What Is the Church? And Why I Love It!

 

What is the Church?

Perhaps there is no better time in history since Acts 2 to ask the question, “What is the Church?”  We live in a time when church attendance is in sharp decline all around the United States. Technology has made it easier to just stay home and watch a service and convince yourself that it is church. So often when we assess the health of a church we think of buildings, bodies, and budgets. We live in a culture that has become increasingly individualistic and consumer driven, and the church is not untouched by such thinking. Americans are not known for our communal habits. Because of all these factors and more, we develop some kind of idealistic view and somewhat individualistic view of the church, which ultimately renders this powerful idea powerless. The church is God’s idea. It is His idea to build His church, to love His church, and to use His church to accomplish His divine plan on earth as it is in heaven. The church is more important than most of us are aware. The church is not God’s plan B for this world, but His plan A.

The Greek word for “church” is ekklesia and means “called out assembly or gathering”. It was used of a public gathering of people for a specific reason. Synagogues would be considered an ekklesia, as well as a number of other gatherings. So what is so unique about the Christian ekklesia? To answer that question, I would like to address what Jesus said about the church, how it is described in the book of Acts, and Paul’s many teachings about it.

Jesus on the Church - Matt. 16:13-20

 

In this passage, Jesus asks His disciples a question. “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”  Jesus wanted them to articulate how others identify Him. They give Jesus answers such as “John the Baptist”, “Elijah”, or even one of the former prophets. All of these answers reveal that others identify Jesus as someone special, but none of them were accurate. Then Jesus asks an even more important question to His disciples. “Who do YOU say that I am?” It is the question of all questions, and one that every person will have to wrestle with and answer for in their life. Peter is the first to speak and his answer is super important to understanding what Jesus says after his response. Peter said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” For Peter to say this, it meant that Peter believed that Jesus was the one God promised would come to deliver His people and save them. This was no small matter. Peter was confessing not only his belief, but no doubt his allegiance as well. Jesus responds to Peter affirming that it was His Father who revealed this to him. Then Jesus says, “I tell you, you are Peter (petros), and upon this rock (petra) I will build my church.” This is a critical sentence for understanding the church. Is Jesus telling Peter that the church would be built upon him? That is certainly a very common interpretation held by the largest Christian denomination in the world… the Roman Catholic Church. The implications of this interpretation form the belief that Peter functioned as the first Pope and what is said after this would give Peter a great deal of spiritual authority. This seems unlikely to be the case for several reasons. First, Peter never really acted in this kind of position. In fact, in Acts 15, where Peter was present, the man who made the final decision on the matter at hand was James, the brother of Jesus, not Peter. If Peter was functionally the pope and he was a participant in that meeting, it would seem odd for him not to make the final decision. Also, we have recorded that Paul rebuked Peter for his double standard in treatment of the gentiles when prominent Jews were present. Again, it would seem odd for this to happen if Peter was functionally a “pope” and had the authority the Roman Catholic Church ascribes to the pope. A second way this could be interpreted is that Jesus is calling Himself the petra and the church was being build on Him. While this could be the case, especially since Jesus is described as the chief cornerstone of the church, I think there is a better explanation for what Jesus means. This statement has a context. That context is Peter’s confession that Jesus is the Christ, and it is upon his confession that Jesus will build His church. In other words, the church is built by individuals confessing that Jesus is the Christ starting with Peter. The reason this interpretation makes the most sense to me is that this is how we see things play out in the book of Acts. People repented of their sins and confessed Jesus as the Christ and the Lord added to their number daily those being saved (Acts 2:38-41, Acts 2:47, Acts 6:7). So I believe that the church is built on the confessions of individuals that Jesus is the Christ.

The Church’s Very Beginning - Acts 2:42-47

 

Jesus was ascending into heaven in the first chapter of Acts, but not without telling his disciples to sit tight in Jerusalem and wait for the Holy Spirit to come. So they sat tight, and in chapter two, while they are gathered together, the Holy Spirit came, Peter preaches and people repent and believe… about 3000 people were added to their number. Immediately after that the book of Acts describes what these believers did. The devoted themselves to the Apostle teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to the prayers. They took care of each other and continued to share the message of the Gospel. However, nowhere in chapter two is the word ekklesia mentioned, and yet the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. It is not until chapter five that we see the word ekklesia being used… “fear came upon the whole church”. What is critical to understand here is that the Holy Spirit’s presence and power make the Christian church unique. It is a community of people who possess the indwelling spirit. It is not just a simple gathering. We will see this even more clearly as we look more closely into the Apostle Paul’s teaching on the church.

