One for All and All for One

Happy Sabbath! It's great to see everybody here. We have the flowers out. It looks beautiful. We're all set up with the lights and everything and a lot of smiling faces. So it's great to see you all here. And something about the nose. You can't see it. If I do this, I'll be breaking the law or something, right? Oh, the masks! Well, I can't wait to give a sermon without a mask on.

But anyway, we're almost there. We're going to get through this and we'll talk about that a little bit. Hello to everybody on Zoom and Facebook as well. We're glad you could join us virtually. We hope that you can join us in person here at some point. I talked to a few of you who are online. You aren't able to make it and everyone is thinking of you here.

So it's good to have you with us as well. When I was growing up, I watched a lot of TV, as probably you did as well. A certain generation. We didn't have internet.

We had television. And I really enjoyed, as a little boy, watching these adventure shows. I watched all sorts of different adventure shows. And if I start naming them, then you're going to say, oh yeah, you're really old. Oh yeah. But I'll mention a few anyway, because some of them have stood the test of time. I enjoyed Zorro, because that took place in California. And I thought that was really cool. And there's lots of remakes of Zorro over time. And one of the shows that I watched, and they've made so many movies about this, is The Three Musketeers.

People heard of The Three Musketeers? Not the only one. It's a classic, right? And The Three Musketeers, there'll be a test on what the names of those are. They're very hard to remember. The Three Musketeers made famous, and actually, Alexander Pudouma, who wrote the book The Three Musketeers back in the 1840s, he made famous an expression, one for all and all for one. Okay, have you heard that before? Anybody? Everyone's like, yeah, don't ask me things that are so simple. All for one and one for all.

That expression is, was actually used before Alexander Pudouma put it into The Three Musketeers. Amazingly, Shakespeare used that expression, that's the first time we see it in English, in the 1500s. And in preparing for this message, I came across the fact that that expression is also the unofficial motto. They say unofficial because there is no official motto, but it's the unofficial motto of the country of Switzerland, one for all and all for one. And essentially, it means that we pull for one another, and everybody pulls for us. That expression is actually defined in dictionary.com, and I'll read that definition for you. It says, all the members of a group support each of the individual members, and the individual members pledge to support the group.

One for all and all for one. Now, that expression can sound a little quaint, actually, maybe even a little naive, perhaps an aspirational thing, but it's a TV show, or it's a film. But in actual fact, that phrase and that expression has a great deal of meaning if we really dig into it. And if we go back even before Shakespeare long ago, there's something that the Apostle Paul describes in Ephesians 4, and I'd ask you to turn there, that gets to the same idea.

Ephesians 4 verse 4, nice memory verse if you want to remember Ephesians 4.4. If you turn with me there, I've turned in my Bible already here as I've started. Ephesians 4 verse 4 says there is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling. Just like we may think of all for one and one for all being perhaps a bit quaint, we might also read over this verse quickly, not understanding the significance and the power of what it means to be one body.

It's more than a worthy goal. It is indeed who we are. We are one body. We are not part of a body. We are the body. Now, why is it that we might not understand this phrase as deeply as we could, or why is it that perhaps we might look at this phrase maybe not in the way that we should? Well, I would argue that we live in a culture that glorifies the individual.

We live in a culture which is all about the celebrity, the most valuable player, the solitary visionary, and then you can name the person. We have the time, 100 most influential. We have the top 10 richest. We have all sorts of prizes and things that go to individuals. We live in a very individualistic society. Why would we be surprised if that didn't rub off on us?

The apostle Paul wrote to his assistant Timothy, and you don't need to turn there, but I think you know the reference in 2 Timothy 3. You can note it in your notes. 2 Timothy 3 verse 1 talks about perilous times. He says there will be perilous times. What's the first thing that he says there? He says that men will be lovers of themselves. This individualism. In the 1970s, they called it the me decade. It's all about me, and it's kind of been that way here in this country since then. For us, we do not face the risk that we might just become addicted to working in teams or working in groups like some Star Trek Borg, Mindhive, or something. That's not our risk. Oh, you guys are always working together. It doesn't work that way in our society. Now, those who enjoy or read dystopian literature, that's a genre of post-apocalyptic times, what do you know about dystopian literature and how they describe individuals and groups? Well, you see, after the apocalypse, when everything is sort of destroyed, groups come together for survival. Small groups get together, and they all work together to try and survive in these difficult times. But pre-apocalyptic times are not about working in small groups and making sure everybody's working together. It's about the individual. And surprise, surprise, we live in pre-apocalyptic times. This is not the time when it's all about the group, it's all about the team, it's all about the family. No, this is the time when it's all about the individual. And so why would the body of Christ not be under attack from all sides to focus on the individual?

