There is a passage in the Scriptures that, I believe, describes most of what God has called us to be and to do. It’s Ephesians 4:11-13. In a word, it’s about getting equipped to minister in such a way that we become mature.

My desire is that congregations—including my congregation here in Jerusalem, King of Kings Assembly—will take a giant stride forward in becoming local bodies where “every member is a minister and every saint is a servant.” But more than that—more than ministry for the sake of ministry—there will be ministry for the sake of maturity.

Let’s read this all-important passage from God’s Word, Ephesians 4:11-13:

¹¹ And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, ¹² for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of [Messiah], ¹³ till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of [Messiah].

In another Bible version, the phrase “to a perfect man” is translated “and become mature.” While most of us are not excited about getting old, all of us want to be mature. There’s probably nothing more upsetting than having someone come up to you and say, “You are the most childish person I’ve ever met!” Ouch! That hurts.

A pastor asked a boy in his congregation, “How old are you?” The boy answered quickly, “I’m 12, going on 13, and soon I’ll be 14.” Each of us wants to be mature. And if we’re parents, we want our kids eventually to grow up. We don’t want to have to change any more diapers, or dress our kids, or—for sure—pick up dirty clothes off the floor of our teenager’s room.

But did you know that maturity is not just something important for you and for me as individuals? It’s also important for congregations to become mature together. I want you to note the fact that Paul uses the word “saints” here in Ephesians 4. Did you know that the word “saint” is not found anywhere in the Bible? We find references only to the plural, not singular, form of this word. Yes, we may be born alone, but as soon as we leave the womb of the Spirit, we become part of the family of God. We become a member of the body of Messiah. We are not merely individuals, but part of a larger whole.

Now in Catholicism a saint is usually an outstanding monk or nun. In Protestant churches the emphasis is also on the individual and on one’s personal relationship with God. But the Bible puts a lot more emphasis on the group, the corporate body, the congregation. But you might say that perhaps this is the case in the Old Testament, where the focus is on the nation of Israel as a people, but the New Testament is different. No, it’s not.

Practically all the epistles in the New Testament are written to whole congregations. And even in the letters written individually to Timothy, practically all of the advice that Paul gives this young pastor is aimed at helping him to lead his congregation toward greater maturity and more effective ministry. He deals with such congregational matters as corporate prayer and worship, appointing elders and deacons, entrusting ministry responsibility to others, proper handling of the Scriptures in preparation for preaching, public reading of Scripture and teaching, keeping away false teachers, and ministering to family members in the congregation. Yes, there’s some personal exhortation to Timothy personally, but Paul’s ultimate concern is for the health and maturity of the whole body.

So when we talk about spiritual maturity, it’s not only important that you grow up. It’s even more important that your congregation grows up along with you.

So don’t merely think about how you are going to go up another step on the ladder, or about what you are going to accomplish. Think about your congregation. Think about how all members of the congregation together can become better equipped to minister for the sake of maturity.

Obviously, before you plan to accomplish anything, you need to set your target—you need to know what your ultimate goal is. Then what you do is work backward, looking at the things that need to be put in place to reach that goal. Well, that’s what we’re going to do here. We’re going to define our goal and then work backward to map out the things we need to do to get to our destination.

Looking at Ephesians 4:11-13, we need to start at verse 13 and then work our way back to verse.11. You see, it’s in verse 13 where we find the goal for the congregation.

1. Our goal is to become “mature,” or “a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of [Messiah].”

Here’s the goal for the saints of God together as a congregation. Paul says in verse 13 that the goal is to become “mature,” or “a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of [Messiah].”

Now we have already emphasized the importance of maturity. But we haven’t yet defined this goal. What is the definition of maturity? When a congregation becomes mature, what does it look like? The answer is: It looks like the Messiah.

Earlier in the book of Ephesians Paul wrote in 1:22-23, ²² “And He put all things under [Messiah’s] feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, ²³ which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.” When a congregation, when the body of Messiah, is fully mature, it has the “fullness of Him who fills all in all.” When a congregation becomes mature, it will be filled with the presence of the Messiah — it will have His character, even His fragrance.

The only way the Messiah can fill us in every way is if we decrease, and He increases. As long as we are filled up with what we are doing, with our plans and programs, and are doing things for our glory, then we can’t be filled with the Messiah. In other words, as long as we’re filled with ourselves, we can’t be filled with Him.

