Eph.4:4-6 – There is one body and one Spirit, just as you also were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.
This passage is loaded with the treasure that we enjoy with Jesus Christ. He has called us into a oneness, a fellowship with the Father and Himself. This was the Apostle John’s passion as he reveals in 1 John 1:3 – “what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” In Paul’s description in today’s passage we see this oneness on display.
- ONE BODY – There is only one church that has existed through the ages. It has lived through every generation and through every culture in this diverse world. There are many different cultural ways our faith is expressed but through it all there is one body.
- ONE SPIRIT – There is one Spirit, the Holy Spirit that we have all received. It is the Spirit of God that joins us to the Father and the Son and joins us to one another. He is the very life of the body.
- ONE HOPE – There is one hope, that hope is eternal life enjoying the intimacy with the Father and the Son that we have tasted in this life. It is this taste of God that fills us with hope every day.
- ONE CALLING – We are all in this fellowship because we have heeded the call of His sweet voice. He called us out of darkness into this kingdom of light. All of us in this spiritual community are there because we responded to His voice.
- ONE LORD – This was the cry of the early church, that Jesus Christ is Lord of all. We are looking forward to that great day when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. It is in submitting to this Lordship that we find purpose and peace.
- ONE FAITH – There is one faith even though there are many denominations with different shades of belief. At the end of the day the one faith is the faith that declares that Jesus Christ is Lord of all. He is the only way to heaven and the author of our one faith.
- ONE BAPTISM – To me this refers to the baptism that Jesus performs, full immersion into the Holy Spirit. As Christians our oneness comes from being in Him, this becomes our experience when the Holy Spirit comes upon us.
- ONE GOD AND FATHER – Everything originates with Him, He lives within us, He is working through us and as James said, “Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.”
This is our heritage, we have been brought into this dynamic spiritual union between the Father and the Son. We enjoy this union in our fellowship as Christians.