Us. Why would we not be under attack to be thinking more about ourselves than about others? Individualism. That often within the church can lead to splintering and cracking at every sort of gust of wind that might come by. So today I want to examine Ephesians 4, verse 4, and I want to examine the context. The context of Ephesians 4, to share two parts, or two points. There's two points to the sermon. The first part, or the first point, is that being the body of Christ means being part of a community. Being the body of Christ means being part of a community.

And second, being the body of Christ means serving in that community. We're going to go through both of those as we examine the context, and when we're done, I hope that you will be moved to action to draw closer to your brothers and sisters in the faith and to take a more active role in serving in the congregation. I'm going to define that word serving as we go through. And the title of today's message is One for All and All for One, because hopefully you'll remember that next week when somebody says, what did he talk about? He talked about one for all and all for one.

Now we should still be here in Ephesians 4 if you've had a chance to turn there, but let's go back a few verses to Ephesians 4, verse 1 to get the context. We're going to go through this first point, which is being the body of Christ means being part of a community. Ephesians 4, verse 1, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to have a walk worthy of the calling with which you were called. This is our response to God's grace and the calling that we've received. We love God by living in a way, a way of life that is worthy of that high calling.

I shared the story before, but I was asked by a teacher at my daughter's school. My daughter was going to a non-denominational Christian school, and I was asked by one of the teachers, a professing Christian, who asked me, why do you as a Christian take your daughter out of school to go to this feast of tabernacles, this Old Testament celebration?

I answered with Ephesians 4, verse 1. I said, this is my response to grace. This is how God wants to be loved. He asked us to keep His commands, and so I keep His commands. He says to do this. I observe these things because I want to walk worthy of this high calling. Now, it's a powerful verse to inform us as to how we should be living, but there's not a period at the end of verse 1. It's a comma, and the thought continues into verse 2 and to verse 3 to really describe what Paul is trying to get across here.

In verse 2, and I'm going to read verse 1 going into verse 2 so we can get the flow, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to have a walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with long suffering, bearing with one another in love. Now, Paul specifies the attitude of this conduct, the attitude of the walking worthy. Worthyness means lowliness, as it says.

It means humility. It means gentleness. It means patience. And it means bearing, bearing with one another in love. And so in verse 2, we are introduced to community, which is the first part of this message, community, because you can't bear with one another if you are not in a community. There's no one to bear with. You have to have others to bear with.

And the word bearing is very interesting because bearing implies a certain difficulty. Merriam-Whipster's dictionary defines bear or bearing this way, and this is an interesting definition I find. It says to accept or allow oneself to be subjected to, be subjected to, and you could put all sorts of things in there, often difficulty, but you're subjected to something without giving way. That's the definition according to Merriam-Whipster's. And Wefter gives an example.

He could bear the pain. He could bear seeing you cry. Bearing means that you go through some difficulty and you stand up. You move through it. You persevere through it. In other words, when we bear pain, it means it was difficult, but we persevered. We might say, Tim Pebworth's sermon was long and boring, but I was okay.

I bore through it. I made it through. We might say, it's a long drive to bend in a day, but I was able to bear it. That's what bearing means. It implies some sense of irritation, some sense of difficulty. It means that when someone says or does something we don't particularly like, or that hurts us in some way, we don't get bent out of shape emotionally. We move through that difficult moment and we maintain our equilibrium. There's a certain equilibrium in there. So when we bear with one another, it means two things.

