JesusWalk Bible Study Forum: Q2. Essential Attitudes for Unity - JesusWalk Bible Study Forum

Q2. (Ephesians 4:2) What characteristics or attitudes are necessary for maintaining unity with other Christians according to verse 2? Which of these do you think is most important? Which is most difficult? Exposition

We are to walk in humbleness, gentleness, patience and forbearance. I feel if we are truly humble we will acknowledge God as our source the gentleness and patience and forbearance will come naturally. We will be patient with others who may not be as far along in their walk with the Lord as we are as we remember how far He has taken us and how far we are from our ultimate goal. We will be gentle with others as we remember how gentle Godis with us. We will be forbearing of what we consider their faults as he does the same for us. I believe humility is the hardest attitude to consistently walk in as self wants its due and we must constantly remember who our source is.

We are to be humble and gentle and patient bearing with one another in Love.
I believe the most important is Love for it is best describes in 1corinthians 13 4-8. All of the above mentioned attributes are demonstrated in Love. When one loves someone they place all their needs before their own needs. If we love God than through the help of his HOly Spirit we must strieve to have that Agape love for our brother/sisters. Humility is probably the hardest we must start realizing that our source for everything is God and there is only one Super -Star in our churches today , and his name is Jesus Christ , King of KIngs and Lord of Lords , Brothers and Sister without Christ we are nothing.
May we always show love as our Lord Jesus did .

The characteristics/attitudes necessary for maintaining unity with other christians are: humility, gentleness, patience, forbearance and love. I believe love is the most difficult. The reason for this is that we do not fully understand the kind of love God want us to have for each others. This love (agape) makes you love in spite of; not built on emotions. If you have agape love, humility, gentle, patience and forbearance will be manifested daily in our lives. God said IF you love me you will obey me.

[/QUOTE]Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.

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[COLOR=blue] Wow, put a bunch of people together in a setting where there is a hierarchy and you may have a problem here. I am thinking of a Church, perhaps a Church meeting to discuss changing or remodeling or repairing the building. My church just did that. There was one older person who was dead set against new carpet, although it was 25 years old and needed replaced. We had to try to get this person's opinion in other things because the Congregation voted for the new carpet. All attempted to help this person accept the changes, such as the changes in the pews that were to be made. This person was against this too, but this also had to be done to enlarge the stage area. In the end I think we were able to help this person to accept the changes and the remodeled building is beautiful. No one forced anything on this person. We acted to try to get this person's input in as many of the areas as we could for the remodeling as it was extensive.
Now we could have said to this person, the Board and Congregation has voted for this and this is the way it is going to be. But that would have been wrong and not the Christian way to go about it. No one wanted to hurt this person who is elderly and was instrumental in the previous remodeling project 25 years ago.
What is the most important? That is easy, love.
I think that the more a person has given their will to Jesus, the better they are able to follow verse 4:2 And the great thing about giving your will to Jesus is the peace He gives back.

"Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love." (4:2)


I find the most important part of anything Jesus did was out of Love. Our ideas of Love are somewhat similiar, yet different. These days I see more and more people who give in and say it is because they Love them. Well spare the rod and spoil the child. Even God will Discipline His children out of Love. In the worldly sense... the congregation; that is the people who gather together every Sunday seem to choose to ignore the Disciplinary part of Love. They forget that Jesus Rebuked when necessary... they forget that Jesus turned over tables... forget He told a woman to be still. He was always straight forward with His words. It could be offensive, debateable, challenging, and even somewhat Rebellious sounding. But every time He spoke, He spoke Truth and it was because He loved and still loves us so much that He chooses to tell the Truth. And at times the Truth causes us to squirm a bit.

I believe it takes the power of God to keep anyone Humble... and patient... and forebearing. I used to think I could do this without any problems... I am used to this part... but have found it has taken the Strength of God to keep me in the way of being Humble; able to forebear... and on occasion I have been known to lose Patience.

We can never follow any particular person who we may think is Sooooooo christianly... because you will find they are of the Flesh every time. We can however follow the Example Jesus led.

(Ephesians 4:2) What characteristics or attitudes are necessary for maintaining unity with other Christians according to verse 2?

Lowliness, meekness, longsuffering, and love.

Which of these do you think is most important?

Love.

Which is most difficult?

Again .. Love. It requires a great deal of attitude and work to love another.

Love is the most important attribute the Lord gives us, therefore, this should be our attitude toward the church and family. This is difficult and probably impossible without the Spirit living within us. We just don't have the capacity to love as our Lord loves without His assistance.

What do we need to walk in unity? The fruit of the Spirit! "For the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as they self.; But if ye bit and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another; This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the **** of the flesh." GAL.5:14,15,16. Being able to maintain unity is impossible while walking and living in the flesh; for our flesh want's it's own way...is selfish, and self-serving. Only through Christ, and trip's made often to the cross, are we able to keep this flesh under control, and walk in the Spirit, and be as "one"! "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith meekness, temperance; against such there is no law" Which of these do I feel are more important? If I'm to be honest, I feel they all are important, but if I had to pick one, it would be love. Not the "love" that the world offers, but the love only Christ can offer! The most difficult? That would be humility (meekness!) I think our pride gets in the way many times, and cause's us much grief. For how can we think of unity, if we're so concerned about "ME"!?

