You can tell a lot about a person by watching how they walk. My father was a wise man in many respects. When I was a young boy, I remember him saying, walk like you mean business. He meant by that was to walk like you have something to accomplish. As I grew older, I found myself watching the way I walked. I also began to watch the way others walked. Our walk will tell others where we are going.
The Apostle Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus from his prison home in Rome. His words were of great power because he wrote them as a prisoner, a prisoner because of his faith. He begins the fourth chapter with these words, "Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called" (NASB95). Paul is writing to encourage the believers in Ephesus to walk like they were called. The word "implore" tells us that Paul urgently tells them something. This is an important thing that they needed to hear and follow. Paul is not talking about a positional calling in the Body of Christ. He is talking about our calling as believers. Paul is telling us how to walk in a sin-filled world.
In verse 2, Paul gives us a list of ways we should walk. This is what he writes, "with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love." The first thing that Paul says is that we should walk with humility. When we hear the word humility, we often think of someone who does not think much of themselves. They walk with their heads down. But the real meaning of humility is to assess oneself properly. What is the proper assessment of a believer? I once was lost, but now I am found. I am the righteousness of God in Christ. Because I am forgiven, I can boldly enter the presence of God. I am a child of God. Those are some of the things we have received because of our faith in Jesus Christ. We are to walk in this world having a proper assessment of ourselves.
The next thing that Paul says is we need to walk with gentleness. Gentleness is kindness toward others. This does not mean that we don't stand against evil. One way to show our gentleness is to rescue people from the evil around them. That is true gentleness. Jesus was gentle, but when there were people taking advantage of others, that gentleness was seen as resistance.
Paul then tells us to be patient. How do we show our patience? Being tolerant of one another means that we don't give up on someone. We are not tolerant of the sin they commit, but we are tolerant of the person. How do we do that? By loving that person in the same way that Christ loves us. Christ will never give up on you, and we have that same love for people in our spirits. We need to let that love be seen in our walk.
We are living in a time in which the devil would be delighted to see division in the Body of Christ. He is trying fiercely to divide us because he knows that our strength comes when we stand together. When the body of Christ is together in unity, then the Lord pours out a blessing. I see the Body of Christ coming together more now than ever before in my lifetime. Paul is talking about in verse 3, "being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace." There is diligence in the body of Christ to preserve and walk together in unity. This unity doesn't come from a doctrinal agreement. It comes from a bond of peace. The bond of peace means an agreement to fasten ourselves together in harmony. When the Body of Christ agrees to live in harmony with each other, the world will see our walk, and in seeing our walk, they will see Jesus.
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