Sermon
Birds of a Feather
August 28, 2005
Pastor Mark Cox

There's an old saying that I'm sure all of us have heard, and it goes something like this--"Ornithological specimens of the same or similar plumage tend to habitually congregate in the closest possible proximity." Have you heard that one before? You might know it a little more familiarly as--"Birds of a feather flock together". Like it or not, we tend to associate with, hang around, and generally like to be with people who are like us in some way - who share similar values or tastes or in whom we just have a lot in common.

Sadly, this concept that birds of a feather flock together seems to adequately describe most churches in America today. Despite our great diversity as a nation most congregations are not known primarily by any doctrinal unity, but rather are distinguished more by socio-economic status, or ethnicity and skin color, or (more recently) by age and worship style preference.

There's one church in our area in which there are four different congregations-all of them Christian- in which they all meet in the same building at different times. One, a younger more contemporary group, meets early on Sunday morning for their own style of worship service, and then when they're done, a more traditional congregation meets for their own style of liturgy and worship. In the afternoon a Hispanic congregation uses the facilities for their own worship, and in the evening a Polynesian congregation comes in and has their own style of worship service.

And while I can understand why these type of distinctions happen, whether it's because of language barriers or because of a certain outreach to a certain community, I can't help but be a little saddened by this trend.

In John 17 we have recorded one of the most famous prayers of Jesus, known as the High Priestly Prayer, in which He prays not for His disciples, but He is also praying for us. And in verse 20 of John 17 it says: "I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word," That's us. And here's what Jesus prays for us, "that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me."

The unity of believers was very much on the heart of Jesus for two reasons: one, this unity reflects the unity that Jesus the Son has with God the Father; and two, this unity is meant to be a witness to the rest of the world. People are to see something inexplicably different in the way that Christians relate in oneness that would testify to God's power. Unity is important to Jesus and should be to us as well.

Now as a youth pastor I am particularly sensitive to generational splits within a congregation. Many churches today, in what I believe is a sincere effort to reach out to young people, have taken the route of implementing two distinct worship services of which people can choose to attend depending upon their preference of worship style. One service tends to be a more traditional liturgy with organ and hymns; the pastor is dressed in a suit or robe and the sermon is delivered from behind a pulpit and is generally geared toward an older audience.

The other service will be more contemporary with guitars and drums and PowerPoint slides; where the pastor might be dressed in khakis and a sweatshirt and perhaps sitting on a barstool to the side of the stage, more as a storyteller than perhaps as a preacher, and the goal is to have a service that will reach out and connect with the younger generation.

Now we all have preferences for how we like worship to be conducted, but the problem is that sometimes the tension over these preferences runs so deep that it has caused generational splits within a congregation. And rather than seek a common ground, many churches have resigned to having two separate services; one for the old people, one for the young people, and again, Birds of a feather flock together and it seems never the twain shall meet.

This morning we're going to look into Paul's letter to the Ephesians and explore a little bit about what the Bible has to say about the unity of the church and address the questions: Is it important for young and older generations to worship together? Is it even possible? And if it is, how is this unity achieved?

We'll be starting in chapter 2, verse 18 of Ephesians. So if you have your Bible or there are Bibles in the pew, you are welcome to follow along, or there are notes as well. I won't be able to get through all the notes today, but you have them and I'll be skipping around to a few parts.

Now the Apostle Paul is writing his letter from prison in Rome. Paul has been arrested for committing the crime of ushering Gentiles into some of the restricted areas of the temple in Jerusalem. Now the temple in Jerusalem had many courts that were concentric and segregated courts. The largest outer court was the court of the Gentiles. The Gentiles could go there. But after that came the court of Jewish women, inside of that was the court of Jewish men, next came the holy place in which only the priests were allowed, and finally at the very center of the temple was known as the holy of holies; the very inner sanctum where the very presence of God dwelled.

And Paul was arrested because he ushered Gentiles into some of the intermediately courts that were restricted only for Jews people. At his trial Paul claims his right as a Roman citizen to have his case heard by Caesar, and so he's shipped off to a Roman prison, during which time he probably wrote the letter to the church in Ephesus. The church in Ephesus was a combined church of Jewish and Gentile believers, which caused for tension both inside and outside the church.

Now at this point we're going to pickup today in chapter 2. Paul is specifically addressing his words to the Gentiles, the non-Jewish Christians. And it's important that we keep in mind that this is Paul, who is a Jew, addressing Gentiles about the spiritual blessing they now share in Christ. Verse 18 of chapter 2 it says, "For through Him (Jesus) we both (Jews and Gentiles) have access by one Spirit to the Father. Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit."