There is a community that we must be in because we have one another. And two, that community will be difficult. That community will be difficult. That's right here in the verse. And yet, we will subject ourselves to that community and we will maintain our equilibrium. We will bear with one another. Now, what happens when we get into an awkward or difficult situation with someone? What is our natural human response? Well, I'd like to ask that question in the sermon chat. I'm going to give you two answers that, from my perspective, are interested in your answers. The first thing I see is that we flee.

We flee the scene. We go and find other people who are more like us and we spend time with them instead. That's what we do. We sort of excuse ourselves politely or perhaps involately, depending on the situation. And then we go talk to somebody we know and you say, man, I can't believe that conversation. That was weird. And we start talking to the person who's more like us about what just happened. The second thing that I see is that we fight. We fight. We identify the error of the other person and we require that that other person change his or her ways or else. We're going to let them have it. They are out of line.

So those are two things that I've identified. I'm curious your examples. Again, after church, during sermon chat, I'd like to hear it. But I would argue that flight or fight is not what verse two says. It says, patiently, humbly, with gentleness, subjecting ourselves to one another in love. And this is what being in a church community like the San Francisco Bay Area here at Aluma or San Jose would look like. And then Paul finishes the sentence in verse three by saying that all of this is for the purpose of endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Verse three tells us then that all this work is for the purpose of being unified by God's Spirit and being connected in peace. So when someone walks into this community, and I believe that they would feel this, they can feel God's presence here. They can feel God's Spirit at work. They can sense the peace. They can sense the safeness. They can sense the community coming together to support and identify one another. So this is the context of the statement in verse four that we started with in the introduction, that there is one body. You see, verse four is not a command. Verse four is just a statement of fact. There is one body and one Spirit. That's just a statement of fact. The question is whether we're going to be part of that body or not. And Paul, in verse one to three, is giving an exhortation. That's what it is. It's an exhortation. Go back to verse one and look at verse one again. He says, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you. In my margin, next to beseech, there's a little number two. And over there, in my notes in the New King James version that I have, it says, I exhort or I encourage. It's an exhortation. Paul is exhorting us to pay attention. And why would Paul, speaking under inspiration, writing under inspiration from God, recorded here in Scripture, why would this exhortation be different than other exhortations, than other commands to obey God's laws and statutes? Because really, the two great commandments that Jesus told us were to love God and to love your neighbor. To love God and to love your neighbor. And this is very much about loving our neighbor, isn't it? And it's also about loving God. And what I've noticed is that sometimes we can be very careful to observe the Sabbath, tithing. We can avoid pepperoni pizza. As a kid, I used to love pepperoni pizza.

My dad wasn't in the church, and he would make sure he gave me lots of pepperoni pizza, trying to get me to not be in the church. But I quit eating pepperoni pizza. Yeah, we can do that. We can avoid those things, and we can say, I'm good. But we know, really even saying that, we know that's not true. We can do those things, but then not bear with one another in love, and be just as sinful, just as culpable, just as divisive, as if we were walking in with a pepperoni pizza and serving it for snacks after church. Verse four is a fact. Verse one to three is an exhortation of whether we're going to be part of that fact. Will we be the fact of the body of Christ and heed the exhortation, or will we flee? Will we stay home from church? Will we attach ourselves? And I'm going to be blunt here. Will we attach ourselves to little groups, self-styled refugees? I think I've heard the term. So easily identifying the sins of other people while being blind to the beam in our own eyes. It can happen, and it does happen. You know, President George W. Bush said something I think is quite profound in this regard. He said, too often we judge others by, excuse me, too often we judge other groups by their worst examples while judging ourselves by our best intentions. And this has strained the bonds of understanding and common purpose. Now he's speaking about the United States of America in terms of our bonds of understanding and common purpose, but certainly that could apply to the Church of God, to the body of Christ as well. We can so often judge others by their worst examples and ourselves by our best intentions, but perhaps we should switch it and judge others by their best intentions and ourselves by our worst example. Could the divisions in our country be impacting the body of Christ? Could the prophecy of 2 Timothy 3 verse 1 be impacting the body of Christ, the Church of God at the end time? Could our own lack of patience, gentleness, and humility be the obstacle to us bearing with one another in love? I'd like to answer those questions if you'd allow me, because in my view, yes, our own shortcomings when it comes to loving our neighbor could be responsible for division and strife within the body of Christ. Me. Me. I'm talking to me right now, and I hope you're talking to you. And yes, we are influenced by the world around us as much as we don't want to admit it. We often tend to think of the influence of the world in terms of the media, violence in the media, or sexual content, these things like that. But the influence of the world reaches beyond that and affects how we view ourselves and others, how easily we can give up on each other, how easily we can divorce ourselves one from another, simply because we become unwilling to bear with one another, to bear with one another. And so the question is whether we will ask for God's Spirit to give us the humility, the patience, and the love to overcome our pride and unite, maybe even reunite, with God's people. And with this in mind, I'd like to go to the second part of this message, which is being the body of Christ means serving in that community.

