The Power of Radically Ordinary Faithfulness

Well, if you are visiting with us this morning and you do not own a copy of God's word, please use the pew Bible in front of you.

The big numbers are the chapters and the little are the verses.

And you are more than welcome to take that home with you as a gift from us to you.

Before I dive into the message for this morning, we do have a unique blessing.

By God's grace, we are supported by Berean Bible Church in Logan'sville, Georgia.

And I did not warn them I would do this, but Berean Saints, if you would just stand up real quick so we can just see who you are.

Y'all can clap.

There you go.

Y'all can sit down.

These dear saints drove hours yesterday to be here to worship with us and to take word back to their church family.

We are grateful for like-minded churches who pray for us and support us financially so that we can proclaim the gospel here.

Join me in a quick word of prayer as we pray for Bereen, real quick.

Heavenly Father, praise be to your name that you have taken other saints all across the globe and have moved in their hearts to start churches to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We're grateful for the ministry of Bereen.

We pray, Father, that you continue to magnify your name through the saints there.

May your gospel go forth.

May people come to faith in Jesus Christ.

May the saints mature in you.

And I pray for their pastors and church leaders, Lord.

May you use them to shepherd well, to disciple the flock, Lord, so that they can help be tools in your hands to advance your kingdom.

And I pray for these precious saints who took time out of their weekend to be here with us, Lord.

May they be encouraged in the faith and may you return them home safely to their church family.

In Christ's name I pray.

Amen.

Well, friends, we conclude our series in the book of Ephesians.

And this passage we're looking at this morning that our brother read for us, uh, most preachers just kind of gloss over or just lump it into uh what Paul says earlier in chapter six, but leave it to Cam to comb every nook and cranny to see what God has for us.

But if we believe that all scripture literally is inspired by God and profitable for our correction, then we should slowly seek to benefit from every last drop.

Well, most of us are fans of history of sorts.

And when you look at some key historical events like World Wars and so on and so forth, what tends to come to our mind are the heroes of those movements, right?

So you think of uh Winston Churchill or General MacArthur, or we can go on and on.

You you remember some of the big name heroes that were used to do good.

But what you often don't hear about are the unsung heroes, so to speak.

The average Joe who just did their role faithfully that no one ever hears about until a documentary is made decades later or a book comes out.

That's kind of what I see in our text this morning with Tychicis or Tychicis, however you prefer.

He is a sort of unsung hero, someone the Bible doesn't say a whole lot about, but played a vital role.

And I believe he has rich implications for us today as we seek to faithfully follow Jesus.

And so the main thing I want us to look at this morning from Paul mentioning Tychicus is this.

None of us in this room has to be a Paul.

You likely won't be a Paul, but you must be a Ticekus.

God has called you to live faithfully, to serve quietly, and to strengthen others with the gospel and his word.

So, no, you don't have to be a Paul, but you must be a Ticekus.

But the question is, who exactly was this man Tychicus, and why does Paul highlight him at the end of this great letter?

Well, you don't have to turn here.

I just want you to listen.

But I'm just gonna read every verse in the New Testament that mentions Ticchus and give a brief context behind that text.

So our text this morning, the most obvious, Ephesians 6, 21 through 22, as Paul concludes this letter, now to give you context, Paul's writing from prison or likely house arrest, and he says, Ticekus, our dearly loved brother and faithful servant in the Lord, will tell you all the news about me so that you may be informed.

I am sending him to you for this very purpose, to let you know how we are and to encourage your hearts.

So Paul writing to these Christians in Asia Minor, which would have likely been a cluster of house churches, he commends Tychicus at the close of this epistle.

He is both the letter bearer and an encourager.

So he would have physically taken the letter Paul had written to these churches in Asia Minor, and probably maybe he was the one who read it to them or helped circulate it.

But he also was given the task to strengthen the believers in Paul's absence.

Over in Acts chapter 20, verse 4, it says he was accompanied, Lord, give me strength to pronounce these names.