Paul is saying to these Gentiles, 'Be encouraged my brothers, for because of Christ's death and resurrection we both, Jews and Gentiles, now have "access" to the very presence of God.' If you recall that when Christ died on the cross, the Gospels record that He cries out and let out His spirit, and right at that moment the curtain that hung in front of the entrance to the holy of holies, that very inner sanctuary in the temple, that curtain was ripped open in two, signifying that since Christ fulfilled the righteous requirements of the Law and He now transfers that righteousness to us who believe, we are now declared righteous before a holy God and have unfettered "access" to the very throne room of God.

A major change has taken place in which Gentiles are no longer excluded from God's covenant but now have equal citizenship with Jews in one new combined church, members of the same household of God; built on the same foundation into a dwelling place for God. The circle of God's covenant, because of Christ, is no longer limited to the nation of Israel, but now is open wide to all the nations and to all who would come to Christ.

It may be hard for us, nearly 2000 years removed, to get a sense of just how...get a sense of the weight of this change, and get a sense of just how revolutionary and explosive this was to have a combined church of Jews and Gentiles who now called themselves brother and sister and part of the same household of God.

The animosity that existed ran deep, as Gentiles had generally had nothing but disdain for Jews and Jews had been taught that Gentiles were created by God merely as the kindling for the flames of hell.

To get a taste of what this might have been like, if you have been following the news in the last couple of weeks you've seen where Jews have been ordered out of their homes in an area known as the Gaza Strip, just north of Egypt in Israel, and some of them even by military force are being dragged out of synagogues as the land is to be handed over to the Palestinians. Some Jews harbor such animosity towards the Palestinians that they have even lit their homes on fire so that Palestinians won't be able to live in them. The hatred that exits between these two groups runs deep and is passed on from generation to generation.

Now imagine that somewhere right in the middle of the Gaza Strip a group of Jews and Palestinians began coming together and worshipping in the same Spirit of Jesus Christ. Suppose they laid aside their hatred, put down their rocks and weapons, and instead began to worship as one family and calling themselves brother and sister. What would happen? It would be a miracle and clearly the world would take notice! Something different, radically different, would be going on here.

Now take this most unlikely scene and consider the fact that it actually happened in Ephesus, founded upon the teaching of the apostles and the prophets and with Christ as the cornerstone of their faith, these two distinct cultures who hated each other to the core were now being built together by the Holy Spirit as one holy dwelling place for the living God, and the world was taking notice.

Paul goes on in chapter 3 and he says, "For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles--..." And remember Paul has been thrown in prison for preaching this. This is not a popular message that Jews and Gentiles are going to worship together.

But notice in verse 2 there is a hyphen. Hyphens are important. I'm an English teacher. Know your grammar. The dash signifies that Paul is going to go on a little side note here and we need to make sure that we follow his logic as to what he's saying, and so in verse 2 Paul writes, "if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you..." Now other translations instead of the word dispensation will use the word the stewardship of God's grace or the administration of God's grace, and basically the idea is that God has dispensed to Paul, has given and entrusted to Paul, a message and it's going to Paul's job to pass this message on.

And so he says, "if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you, how that by revelation He made known to me the mystery (as I have briefly written already, by which, when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ), which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy apostles and prophets: that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel, of which I became a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effective working of His power."

Now again, God has entrusted Paul with a message, which Paul refers to as the mystery, and Paul's assignment is to make this mystery known to the world. But the question is what is this mystery? What does he mean when he talks about the mystery?

My wife and I, Lori, we love good detective stories and mysteries, and in particular, I like the British productions of the Agatha Christie novels. What's fun about mysteries is that throughout the story there's always, you know, little bits of evidence and clues and sometimes they try to distract you with what's called red herrings, and what's fun is to try to figure out who did it before the end of the film.

Now all of these Agatha Christie stories end pretty much the same way, where the detective, whether it's Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple or whomever, they gather up all the suspects into one room and then through logical deduction and a systematic retelling of the events, the murderer is exposed and the mystery is revealed. Generally it ends up being some unsuspecting little mousy nursemaid who's some vicious psychopath. That's how those work.

But the whole idea is that the movie is over because the mystery is now revealed. Likewise, in the Bible, a mystery means something that was hinted at in the Old Testament, but is not fully revealed until the New Testament. And what Paul is saying is that this concept of a united church of Jews and Gentiles worshipping together is something that God has had in His mind since before Creation, and He gave hints of it throughout the Old Testament, but it was not made known until He reveals to Paul on the Damascus road His plan. This united church has been part of God's plan from before the beginning of time, and now, through Paul, the mystery is revealed. And it was Paul's assignment to make this newly discovered revelation known to the Gentiles.