Let’s look at the various levels of maturity. There are four: The first level is the “give me” stage. I am familiar with this one. My wife Ann and I have four boys, who were once little children. When they were small, we heard them say, “Give me, give me.” I remember coming home from a trip and the first words I heard were not, “Daddy, I missed you.” Instead, I heard, “Daddy, what did you buy me?” Congregations can be like that. Immature believers sit there in the service and say, “OK, pastor. I came all this way tonight to the service. I could have been home, watching a great movie. Your sermon better be good tonight. Give me something good.” Now I don’t think that my congregation is a “give me” congregation like that, but many congregations are made up of such people.

The next level of maturity is the “help me” stage. When a child is a little older, instead of always saying, “Give me,” he’s saying, “Help me”—for example, “Help me with my math homework.” They don’t say, “Mommy, do my homework for me (at least not usually). They usually say, “Help me.” Congregations are getting past the toddler stage when the people say, “I know I can’t just sit here and get spoon-fed all the time. I want to get involved and help somewhere, but I don’t know where—I’m not even sure where I’m gifted or if I’m gifted. Help me find my place.”

Then there’s a third level of maturity. It’s the “test me” stage. When a child becomes a teenager, not only does he want to learn, but he also wants to try out what he’s learned outside the classroom. He likes music, so he gets a part-time job working in a music store. Another teenager likes working with computers, so he works part-time servicing computers. As each one uses what he has learned in the real world, he tests his skills in the laboratory of life. A congregation that is going through adolesence has people who are saying, “Test me. Give me a little job and I’ll see how it works out. But give me some tools. Give me some training.”

And then we have the fourth level of maturity. It’s the “use me” stage. The mature man knows who he is, how he’s wired, where he’s going. He knows he can’t be a professional student the rest of his life. He’s got to go out and contribute something to society. So a fully mature congregation should look like this: It’s past the “give me,” “help me,” and “test me” stages; now everyone is ready to say, “Use me.” Every member wants to be a minister, and every saint wants to be a servant. Why? Not for their own sake, but the for the sake of the Messiah—for the sake of bringing the whole body to maturity, where together we are filled with the fullness of the Messiah.

I remember growing up as a child. As just a small boy, I got to meet such people as Loren Cunningham, David Wilkerson, Nicky Cruz, George Beverly Shea, and Tommy Barnett. Many of these people slept in our home. I looked up to them. I thought to myself, “I want to grow up and be like them.” Why? Because they were mature men being used by God in mighty ways.

I trust that my congregation is on the way to becoming mature. Parts of the congregation are already mature. And a large segment is not content with just being fed and helped. They’ve been tested and now they’re being used by God in wonderful ways.

Now there may be some of you who have already turned down the volume on this message and said to yourself, “Well, he’s not talking to me. He’s talking about other people. He’s talking about immature people. That’s not me.” This reminds me of the little boy who came to his mother one day and said, “Mother, guess what! I’m 8 feet 4 inches tall!” His mother, in great surprise, inquired into the matter and found that her son was using a 6-inch ruler; he was actually 4 feet 2 inches. Our measurement of maturity is not our neighbor. It’s the Messiah. Now how do you measure up on a scale from one to 10?

If you’re looking for the definition of maturity, check out another dictionary, one that contains only the words “maturity: a noun” and then a a full-color picture of the Messiah.

In Mark 10 we see grown men acting like little children, fighting over who will sit on the right and the left of the Messiah in glory. Yeshua, the epitomy of the mature man, replied, ⁴³ “‘…Whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. ⁴⁴ And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. ⁴⁵ For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.’ ”

If we want to be mature, we’ve got to become like the Messiah, who did not come to get but to give, who did not come to be served but to serve. Until we arrive at the place where we fulfill the motto, “Every member is a minister and every saint is a servant,” we have not arrived at maturity.

I trust that we are all being led one step further toward maturity, where we become more like the ministering Messiah, where we become as Ephesians 1:22,23 says we should be: “the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.”

Now you can’t make yourself grow. I tried to be 6 feet 4 inches and it didn’t work. No, God makes things grow. But you know something, there are things we can do to cooperate with God to create a healthy environment for growth. If I hadn’t eaten as a child, I’d be a lot smaller than I am today.

2. Our environment for growth is unity concerning our knowledge of the Son.

What can we do to bring about maturity? Well, let’s go backward in our text. Immediately before he mentions in verse 13 of our text the goal of becoming “ a perfect man,” or mature, attaining to “the measure of the stature of the fullness of [Messiah],” Paul mentions a condition that will help bring maturity. The proper environment for growth is when “we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God.”

So in order for a congregation to grow to maturity, it needs a healthy environment for growth; it needs unity in the essentials, that is, unity concerning the Son of God and who He is. For a congregation to reach maturity, its head must be Yeshua, its heart must beYeshua, and its harmony must be Yeshua.

