Ephesians Part 4 - A Dwelling Place for God

Mark: Happy Father's Day. I ⁓ I preached my Father's Day message Monday night with the men's gathering. How many men were there? It was an amazing men's gathering, beautiful night together. And ⁓ this morning we're I'm gonna jump right in. We're gonna continue our series on Ephesians. How many are enjoying it? ⁓ I was kind of weak, guys. Okay. Well, I'm pumped about it, and ⁓ I'm excited to preach today, and I'm gonna be ⁓ speaking next Sunday as well. And then I wanted to let you know that. ⁓ after next Sunday, I'm gonna begin a six-week sabbatical. ⁓ a while back, our trustees put in place ⁓ an intentional sabbatical plan in which ⁓ all of our pastors every seven years ⁓ would have an extended time to unplug, ⁓ be just set apart under the Lord for rest, renewal, and just just to be with God. How many think that is a good thing? And ⁓ I'm excited about that. I'll be honest with you. I'm gonna really miss you. ⁓ so if you see me out and about and I'm ex extremely excited to see you and I kind of attack you with hugs, that's just who I am. but ⁓ I want you to know you're you're in really good hands here. ⁓ our team of pastors, our leaders, are just absolutely amazing. They're gonna pastor you well. Our preaching team is gonna continue on with the Ephesians series. In fact, ⁓ Really the reason that I started this series was I really wanted to ⁓ preach Ephesians four, five and six and ⁓ I'm just preaching Ephesians 1 and 2 and 3. So I'm giving the others for for them, but they're gonna keep going with it. ⁓ but it's gonna be incredible, and then we're gonna move on to the parables of Jesus. So you're not gonna wanna miss out. I encourage you to be here, stay, stay connected. ⁓ but today we're gonna be in Ephesians chapter two. If you have your Bibles, you can open them. Pastor Gary took us through the first 10 verses last week. ⁓ and I wanna do just a quick little recap. ⁓ Over those verses because Paul reminds us of some really important stuff. He reminds us that before Jesus, we were in verse one, we were dead in our trespasses. That we were dead in our sins. ⁓ this wasn't just like on the struggle bus. This wasn't just ⁓ needing a little fixing. We were dead. We were dead, and that condition is. That we were living in was ⁓ we were walking according to the course of this world, it says there, that we followed the pattern, we were following the values, we were, we were following the mindsets of a fallen world system. There was a a way that seemed right to us, but ultimately it led to death. And Paul tells us why this was. He says, We were following the prince of the power of the air. That is now at work in the sons of disobedience. Church, that spirit is still very much at work in the world today. There are real, very real principalities and powers that are opposed to God and that are opposed to his purposes. There is a spiritual conflict that is raging around us, whether you realize it or not, there is a battle that's happening between light and darkness, between truth and deception. Between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of this world, and we get to see it literally play out before our eyes every single day. The battle isn't against flesh and blood. How many are thankful for that? And we need to stay clear on that. It's a spiritual battle with very real spiritual powers that oppose the purposes of God. And Paul reminds us that before Jesus, we weren't just merely influenced. By that dominion, we were enslaved to it. But then Paul gives us two of maybe the most hope-filled words in Scripture, and it's these words, but God. But God. Verse 4: But God, being rich in mercy and love, made us alive together with Christ. God stepped into our deadness. He stepped into our rebellion, into our darkness, our bondage, and he made us literally alive together with Christ. Colossians 1 says it something like this: that Jesus came on a rescue mission to deliver you from the domain of darkness. And he transferred us into his kingdom of light, the kingdom of his beloved Son, Jesus Christ. This is the gospel. This is the gospel, but but you'll never fully grasp what you've been saved into until you awaken to what you've already been saved from. Sometimes we got to remember where we came from to recognize what God is doing in this moment. So turn to somebody, look them in the eyes and say, You were dead. You were dead. And if you're here this morning and and and you've never truly been born again, I want to tell you this is for you. This is for you, Jesus. He didn't come merely to make bad people a little bit better. He came to make dead people come alive. Dead people to come alive. He enters into our brokenness, into our deadness, and he brings life and he brings wholeness. It it's by by grace through faith in him. How many is thankful that the same God who raised Jesus from the dead still makes dead people come alive? Today, today, he makes us new, and as new creations, where