Coming out of Sunday’s teaching, “Ephesians: Walking in Unity” spend some time in prayerful reflection and dialogue with your Home Church/Friends/Family around any combination of these questions
Read through Ephesians 4:1-16 before starting. Pray and ask God to speak.
- How did God speak to you through the text and/or Sunday’s message? What jumped out to you? Why? What are some of the main ideas that Paul is communicating in this passage?
- What’s important about the first word in this passage, “Therefore”?
- What comes to mind for you when you read about Paul begging the church to “lead a life worthy of your calling”? What does this mean? What is this rooted in?
- In verse 2, Paul talks about three characteristics that are critical for unity in the church: Humility, Gentleness and Patience. What happens in the church (and/or in relationships when any one of these three things are absent (or lacking)? What can happen when they are present?
- What’s significant about Paul’s words in verse 3, “…keep the unity of the Spirit…”? What do you think this means?
- What jumps out at you in verses 5-6? What do these verses show us about God’s heart for oneness? Why is it that churches/people so often divide over non-essential things not on this list? Is there a time to divide over those sorts of things? Why or why not?
- What’s significant about Paul’s words in verse 12 when he talks about their (leaders in the church) responsibility is to equip God’s people? What does this mean? How does the church often get this wrong?
- Jeff talked about the importance of being a contributor instead of a consumer in the church. What does it look like to be a contributor vs a consumer? How does this (being a contributor) contribute to the growth/maturity of the church?
- Look again at verses 13-16. What strikes you about Paul’s vision of the church here? What does Christian maturity look like? What’s needed in order for the church to grow/mature? What’s the role of Christian unity in this process?
- How is God calling you to respond? What might it look like for you to “lead a life worthy of your calling” this week?