Acts 20:4

He was accompanied by Sapodar, son of Pyrus from Berea, Aristarchus and Secundus from Thessalonica, Gaius from Derby, Timothy, and Tychicus and Trophimus from the province of Asia.

So part of Paul's ministry team, so to speak, were delivering these collect, they were a collection of saints delivering letters in Jerusalem and ministering in Jerusalem.

And Tychicus here in Acts 20 is counted among the faithful companions who Paul had commended to minister to the churches in Asia Minor.

Colossians 4, 7 through 8.

Paul again, writing to the church in Colossae here, says, Ticekus, our dearly loved brother, faithful minister, and fellow servant in the Lord, will tell you all the news about me.

I have sent him to you for this very purpose, so that you may know how we are, and so that he may encourage your hearts.

Nearly identical to Ephesians chapter 6, isn't it?

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

Showing the pattern.

Tychicus was entrusted with one of Paul's letters.

He was commanded, or not commanded, but encouraged by Paul to give updates to the congregation on Paul and his ministry partners' journeys and how they're doing.

And they were to encourage spiritually God's people.

Titus chapter 3, verse 12, last one.

Titus 3:12

Paul says, When I send Artemis or Tychus to you, make every effort to come to me in the copolis, because I have decided to spend the winter there.

So Paul planned to send either Artemis or Ticekus to relieve Titus on the island of Crete, where Paul had encouraged Titus to set up elders in the churches in Crete.

So he he sends Titus to Crete, proving again that Tychicus was trusted with great leadership responsibility by an inspired apostle.

Paul sent Ticekus not just to deliver the letter, but to encourage the body.

So he wasn't just a glorified mailman, like here, physically delivered this letter I wrote.

He said, no, deliver it and encourage the saints and give them a report of how we are doing.

So Tychicus played a vital role in the ministry of the Apostle Paul.

Though his name doesn't appear often in the New Testament, I just read a handful of verses and that's all of them.

But when it does appear, the pattern is consistent.

Tychicus was faithful, he was dependable, and he was an encourager.

From these passages, we can sketch out a kind of character profile, so to speak, of who Tychicus was.

What was he known for, and how did God use him?

Now, before we step into this, just give a disclaimer.

I'm not a fan of uh character profiles where sometimes we can, you know, let's preach on David and Goliath and say, You're you're Goliath, who are the Davids in your life for you to take down?

That's not how we interpret the Bible.

I love y'all.

You are not Goliath, you are not taking down, uh, I'm sorry, you are not David, you're not taking down anything.

Maybe some of y'all are Goliath, I don't know.

That's why you're in church, right?

But I do believe the Bible does lay out a pattern for us that says, no, we can learn even from examples, both positive and negative, in the Bible, so that we can faithfully follow the Lord.

Here's an example.

If you turn over to 1 Corinthians chapter 10, 1 Corinthians chapter 10.

1 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention 1 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

There's a lot of verses, but I think this is helpful for my point this morning.

Paul makes that very argument by using the nation of Israel, but he's encouraging New Testament Christians in Corinth.

In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, beginning in verse 1, Paul says, Now, I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud, all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses.

1 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

Moses, I'm sorry, and were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.

They all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ.

Verse 5.

Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, since they were struck down in the wilderness.

Now these things took place as examples for us, so that we will not desire evil things as they did.

Don't become idolaters, as some of them were, as it is written, the people sat down to eat and drink and got up to party.

Let us not commit sexual immorality as some of them did, and in a single day twenty-three thousand people died.

Let us not test Christ as some of them did, and were destroyed by snakes.

And don't grumble as some of them did and were killed by the destroyer.

These things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our instruction, on whom the ends of the ages have come.

So whoever thinks he stands must be careful not to fall.

No temptation has come upon you except what is common to humanity, but God is faithful.

And he's saying, Let that be an example to you, saints in Corinth, not to go the same path as them, but rather to choose righteousness.

So Scripture gives us both negative and positive examples.

