Speaking The Word To One Another

Speaking The Word To One Another

In Ephesians 4 Paul famously lists the gifts that the ascended Christ has given the church—apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor-teachers.  We are also told that these giftings will “prepare us for works of service” (Eph. 4:12). 

The picture here is of all the different parts of the body fulfilling their proper function, each part working with the others for the growth of the body.  But what is common across this multifarious function of different body parts is “speaking the truth in love” (Eph. 4:15).  We may each do this in different ways, in different contexts and with different levels of effectiveness, but the basic methodology of body growth is that all the members “speak the truth in love,” one to another.  We are to be disciples confessing.  In Matthew 10:32-33 Jesus said, “So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I will also deny before my Father in heaven.”  To be a disciple is to openly confess his Word to others.  We have all been given a “word ministry”.  That is what builds up a local body of believers. “Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you and evil unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.  But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.”

This can only mean that God wants all Christians to be speaking to each other regularly, urging and encouraging one another being saturated with the Word of God.  The more Word centered we become, the more we are built up to the glory of God.