Ephesians 4:1-3

Ephesians 4:1-3

Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God. Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other faults because of your love. Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the spirit, binding yourselves together with peace.

                There are days at work where I think my job would be easy if it weren’t for the people. I can be having a great day and one rude person can come in and do or say something that can ruin my day if I let it. The Christian walk is really no different. Our walk with God would also seem so much easier if it weren’t for the other people.

                In today’s verse Paul asks us to live a life worthy of our calling. We are to live our lives in a way that we are an example of God’s love to those around us. To live set apart and holy lives. It is easy to live a holy life when we are sitting by ourselves reading our Bible and praying, but much more difficult when there are other people around, even other Christians.  It is easy to be kind, loving, meek, gentle, and patient when you are alone and spending time with only God, but it is much harder to do when the person who has hurt or annoyed you is right next to you.

                When we are around the people that hurt or annoy us it is tempting not to act like a person with a call of God on our lives.  When we are around those people we want to react in anger and be hurtful to them. I had a customer this week that tested me in this area. I was explaining (very sweetly I might add) to this customer a policy that we had. He got very gruff and in my face and told me that I would not follow the policy, but would do what he wanted me to do. Sometimes this particular policy can have an exception and I was going to tell him that if it were necessary I would try and get approval to do what he needed, but since he got rude with me before I could tell him it did not make me want to be helpful to him. In fact my first reaction was to say, “Watch me!” I of course did not say that. In fact I don’t think I had time to say anything before he took off out the door. My first reaction was to hurt back, not to be kind.

                God does not want us to hurt back when we have been hurt though. In Matthew 5, Jesus said that we are to love those who hurt us. He points out that anyone can love the lovely, but that we need to rise above and love those that are difficult for us to love.  God asks us instead to be humble and gentle.  He asks us to be patient with each other making allowance for each others faults. We all have faults, quirks, and things in our personalities that can be difficult for other people to deal with. Some things that bother me may not bother you. We need to remember that different people handle things in different ways and we need to remember to make allowances for that when we deal with each other.

                God wants us to put forth the energy to walk in unity with each other. Unity does take effort. We have to make allowances for each other because of our love for each other and our love for God. This week really look at your love walk. Are you living your life in a way that people see your love for them and for God?