Have you ever noticed how busybodies and gossips never gossip good things?  “I just want to come and gossip about this person and just talk about how great of a blessing they are to the church.  It’s so good to see their growth and many of these things that are being cast off of them, the weights and sins that used to get them and duh, duh, duh, duh.”  Just knock yourself out gossiping about that.  How much time do you spend building people up rather than tearing them down?  I’m talking about in the body, as we refer to one another, as we seek these different things.  “Well, it usually just kind of depends on what’s in it for me, basically.  Because, you see, if it’s a time when I need for everybody to appreciate my greatness and my wisdom and my knowledge—see, I know everything.  Whenever we’re in a conversation, I am the expert—brain surgery, rocket science, sports, finance.”  My, how we love ourselves and think of ourselves.  The question we should be asking is, are we loving one another as Christ loves us?

Brothers just talking together about a given subject, whatever it might be, and the person might misspeak.  It wasn’t to deceive or mislead people, it was just a missed fact on it or something, and we have to set them straight, that compulsion.  “No, it wasn’t ninety-nine; it was ninety-eight.”  Why do you have that compulsion?  Why can’t you let it go?  Did it hurt anybody?  That wasn’t the point they were trying to make anyway.  As we go deeper into this, let it become weighty, that if we bite and devour, we will be consumed, the Scripture says.  Do you know what?  It’s the last days.  We’re not going to have a lot of time to get this thing right.  Do you want to know the habit that that’s become among us?  You think losing those few extra pounds is tough.  You think foregoing that new house or that new furniture is tough, try denying yourself in this when it’s been such a big part of your life.  That’s why you need somebody to say it every time you do it, so that you can begin to be aware of it and hate it; amen?  Be able to love with the same love wherewith Jesus has loved us.

Look back over at Ephesians, and in this Ephesians passage, Chapter 4, we’ve seen the beginning of this chapter talking about unity, the fact that we’re one body, and we have one Lord and one faith, that He’s given spiritual gifts into our midst to perfect us for the work of the ministry.  He put gifts here in our midst, listen, to make sure that the body is edifying one another; amen?  That’s part of what we’re here for.  Because if we don’t, we’re not going to stand.  It’s impossible.  Go back to Galatians.  Let me just show you a couple of the other words there in Galatians that are so important.  Chapter 5 again.  You see that word, verse 20, that word “variance”?  It just means divisions.  Now, I know this statement pertains to leadership and to teachers, et cetera.  But the point I want to make is this.  The moment we’re involved anywhere in division, wherever there’s division, “this group is special.”  As it pertains to us, the body, “this group is more spiritual, this group knows more of the Word.”  When it came to leaders, the Holy Spirit brought great reproof on that (didn’t He?) when He said to be there and say that I’m of Paul, I’m of Apollos, I’m of Cephas.  He said, “All you’re doing is showing your adolescence.”  There is no division in maturity, in love, in Christlikeness.