Pastor Gary ended, verse 10, as new creations, we've been created for good works that God prepared beforehand for us to walk in. How many ready to walk in some good works? I am too. So that's the first 10 verses. But beginning in verse 11, Paul shifts the focus. The first half is about personal salvation, what God Has done in you, God bringing you into his family. And the second half that we're gonna be in today is about how that new family, that new humanity, that new people actually learns to live together as his church, as his people. Throughout Ephesians, Paul, what I've noticed in this last few weeks is I've been just digging in, ⁓ maybe on a level that I I haven't even dug in before. What I recognize is that Paul really He he builds his points slowly. He layers them. There's so many layers in all this. It's so easy to miss so much. That's why we have to give ourselves to it. Are you still reading it? I want to encourage you to keep reading it. Keep reading one, two, and three, and then we'll shift to four, five, and six later. But keep reading it because there's just layers of goodness. And Paul builds this section that we're going to be in today from what he said at the end of chapter one that we were in a couple weeks ago, where Jesus Is identified there as the one who is raised from the dead. How many know that that this began with Jesus being raised from the dead? That Jesus is the one who is seated at the right hand of the Father right now, that He is above all authority, He is above every power and every dominion, He is above every name that is named in this age and in the age to come. How many say that's that's that's a very high name? He's above everything, everything. And then in verse 22 there of chapter one, it says, Jesus is the one who has subjected everything under his feet and given as head over all things to the church. How many know Jesus is the head of the church? He's given over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. That's that's a that's a mouthful right there. This right here is the distinctive reality of the true church of Jesus Christ, is that Jesus lives in his people. He lives in his church. Collectively, we are the house of God. That's the point that Paul is making in our text today. So let's begin in chapter two with the very last verse, and then we'll go to the top and work our way down. Because it connects with what we just read. I want you to get these layers. I want this to connect with you. Verse 22. In him, you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Everybody say together. We are being built together. You, me, we are being built together into a dwelling place for God. You're the house of God. We are the house of God. This union that we have in Jesus Christ and with each other forms the literal sanctuary where God lives. I'm not talking about the building, the building's important, it has its purpose. I'm talking about the collective people of God in whom the Spirit of God dwells in and lives in. This is the church. This is the dwelling place of God. He doesn't live in a temple or an ark anymore. He lives and dwells in us. And not just us here in Springfield or America, there's millions of people all over the world that are a part of this dwelling place. This letter to the Ephesian church is is going to a bunch of new believers who are both primarily Gentiles, but undoubtedly Jews heard as well. And the passage today isn't about reconciliation between God and us. It's about reconciliation between Jew and Gentile. It's about the unity of the church. What we're about to get into is about the unity of the church. He's calling for the Jew and the Gentile to come together. So let's read it. Here we go, starting with verse 11. Paul says, Therefore, remember, remember that at one time you, Gentiles in the flesh, which were called the uncircumcision, because that's what Gentiles were called, the uncircumcision, by what is called the circumcision. The Jews called them that, which is made in the flesh by hands. Remember that you were, everybody say you were, you were. At that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who want who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one. And has broken down in the flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances. Now that's a big, we're gonna tackle that in a minute. That he might create, get this in himself one new man in place of the two. So making peace and might reconcile us both to God in one. One body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. Everybody say, killing the hostility. Killing it. And he came and he preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to those who were near. Talking about the Gentiles were considered far off, the Jews were the ones that were considered near. He preached peace to you. For through him we both have access to one spirit, to the Father. Verse 19. So then, because of all this, you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundations of the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him, you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Everybody say that's a mouthful. That's a mouthful. That is packed with some of the richest riches ever. So remember, Paul, we said this a couple weeks ago. He's locked up in jail in Rome. He's in a Roman jail. And yet he's writing to this church about this vision about what God is building. This new humanity, this new people, this new, this new community of Jesus people that we call the church. But what Paul is describing ⁓ is really revolutionary. It's hard for us to grasp it because we're Gentiles, right? We're not Jewish. We represent the Gentiles. But what he's describing here that God is doing is absolutely ref revolutionary. It would have been mind-blowing to them. Especially coming from a lifelong Jew in which Paul was, to hear these kinds of words. He wasn't put in jail because he offended Rome, guys. He was put in jail because he offended his fellow Jews. Who then wanted to kill him. It's this vision of what God is building that actually got him locked up in jail. But he doesn't give in to the threats. He's like, I've got to proclaim this vision of the kingdom of God. He's like, I've got to preach boldly. I've got to proclaim this vision of what God is doing in his church. That what God had done in them through Jesus individually was now gonna be done among both Jew and Gentile, among the entire world. That Jesus had broken down the dividing wall of hostility between them. Let me tell you, there was incredible hostility. You dig into this, the the hostility that was between the Jews and the Gentiles was in incredible. The Jews, remember, were the believers in the one true living God. The Gentiles were the blasphemers who who rejected God and and his laws. A wall of hostility between them. The Jews despide the despised the Gentiles because they didn't have the law, and then the Gentiles despised the Jews because they despised them. How easy it is when somebody despises you for you just despise them back. Well, you don't like me? Well, guess what? This word hostility here is this word hate. They hated each other. So we have to understand like context here. They hated each other, and this hostility between them was very powerful and it was very, very intense. And I was reading in one commentary, and it said this about the hostility. It was talking about the barrier that was between them. It says the barrier between Jew and Gentile was absolute. If a Jew married a Gentile, the funeral of that Jew was carried out. Such contact for the Gentile was the equivalent to death. Meaning you were a Jew, you saw, you know, Jane, and you're like, Jane is beautiful, and I like Jane. And I'm gonna go for Jane. And if you went for Jane and you were a Jew and she was a Gentile, a lot of Jay is going on here. and you married her, you'd be considered dead. Your family. It was intense. Even to go into a gentile house was to render a Jew unclean. It was not even lawful to render help to a Gentile woman in childbirth, for that would bring another Gentile into the world. Can you imagine? There was, this is the world in which the Jews and the Gentiles lived in. In fact, I read there was this morning prayer that Jewish men would pray, and it was this I thank you, God, that you have not made me a woman or a Gentile. I know, right? It's terrible. I say all that to you because I think if we don't get that, then we can't really get it. It was intense. It was intense. Now, in this day, everything was centered around the temple. The Gentiles had to stand outside the outer court of the Jewish temple. And so if you understand like temple life, there were these different courts outside of ⁓ of the temple. So the the the Gentiles. Had to stand way far off. The next court was for Jewish women and then Jewish men, and then the innermost court, as we know, was for the priests. And then, of course, there was the Holy of Holies. That was kind of the order of how this worked. So the Gentiles, they had they had to stand far off, literally, far off, far away. They could look at the temple, but they could not draw near. The Jewish historian. Josephus tells us that the Jewish part of the temple was encompassed by a stone wall for a partition with an inscription that forbid any foreigner to go in under penalty of death. I mean, this would be like if out there we put up a big wall outside of the sanctuary here, and we're like, if you are not a Christian and a member of hope, no enter. Like you come into here, it's at your own risk of death. I was reading. And archaeologists found the exact wording that would be outside of the temple. And it was this. I think we have it on the screen. No foreigner may enter within the barrier and enclosure around the temple. Anyone who is caught doing so will have himself to blame for his ensuing death. This is a kind of hostility that was going on. In other words, the sign didn't say trespassers