Israel's failures are written down.

He even says that these are written down for your instruction.

So he's saying their foolishness, their sin is instructional for you today.

So when we come to Ephesians 6, we realize on the positive end, Tychus is an example of how to faithfully follow the Lord.

Which means the Bible doesn't just tell us what to believe, but it also shows us lives to avoid and lives to imitate.

Now, when we read 1 Corinthians 10, we gotta guard our hearts and not think, yeah, those foolish Israelites, if I was there, I would have faithfully followed the Lord and Moses.

Like I highly doubt it.

You would have just been included in the story, more than likely.

But we have that example that even encourages us to see, even when I fall flat on my face, my face and rebel against God, I'm not new.

This has been going on for centuries, and yet the Lord is faithful.

So let's do a brief character profile and see what we can learn of this character Tychicus that was so near and dear to Paul that he would include him at the end of his letter to the church in Ephesus.

Well, first let's look at his identity.

According to what I read in Acts chapter 20, we learned that he was a Gentile believer from Asia Minor.

Acts 20 · chapter mention

He was known by Paul and the early churches as trustworthy and dependable.

Think about it.

If Paul is identifying Tychicus to deliver this letter to these churches in Ephesus, Paul, number one, trusted Ticekus.

He thought he was a man of good character and faithfulness to the Lord, and he had confidence that the churches knew him and would receive him as someone worth listening to as he encouraged them in the faith.

I guarantee you, Paul did not just randomly select someone in the church in Ephesus and say, Hey, you go.

What about his reputation?

Well, in our text this morning in Colossians chapter 4, he's called Paul's dearly loved brother.

Colossians 4 · chapter mention

That says a lot, doesn't it?

His dearly loved brother.

But he's also recognized as a faithful servant and minister of the gospel, and he's known for his encouraging spirit.

Do you think an apostle would send someone with his letter and encourage them to encourage the congregation if he didn't think that that man was competent in the spirit and the word of God to encourage the saints?

Paul knew what he was doing.

What was Tychicus' role in ministry?

Well, from what we can tell in Ephesians and Colossians and Philemon likely, he was a letter carrier.

He was a messenger on behalf of Paul.

He was one of his ministry partners who was exhorted by Paul to deliver Ephesians, Colossians, and some scholars uh debate whether he even delivered a Philemon as well.

He was an encourager sent to strengthen and comfort local churches.

Think about that.

He probably uh is actually, well, I mean, he is from Asia Minor, but he didn't maybe know every single church in Asia Minor.

Yet he had this privileged role of going around all the churches and encouraging them and giving them an update on their beloved apostle, who we know the elders, especially in Ephesus, love dearly when you go read Acts chapter 20, and when you hear that exchange where Paul is leaving and they know it's the last time they will see him, and they weep because they know they're gonna miss their brother Paul, whom they love dearly.

Acts 20 · chapter mention

He also was a sort of relief worker because he was sent by Paul to Ephesus, according to 2 Timothy 4.12, and possibly Crete and Titus, to fill leadership gaps, so to speak, to relieve Timothy and Titus.

So I'm bringing this up to say this was a trustworthy brother, at least for Paul.

Paul trusted this man.

The Bible doesn't give us all the details of when did he come, when did Tychicus come to faith?

Was it under the ministry of Paul or somebody else?

How often did Paul invest in this man?

We don't have those details, but what we do have is the end result of the relationship.

Paul loved this brother as a dearly beloved brother.

So Paul's ministry with Tychicus shows us that the church advances through people like him.

So what can we learn and apply for ourselves today?

When you look at this text and you see this character and we ask the question, okay, so so what for me?

Like, how does this encourage me in my walk with Jesus?

Let me give a few points of application that I think are helpful.

Specifically from the character and ministry of Ticekus.

Number one, clearly this brother valued faithfulness over fame.

Though he was not in the spotlight, so to speak, he played a vital role in preserving scripture and supporting local churches.