He continues in verse 8: "To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ"

Now when Paul says he was "the least of all the saints", this is not false humility on Paul's part, but rather an amazement that God would choose him, of all people, to proclaim the mystery of the church. By human logic, Paul would be the last of all the Christians for such a task or the least we might say. Recall that before his conversion, Paul was a Pharisee whose main goal was to eradicate the earth of these Jesus followers. But now, in God's divine wisdom and in a way that can only point to God's power, Paul's heart was transformed and he was appointed by God to build up the very institution he once tried to destroy. Imagine the impact this had on people at the time--the main persecutor of the church had now become its main promoter. The chief adversary of the church was now its chief advocate. And the world took notice.

But why? What is the purpose for why God has created this new church and why is it so important that we be united? I mean it's easy to talk about unity. We can all say, 'Let's all just get along,' but we all know that unity is hard. It's not an easy thing to try to get along with people who are different than me. It would often be a lot easier if everyone were like me...church would be easy. It's heard.

Unity requires that I be uncomfortable at times and that I don't always get my preferences. Perhaps it would have been much easier for Paul to start two churches in Ephesus. He could have had one church on one side of town that was for Jewish Christians, and then started another church on the other side of town and said, okay, Gentile Christians you come and worship here. Or he could have split up the congregation--Jewish Christians you worship in the morning, and the Gentiles Christians you have sanctuary and can worship in the afternoons.

But that's not what he does. There is one church in Ephesus and it's imperative that they learn to get along and treat one another as family. And why? The answer is in verse 10: "to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church". The English Standard Version, I think, puts it a bit clearer when it says, "through the church the manifold wisdom of God might be made known..." The word manifold simply means "many-sided". God's wisdom is many sided.

It is through this united church that God says He is going to let His vast, many-sided wisdom be known. It is through the church that God is going .to reach the world with His power and grace. The church is the vehicle by which God wants to make Himself known-Yes, God does reveal Himself in His Word in the Bible, but it's us, the church, that is the embodiment of that Word. We are the body of Christ, and it's this embodiment that the world will see. And if the church is acting in unity, striving to bridge cultural gaps and break down barriers that are between people, the world is going to take notice.

And so how is this unity achieved? How do we break out of our flocks and reach out to others?

I want us to, if it's possible, to imagine for a moment what it must be like for God to exist in heaven. I know it's hard, because I imagine that heaven is going to be so radically different than our live here on earth. But let's just try for a minute to try to imagine what it's like for God to exist in heaven.

Let's start with food - How does God eat in heaven? or does He eat? Is there food in heaven? Part of me really hopes so...but I also know that there is no death in heaven so our bodies aren't going to be nourished the same way they are here, and certainly God Himself doesn't need food as He is perfectly sufficient and not dependant upon anything for His existence.

Well what about clothing then? What clothes does God wear in heaven? The Bible says that God is spirit and the Book of Revelation speaks of Him as robed in majestic celestial light, and in heaven there is no sun because the very presence of God illumines all of heaven. He has no need of clothes as He has no fleshly body to cover from nakedness nor from cold.

What about communication? How does God communicate in heaven? Does He speak in the same way that we speak here on earth? We have these vocal chords that we use and they make these vibrations in the air and these vibrations hit our ear drums and are turned into electrical signals that go to our brains and we interpret these as words and as language, and it's a very sloppy process. And as we know a lot of times there is miscommunication - we try to say something and people don't get it, and there's tension that comes from that

I imagine however God communicates in heaven, whatever way He does it, that He is able to communicate perfectly, whether it's commanding His angels or communing with the saints, He does it in perfect harmony without misunderstanding, without confusion. So you get the idea.

Now consider for a moment that this holy God who lives perfectly in heaven in all harmony, beauty, and order-He takes the initiative to set all of that aside to come to earth as a human being, to take on a body of flesh that gets dirty and feels pain and gets tired, and He has to wear clothes that get soiled and worn out, and He goes through the awkward stages of childhood and adolescence, and He attempts to talk with people who misunderstand Him and reject Him and slander Him, and He's arrested and beaten and spit upon by His own creation, and ultimately killed as a common criminal. God in His love for fallen man, set aside His own comfort to reach out to us. The Incarnation, the story of Christmas, is at its core a call to missions. God has set the precedent of setting aside His own preferences and reaching out of His comfort zone for the sake of drawing others closer to Him.

