#116 Maturity in Christ | John 17 & Eph 4

Way of the Bible

Welcome to Episode #116 of Way of the Bible podcast. This is our fourth of eight episodes in our fifteenth mini-series, It’s All About Jesus. On this episode we’re going to take a look at mature fruit not seen in Jesus’ Parable of the Sower. We get a sense of what this mature fruit looks like from Jesus’ high priestly prayer in John 17 and Paul’s description of the unity of the body in Ephesians 4.

On our last episode we looked at Jesus’ explanation of the Parable of the Sower to his disciples in Luke 8:16-21. In his explanation of the parable Jesus gave his disciples both encouragement and a warning regarding spiritual maturity in Luke 8:18 – “Take care then how you hear, for to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he thinks that he has will be taken away.”

We are going to be in overview mode as look at the passages today from the book of John and the book of Ephesians. I want to encourage you to do your own reading, meditation, study, and discussion of these passages with fellow believers to begin to experience how deep and crystal clear is the call to spiritual maturity for all believers.

The New Testament indicates Jesus’ disciples and apostles were taught by Jesus how to follow him. After the Day of Pentecost these disciples and Apostles were given instructions and guidance by the Holy Spirit to teach others how to replicate following Jesus in new disciples.

The letters and epistles indicate the four soils were present in the first century church. The writers of the letters and epistles provide instructions for how to start where you are and strive daily toward spiritual maturity and pitfalls to avoid that people take wandering off the path. Jesus explained why people wander in his Parable of the Sower and it has to do directly with how they “HEAR” the word of God and what they do in response.

With that as a brief introduction, let’s get into the text.