Ticekus was not an apostle, he was not an elder, from we could tell, he was not a deacon, and yet he faithfully served the apostle he loved, and he had the privileged role of delivering inspired scripture that we are learning from today, thousands of years later.

He was an encouragement in ministry.

His job wasn't to be flashy, but to steady hearts with gospel hope.

He wasn't out to build his own platform, so to speak.

I'm sure he didn't show up to the churches in Asia Maya and say, yo, I'm here.

Paul sent me.

Yeah, that's my guy.

I know him.

He picked me, right?

He he wanted to faithfully serve these local churches and help them love their pastor well.

He was clearly available and useful.

He he was essentially went where Paul sent him, showing that God uses flexible, available, obedient, humble servants.

Tychicus probably didn't say, uh, you know, let's say Paul was looking for people to go encourage some of these churches he was ministering to and needed to write letters to and say, hey, who who feels called to do this?

Like sometimes here in American churches, we tend to specialize in church.

Or it's like, oh, I'm not really called to do that or do that.

Let me just be transparent.

As a pastor, what encourages my heart when saints are like, what does the church need?

Like, how can I be a blessing to the body, even if it's something I don't necessarily get super excited about?

Think about it.

Tychicus was traveling all over the place, guys.

That means when Paul said, go to Crete, go to Ephesus, go here, he was traveling.

He was inconveniencing himself for the spiritual good of brothers and sisters he loved and wanted to see flourish in the faith.

Ministry is costly and self-sacrificing.

What we also learn from his example and his relationship with Paul is that ministry partnerships matter.

Paul did not minister alone.

I think sometimes when we read the Bible and we look at Paul or Peter and the other apostles, we think, you know, they're like superhero Christians.

And don't get me wrong, the Lord sovereignly used them to do miraculous things.

But friends, they they breathe the same air we breathe.

They got hungry just like you do.

They had the same Holy Spirit indwelling them that's indwelling you this morning if you're in Christ.

And though he was an inspired apostle, Paul made a commitment to not do ministry alone.

Tychicus reminds us that the gospel advances through means, and that means is God sovereignly working through broken people to accomplish his purposes.

This brief conclusion in Ephesians 6 gives us another glimpse into the life and ministry of Paul and his co-workers.

Because first we learn that Paul always served with a team, as I said, but it appears that whenever Paul traveled, planted churches, or strengthened other believers, or was in prison, he always had other dedicated believers around him, which just shows you the forethought of Paul.

It's almost like he planned for every scenario.

I'm gonna go to Ephesus and I'm gonna seek to plant churches and train up elders, but if I get locked up for preaching Christ, I got a team of gospel ministers around me who I'm just gonna deploy to keep doing what I was doing.

So the gospel does not stop advancing.

He surrounded himself.

This flies in the face of just how we sometimes think of ministry where it's like it's just one guy, one person doing all the work instead of no Ephesians 4.

That's why Paul said equip, but speaking of elders, equip the saints for the work of the ministry.

So whether he was planning churches or traveling, he did so with a team.

But not just because he wanted friends.

Paul was constantly investing in and relying on other people like Tychicus, like Titus, like Timothy, to help him in his efforts to share the gospel and build up churches, which means Paul was never about building his own platform or getting more people to follow him.

He wanted more and more people to follow Jesus Christ.

And he sought whatever means possible to raise up more godly men and women who could go forth and proclaim the message of salvation.

So from Paul's example, we can learn that we have a role to invest in others, who will invest in others, who then will invest in others, and the gospel will continue to advance, saints will continue to mature in the faith, and churches become stronger as a result.

I see what we do on Sunday morning morning to some extent as this is a spiritual catechism where you are coming to be trained in.

Your knowledge of God's word, so that when you leave this building, you are deployed back into your community and sphere of influence to do the work of the ministry.

This is why every ministry we seek to establish is centered around the gospel and the word of God.

We believe the more you know God's word, the more you know God, the more you know yourself, and the better equipped you are to disciple others to help them follow Jesus.