How many of you know that when there is harmony in the home a child more readily tends to grow up to become a well-rounded, mature man? When mom and dad love each other, and express that love around the child, the child feels more secure. And when you feel secure, you tend to have a greater willingness to progress and move into new frontiers. When parents constantly fight or get divorced, often their children become insecure and too frightened to grow up.

But when there’s harmony in the home, the idea of growing up and becoming like mom and dad is something to which a child looks forward and for which he strives. For the child who grows up in a harmonious home, maturity becomes a natural desire and goal in life.

I thank the Lord for the incredible unity that my congregation, King of Kings Assembly, has enjoyed over the years. We’ve never even come close to having a split or division. Even the two Hebrew congregations that were started by members of King of Kings did not leave over disagreements. They left with our blessing and backing. Seeing new congregations planted has always been our desire.

Why have we had such unity over the years? I believe it’s mainly because our unity has not been built around certain personalities, around certain leaders. If that were the case, then we would have split apart long ago, because some of our main leaders have moved on to other places. It has not been built around certain common denominators, such as having a similar racial background, or sharing a common socioeconomic strata or a common language. In fact, I don’t know of any congregation that has more differences than we do in every one of these areas. Just check out the different races, tongues, levels of income and position—I mean we’ve got people making $40,000 a year in the diplomatic corps and others barely living from day to day as a volunteer.

So what’s our unity built around? It’s built around Yeshua and our knowledge of who He is through His Word. It’s built around the fact that we’re constantly in the Word—the Word for us is the staple of our diet and not just some low-calorie dessert. Through preaching on Sundays, or studying together in a LIFE cell, we are a unified congregation because we put a premium on God’s Word and put Yeshua at the center of our study and our worship.

In the world today there are leaders who are trying to grow their congregations by attracting people to their programs. Some try to compete with other congregations by putting on a more spectacular show. Others try to grow by being up-to-date and relevant; they are so user-friendly in their approach that everything they do is designed to make people feel comfortable and not scare them away. There are even Messianic congregations that sometimes put more emphasis on traditions and rabbinical interpretations and Jewishness than on Yeshua.

Now all of the things I just mentioned are done with good intentions, in the name of attracting people and making congregations grow. But I want to tell you that true growth is not getting more people to attend your congregation. True growth is qualitative, rather than quantitative. True growth is growth in maturity.

I like what one pastor said, “Man can build a crowd, but only Jesus Christ can build a church.” And the only way for a congregation to grow in maturity is to have a spirit of unity built upon a common knowledge of the Son of God, Yeshua HaMashiach. When we agree that Yeshua is Lord and Saviour, and that He is the head and the heart of our congregation, then He also becomes the harmony of our congregation.

I like what it says in Psalm 133. In verse 1 we read, “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!” And then verse 3 says, “It is like the dew of Hermon, descending upon the mountains of Zion….” I remember when I first moved to Israel and saw how green things were in spite of the fact that we get no rain for seven months of the year. I found out that it isn’t just Israel’s sophisticated drip-irrigation system that makes things grow. Some of these plants and trees don’t have any irrigation at all. The key to their growth is the dew of the morning. When brothers dwell together in unity, it’s like the dew of Hermon falling on the mountains of Zion.

Unity or harmony brings fertility and growth. Unity is the environment a congregation needs to have growth in maturity, as Paul teaches us in Ephesians 4.

3. Leaders prepare people for ministry by equipping them for growth in maturity.

Now continuing our journey backward from our goal to the various factors that lead us to achieve our goal, let’s return to the first two verses of our text, verses 11 and 12: ¹¹ “And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, ¹² for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of [Messiah].”

So this brings me to the last, but not the least, of my points here. In fact, it’s the point from which I got the title for this message—ministry for the sake of maturity. In order for this congregation and others to achieve greater growth in maturity, we need more ministry and more ministers.

It’s not enough to be unified. I know congregations where everybody agrees 100 percent with a detailed doctrinal statement—including the fact that Yeshua is Lord and Savior and God Himself—and yet they’re as dead as they come. It’s called dead orthodoxy. Somebody said that this is the fastest way to get to heaven, because, as Paul said, the dead in Christ will rise first. But I don’t think Paul had this group of people in mind!

No, for a congregation to grow in maturity, it needs more than unity in doctrine; it also needs ministry in the Spirit. To become mature, a congregation needs more than a professional preacher to spoon-feed the milk and meat of God’s Word. It requires a whole ministry team and a great priesthood of believers who see their primary calling in life as serving the Lord by building His body.

