NOTES for Eph 4:1-16

When Paul speaks about the unity of the church community, he clearly has in mind more than organizational or doctrinal unity. For him, the unity of the church community is first of all evidence of the normal and full spiritual life of the Christians who belong to it. The apostle understands perfectly that unity is not an end in itself and not even a means for solving particular tasks facing the church. The unity of the community is the natural consequence of normal relationships among Christians as inhabitants of the Kingdom. If God is truly not only "over all," but also "in all" and "through all" (v. 6), then the unity of "all" is implied by itself; there can simply be no other relationships among people who live in the Kingdom and breathe one breath with God.

But for a person who has not yet been transformed completely, it is easy to lose the Kingdom by making concessions to his own sinfulness. That is why Paul urges the Ephesian Christians to preserve unity (vv. 1-6). On his lips this appeal sounds like a call not to forget the Kingdom and spiritual life. Paul judges church ministries from the point of view of how much they bring those who serve closer to the fullness of life in the Kingdom. For him, the very concept of grace is inseparable from service; it is given to a Christian for service, and it is given as an inseparable part of the relationship that binds him to the Risen One (vv. 7-10). For Paul, service is also inseparable from the spiritual life of the one who serves. If the Church were an ordinary religious organization, everything would be simpler: future ministers would simply be trained the way people in our still untransformed world are trained for any work requiring special knowledge and skills, and after their training they would be sent to their ministries like young specialists going to work after completing their studies.

But in the Kingdom everything is different. Here it is impossible to learn anything or prepare for anything without being rooted in the life of the Kingdom and without transforming one's own nature, so one has to learn service in the process of serving. The life of the Kingdom is so whole that it cannot be separated from service in the narrow, concrete sense of the word, and no one is ready for it, above all because one can learn to live in the Kingdom only by entering it. The ministries of the Kingdom can be learned only by living in it. Life in the Kingdom itself becomes service, and service becomes part of the life of the Kingdom. It is no accident that Paul considers the main meaning of all church ministries to be the building up of the body of Christ, and the main task of those who serve to be the attainment of that fullness of spiritual life which, in familiar language, can be called adulthood, when a person becomes so mature in every respect that any task can already be entrusted to him, as it is entrusted to an adult and responsible person (vv. 11-16). The Church is a community of inhabitants of the Kingdom, and only the Kingdom can be the means, goal, and meaning of any church ministry.

The apostle Paul does not merely ask—he implores. He implores all of us to walk worthily of the name of Christ's disciples. And what does it mean to walk worthily of the Christian name? For Paul it means “maintaining the unity of the Spirit.” We keep thinking that what matters most is some extraordinary virtue (which, admittedly, we do not possess either, but never mind—we will strive for it). Yet everything turns out to be so simple... and almost impossible. Preserve unity. Is this possible in today's world, where not only different Christian denominations are divided, but often even the admirers of different priests within a single parish? And what will this unity consist in? It is perfectly clear that none of us, nor even all of us together, can reunite the divided Churches. Paul has probably already given the answer: unity lies in humility, meekness, and patience, in bearing with one another in love. In other words, it lies in accepting the other person with love despite the fact that he is different.

Paul's words about one body, one spirit, one faithfulness, and one baptism sound like one of the early Christian creeds. In those days there was no single creed; there were, apparently, several. And although no one formally canonized these creeds, in fact they played their role: they allowed Christians to formulate briefly and capaciously the main credo of their faith and life. And at the foundation of the formulation offered by the apostle in his letter lies the Church as one body and one spirit, united by one hope, the only hope for all.

The issue is precisely the Church with a capital letter. Not an earthly community founded by people, but a spiritual reality. As a spiritual reality, the Church is always the Kingdom on earth. If a Christian is by definition an inhabitant of the Kingdom, then the Church is by definition the representation of the Kingdom on earth.

Its members are united among themselves by one breath, the same for all, the breath of this Kingdom. And they are bound by one common hope: the hope that the day of Christ's return in glory will come, when the Kingdom will be revealed to the end and in fullness, including and transfiguring the whole world. Therefore all Christians have one Lord. In this case precisely Lord with a capital letter. King. Sovereign of His Kingdom. The very Kingdom into which one enters through baptism, which is also one. Of course, if there were many churches, there would also be many baptisms. But the Church with a capital letter is one by definition.

Therefore baptism is also one, if it is real: it brings a person precisely into this Church with a capital letter, not into some earthly community. Or it brings him nowhere at all, but then the word "baptism" should be put in quotation marks. And the faith of all Christians is also one, if only they are Christians. Faith, of course, as faithfulness to Christ, not as various descriptions of numerous versions of a Christian worldview. And one God over all and above all. And in all. For only God's presence can make the Church the body of Christ and the world the Kingdom. In this is the hope of Christians. If, of course, we are speaking of real Christianity.

The biblical teaching about a personal God is often contrasted with pantheism as a pagan teaching. Indeed, pantheism is characteristic of the pagan world, while pagans rarely speak of a personal God. Still, one cannot say that they do not speak of Him at all. But a pagan's personal spiritual experience often truly has a pantheistic character. This is no surprise: for full communion with God, revelation is necessary; to know God as a Person, He must reveal Himself to the seeker. Pantheism is another matter: God's presence in the world is a reality, and this reality is accessible to every seeker.