This is an example we see going all the way back to Jesus choosing the 12 disciples.

This is why I know I say this often, but whenever I meet a Christian who says I'm a disciple of Jesus Christ, but they're not discipling anybody else, helping them follow Jesus, I'm just confused what they mean by I'm a Christian.

To be a disciple is to be a discipler.

You can't say you're a disciple, but you're not helping anyone follow Jesus.

That's the pattern that has been laid out for us going all the way back to Jesus in the 12.

So what does this mean for us when we look at our brother Tychicus' example and Paul's mentoring of him?

Let me give a few that I think are helpful.

Number one, not all of us in this room will be a Paul, but each of us can be and should be a Tychicus.

Which means you may never preach a sermon, you may never write a letter on par with anything we find in the New Testament, you might not do anything that makes it in a church history book, but you can walk in faithfulness, you can love Christ's people, you can share the gospel, and you can be a steady presence in the life of a local church, which I think we tend to undermine the power and the influence of those things.

Everyone gravitates towards whatever gets the most attention, but we tend to neglect the faithfulness that undergirds everything else.

Or second, God wants to use you as an ordinary, faithful, encouraging servant to carry his word and strengthen his people.

As pastor Zane and I do not want anyone in this church to be some super Christian who has a major influence.

We want you, and I mean this in a positive way, we want you to be radically ordinary Christians.

Because I think that is the most powerful influence you could have.

Fathers who faithfully and ordinarily love and disciple their wives and their children and lead their homes well, wives who faithfully submit to and follow their husbands to the glory of God, co-workers who exemplify Christ-like character in the workplace.

I can go on and on.

Radical, ordinary Christians who seek to be faithful in every sphere of life to the glory of God.

Don't underestimate the power of a simple word of encouragement, a prayer with a brother or a sister, or just physically being present with someone in a season of suffering.

The most ordinary, quote unquote, mundane things that don't make it in the Christian highlight reels of history, but that the Lord uses as a means of his grace to minister and strengthen his people.

Third, in a world obsessed with platform and recognition, we thrive as a church when you quietly and faithfully serve Christ and His people.

Too many Christians think of ministry, quote unquote, only counts if it's tied to a formal program or a title or office in the church.

But real ministry is the everyday faithfulness of God's people.

And we thank God for leaders in church ministries, don't get me wrong, we're not decrying those things.

But the heartbeat of the church is ordinary believers using their gifts to build one another up.

Many of you in this room, God will never put a desire in your heart to be a deacon or an elder or any formal ministry leader.

But guess what?

If I could speak to the members of Redeemer, when you join this church, you sign a church covenant, and our church covenant did not fall from heaven on golden tablets.

It's just a summary of what the New Testament says about how we are to live as Christ followers in a local church family.

That is ministry, simply helping one another make it to heaven.

That is faithfulness in God glorifying.

I was just sharing with someone the other day, just me and my wife's testimony of how the Lord has used ordinary people to help us be where we're at today.

The first, y'all know my story.

I mean, the first year and a half of our marriage was horrible.

Like we did not get along.

We fought all the time.

We didn't know how to forgive.

We had sinful anger.

And there were some faithful, ordinary saints in our church who counseled us for several months and were honest enough to call us on our mess, to call us to repentance and point us to God's word.

And the Lord used that mightily in our lives to this very day.

Saints you don't even know their names, seeking to just be faithful church members.

But for if above all, Tychicus points us to Jesus, the ultimate faithful servant.

If you don't know Christ this morning, you can't truly serve him or his people because Jesus is the beloved son who came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

The ultimate demonstration of service, expecting nothing in return.

And he lays out that promised hope.

If you trust in him today, you can join him in the great company of servants like himself, like Tychicus and Paul, who lived their lives to encourage and strengthen his church.

And Paul ultimately laid his life down for his servant Jesus.

Let me give some biblical illustrations.

Well, some biblical illustrations and some real life ones.