I've been a little, perhaps, more academic, and now we're going to get a little more practical. Now, we read Ephesians 4 verse 4 in the introduction, but let's read it again, because there's something that Paul introduces here in verse 4 that's important. He says, there is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling. See, verse 4 introduces the analogy, which Paul writes about in other letters. It's the analogy of the body, the human body. We are not a team, although we need to work like a team. This group here is not a team. We're not a team. We aren't a club, although we are united by a common purpose. We're not a club.

We are not a troop. The biblical analogy would be a flock. We're a small flock, but we are a body. That's what Paul says here in Ephesians 4 verse 4. We are a body, and a body is indivisible. Indivisible. You might have heard that term from the Pledge of Allegiance. Indivisible. That is, you can't cut off one part of the body and have that part maintain its own life. When the hand is severed from the body, it dies. When the eye is removed, it no longer serves any purpose. It cannot see on its own. It has to be connected to the body to function. Paul describes this idea in detail in 1 Corinthians 12. So let's go over to 1 Corinthians 12.

We're going to touch on some facets here of what it means to be a body, as Paul describes it.

1 Corinthians 12, and we'll start in verse 13 to give an idea of how Paul describes us as a body. He says in 1 Corinthians 12 in verse 13, For by one spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and have all been made to drink into one spirit. This verse should sound very similar to Ephesians 4 verse 4 because it's got one spirit and one body. It's the same idea. Now just think about this for a moment. This is perhaps you have to turn around, but look around. You know, maybe you have to turn around. You can look at each other. Oh, now I'm awkward. It's awkward now. I'm looking at somebody. Oh, it feels better. You're not looking at me. Yeah, this is the body. We are tied together. If you look around, the person behind you can't go it alone. They can't go without you, and you can't go without them. We are fulfilling different roles, though. We have, maybe not in the same context, Jews and Greeks and slaves and free. That was the context of the time, and you could say the same thing here. We have all sorts of ethnicities, ages. We have all sorts of different styles and temperaments and backgrounds, and we are all tied together. Verse 15 says, for in fact, the body is not one member, but many. And then he goes into some discussion. If the foot should say, because I am not of the hand, I am not of the body, is it therefore not of the body? And the answer, of course, is no. We can't look at the person next to us and say, well, you know, I don't know about you, but I'm good. I'm not sure where you're going. No, we are all one body. That's what Paul says in here.

We don't get to say to the other person, just because I'm not an ear, I'm not of the body. And Paul goes into these logical fallacies, these errors in thinking, that people in Corinth had about themselves in that congregation. And perhaps about people here in the San Francisco Bay Area. I feel very thankful to be part of this community here, because this community I know cares deeply, one for another. And we've been very blessed with stability over the years, and I'm very thankful for that. And I think we could have this discussion, and I think we could, and I hope we can, further this discussion after church in our sermon chat. And then in verse 25, after he goes through these logical fallacies of how we can't be separated one from another, he says in verse 25 that there should be no schisms in the body, no divisions, but that the members should have the same care for one another, all for one and one for all. There should be no schism about who does what. No schism in trying to fulfill some role we shouldn't fulfill. No leaving the body because we disagree with points of administration. Why? Well, look in verse 26, and if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it, or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. See, when someone decides they don't want to be here anymore, we hurt. We hurt. I hurt. I've had these conversations with you. We hurt when somebody has walked out. They've abandoned this way of life, or they're hurt in some way and they don't want to come back. It hurts.

When somebody is offended or holding a grudge, the body is fighting an infection, a disease. It's weakened because that member who has so much to contribute is not here.