will be prosecuted, it said trespassers will be executed. Now some of you have that on your land here in Missouri. I know who you are. I don't, I'm just kidding. What Paul is saying is this. Jesus tore that wall down. In Jesus, those who were cut off, those Gentiles who had to stay way, way, way, way, way back, had to be far off, those who were strangers, those who were separated from Christ, those who were without hope and without God, have now been brought near by the blood of Jesus Christ. Now you think about this: the Jewish Messiah, Yeshua, he comes and he breaks down the wall of division. It's what Jesus did from the very beginning of his ministry. He breaks down the wall to offer a Samaritan woman a drink at the well. You remember this story? This was scandalous that he would have done this. He breaks down the wall to go to the house of the Roman officer whose child is sick. He breaks down the wall to touch the lepers and the unclean. Jesus is always, church, Jesus is always jumping over and breaking down walls to seek and save the lost. He's always doing it to draw near to those who are far off. Church on the cross, this is something we need to get. Jesus broke down the wall, not only between us and him, he tore down the wall between us and one another. This is what he did. He changed everything. And Paul's saying, in other words, how are you gonna tell the world now that God is gonna unite all things together? In heaven and earth, in his son, if you guys are gonna keep calling each other names. If you're gonna keep hating each other, if you're gonna keep treating each other that way, how how are we gonna show the world? He's like, church, you've got to get this. Jesus has broken down the literal wall of hostility. It's over. How? He goes on, verse 15. Get this by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances. That he might create in himself one new man in the place of two, so making peace. Now, here is where we have to be careful because we can get into some error here. We have to be careful. Some people read this and they say, Jesus abolished the law. I want to tell you, no, he didn't. Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount that He came not to get rid of it, He He came to fulfill it. He said, I didn't come to abolish the law, I came to fulfill the law. He's not talking about the law expressed in the Ten Commandments. Some people read that and they're like, hey, we don't have any law anymore. We don't have any rules. We get to just do whatever we want. Freedom. How many know that doesn't work? That doesn't work in the nations of the earth, and that doesn't work in the kingdom of God. Jesus did not put the moral law to death. He draws out the goodness of the law. He expands it. He deepens it. Like I've said it like this before, grace doesn't. Doesn't lower the standard, it actually raises the standard. What he's talking about here is the ceremonial law, the particular commands in regulating Judean life that kept the Gentiles out, things like like dietary law, things like circumcision. How many thankful for that? That that's over, especially, you know, if you're older. ⁓ Galatians five. I'll let that go. Galatians five six, Paul says it like this. In Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith through love. True circumcision now in Jesus, because of what he did on the cross, is a circumcision of the heart. It's a new heart. It's it what he's abolished are all the ways that human humans were to cleanse themselves so they could approach God. What Paul's saying, Jesus is the final sacrifice once and for all. By offering up his life on the cross, there is no longer any need for a sacrificial system. No more blood needs to be shed. His blood is enough. And his blood killed the hostility. His blood killed the hatred that he might create in himself one new man, one new person in the place of two. So making peace. Guys, this is so layered, but we've got to get this because when this gets in us, it will change the way we live. The peace between us is only found in him. People that are searching for peace through the systems of this world will never find peace. You know, peace agreements, bless their hearts. They're not gonna find the true peace. It's only found in Jesus. There's only peace found in him. The Gentiles were far from God, okay? They didn't have the law, they didn't have the Bible, they were extremely immoral, they were a mess. The Jews, they they were near, it says. The Jews had the Torah, the Jews had the scripture, the Jews had the law of God, they had the tabernacle, they were they were near. But look at what verse 17 says. Yet it says both of them needed to hear the gospel of peace. Both of them were estranged from God and needed to be saved. Both Jew and Gentile must be born again to become the people of God. Are you with me? This is important. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. And this is what the gospel tells us: that until you hear the gospel, you divide the world wrongly. But Paul says, look, look what God is building. Look what God is building. Paul's writing to this new church that has Jew and Gentile believers. And he's saying, there's no more reason for any Jew to block out any Gentile or anybody else. If they're baptized believing people, they're a part of God's new temple. If they've turned from their idols and they are worshiping God, Their sins have been forgiven. They're reconciled. They're full members of God's people. This is what God has done. He has created in himself one new man. Are you with me? I want to be clear on this this morning that this has nothing to do with the idea that's out there that the Gentile church somehow replaces ethnic Israel. I don't believe that. No, this is about the fulfillment of Scripture, the repeated promise made to Abraham that one day the nations will come in. And join the physical children of Abraham in a single body. In other words, Abraham's people aren't abolished, they're extended. And guess what? We've been grafted in. We've been grafted in into Christ. This is the new covenant. Whether Jew or a Gentile, whenever one turns to the Lord, the the veil, it says, has been has been removed. Second Corinthians says that. Whenever a Jew Turns to the Lord, that veil is removed and they come into the kingdom of God. Whenever a Gentile, whenever a person from America who's an unbeliever turns to the Lord, that veil comes down and they get to turn to him, their eyes are opened. Jew, Gentile, Iranian, African, American, whatever. This is the truth. Because of all of this. Verse 19, so then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone. What does this mean? Means no longer strangers, no longer separated, no longer outsiders. Your fellow citizens. And members of the household of God. And when I when I dug into this, this this word households, it actually is this word that talks about blood relation. This household of God. We are in blood relation now with one another. It speaks of family. I want you to go ahead and just cut your finger and touch the person. No, I'm just kidding. That was a bad joke. We are blood relatives with every other brother and sister in Jesus Christ. That means every other race, every other nationality, every other ethnicity, and human being who is in Jesus. That means I have more in common with an Iranian Christian than I do with an unbelieving American. Let that sink in. Let that settle in. I have more in common with an African from Zimbabwe or an Asian or a Brazilian believer than somebody that I grew up with or a family member that does not believe in Jesus Christ. That isn't a Christian. The one new man is a new humanity. We've got to get this, guys. This changes. It seems obvious, but I'm telling you, if this will get in us, it will change the way you see every single believer around you. It's not a club, it's the Church of Jesus Christ. And belonging to this community is greater than every other identity we carry. So, what does this mean? This means I I belong to Jesus first and I'm an American second. Some of us need to hear that again. I belong to Jesus first. I'm an American second. I'm all for us being pro-America, but it has to slot under our place as followers of Jesus Christ. In every way. Like it doesn't ever get to jump on top. And we should be patriotic and we should be thankful and we should all the things. But I'm telling you what, if that contradicts with being a Jesus follower, it's got to bow to him. It has to bow to him. I'm a Christian before I'm white. Christian before you know, I'm black or whatever what whatever your nationality is. I'm a Christian first before I'm a Thompson. I love my family. And luckily they're believers, so it works. I think they are. Right? Okay. J just kidding. Dad joke. They're terrible. I'm a Christian first, before the class I'm in. What does that mean? That means that we can come into a room like this, and people that are ultra wealthy might be sitting here, and people that are just trying to figure out where their next meal's gonna come from, and we Are united. We we we come from different backgrounds. You could be all about sports and somebody else can be all about music, and all of a sudden we're united. We're different, but we're united. Look around the room right now. Your family is much bigger than you could have ever imagined. Not just in this room, our city, our our the the nations of the world. When you meet a I was in Zimbabwe recently and I'll tell you what, it's like you see this played out, all of a sudden you're with people that you have zero in common with, and all of a sudden you're like, I feel like you are family. Guess what that is? You are. Like you're my people. Paul is saying here, God is doing something that the world has never seen before. He's broken the dividing wall that has divided the human race and have kept people from living in peace. I say this again: peace is a person, true peace will not be found