It is no accident, therefore, that the path of spiritual searching often led many first of all to pantheism, which strengthened their paganism: from pantheism it is easy to move to the deification of the cosmos. The possibility of such deification was one of the reasons why the authors of all the biblical books without exception treated pantheism with great caution. Still, pantheism found a place on biblical pages: there is a certain truth in it, though not the whole truth.

If God's presence in the world is a reality, then pantheism has a right to exist, without claiming, of course, to be the final truth. And in the context of the New Testament revelation, the revelation of the Kingdom, it receives a new dimension. Indeed, pantheism is possible insofar as God's breath, God's presence, permeates the universe, and has done so from the very beginning, from the moment when, according to the Poem of Creation, "the Spirit of God spread His wings over the water."

And this very presence makes possible the transfiguration of creation, the qualitative change of its nature that will free the world from the power of the evil that entered it at the fall. But for such transfiguration to become possible, the fullness of the Kingdom had to enter the world from within, through a human being, more precisely, through the God-Man.

And now that this has happened, pantheism acquires a new quality. Before, it reminded us of God's presence in creation; now it reminds us of creation's presence in God. Not in the depth of God's person, where there is and can be nothing created, but in the process of God's existence, of which His Kingdom is part. God immersed in the life of the world, in its very depth, and the world included in God's life insofar as that life is open to it: this is the Kingdom. And God's own life is "over all, through all, and in all."

When we look at the parallel passage in the Psalter quoted by the Apostle Paul, we see that there is a slight but significant difference. The epistle says: Therefore it is said, “When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men.” But the Psalter says: “You have ascended on high, You have led captivity captive; You have received gifts among men, even from the rebellious, that the Lord God might dwell there.” What does “led captivity captive” mean? He made those who had been captives of Satan His own captives; in effect, He redeemed them in order then to set them free. But the words “gave gifts” and “received gifts” are a little more difficult. It must be said that this difference occurs not only in the Russian translation but also, for example, in the Vulgate. The apostle is therefore deliberately introducing a new meaning. In fact, this is something very important. A gift. The gifts brought to the infant Jesus are precisely what unites this apparent discrepancy: gifts to the One who offered Himself as a gift. He receives gifts and gives a gift, the greatest gift. How wonderful that this reciprocity suddenly becomes clear in what seemed to be a simple variant reading, almost an error. The Holy Gifts. “This bloodless sacrifice,” “the sacrifice of praise,” which is “the mercy of peace.” Suddenly we merge, and it becomes impossible to distinguish what Christ gives me from what I give Him. O. Henry has a story called “The Gift of the Magi” about two very poor lovers who desperately want to give each other a Christmas present, but have no money. She secretly cuts off her beautiful hair, sells it, and buys him a chain for his watch, while he sells the watch and buys her a comb for her hair. From a material point of view it all looks so absurd and unfortunate, yet in truth this is happiness. These are the very gifts that we bring to one another and to God every day of our lives. Let everything turn out awkwardly. We give what is most precious.

The apostle Paul tells us today that the purpose of teaching in the Church is that we all come “to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the full stature of Christ.” Sometimes we think that knowing Christ is reserved for a chosen few, for teachers, monks... In fact, this is precisely why the Church exists: so that the Lord may reveal Himself to us. He reveals Himself in the sacraments, in His word, in the teaching of the Church, and in fellowship among brothers. The Lord gives His gifts so that everyone may benefit from them—not only the person to whom a gift is given, but all those around him as well. And each of us is called to seek knowledge of the Lord, knowing that even if I do not have the gift of understanding or teaching, someone in the Church does have this gift, and it was given for me too.

It would seem at first sight that there is contradiction here with one of the well known part of the Bible: we know that in Matthew 18:3 Jesus says "become as little children", and here Paul says to us - "be no more children". We shall still return to this paradox in a few days, but let’s notice today that Jesus says we cannot enter the Kingdom without "childishness", but He says nowhere we should remain children.

The apostle Paul explains that Christian life is an obligatory growth, and moreover in the foremost - in love. We don’t have to crawl, but have to go, go to Christ, and we must have in us for that a very solid "vertebral column" of faith, capable of resisting the wind of false doctrines, temptations, delusions, longing to mislead us.

In the Letter to the Ephesians, from which we read a passage today, the apostle Paul formulates a view of human life that is very important for us: life as purposeful movement, a path directed toward God. He says that God builds up all the diversity of the Church's life so that we may all “grow to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” The apostle says that we are called to grow “into Him.” And one can move along the path of growth only through true love. This view makes every human life meaningful, which is important in itself. Even more consoling, however, is that following such a path frees us from dependence on the measures by which we assess earthly success: wealth, power, authority, and strength. According to the apostle, the one who acts in love puts on the dignity of Christ. Together with the call to growth, the apostle thus also proposes a new scale of values, a true gradation of good and evil whose starting point is God Himself.