When one member tries to pull another member out, that's like cancer. That's the body fighting itself.

Again, I want to be clear. I'm not talking about doctrine. We've been through that story before. I'm talking about styles and administration and approaches. I'm talking about bearing with one another right now. Generally, in my experience, people stop being part of God's church or a community of believers. They stay home. They band together in little living room groups because they've been hurt, because they say they see sin in the congregation.

Generally, what I find is that there is some underlying issue that hasn't been addressed in that person's life. The church is the scapegoat, the pastor, the congregation, the administration. We're all sinners. We're all sinners. I hope that if you came to me and said, you hurt me because you did this, I hope that I would say that I'm sorry. I hope that I would say I'm sorry, and not trying to defend myself or justify myself or tell you why you're wrong. I hope and pray that I would just listen and recognize where I made a mistake. I hope you would too. I hope through that attitude and approach, those who are not attending with us now, who might have been hurt in the past, they would be willing to come and at least talk to you and talk to me. This is something we all do. It's not an if I've said something. It's when I said something. We need to recognize when you said something, not if you said something, it's when you said something because we're all sinners. We've all made mistakes and we've all said things we should know. We've all jumped to conclusions. We've all judged intense when we should have. Only God knows the heart. We cannot judge another person's heart. I hope that you would do these things and that the body would be healed because of that. That we would grow into the image of Jesus Christ. This is the power of God's Spirit working within the body. This is what it means to bear with one another. In verse 27, he says, now you are the body of Christ and members individually. It's an important distinction. You are not part of the body of Christ. You are the body of Christ. That's what he says. You are the body of Christ.

But what does it mean to be the body? Again, what does that mean? Well, the context of 1 Corinthians 12 is all about spiritual gifts, as is Ephesians 4, because the hand has a purpose. The hand doesn't just get to do nothing. The foot has a purpose. The eye has a purpose. Every part of the body has a purpose, and that purpose is to serve the body. What we're talking about today is spiritual hand-eye coordination. You're the hand and you're the eye. The foot has to learn how to step forward, and the other foot has to step after. The two feet have to work together, and the knees have to bend, and you have to have some bounce in your step. We're learning how to spiritually jump rope, because all of us have to work together to figure these things out. Each of us has different gifts. Let's go back to Ephesians 4, and let's continue the discussion there, because again, it's great to say, okay, we're all the body, but this is where we have to start getting serious and practical. Ephesians 4, verse 7 says, continuing the thought on Ephesians 4, but to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore, he says, he who ascended on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men. Now, this is a quotation from Psalm 68, in verse 18. Psalm 68, verse 18, and the imagery is of a king returning to the homeland after being away, and the king might have subdued some foreign power, and is now coming back and is giving gifts after he's returned. Jesus Christ is sitting at the right hand of God the Father. He has triumphed, and now he is giving gifts to his subjects. We, his subjects, are receiving these gifts. We each have been given gifts, and that is how this dynamic body of Christ grows and thrives through the gifts that we've been given that we then give back one to another. Now, I can't answer what your gift is. People ask that question, what is my gift? I can't answer that. You have to answer that. It is your job in prayer and fasting and supplication to God to ask and seek and not to determine what those gifts are, but you have them. It may not be visible to others. It may not even be obvious to you, but fundamentally, the gifts flow out of a desire to contribute, to love, and to serve. And if you have that desire, then the gift will flow, maybe even without you even knowing it, even without you realizing it, but it will be there.