So many of you might have heard the name or you're familiar with the name, Andrew, in the New Testament.

And we see the story in John chapter 1, verses 40 through 42.

John 1:40–42

Andrew was uh Peter's brother.

Actually, we can turn over there.

Uh John chapter 1, real quick.

John 1 · chapter mention

Speaking of ordinary Christians, ordinary faithfulness, John chapter 1, verse 40 and 42.

John 1:40

It says, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who heard John, John the Baptist, and followed him.

He first found his own brother Simon and told him, We have found the Messiah, which is translated the Christ.

And he brought Simon to Jesus.

When Jesus saw him, he said, You are Simon, son of John, you will be called Caiphus, which is translated Peter.

Now that's a very small detail you could easily gloss over, isn't it?

Andrew is just out and about.

He has an encounter with John the Baptist.

He's encouraged by John's ministry.

He's following John, and he becomes convinced Jesus is the Messiah.

And what does he do in his zeal?

He goes to his brother.

Bro, we found the Messiah.

And what happens?

Peter ends up becoming the leader of the church in Jerusalem.

An ordinary brother, Andrew, simply telling somebody else about the Messiah, set off a trajectory that he had no clue was going to take place.

Andrew isn't a pro isn't nowhere near as prominent as a Peter, a James, or a John, but you better believe he played a significant role, didn't he?

Andrew quietly brought his brother to Jesus, and Peter became the leader of the apostles.

Without Andrew's quiet faithfulness, there is no Peter at Pentecost.

Don't get me wrong, God is sovereign.

We can't thwart his plans, but God, I love how God just plays chess with everybody's lives.

Where it's like he knew he was going to call Peter, but he did it through the means of John the Baptist first, then Andrew hearing John, following him, and then going back and telling his brother Peter about the Messiah.

And then Jesus calling Peter into his ministry.

Without Andrew's quiet faithfulness, there is no Peter at Pentecost.

Here's another example from history.

Edward Kimball.

Just curious.

Anyone ever heard the name Edward Kimball?

Raise your hand.

Okay, you guys are nerds.

That's cool.

Edward Kimball, good.

Edward Kimball lived in the 1800s.

He was a faithful Sunday school teacher in Boston at Mount Vernon Congregational Church.

He faithfully, every week, taught a Sunday school class to teenage boys.

One of those boys was a shoe clerk named Dwight.

That boy, Dwight L.

Moody, went on to become one of the greatest evangelists in American history.

There's books written about Dwight Moody.

You can read books he's written, sermons he's published.

And yet no one knows how he came to faith in Christ.

A faithful brother teaching a Sunday school class to a group of teenage boys that the Lord would use to bring Dwight Moody to faith, and then use Dwight to proclaim the gospel to a plethora of people.

What about Pauly Carey?

Anyone familiar with that name?

Pauly Carey?

You can raise your highs, okay.

Polly Carey, there you go.

Lucas, Lucas knows Polly.

Pauly Carey.

Many of you might be familiar with William Carey.

Does that sound familiar?

William Carey is considered the leader, the pioneer of modern missions, or the father rather of modern missions.

He served faithfully in India.

But few know his sister, Polly, who was bedridden for close to 50 years.

For 50 years, she committed to praying for her brother and his missionary endeavors in India.

And for years she committed to writing to him regularly to encourage him in his ministry.

She never traveled, she never preached a sermon.

She never formally led anything because of her health issues.

Yet her hidden intercession and writing ministry to her brother to strengthen him in his very difficult ministry sustained that brother's work that ended up shaking the entire world.

What about my favorite Baptist of all time, Charles Spurgeon?

In his own biography, he gives a few people that the Lord used in his life, starting with his mother, Eliza.

Eliza Spurgeon gathered all of her children on Sunday evenings and would pray for their salvation.

I've read vivid accounts of her physically almost squeezing Charles Spurgeon to death, laboring over him in prayer in tears that the Lord would save his soul.