If you look back in verse 22 of chapter 2, there's a beautiful verse there where we see a complete picture of the Trinity and how it connects with the church. Paul writes in verse 22, "In Christ we are being built together as a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" - In Christ a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Often I hear people make the statement, "The church is more than a building", which is true, but saying that the church is more than a building is kind of like saying the sun is more than a light bulb, or the Pacific Ocean is more than a puddle. Yes, the church is more than a building, but it's a lot more. The church is a group of diverse people who because of Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit are being built together as a dwelling place for the Living God.

The church building is not these four walls around us, but it's you and it's me and it's everyone in our community who comes to Christ, no matter what their background, no matter what the color of their skin, no matter how much or how little money they have, no matter if they speak English, Spanish, or Chinese whether male or female, whether teenagers or the elderly, whether sick or blind or healthy, whether you're a doctor or janitor or housewife or unemployed-it does not matter. When you have Jesus Christ as the cornerstone of your faith and the Bible as your foundation, we share something deeper than any human category, something much greater than just being inside the same building, and it's in the midst of the unity-a unity that is so completely foreign to our world a Spirit-led miracle of oneness-that God looks upon and says, 'Now that's where I'm going to live and that is where I'm going to show My glory.'

The unity of the church is our greatest apologetic. The unity of the church is our strongest witness to our community, and the unity of the church is the most effective means of evangelism to a lost and broken world.

Now we have a dilemma here at Highlands-each year we lose young people who progress through the high school youth group, who are generally excited and sincere about their faith in God, they graduate from high school, maybe hang around the youth group for another year or so, but then because they have developed so few adult relationships they feel out of place and not sure how they fit in with the rest of the church body. It's not long after this that they just sort of drift off and lose contact with the church and with their faith.

We must strive for unity. We cannot take the easy way out and say, 'You young people, you go in the back and you worship in the preference and style you like, and the older people we're going to stay here and do it how we like,' and be satisfied with that. That's not a compromise, that's a tragedy. Not only do we rob each other of the needs of family, but it's a terrible witness to our community-even in the church it seems that birds of a feather flock together.

Imagine a family in a home where when it comes to dinner time, the parents prepare a meal and they sit down in the dining room to eat the meal, and meanwhile the kids go and prepare their own food and they go off in the back of the house and eat their meal there. While that may happen more and more these days, we couldn't look at this and agree that that would be a healthy family. We'd have to agree that there's something going wrong here. There's a brokenness here that is not right and a lack of order to this home that I would not want to model my family after.

A healthy family is one where all generations, from the youngest toddler to the oldest great grandparent, love and respect and grow from one another in unity. Younger generations are starving for wisdom and guidance, and mentors they can look to, to talk about the struggles of growing up and role models of how to become an adult. And older generations need youth to maintain a spirit of vitality and usefulness and an assurance that my life is helping shape the next generation and my life has real purpose to it. We all want this in our homes and we should all want this in our church.

And so how does this happen? I stand here today, not saying I have all the answers for how we come here, but I do know a few things: that we first need to recognize that true unity is not something we can do by our own effort. Our natural tendency is to stay segregated and flocked together with those who are like us. Unity begins by recognizing the reach of God's grace in my own life, and how far He went out of His comfort zone to make contact with me, then praying for Him to open my eyes in ways I can begin building unity in my family, or with my neighbors, or those at work, or with the person who is sitting next to me in the pews this morning.

Jesus prays for unity of His church and we should be praying for that as well. I need your prayers. We're in this together. I pray for God to transform my heart to love people more like He did Paul's, and instill in me a passion for those who are estranged and outside the church family, to take the risk as Paul did and usher people closer and closer to the presence of God. I pray for God to grant me the willingness to be uncomfortable and not cling to my worship style preference.

As we are united on the same foundation of the Bible, with Christ as the cornerstone and God is at the center of our worship, then I don't really care what songs we sing, I don't care what clothes they ask me to wear, but instead I pray, Lord, give me the courage to reach out to those who are different from me - whether of a different generation or different skin color or whatever. And Lord help me to begin the process of friendship, of unity.

We are the church; the body of Christ, and it is through us that God is going to reach our community. Let us not settle for compromises in unity, but rather strive and pray together as one family for God to build His church. He wants to do it and He will do it for His glory.

Will you stand with me?

Father, You prayed for unity for Your church, and Lord unity is not something that we can do in our own efforts, but we need Your strength to do that, and so Father, as we close today we come just wanting You to convict our hearts of people in our lives right now that You want us in Your strength to reach out to. And Father we pray for us as a church and our generational differences and everything else, Father, the struggles of unity, but to embrace them, Father, in Your strength and to Your glory. Guide us Father. We surrender all these things and we pray them and say we love You, in the name of Jesus Christ we pray, amen. Blessing on you all.