreshed and strengthened to then go out into the world and do the work of ministry that God has for each one of us, the good works that He has prepared in advance for us to do. 

And if the Lord wills and we are faithful and people are willing to receive the truth through the evangelism efforts of our people in these communities, the church might grow numerically as new believers come here to learn and grow and mature in order to be equipped and then go out and reach others. 

This is why we are committed to the deep preaching of the word of God, to the depth that the Holy Spirit allows, and we trust Him to make this truth effective in the lives of our brothers and sisters, each one of us here, so that we might each continually grow and be fed and mature. 

So many in the church, in my time being a Christian since the end of the last century, so many were taken captive by hollow and deceptive philosophies of men in the church growth movement that swept evangelicalism in the late 20th century, and churches became primarily or solely evangelism meetings where they preached a watered-down, non-offensive gospel that sought to entertain and meet the felt needs of lost men. 

This was more of a marketing movement than anything, born out of the mind of C. Peter Wagner, a man who was part of the founding of the New Apostolic Reformation and who wrote a book on dominionism. He was a mentor to Rick Warren, according to Rick's own doctoral thesis on the church growth movement. 

And this movement has greatly influenced how church is done in our time. What I found really interesting to come across from what we looked at this year ago is Charles Spurgeon actually preached a sermon on this heresy back in the late 1800s. So there's nothing new under the sun. It was called Feeding Sheep or Amusing Goats. Some of you may remember that. 

And it is so profound and so bold and so applicable to what we are studying here this morning. I'd like for you to listen and follow along with Spurgeon's words. They're on the back of your outline. I'm sorry for the small print for those of us who are advanced in years. But it would only fit on one page that way. 

So listen to the truth that he speaks, the message we need to know and believe and commit ourselves to in this present church world of confusion. Spurgeon begins, “An evil resides in the professed camp of the Lord, so gross in its imprudence that the most short-sighted can hardly fail to notice it. During the past few years it has developed at an abnormal rate, even for evil. It has worked like leaven until the whole lump ferments. 

The devil has seldom done a more clever thing than hinting to the church that part of their mission is to provide entertainment for the people with a view to winning them. From speaking out as the Puritans did, the church has gradually toned down her testimony, then winked at and excused the frivolities of the day. Then she tolerated them in her borders. Now she has adopted them under the plea of reaching the masses. 

My first contention is that providing amusement for the people is nowhere spoken of in the scriptures as a function of the church. If it is a Christian work, why did not Christ speak of it? Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. That is clear enough. So it would have been if he had added, “and provide amusement for those who do not relish the gospel.” No such words, however, are to be found. It did not seem to occur to him. 

Then again, he gave some apostles, some prophets, some pastors and teachers for the work of ministry. Where do entertainers come in? The Holy Spirit is silent concerning them. Were the prophets persecuted because they amused the people or because they refused? The concert has no martyr role. Again, providing amusement is in direct antagonism to the teaching and life of Christ and all his apostles. 

What was the attitude of the church to the world? Ye are salt, not sugar candy. Something the world will spit out, not swallow. Short and sharp was the utterance, let the dead bury their dead. He was in awful earnestness. Had Christ introduced more of the bright and pleasant elements into his mission, he would have been more popular when they went back because of the searching nature of his teaching. 

I do not hear him say, run after these people, Peter, and tell them we will have a different style of service tomorrow. Something short and attractive with little preaching. We will have a pleasant evening for the people. Tell them they will be sure to enjoy it. Be quick, Peter. We must get the people somehow. Jesus pitied sinners. He sighed and wept over them but never sought to amuse them. 

In vain will the epistles be searched to find any trace of the gospel amusement. Their message is come out, keep out, keep clean out. Anything approaching fooling is conspicuous by its absence. Listen to this. They had boundless confidence in the gospel and employed no other weapon. After Peter and John were locked up for preaching, the church had a prayer meeting, but they did not pray, “Lord, grant thy servants that by a wise and discriminating use of innocent recreation, we may show these people how happy we are.” 

If they ceased not for preaching Christ, they had not time for arranging entertainments. Scattered by persecution, they went everywhere preaching the gospel. They turned the world upside down. That is the difference. Lord, clear the church of all the rot and rubbish the devil has imposed on her and bring us back to apostolic methods. 

Lastly, the mission of amusement fails to affect the undesired. It works havoc on young converts. Let the careless and scoffers who thank God because the church met them halfway speak and testify. Let the heavy laden who found peace through the concert keep silent. Let the drunkard to whom the dramatic entertainment has been God's link in the chain of their conversion stand up. There are none to answer. 