Now, we know from human psychology that we all react and interact with the world differently. There's the Myers-Briggs Personality Inventory. How many people have taken Myers-Briggs? A number of you. Okay, so you know, right? ESTJ, INTF, all those things. There's the Disc Inventory, DISC, four types. There's a type that analogizes us to animals. I'm a golden retriever, I'm a beaver, or I'm a lion. There's ones that analogize us to colors, yellow or red. There's others that use fancy words like melancholy. Is there one that says stoic? I can't remember. There are all sorts of types of personality inventories that we can take. And in my experience, all these tests have one thing in common. They show how every organization, and I say organization because often they're given in the context of some kind of company, but by extension you could say organism, like the body, needs all the different types. They need all the different types to function optimally. When you don't have all those types there, then the organization doesn't function properly. And when an organization forces out or looks down on certain types of people, it ultimately suffers. This is what Paul was talking about in Corinthians 12. You can't look down on one part of the body or the other. I worked in an organization that was very, very engineering focused. Everything was about the numbers. Everything was about quantification. Everything was about lists. And the company was pretty proud of itself for its thoroughness and its attention to detail. But you know, it was missing something. It was missing a certain flair. It was missing a certain fun. It was missing a certain creativity. And the company suffered. Now, if you throw the company all over to the creative types, maybe nothing's ever going to get done. But if you throw all the company over to all the detailed people, it's a pretty boring place to be. We need all the styles and types in the body to be able to thrive. And so we've been given gifts. And in all those tests, they all go back to one thing. They say we need to modulate our styles so that we can work together. You don't learn your ESTJ so that you can be in your little ESTJ Myers-Briggs. I'm speaking in code. I'm sorry if you haven't taken Myers-Briggs. ESTJ. Extroverts, sensing, thinking, judging. I'm looking. Okay, I got some nods there. Okay. Or INTF or whatever. You can't all be yellow or all be red or all be lions or all be golden retrievers. We need all the different styles. Now look at verse 11, Ephesians 4. So we've been given these gifts. We need to contribute to the body. And it says, and he himself, that is Jesus, gave some, or God and Jesus Christ working together, he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers.

Verse 12, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. So God founded the church on the apostles and the prophets, and he built his church on those who evangelize, those who pastor, and those who teach, and all those roles accomplish three things. Three things are described in verse 12. The first one is the equipping of the saints.

The equipping of the saints. We are to be equipped. That's what the purpose here. Now, what are we supposed to be equipped for? You can write down in your notes here. We won't turn there. 2 Timothy 3 verse 17 says that Timothy was equipped for every good work. We have to be equipped to work. You don't put a tool belt on if you're going to go on a construction site and sit down and drink coffee. They're going to make fun of you. You've got to get to work. You put the tool belt on, you equip yourself to get to work. Not for our own salvation alone, not for our own glory, not to be first in the race, but to be part of supporting the community, the work of ministry. That's the second item on the list in verse 12, the work of ministry or the work of service. Now, if you can't name some work of service that you are doing in this community right here, in this body of Christ that we are part of, that we are in, that we are, then we have no workshop for Christ to work in. Christ needs us to be working so that there's a workshop that he can work with us in. Now, if someone has a physical disability, let's say somebody's not even here. You're listening right now on Facebook Live, or you're listening on Zoom because you are not physically able to come here. And that happens. We have shut-ins. We have people because of the virus right now. It's not safe for them to be here. That doesn't mean you can't help either. There's things that you can do. There's things that we all can do. I think we've talked about a lot of times there are certain people who maybe can't serve in physical ways, but you go to them and you ask them to pray about something, and you feel like God hears them. I have those people in my life. I hope you have those people in your lives. We can all serve. Ideally, we can serve physically, but if we can't, then we can serve in other ways by praying, fasting, making phone calls, encouraging, writing letters, writing notes. Service is how we meet people. Service is how we learn to work with people. Service is how we encourage people. Service is how we are encouraged ourselves. Service is how we expose ourselves to different ways of thinking. It's how we uncover our own biases, and it's ultimately how we build up the body of Christ, which is the final point that Paul makes here. He says to edify or build up Christ. Now, perhaps you've heard, because it's been said, that there's three things that we all want when we come to church. You heard the three things we want when we come to church? Maybe. Okay. Here's the three things supposedly we want when we come to church. We want to hear a good sermon, we want a good cup of coffee, and we want a fellowship. Maybe you've heard that. But I would say ask not what the church can do for you, but what you can do for the church, because who's going to serve the cup of coffee? And who's going to set up the lights and get all this set so we can hear a sermon? And who is going to pay for the hall that we fellowship in? Right? We all have to contribute in some way to making this happen, and it's great when we can show up, or we can hear a sermon, and we can have a good cup of coffee, and we can fellowship and go home and feel encouraged. That's good. But hopefully we can contribute to that happening.

