I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.
But each of us was given grace according to the measure of Christ’s gift.  (Ephesians 4:1-7)
Dear brothers & sisters in Christ,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and Jesus Christ the risen Lord and Savior. Amen.
Paul wrote to the congregation in Ephesus from prison to remind them of their calling and encourage their lives as disciples. Like all congregations for the past couple thousand years, they needed some reassurance and fortification.
Communities are just as subject to discouragement, fear, doubt, and temptation as individuals. Being a community of faith is hard work. One fallacies of congregational life is that people expect it always be easy and harmonious. For some reason, we are tempted to think there is some magic force-field around churches that keeps out sin and evil. We somehow forget that we are a gathering of sinners who are being redeemed. If that magic force-field really did exist, Jesus would be sitting all by his lonesome.
Communities of faith need buttressing for the simple fact that living in community is difficult. We can be tempted to despair, to doubt, to apathy. We can be tempted to either hoard or devalue the gifts we have among us. We need reassurance. We need encouragement. We need the Gospel just as much as the person who has yet to hear it for the first time.
We have been blessed with innumerable and varied gifts. Together, we participate in God’s mission here on earth. We seek to reach out to proclaim Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord to our little corner of the world. Our words express the love of Christ. Our actions declare the saving mercy of God. We build up the Body of Christ by the grace and power of the Holy Spirit.
God uses us as a unit to give life and salvation to this world. God uses the very people who are being redeemed, to give redemption to others. As Jesus once stated to the disciples, “What is impossible for mortals is possible for God.” It is pretty amazing what God is accomplishing among us. And it will continue to be amazing as God continues to act in this area.
The grace and peace of God which surpass all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the risen Christ Jesus. Amen.
In Christ,
Pastor Carla
The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. (Ephesians 4:11-13)