The mission of amusement produces no converts. The need of the hour for today's ministry is believing scholarship joined with earnest spirituality, the one springing from the other as fruit from the root. The need is biblical doctrine so understood and felt that it sets men on fire. 

My brothers and sisters, this is the message of our text this morning. And this is the truth that we are committed to, in trust of the very words of God and the Holy Spirit to give us understanding and empower us to do his work while he leaves us in this world. 

Let's look at our text together, Ephesians 4, 7. But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore, he says, when he ascended on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men. Now this he ascended, what does it mean but that he also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? 

He who descended is also the one who ascended far above the heavens that he might fill all things. And he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastor-teachers for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. 

That we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love. 

I've given you five points on your outline. First, each one. Second, triumphant salvation. Third, gifts to the church. Fourth, growth and unity. And fifth, truth in love. 

Well, first we see in our text each one in verse 7. But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. And here we see the key word grace. Grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Paul's been talking about the grace of God in salvation, in the forming of the body of Jew and Gentile as one new man, and the emphasis has been on the body, the whole, the unity of the whole in Christ. 

But here he changes focus and he emphasizes the individual within the body, each one of you. To each one, it says, to each individual, God has given grace. Expositors comments, what is given is not the charisma, extraordinary powers, such as the special gifts, like we might read in Romans 12, but the charis, grace, the subjective grace that works within and shows itself in its result. God's gracious relation to all is a relation also to each individual. He cares about you. He gifts you, he gives you grace so that you might serve and function in the body. 

And this is where Paul's going. He's talking about service. He's talking about grace for service in the body in order to promote growth in unity and in purpose. And then we kind of come to this parenthetical statement concerning and relating to the larger context at hand, the salvation that Jesus accomplished and the subsequent grace he bestows. In verse 8, look at verse 8. 

Therefore, he says, when he ascended on high, he led captivity captive and he gave gifts to men. Now this, he ascended. What does it mean that he also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things. 

And here we see triumphant salvation. He gives grace to each one in the body. And Jesus has accomplished a triumphant salvation. This is a bit of a confusing set of verses, but we're going to do our best here to unpack it in its context. Paul here quotes from Psalm 68. I'd like for you to turn back to Psalm 68 with me, please. 

Psalm 68 at verse 18. You have ascended on high. You have led captivity captive. You have received gifts among men, even from the rebellious, that the Lord God might dwell there. Blessed be the Lord who daily loads us with benefits, the God of our salvation. Our God is the God of salvation, and to God the Lord belong escapes from death. 

He says God is the God of salvation. Blessed the Lord, speaking of Jesus, as Paul explains here in our text, is the one who daily loads us with benefits. Grace. Constantly bestowing on us his grace, his person. The context of the psalm and the application to Jesus here is all about salvation. 

Now many have tried to apply these verses along with first Peter 3 to a doctrine popularized by the Apostles Creed that Jesus descended into hell after he died in between his death and resurrection. The fleshing out of this idea gets a little strange in my opinion, so I'm not gonna, we've done that before and I'm not gonna go into all that. If you have questions I'd be happy to answer them. 

But I think we can understand this much more simply here in the context of the salvation that Jesus accomplished by his incarnation, death, burial and resurrection, and then ascension into heaven, and how he now sits above all at the right hand of God and ministers grace to the church for the service of each individual in the body. It says that he had to first descend in order to ascend. 

Now the language here in my opinion is a little misleading when it says the lower parts of the earth. I'd like you to listen to Weiner's Greek grammar. He says Paul is endeavoring to show that the passage he just quoted Psalm 68:19 that we just read must be understood of Christ and not of God because an ascent into heaven necessarily presupposes a descent to the earth, which was made by Christ in his incarnation whereas God does not leave his abode in heaven. 

Accordingly, the word denotes the lower parts of the universe which the earth constitutes. I think this is the best understanding of the text that Paul is simply saying this psalm applies to Jesus because it is Jesus who descended to the earth in order that he might accomplish salvation by his blood and then ascend to present himself in the Holy of Holies in the heavens. 

We see reference to this in Hebrews 9 as well in Hebrews 9:11. It said Christ came as high priest of the good things to come with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands that is not of this creation. Remember in Hebrews 8 the author told us that Moses was shown everything in heaven and he built a copy of that on the earth in the tabernacle. 

So there's a heavenly tabernacle. Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with his own blood he entered the most holy place once for all having obtained eternal redemption. Then down in verse 24, it says for Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands which are copies of the true but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God for us. 

Not that he should offer himself often as the high priest enters the most holy place every year with the blood of another. He then would have had to have suffered often since the foundation of the world, but now once at the end of the ages he has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. 