Again, allow me to be just frank and open with you. We have young people who attend United Church of God summer camps, and we have families who attend United Church of God's thesis, who don't attend with the United Church of God the rest of the year.

It may or may not contribute through tithes and offerings in some way, and we are blessed to have these these sites, and we're blessed to have this hall, and we're blessed to have camps. That is a blessing from God, and it is wonderful that we can be open and have as many who would want to attend come. In fact, we have a scholarship to attend ABC, and we don't make a distinction on where somebody attends. That's not a criteria. Anybody who wants to go to a Mass survival college, they meet the criteria of their desire to go. It doesn't matter that they attend with the United Church of God. We have money here for that, and that's a blessing that comes from generous donations and support from this community.

But that being said, there are those who meet in small groups during the year because they want their own independence. They want their own flexibility in terms of how they run some sort of Sabbath assembly to congregate in their own way. But because they are so small, they don't have the resources to have camps or to have fee sites, and so they take advantage of bigger organizations. I would ask, why can't we all be able to fellowship throughout the year so that we can all benefit from all of our collective understanding? Why wouldn't that be possible?

Wouldn't that creativity and energy be better used here together through the year? Could there be reconciliation? Could we be building up the body of Christ together?

I'll leave you with that question. I won't answer that for today. I'll leave you with that question. But here's what I would say. Wouldn't it be great if we could be the biggest small church?

The biggest small church? Who wants to be big? Nobody wants to be lost in a crowd. Wouldn't it be great if we could come into fellowship here like we're coming into our living room, relaxed with our brothers and sisters? Not lost in a crowd, but feeling connected. You see, bigness is only helpful in terms of scale, like camps or the feast site. We don't want that. Christ says we're a little flock. That's what we want to be. We want to be a little flock. We never want to stop being a little flock. Let's be that little flock, but let's be the biggest little flock we can be so that we can provide the opportunity, so we can work together. Wouldn't the body function so much better if everyone served and participated and felt empowered to give whatever talent he or she had without fear of being judged for his or her viewpoints? Because we can easily feel judged. It's so easy, especially if that personality type is not the most common in that community. We all have different personalities, as it were, to our congregations. And again, I'm not talking about doctrine. I'm talking to learning to live in harmony. I think there are people who would like to fellowship here, but they may feel judged. And that's something they've got to work through, and that's something we have to work through. Are we welcoming? Are we welcoming of all styles? Are we welcoming of all different personality types? This is what it means to bear with one another. Now let's finish in verse 13. Let's wrap this up in verse 13. All of this is for the equipping of the saints, the work of the ministry, the edifying of the body of Christ. Verse 13, it says, "'Til 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.'" This is where it all comes together. There's a gentleman named Dr. Roger Pasco. You can look this up if you'd like. He's a Baptist theologian from Ontario, Canada, and he has an interesting summary of this verse. He describes it as showing three types of maturity.

Doctoral maturity, relational maturity, and what he calls perfect maturity. Doctoral maturity in terms of faith, because it says, "'Til we all come to the unity of the faith." This is doctrine. The next one is relational maturity in terms of understanding who Jesus Christ is. He touches our head and he touches our heart, and relationally we are connected through his in that sense, the one he, the one, sacrificed for all.

Walk worthy of that one who sacrificed. Perfect maturity, which is the ultimate goal to become like Jesus Christ. How can this be done alone in our living rooms? How can this be done in little tiny living room groups, watching different webcasts? This kind of doctrinal, relational, and perfect maturity, or ultimate maturity, can only be accomplished by being an integrated, interdependent member of the body of Christ. Looks like I'm being beat, which is good. I'm at the conclusion.

One for all, and all for one. Now, we're not musketeers, not talking about swords, but I think the apostle Paul has that concept down. He says, we are one body, in one spirit. We don't fight for justice in the right in that sense, although we do, but on a deeper level. Our calling is much greater, but our motto is no different. One body and one spirit. We don't fight this battle for ourselves alone. We fight so that we might function within a larger body. We persevere and overcome, that we might serve one another, in preparation for greater service in the kingdom of God. Let us reject the spirit of individualism and embrace our collective responsibility to bear with one another in love.