The Bond of Peace

Ephesians 4:1 - 3 (RSV) ¹I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called,  ²with all lowliness and meekness, with patience, forbearing one another in love,  ³eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 

Once I was having a heated conversation with a man who seemed to me to be rude and disrespectful. I lost my cool. I bark a little and growled a little more. His comment was something like, “What you just said to me is not worthy of a man who holds the position you do?” Naturally, I took his words to heart and repeated them in my mind for about a week. I would especially ruminate on the notion of something being worthy of a minister. Paul’s admonition haunted me; “I beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”

If we knew nothing of the “calling” Paul speaks of we could surmise that it corresponds to the qualities of lowliness, meekness, patience, forbearance, and peace. If you wrote a poem about Jesus, these might be the words you would use. These qualities are like Jesus.

When I blew my top and answer a rude man rudely, I did not demonstrate a life worthy of my status as a follower to Jesus. How can I claim to follow a man and act in a manner so unlike him? My life just doesn’t correspond to my confession of faith.

’Tis a great confidence in a friend to tell him your faults; greater to tell him his.

Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790)

A person’s defect may also serve as a source of strength for the total personality, just as metallurgists deliberately build defects into their crystals to improve their strength. (Indeed, by sticking defects into perfect crystals, solid-state physics has given us the semiconductor, which revolutionized modern technology.)

Sydney J. Harris (1917–1986)

Forgiveness is a funny thing—it warms the heart and cools the sting.

William Arthur Ward (1812–1882)

Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it is a permanent attitude.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968)

I have seen gross intolerance shown in support of tolerance.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)

Because Christ Jesus came to the world clothed in humility, he will always be found among those who are clothed with humility. He will be found among the humble people.

A. W. Tozer (1897–1963)