I want you to notice in our text at the end of verse 10 Paul gives the purpose of this complete and final act of Christ in accomplishing salvation, His ascension and taking of his proper place of glory and authority. It says that He might fill all things and this includes his sufficient grace not only for daily living but particularly in our text for the service that he has planned for us as individuals within the body by his grace for his purposes is the idea here. That's the meaning of these verses. 

So I think we don't need to get too distracted about the ascending and descending. I think Paul's simply saying Jesus is the one I'm talking about when I quote Psalm 68 and he is one who descended in his incarnation, his condescension, accomplishing salvation. He ascended into the Holy of Holies and is now seated at the right hand of God. 

Well, he picks up his thought in verse 11 and begins to develop it down through verse 16. He says and he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists and some pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. 

And we need maturity because of verse 14. We need discernment that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. That's rampant in the church today, isn't it? Welcoming in the world, welcoming in the worldly ideas. 

We don't want to be tossed to and fro. We want to be growing and maturing in order that we might speak the truth in love and that is dependent on the whole body, each part doing its share, it says, working by the grace given to serve one another, to encourage one another, to correct one another, to love one another and then to go out to love and reach the lost. 

So after emphasizing that Jesus gives grace to each individual within the body, here he shows us that Jesus also gives specific gifts to the church as a whole in the form of men and His purpose is for each one to exercise that gift by the grace He provides in order to bring the believers to mature maturity. 

So here we see gifts to the church for growth and unity. He himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. The word Apostle speaks in a primary sense of the twelve Apostles and in a secondary sense of those who proclaim the Word of God today. Prophets refer as it does in most instances throughout the Word of God. 

If I asked you when I say the word prophet what comes to your mind? What do you think of if I say prophet well most of the scriptures including in the Old Testament a Prophet was a man who spoke the revealed Word of God. He was not one who told the future or gave some prophecy concerning the future. There is that but most of the time, and certainly in the New Testament, they are the men who speak forth the truth already revealed in the Word of God. 

Evangelists are missionaries both at home and abroad who go out and preach the word. The word pastor means a shepherd. Weas tells us that the words pastors and teachers are in a construction called the Granville Sharps rule. Some of you will remember that which indicates that they refer to one individual. So what he's saying here is a pastor-teacher, the one who shepherds God's flock is also the teacher of the word. 

He says God's ideal pastor is one who engages in a didactic, that is a teaching ministry, feeding the Saints on expository preaching, giving them the rich food of the word. So Jesus has given by his grace solely from himself men gifts to the church and we see that the focus in all of these roles is one thing: the Word of God. 

They are to within the gifts given the grace provided preach and teach the word, exhort and encourage, rebuke by the Word of God. That is the job of those who lead in the church who teach and preach and oversee and it is the job of evangelist who goes out to preach to also give the Word of God, the message of the gospel. 

Well, next we see the purpose of this gift of grace in the body, Ephesians 4:12. He says for the equipping of the Saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. And we see this very firm consistent message concerning the role of the pastor-teacher throughout the Word of God and the pastoral epistles written by Paul to two young pastors who were given instructions on how to do church, how to conduct themselves in the house of God, we see clear instruction. 

First Timothy 4:13 Paul writes to Timothy who he left in Ephesus till I come. What are you supposed to do Timothy? What's the pastor supposed to be doing till I come? Give attention to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine. Do not neglect the gift that is in you which was given to you by prophecy with the laying on of the hands of the eldership he says. 

Meditate on these things. Give yourself entirely to them. That your progress may be evident to all. Take heed to yourself and to the doctrine. Continue in them, for in doing this you will save both yourself and those who hear you. 

In second Timothy chapter 3 at verse 13 he says, but evil men and imposters will grow worse and worse deceiving and being deceived. That's our world today, isn't it? Lies upon lies. What's the man of God to do? You must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of knowing from whom you have learned them and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. 

All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Why? That the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. 

So what is Timothy to do then? What is the pastor-teacher to do? I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who will judge the living and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Preach when they'll listen, preach when they won't listen. 

Preach the chair! I remember Pastor Krenz had a needle point on his in his office on his wall and every week I'd look at that and there's a little little boy on a pulpit and baggy pants and he's looking and there's a little mouse sitting there on the floor and nobody else in the church and it said preach the word no matter what. Preach the truth no matter what. Preach the word. 

In season, out of season, convince, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine. Well, we need to do, well we better figure out another way to reach them, right? We better have a pizza party and a coffee bar and a rock band and some smoke machines and a car wash, get them in here. What are we to do when they won't stand for sound doctrine? Preach the word! 