But he describes his mother's prayers as she prayed for his salvation with urgency and impressed theology on him at a young age in plain words that stuck with him that he could understand.

Well, Charles Spurgeon came to faith in Jesus Christ when he was 15 years old during a snowstorm where he's roaming down the street and just happened to stumble inside of a chapel that didn't even have their preacher that day because he couldn't make it to the chapel because of the storm.

And so an average layman in the church stood up, read from Isaiah 55, 22, and gave, according to Spurgeon later, one of the worst sermons he has ever heard.

But the man read from Isaiah 45, 22, simply saying, Look unto Christ and be saved.

And in that chapel service, Charles Spurgeon came to faith in Jesus Christ by an average layman who was not a preacher, was not a pastor or leader in the church, but he was just a faithful man who wanted to minister to God's people.

And Spurgeon would go on to be one of the most influential Baptists in church history.

Spurgeon also tells of an example of a cook who worked for his grandparents.

As a boy living with his grandfather for a season, Spurgeon was deeply impacted by the family's cook, who was a humble Christian woman who loved Christ and spoke of him with sincerity with Spurgeon.

Her simple childlike theology made a lasting mark.

Spurgeon described this dear sister this way.

He said, I have often said that I learned more from my mother's knee than from all the theologians in the country.

And I might add that I learned much more theology from an old cook in my grandfather's house who used to talk to me about the things of God.

And if you didn't know, Charles Spurgeon never went to seminary.

He just studied and studied and was grateful for the people God used in his life to deepen his understanding of God's word.

The lessons here I'm trying to hold up for us is that behind this great preacher, Spurgeon in particular, stood ordinary, faithful servants, a mother, a cook, and a nameless layman.

People don't even know the man's name to this day, all hidden, but all eternally fruitful.

That says something.

Don't believe the lie that your insignificance, if you never become an elder or a deacon, if you never lead a small group, God doesn't call everyone to a church office, but He does call every member to ministry.

Listen to that again.

Many of you will never be called by a church to be one of its pastors, deacons, a formal ministry leader, but every last one of you is called to ministry.

And praise be to God.

It is a humbling reality to know that a sovereign and holy and righteous God will use broken, sinful people like you and me to do anything for his divine purposes.

These are things we get to do, not what are owed to us.

Whenever we have the privilege to open our mouths and communicate God's word to somebody else to help them know the Lord, that is a privilege.

We are speaking the oracles of God, so to speak.

We are ambassadors for Christ, as Paul said earlier in this chapter.

Every last one of you is called to ministry.

This is why we're big on meaningful church membership, because we believe when Paul says equip the saints for the work of the ministry, he's speaking specifically in the context of a local church.

Don't get me wrong, as Christians, we minister into our communities, into our sphere of influence, but primarily we all are accountable to a local church family where we get equipped, encouraged in the faith, and then deployed to serve the Lord.

Let me give a few more thoughts.

If you go back to our verse in Ephesians chapter 6, verse 21, I love how Paul concludes the letter in verse 23.

Ephesians 6:21

He says, Peace to the brothers and sisters and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Grace be with all who have undying love for our Lord Jesus Christ.

One thing over the years I have grown to appreciate about the ministry of Paul is just the man's God-centered perspective in all of life.

Don't get me wrong, Paul was not perfect.

He was a flawed center just like you and me.

But the man is writing from prison, and yet he is dead focused on encouraging these saints.

Peace to the brothers and sisters and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Grace be with all who have undying love for our Jesus Christ.

Just imagine if you're a Christian in this day, maybe you two are facing persecution for choosing to be baptized into the church in Ephesus.

Now there's a target on your back.

You're worried about are they gonna come and shut down my business?

Are they gonna throw my wife and kids in prison like they did Paul?

You still are you're I'm following Jesus, but I'm I'm concerned.

Anything can happen.

The leader is in prison writing to us, but imagine this letter showing up in light of all that Paul has said, and he is concluding by encouraging them, peace be with you, brothers, with love and faith.

