“Therefore I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to walk worthy of the calling you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.” (vv. 1-3)

Worthy.

We might get this one wrong in the church.

When the Word instructs us to “walk worthy of our calling,” we likely default to a kind of generalized worthiness. We translate “worthy” to mean “as morally perfect as possible.” So we turn the walk into a personalized pursuit of purity.

But what was Paul (inspired) actually leading us toward?

Unity.

Love.

Humility and gentleness and grace.

He was led to lead us toward all these things—specifically in the church, as the church. Why? Because it’s a testimony to Christ, who rescued us from the darkness and called us into His light, together.

If we miss the fact that our willing humility is a witness to Him, we’ll fall short of this calling’s worthiness. But if we genuinely love one another, genuinely serve alongside one another, genuinely forgive one another, genuinely honor one another, and genuinely submit one to the other, we’ll resemble Christ—and we’ll look like the people He genuinely saved.

“Worthy” is a specific kind of witness.

Let’s work it out and walk it out, together.

— Tyler