He says according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers. They'll pick guys that will tell them what they want to hear to make them feel better and they will turn their ears away from the truth and be turned aside to fables. 

But you, he says, be watchful in all things. Endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. Meditate on these things. He says the Holy Scriptures give yourself entirely to them. That's what Spurgeon said in that sermon. If they were so busy preaching Christ, if they were so busy giving themselves to the word and prayer, they didn't have time for all that monkey business. 

That's what he says to do. What clear instruction we have that the man of God who preaches and teaches, who oversees the church is to focus on the Word of God, is to give himself to the word and prayer and he's to preach and teach to the depth of his ability by the grace that Jesus gives and the strength and wisdom that the Holy Spirit provides. And he's to do this in order that for the express purpose that the Saints might be equipped to go out and do the work of ministry to reach the lost and glorify God by word and deed as a witness to the grace and power of the gospel. 

And this faithful consistent focused work of the pastor-teacher is first for his own growth and maturity and witness as Paul says that your progress may be evident to all, and then for each believer in the body, gifted for service by the grace given by Jesus and for growth by the Word of God fed and nurtured under maturity for the work of service within the body and ministry to the lost. 

And we see the plan and purpose of God, God the result of this faithful work in the church in the following verses, verse 12 says for the equipping of the Saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. 

That we should no longer be children tossed to and fro carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men, the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head Christ from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effective working by which every part does its share causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself and love. 

And these verses we see several things that are the result of a focus on and preaching and teaching of the Word of God and the exercise of service by grace by the grace of Jesus in the body. First we see edification. 

Second, we see unity. Third, we see maturity. Fourth, we see discernment. And fifth, we see speaking the truth in love. And finally in verse 16 we see that these results require that each and every part does its share. Service is required. Every part of the body is important. 

First we see edification, building up, growth. And this can only come by the Word of God and the grace of God, the power of the Spirit. And this is why it's so vital that the local church be committed to the Word of God, preached and taught, and be in total dependence on the grace of God to make it work. 

We see so many churches where they've been taken by some wind of doctrine, some philosophy of man, carried away from the central truth and purpose of the church. And the result is an anemic crowd, malnourished, unable to discern, with no strength and a loss of purpose and focus. 

Where the lost are sort of just melded into the fellowship and there's no true conversion. The saints are sickly and the lost are deceived within the church because there's no clear gospel. There's no clear distinction, no purpose, no example, and no dependence on the Word and power, the grace of God. 

And this kind of church cannot be effective as a witness in the world. They can draw a crowd, they can draw a big crowd, giving them what they want. That's what Bill Hybels and Rick Warren did. They made surveys and went out to their communities and they asked people what they wanted in a church. And then they gave them what they wanted. 

Yeah, you get a crowd that way. I mean, if we give out a hundred dollar bill to everybody that walks in a door, we can draw a crowd. But who's converted? That's the whole point. What they win them with, they win them to. And that's not true conversion. 

If there's to be edification and growth, it must be by the Word of God. The theme of much of this epistle is unity. He talks about unity, coming to the unity of the faith, unity for Jew and Gentile, unity in Christ and salvation, and the gifts, the grace is given by Jesus to the church for unity in the faith, he says. The faith here is the faith in Christ. 

That's why we see Paul follow with the words knowledge of the Son of God. The word knowledge means full knowledge, precise, correct knowledge. The word perfect, coming to a perfect or mature man, teleos, mature, complete, full-grown. Expositor says the state at which unity is lacking is the stage of immaturity. 

The stage in which oneness in faith and knowledge is reached is the state of mature manhood in Christ. The words mature man refer to the individual believer. The Apostle has in mind the spiritual maturity of each saint. 

And my friends, the maturity, this full, complete, accurate knowledge of Jesus can only come as we know him, and we can only know him, who he is, what he's done, what we have in him through the Word, by teaching, by doctrine. Sometimes we hear men say doctrine divides, and it may divide the sheep from the goats, but it's only doctrine, it's only truth-teaching, accurate knowledge of the Son of God that can bring unity in the faith and maturity in the man of God. 

And this maturity leads to discernment. He says we're no longer tossed to and fro, we're coming to maturity so we can know good from evil. I was thinking about as I was writing this sermon that I'm so blessed, I'm so thankful for Living Hope Church, for this place, for the elders of this church, for the people in this church, to God for his grace and provision and direction. 

What a joy it is and privilege to preach and teach the Word, to have Jesus, his person and work, his Word be the focus of all that we do, to have brothers and sisters who are hungry for the truth, for maturity, for holiness, for witness, and to have those believers know and be convinced that the way to all of these things, to glorify God in all that we do, is through the Word, is through edification, through unity in the faith, through maturity and discernment. 