But then he says, Grace be with all who have undying love for our Lord Jesus Christ.

Would that not at least give you a little measure of strength and grace to say, if Paul can press on and trust God, then certainly I can.

Not to neglect the fact that, you know, we got to keep in context what has Paul been saying in this letter.

In the first couple of chapters, he's unpacking the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ for these Christians.

Then he's getting into how you live in light of that gospel, and now he's concluding Grace be with all who have undying love for our Lord Jesus Christ.

Paul is essentially saying, My love for the Lord goes until I lose my life.

And I hope it be the same for you.

One thing I learned from our shared traumatic experience as a nation with COVID and everything was just a deep concern with how many Christians I saw who just feared death.

Where I'm like, I'm just I'm confused about your understanding of the gospel.

Like I thought death simply ushers us into the presence of our Savior.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying be unwise and foolish and go look to die.

I'm not saying that.

But Paul had a God-centered perspective, even in his darkest moments, sitting in a prison cell.

Keep in mind, Paul didn't know the rest of the story like we do, guys.

Okay.

As far as he knew, he probably was gonna die then.

And yet he still said, Grace be with all who have undying love for our Lord Jesus Christ.

Let me conclude with a few thoughts: faithfulness, encouragement, availability, partnership in the gospel.

These are the marks of a faithful Christ follower.

These are the marks we see in the life of this brother Tychicus, but even more, they are shadows of the one who is perfectly faithful, perfectly obedient, and who came to serve and not to be served.

Tychicus points every last one of us to Jesus Christ, who's the ultimate model of what a faithful servant looks like.

And that's where Paul leaves us at the end of this letter, resting in the gospel of grace.

Can you just imagine how healthy and influential churches would be if they fought against a consumer mentality and instead said, I want to have a producer mentality and be more like Jesus?

I just want to serve Christ and his cause and his purposes and help people follow Christ instead of, you know, I'm of course, no one in this church because we are perfect and holy and righteous.

But I have met some saints out there somewhere sometimes who say, Well, I will only go to this church if it offers blink, blink, blank.

Or I want to go to this church because it will benefit me by giving me this.

I'm not saying we just chalk away our preferences, but you don't see that thinking in the Bible, friends.

Our Savior stripped himself of all preferences to become a man and to be abused and ultimately murdered to save people who were his enemies.

And yet we walk into churches sometimes and think, well, what does this church have to offer me?

That is completely antithetical to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Or imagine you're one of these Christians in Ephesus and you say, Oh, I don't like the music here at the church at First Baptist Ephesus.

Well, sorry, that's that's your option.

You're not transferring somewhere else.

Ephesians ends where it begins, with the gospel.

When we were dead, God made us alive in Christ.

When we were far off, he brought us near by the blood of Jesus.

And the final word that Paul ends his letter with is one of grace.

This epistle, friends, I would encourage you, if you haven't, maybe sometime this week, sit down and read Ephesians in one sitting.

Six chapters, doesn't take long, and just close in prayer.

And just try to trace what why did Paul write this letter?

What is he trying to address?

What does he want these Christians in Ephesus to believe, stop believing, do, or stop doing?

And how does that apply to me today?

It's been an encouragement to see how Paul just weaves in the gospel of God's grace all throughout this entire book and concludes by, like, just think about this.

He's writing a letter to them, encouraging them in gospel doctrine, and how to live in light of that gospel doctrine.

And then in our text this morning, he's sending Tychicus to present and read this letter to them and to encourage them, which likely means to explain to them what it means, which means an inspired impostle had a huge emphasis on people knowing the gospel very well, to be fluent, so to speak, in the gospel of God's grace.

So, how much more should we be as saints who we have the whole book?

We have the whole story.

We're not waiting for a letter to come to us to be circulated to learn more revelation from the Lord.

We have God's full revelation right here in this book, which is why we preach verse by verse through books of the Bible because we want to know what our God has to say to us.

Amen.

Let's pray together, friends.