Paul’s Teaching on the Church

 

Acts describes what the church did, but we have more of a theological understanding of the church through the Apostle Paul. There are several key passages that we will deal with and make some conclusions.

Eph. 2:19-22… In this passage, Paul describes the church as the household of God. It is a family and made up of the “saints”, which is every believer or “set apart ones”. We see that the church is built upon the prophets and apostles. The prophets foretold the coming of the Messiah and the apostles proclaimed the Messiah had come. Of course that Messiah is Jesus Christ, whom Paul says is the chief cornerstone. The church is described as a holy temple, meaning the place where God dwells. The manifestation of the presence of God is intimately tied to this gathering of God’s people. The church (God’s people under the New Covenant) is the temple of God, not a building. This temple is being built by the Spirit. So the Christian Church is a supernaturally unique gathering of people.

Eph. 4:11-16… To the church, God gave apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers. What was the purpose of these teachers/preachers? They were to equip the saints for two purposes. First, they were to equip the church for the work of the ministry. God has designed His church to accomplish His plans for this world. There is work to be done by His people. Leadership in the church is to equip the saints for that work. Second, the church is to be equipped to build each other up in Christ. The goal is to attain unity of the faith, unity of the knowledge of God, and to maturity in Christ. Paul uses a rather familiar idea to describe the church here and many other places… a body. This body has many members but the head of this body is Christ. However, the emphasis is that the church is designed to help each other grow in the faith.

1 Cor. 12:4-31… This is perhaps Paul’s most extensive teaching on the church. He starts emphasizing the intimate connection that the Holy Spirit has with the church. Each one is given the manifestation of the Holy Spirit for the common good. The Spirit of God gifts each believer as He determines to carry out a vital role in the health of the body. These gifts are not only given by the Holy Spirit, but empowered by Him as well. Once again, Paul describes the church as a body. He uses this illustration to drive home the point that each part of the body is equally valuable and intimately connected to the rest of it. There is no room for pride nor jealousy when it comes to the functions of the different gifts given to people. They all have value. The body is so intimately connected by the One Spirit that when one part suffers the whole suffers with it or if one part rejoices, the whole rejoices with it. One very important aspect of the church that cannot be ignored is implied in this passage. Though the church has a universal sense, meaning every follower of Jesus is part of the church, it is only meaningful in a context where there is a local expression. First Baptist Church of Lowell is a local church and is a local expression of the universal church. 1 Cor. 12 (written to the local church at Corinth) only makes sense in a local expression.

Eph. 5:25-32; 2 Cor. 11:2; Rev. 21:2,9… We find in these passages the fact that the church is described as the Bride of Christ. This illustrates the love that Christ has for the church and His desire to see her grow to become spotless. He leads His Bride and loves His Bride. Jesus loves the church more than we could ever love it. The church matters to Jesus greatly. Even it its messiness and brokenness, Jesus loves and cares for His church, and so should we.

Various Other Teaching from Paul… We find in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 that the church has two offices. Those are the office of elders and deacons. It has structure to it. In 1 Cor. 11, we find that the church gathered to observe the Lord’s Table. In 1 Cor. 14, we find that God designed His church to be orderly and not chaos.

This all brings me to conclude with a definition I would like to offer for this unique gathering of Holy Spirit in-dwelt followers of Jesus. Here it is:

Definition of the Christian Church: It is an assembly of believers, with Christ as its Head, called by God through an individual’s profession of faith in Jesus as the promised Messiah, unified by the power of the Holy Spirit for the purpose of building each other up in the unity of faith and knowledge of Jesus Christ to make know to the world the manifold wisdom of God through the Gospel.

The church matters to God and it has not ceased to matter. In turn, the church should matter greatly to each one of us because it is not a human construct but something God built and continues to build. Hebrews 10:24-25 tells us to “consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day approaching.”

Let us be the church and love the church, as messy as it can be at times.