We do not want to be deceived. We don't want to be taken captive by the schemes of Satan, by the wisdom of men, by fear and deception. You know, I think fear is a real issue. We saw that with COVID, didn't we? Fear. You know, what's going to come next? 

This world's getting worse and worse. Evil men and imposters go worse and worse. I don't know what's going to come in the world, but we have no reason to be afraid. We have no reason to be afraid. And yet if we buy into man's wisdom, if we buy into the ways and means of the world, if we leave the Word of God as our rock and our guide, then fear will come when trouble comes in the world. 

I was looking back for an email and got all the way back to like April of 2020, looking for this email, and I saw a letter I'd written to the church. I forgot all about it. And I read that letter and I thought, that was pretty good. But what it was about was about, hey, we don't know what's going on. You remember March was when that kind of all blew up, and the elders and I met and we said, we aren't, you know, we're gonna start meeting. We did that like 14 days to stop the spread, and then we were, we're gonna meet, you know, we're not afraid. 

I remember I've preached from here by myself with no one in this church a couple messages, and then like the next week there's like five people that just came, you know, where they were coming. And the next week there's like 15 people, and we didn't have any. I mean, if you want to wear a mask, that was fine, you didn't, that was fine. 

But I was just thinking, the letter I wrote was about how we don't need to fear. What are you, what are you afraid of? Dying? You know, I'm ready. You know, what, what are you afraid of? And people needed truth and they needed love, right? 

So I'm just saying, for us, we can't let the world come in on us. We have to stay here in the Word. We have to be in like-minded fellowship. We have to hear the teaching and preaching of the Word of God. And in this way, we know what is good, we know what is evil, we know what to accept, we know what to reject, how we should conduct ourselves in the house of God, in our own houses and in the world. 

We become discerning as we grow in maturity, as we know Jesus more. And we come to the state of fullness in Christ and we believe, and what happens is we speak. Paul says, we believe, therefore we speak. You know, I believe in the way that I farm. I believe that's a good way to farm. I believe that Christians should take the moral high ground on environmental issues and stewardship, and I think we've abdicated that, and I think it's good to raise animals in a pattern of the way God created them. 

And so because I believe in that, I talk about it a lot. People come to the farm and we talk, right? I had 10, 12 people there the last couple days, take them on a little tour, show them what we're doing, talk. That's nothing compared to what I believe about Jesus, right? 

What I have in Him. The hope, the promise, the grace sufficient for today. We believe, therefore we speak. And what do we speak? Do we speak self-help and psychology and worldly means and methods and soap bubbles and soothing stories? No, we speak the truth. We are in this Word and we are growing and we are hearing and we are learning more about Jesus and we're coming to know Him and we're saying, Jesus is great. Jesus is awesome. Jesus has salvation for you. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. What did the Apostles preach? Jesus Christ and Him crucified. 

I desire to know nothing else but Jesus. We speak the truth. We preach Jesus Christ crucified. We stand firm and uncompromising on the Word of God. We don't lie. We don't lie. The world wants us to lie about a lot of things. We don't lie, we tell the truth. We speak the truth in love. Love for God, love for the saints, love for the lost. Our motive is always love. 

And this is the culmination of all that we've seen in our text this morning. Being equipped, growing, maturing, becoming discerning, on fire for the Lord and His gospel, so much so that we speak the truth in love everywhere we go. 

I remember Haddon Robinson saying how he felt bad because he had missed so many opportunities. You know, you'd be at work in the coffee break or whatever and some guy would say, "All roads lead to Rome," you know, talking about religion. And he said, you know, sometimes silence is golden, but he said, I'm talking about when it's just plain yellow. 

We need to speak the truth and the only way we're gonna speak the truth is if we're growing and maturing and we're praying for those people at work and we're praying for those people in our family and we're praying for opportunities and we're looking for those times where we can tell them about Jesus and speak the truth into their situations. 

And this can only happen when the church understands its means, its methods, and its purpose, as prescribed by the Word of God. As Spurgeon said, the need is biblical doctrine, so understood and felt that it sets men on fire. 

Let's close in prayer. 

Father, we thank you. Thank you for the truth, thank you for your Word, thank you that you are sufficient, that Jesus is all in all, he fills all in all, that he gives us grace, grace to serve, grace to live a holy life, grace to glorify you in all that we do, grace to speak the truth when we have opportunity. We know that you've prepared those times, you've arranged those circumstances so that we might do those good works for your glory and for our benefit and for the salvation of the lost. 

Help us to always be a church who is focused on Jesus, wanting to know him more and to tell everyone about him. In his name we pray, amen.