Patience, humility, gentleness, tolerance...and most especially love.

Isn't it interesting that most people will admit these are virtues, but most also would admit that isn't how to get ahead in the world? Ah, sigh, we are often "taught" to win at all costs.

Jesus taught us a better way. I find humility the hardest. Love is the most important.

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2a.) They key is the Agape love that Jesus showed us, that sacrificial love. All of the other charateristics such as humbleness, patience, gentleness and forebearance will follow naturally.
2b.)  Which of these do you think is most important?
2b.) I guess I answered this one above, love.
2c.)  Which is most difficult?
2c.) Love. "[color="purple"]This is my command: Love each other[/color]." John 15:17

What characteristics or attitudes are necessary for maintaining unity with other Christians according to verse 2? Which is the most important and which the most difficult?
Humility and gentleness, patience and tolerance, all wrapped up in loving acceptance of each other are the requirements for Christian unity. Loving acceptance of each other is the most important, I think. And for me, the most difficult is patience especially 'bearing up under provocation'!

Our characteristics should be Christ like.We should show people love and be humble,forgiving.I think the most important is love.You have to love before you can act on any circumstance in a persons life.To me the hardest is to forgive.You have to forgive and forget.I am sure a lot of character goes along with that as well as any thing else.I have to pray for a lot of help from Jesus.

Humility, Gentleness, and Patience, I find Patience is the most difficult for me, and Love the most important.

Q2. The characteristics necessary for maintaining unity are humbleness, gentleness, patience and forbearance with LOVE.
I haven't read the other posts, but I suspect love got many votes for the most important. Christ-like love generates humbleness, gentleness and patience. For me, the most difficult probably is patience. I wish I could post my reasons, but the answer would be longer than a chapter in a book and that's not what the Vision of the Church Study is about. Let us all join together in unity and pray Ephesians 4:2 for each other. lmc

Pastor Ralph, on May 15 2003, 05:18 PM, said:

The characteriscics or attitudes necessary for maintaining unity with other Christians are listed in Ephesians 4:2 - "Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love." However, do these characteristics refer to living a life worthy of our calling in verse 1 or do they refer to keeping the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace in verse 3 or both? I believe this list refers to both verses prior and next. Personally I think the most important is love (agape in our verse), because out of love the other virtues of humility, gentleness, patience, and forebearance can grow. However, I do think it is interesting that humble and gentle are listed first before patience and forebearance and love. Is order important in verse 2 or is it just arbitrary? The most dificult for me is humility which says I defer to God out of submissive respect to His authority in my life. Everybody always says I am the pilot and God is the co-pilot, but that is not what I want I want the reverse.

Humble -
1. Marked by meekness or modesty in behavior, attitude, or spirit; not arrogant or prideful.
2. Showing deferential or submissive respect.
3. Low in rank, quality, or station; unpretentious or lowly.
(from Latin humilis, low, lowly, from humus, ground)

The characteristics or attitudes for maintaining unity with other christians are humbleness, gentleness, patience, longsuffering, forbearance and [color="red"]LOVE[/color]

The most importnt is [color="red"]LOVE[/color]. Love will bring about the others.

The most difficult is [color="red"]LOVE[/color]. Without it all the characteristics would not be easily to obtain and maintained. Secondary, still with in the guidesline of love is longsuffering. "Faith worketh by [color="red"]LOVE![/color]

The characteristics or attitudes needed to maintain unity among Christians are
humility
gentleness
patience
forbearance
love

I think the most important one is humility. As believers we need to have a humble spirit and not think we are better or more superior to others.
I believe the most difficult is love. It is hard to show love to those who are different from us or who don't exactly believe how we believe.

2. (Ephesians 4:2) What characteristics or attitudes are necessary for maintaining unity with other Christians according to verse 2?

By being humble, gentle and patient with one another. Bearing with one another in love. Sounds like the fruit of the spirit to me (Galatians 5:22) and so it is!

Which of these do you think is most important?

That’s a hard choice. If in deed it were possible to exercise one without the other. I think it would have to be Love. After all, it covers a multitude of sins(1 Peter 4:8) Aware of my own weaknesses, if I continue to love, in all circumstances, there is nothing that can come between the fellowship of believers.

Which is most difficult?

The fruit of the spirit was never put in place because it would be easy to put them into practice. On the other hand, remember they are the fruit of the spirit, NOT of man. That means to me, the greater freedom the spirit of God has within me the greater will be the evidence through the fruit being exercised in my life. As Paul says, but the greatest of these is Love. Of course I don’t think he said it would also be the most difficult fruit to exercise at times!

Q2. (Ephesians 4:2) What characteristics or attitudes are necessary for maintaining unity with other Christians according to verse 2?

These are:
Humility
Gentileness
Patience
Forebearance
Love


Which of these do you think is most important? Which is most difficult?

Love is the most important and is the most difficult, because greater love has no man than this that he died for his friends.