without him. It's impossible. The cross is God's answer to racial division. It's his answer to segregation. It's his answer to ⁓ anti-Semitism, to prejudice, to bigotry, and every form of strife and hostility that is known. We are growing into, hear this, one new humanity, a holy temple. You think about that. How you treat another believer is how you treat Jesus. Because he dwells in his church. And his desire is that we would be one. That was his prayer in John 17. Remember? Father, make him one as you and I are one. Most of us would never deface the church property. Right? Like I can't imagine anyone in here, I mean, I don't know you all. You don't seem like the graffiti type. I just I can't imagine anyone here would grab some paint and start defacing the temple, the the building. of God and yet how often we deface the temple with our words. There's a story I read recently about a man who was shipwrecked on a deserted island. Don't you love those stories? He was the only person on the island, and he was there for a year. And when they rescued him, they found because he was a devout religious person, he had built two little churches on the island, two little shacks. And they said, ⁓ okay, why why do you have why do you have two churches? There's only one of you. And he said, Well, of course you always have to have The one church that you go to and the one you stay away from. That's how you know who you are. And we all laugh about it, it's kind of funny, but I I think it's actually kind of true how popular this is right now in the big C church. Almost like the Pharisees who prayed, like, Lord, I I thank you that I'm not like the other people. Like Thank you that we're not like that church across town. Did you hear what's going on over there? That we're not like those people over there. Man, there's a lot of that that goes on. I mean, we worship for forty five minutes. They worship for a measly ten. We build up camps like this. We deface the temple through our words. But here's what we need to know. Our unity isn't found in who or what we're against. Our unity is found in Jesus Christ. And in him together, we are becoming the dwelling place of God. We live in a culture where rage has become the currency. I mean, do you do you feel that? Our culture is engineered towards hostility. I mean, I I you just witness this. Rage and hostility sells. And honestly, I'm weary of it. I think we're all weary of it. Very few people are interested in a news story that says, you know, my neighbor and I, we were in a disagreement, things were escalating. I started to pray for him. And ⁓ I I just showed him Jesus and now things have calmed down and we're best friends. That doesn't sell. We'll be like, we want the story that's like, ⁓ he was so horrible. He did this, this, and this, and then I killed him. You know what I mean? I mean let's be real. Wow. And then we wa we read it with our jaw dropped and we look at that story and then we like look at all the comments under it. Don't look at me like you don't do that. Maybe it is just me. That story doesn't trend. Instead, we're constantly fed the worst things happening in the world and in the church. I clicked on a couple of articles about moral failures in the church, and now my feed is absolutely flooded with them. And and everyone's comments under them. I mean, don't even do it. I just reading it, it's just like heartbreaking, heartbreaking. And listen. This is not what I'm saying. Sin has to be confronted, right? Like failure has to be addressed in leadership and in just in general. But but where are the stories of the faithful pastors and leaders and church people? Like who are finishing well? How about we read some of those? It's becoming, it's become in fashion to tear one another apart in the name of the Lord. Say this local churches. You know, are are really good at subdivision. Subdivision. We're this and they're that. Our city, I think, is on steroids in regards to this, it seems. Of course, doctrine matters. Holiness matters, but flesh still gives birth to flesh. Spirit gives birth to spirit. And it seems that in these last years, somehow it's become okay to tear down and devour one another publicly and otherwise. We could say, put up the walls. You can't come over here. Let's call it for what it is, flesh. Stop calling discernment or whatever else we want to call it. Let's just call flesh flesh. Because you know what? When I've got flesh operating in my life, I need to call it or I need somebody else to help me call it. Here's the truth. Our deepest divisions are dealt with and healed in Jesus Christ. I just speak this over us as a church, you know. One of the the reasons that we exist is to be a place for the beat up, bless you. Beat up. I always hate when that sneeze happens to me too. It always comes in the worst time. So I feel for you, whoever that was. You know if something like this happens, I'm gonna address it. It's just the the it's the person I am. I'm sorry. Love me