Up until about 25 years ago, the idea was quite prevalent that ministry was the job of the pastor. The pastor was the man for all seasons. His job was to marry and bury, baptize and evangelize, as well as preach the Word, counsel the discouraged, and be the chief executive officer of the whole business.

But is that the job description of our spiritual leaders? Paul says that the Lord Himself gave these leaders for another purpose. Let’s read again verses 11 and 12:

¹¹ And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of [Messiah].

In a growing, maturing congregation “every member should be a minister and every saint a servant.” Did you know that you’re ordained by God for the ministry? Earlier in Ephesians, we read in 2:10, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” You were ordained from before the the foundation of the world to the ministry. You were created not merely to watch other people do the work; you were created to do the good works.

If everyone is a minister, then what kind of ministry are you supposed to be doing? Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:17-20:

¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. ¹⁸ Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, ¹⁹ that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. ²⁰ Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us….

Let’s look again at verse 18: “Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.” Every person who is a new creation—that is, every born-again believer—has the ministry of reconciliation. Your job, like my job, is to show people how to be reconciled to God. Yes, it’s the ministry of evangelism, but it’s more than evangelism; helping people to become reconciled to God means helping them to draw closer and closer to God. Salvation is worked out. It is a process. When a person is born again, they’re on the right path, but they haven’t arrived yet. So your job as a minister of reconciliation involves more than evangelism; it involves discipleship.

In your ordination to ministry the Lord gives you a great commission. Yeshua said in Matthew 28:19,20: ¹⁹ “‘Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you….’ ” Again, your ministry goes beyond evangelism; it concerns making disciples by “teaching them to observe all things” that Yeshua has commanded us. It’s not only about catching fish; we’ve got to keep the fish too.

How many of you know that there are more fish out in the sea to catch and clean than the apostles, prophets, evangelists, and teaching pastors can handle by themselves? We need a wider net; as long as we leave the ministry to the professionals, congregations will never grow. As long as a congregation is filled with people who want to sit and soak and never serve, the congregation will never increase in numbers, let alone in maturity.

My heart grieves over the number of people I’ve known in this land who have accepted the Lord, but have fallen away. Or is it more true to say—fallen through the cracks? Because there are not enough workers, new believers don’t get cared for as they should. If we leave the job of discipling believers to the leaders, the job will never get done. Why? Because the leaders’ main job isn’t to do the ministry. What? That’s right. The leaders’ main job isn’t to do the ministry. The leaders’ main job, according to Ephesians 4:12, is “the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry.”

I like this word “equip.” In the Greek, the word is katartismos, a word that is also used in the New Testament to describe the mending of nets (see Mark 1:19). So as a pastor, what is my job? My most important ministry? It is helping the members of my congregation to keep their fishing nets in catching condition. It is keeping the nets in such good repair that when a fish is caught, it doesn’t get away. It is making sure that the congregational net has no holes. It is making sure that every member is in his special place in the ministry network. It is making sure that there is no break or division between any members of the body, so that the net is not torn. Our job as leaders is making sure that our net is whole, so we are able not only to catch the fish, but keep the fish, and then bring the fish back to God, reconciled and ready to land on heavenly shores.

Somebody said, “Every church has three kinds of members: leaders, laborers, and lookers.” Someone has observed that the church is full of willing people—“some willing to work and others willing to let them.”

Yeshua said in John 14:12, “ ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father.’ ” I want you to note that the Messiah was not speaking only about spiritual leaders — apostles, prophets, evangelists, or teaching pastors. He said that “he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do.”

You might say, “I’d rather let the leaders do the real ministry, and I’ll just encourage them to keep up the good work.” No. You are supposed to do the ministry—not me. That’s right. You are supposed to be doing the ministry, and not just insignificant ministry either. Yeshua said concerning every believer that “the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do.”

Every member has a real ministry. It’s a ministry of reconciliation—everything from bringing a man to the Messiah for the very first time to bringing that man to full maturity in the Messiah.

Did you know that even Yeshua, the most gifted and annointed minister who ever lived, didn’t do it all? He left an awful lot of people unsaved and undiscipled before He left this earth. Was He a failure? No. He was just doing his job. He was equipping others to do the work of ministry—people such as Peter, James, and John, and you and me. He left us His example; He left us His manual; He left us the equipment. And now it’s the job of every believer to find his ministry and do his ministry.

So join in the ministry for maturity. Let’s minister to the world, let’s minister to one another, and let’s do our best to become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Messiah.