or I don't know, whatever else. Now I forgot what I was talking about. What was that? Yeah, beat up, burn out, and hurt in life, hurt in church. We got people coming in from all over the city, other states, other places that have been beat up in church, hurt in church. They're gonna come in here and they're gonna be prickly. And you know what? I believe they're gonna find healing because of who we are as the body, the dwelling place of God. They're gonna be around us, they're gonna be like, ⁓ they don't talk like that, like at my last place. They don't treat each other like that. Like they're they're different. Our ultimate divisions cannot be dealt with by human engineering. Can't be dealt with through politicians or even governments. Our greatest divisions are dealt with in Jesus Christ and Him alone. And the the only way divisions are truly dealt with is when the gospel is preached. And when the gospel is understood, and when the gospel is believed, and then when the gospel is applied and lived in every area of life. I want us to be a gospel people. And don't just amen to things, but we walk out of here different because the word of God got in us, it touched us in such a way, and we say, ⁓ that's what he's building. I want to be a part of that. I want to live in the kingdom of God. I want to live in this new humanity. Amen. I'm going to close with this this morning because I want to make sure you have plenty of time for miniature golf to win those knives. Jump over to chapter four. I want to close with some practical instructions. Since I can't preach chapter four, I'm gonna do it anyway. Just a few verses. I'm gonna close with this. Here's some practical instruction for us. Verse one I, Paul, therefore, a prisoner of the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called. How? With all humility and gentleness, with patience and bearing with one another in love. Eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, there is one body and one spirit, just as you were called to one hope that belongs to your call. We don't create unity. We can't. Jesus already did that. Our responsibility is to protect it. Preserve it and to fight for it. In a culture that is fueled, absolutely fueled with outrage and division and hostility and hatred, we are called to be different. We are called to be different. We are we are being built into the very dwelling place of God. And guess what that means? When we walk out of these doors in a few minutes, we get to show the world who we is. And one of the primary ways we do it is how we love one another. Amen. Stand with me. I want to invite our ministry team to come. If you come quickly. I wonder if there are people in the room today that you say, I don't know Jesus. I don't know the Lord. I've never given my life to him. I I don't I hear what you're saying today, but I don't have a relationship with the Lord. I want to tell you, everything we've talked about today is for you. The wall that he broke down between us, he has broken that wall down for you. And he says, Come to me. Come to me, and I'll show you what real life is. I'll show you why you're existing on the planet. If that's you today, and you've never received the Lord Jesus and you'd like to find out more about that, or maybe you just say, I want to surrender my life. Today's your day. Maybe you're a young dad or an old dad or a middle dad. I want to tell you, the invitation is for you today. He is peace. You've been looking for peace? You're not going to find it ultimately anywhere else. He is our peace, and he's broken down every wall. For the rest of us, if you say, hey, I wanna, I wanna go, I wanna live in that new humanity in a way that maybe I haven't, I wanna invite you. Would you lift your hand? My hand's going up. You'd say, I want to live this. This new man, this new reality of what the church is. I'm gonna ask you to be bold. Put your hand up. My hand's going up too. If you'd say, I want to be a part of this new thing that God is doing on the earth. I I pray over you right now in Jesus' name and just pray. I just pray that that we would be a people that would walk in the a manner that is worthy of our calling with all humility. I pray that we'd be a people of humility. That we would be a people of gentleness, patience, that we would be a people that bear with one another in love, and we would be eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace. I pray that we would be courageous and we'd be bold, and we would stand in this day of great darkness, shining the light of our King Jesus. And I pray that over you today. May we be a place where heaven and earth meet, a place where the kingdom of God breaks in, a people of his presence. And I pray that in Jesus' name and everybody said, Amen. Can we give him just a a little bit of praise this morning? If you need prayer for anything, invite you. The team is up here. We'd love to pray with you. If you need to go, God bless you. Have an amazing Father's Day and