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Sermon, Sunday August 22, 2021 – The Church as a Community

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Why do people join a church?

Today there is much confusion regarding the church. What is the church, is it a building, is it a community, how many people constitute a church?

The church is the gathering of followers of Jesus, locally and globally. We join for the purpose of worship, encouragement, spiritual growth and serving together towards the Great Commission.  

The church is not a club or a social construct of the Western culture.

In Ephesians 4, the Apostle Paul implores the church in Ephesus to be all that they are called to be.

The root Greek word for the church is “Ekkaléō”, which means to call out. Paul writes in verse 1, “Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called”. The church is a group of people who have been called out of darkness into light. A group of people, set apart for the Lord to serve him, being on mission for Jesus.

The church is the Body of Christ. This image emphasizes that the church is the center and focal point of Christ’s activity now, just as was his physical body during his time on earth (1 Corinthians 12:27).Christ is the head of the Body (Colossians 1:18). As the body of Christ, we are interconnected and we need each other.

Verse 3-6 focus on the unity of the church, Paul writes in verse 3, “being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” And then he continues to list 7 aspects of our unity; one Body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all (Ephesians 4:4-5).

Notice that we don’t create unity, we have unity because of the Holy Spirit. Our role is to preserve the unity. Unity assumes that we are actually committed followers of Jesus, carrying the same vision and the same mission. It is possible for people to be members of a church that are not actually part of the Body of Christ. Many churches have people on their membership roles who do not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ (Matthew 25:31-46).

True church growth is the result of the members of the church being obedient to Christ. Programs don’t grow the church, every member being obedient to the will of God grows the church. The greatest need we have in our communities and world is the church to be the church, in the true sense of the word. We need to return to the principles of the early church in the New Testament.

In our reading today in v11, we see the gifts of ministry that Jesus has given to the church, “

And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers”. Why did Jesus give these gifts to the church? We see the answer in verse 12, “for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ”.   

God’s plan to reach people with the gospel is not primarily evangelists or apologists. God’s plan to reach people with the gospel is the church. You are the plan God has in mind to change the world!

In addition to these five gifts, God has given spiritual gifts to every Christian as we see in 1 Corinthians 12 and Romans 12. The church will be rich when every member is using their spiritual gifts. Tony Merida writes, “Every member should grow up and use a towel, not wear a bib. They should not be immature consumers but eager servants.”

As the body, the church is edified, or built up by the exercising of the gifts, the church grows spiritually. Individuals grow in their walk with the Lord and the church displays evidence of spiritual health. In Ephesians 4 we see 4 evidences of spiritual health in the church.

  1. Christlikeness: Pastors and teachers equip the church members by teaching and explaining the Word of God (2 Timothy 3:16-17). As we grow together in the Word of God, we become more like our Lord and Savior
  2. Stability: The maturing Christian is not tossed about by every religious novelty that comes along. There are many false teachers and if we are not careful, we get caught up in a false way of thinking that does not line up with the Word of God. The maturing believer recognizes false doctrine and stays clear of it. Are your feet secure on the firm foundation of the Word of God?
  3. Truth joined with love: (Ephesians 4:15). It has been said that “truth without love is brutality, but love without truth is hypocrisy.” It is a mark of maturity when we can share the truth with our fellow Christians and do it in love (Proverbs 27:6).
  4. Co-operation: (Ephesians 4:16). We realize that, as members of the one body, we belong to each other, we affect each other, and we need each other. Each believer, no matter how, extroverted, or introverted, rich, or poor, educated, or uneducated, has a ministry to other believers. In the Body of Christ when one person is in pain, we are all affected, that person is not functioning as God intended. Every person has an important role to play within the church. This is why the isolation many suffered during the lockdown has revealed how much we need to be in fellowship as the church. An isolated Christian cannot minister to others, nor can others minister to him or her, and it is impossible for the gifts to be ministered either way. A virtual church is not the church at all.

Are you ready to step into healthy church community? Exercising your God given gifts for the building up of the church. We need you!

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Sermon Sunday August 15, 2021 – The Fellowship of the Church part 1

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Why do you go to church?

There are various reasons why people attend a worship service; tradition, routine, to meet friends or because they are hungry for the truth. There is tremendous richness in the fellowship we enjoy as we worship with other followers of Jesus.

In the Apostle John’s first letter he begins with the foundation of the church. In chapter 1, there are three keys to a healthy church community.

John begins with, “That which was from the beginning,” (1 John 1:1a). He began his Gospel in a similar way, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1).  Both echoing Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

John begins his letter with the declaration of our foundation in the risen Lord Jesus. John was a living witness to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. He begins by saying that Jesus was more than a mere man, but that he was in fact the son of God and that at the beginning of creation, Jesus was there. John confirms that he heard Jesus speak, he saw him with his own eyes, and he touched him with his own hands. And in verse 2 and 3 he writes that this Jesus is the eternal son of God who became flesh.

John was declaring the Gospel message. The son of God who was born of a virgin and lived a perfect sinless life in order to become the spotless lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This Gospel message is the foundational truth on which the church stands.

Sadly, it is possible to know this truth, without this truth transforming your life. It is possible to profess faith in Jesus, without expressing faith by living a consistent life of following Jesus, dying to our own sinful flesh. Believing the truth of the Gospel brings us into fellowship with God and his son Jesus, John ties this to the church in verse 7, “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.”

Fellowship with one another in the church begins with the foundation of individual fellowship with God through Jesus. We cannot be in true fellowship as the church if we are not followers of Jesus.  

In verse 5, John writes, one of the greatest theological statements in the whole Bible is, “God is light”. He is the source of light and truth (John 8:12).

God began creation by stating, “let there be light” genesis 1:3. Light is the source of life and the beginning point of creation. Light is a symbol of God’s presence in the Bible and a picture of His perfect holiness and righteousness. Light reveals reality.

C.S. Lewis wrote, “We believe that the sun has risen, not because we see it, but because by it we see everything else”.

Verses 6 to 10 are a repetitive back and forth of walking in the light and walking in darkness.

Each of the verses begin with the word “if”, and John seems to play one against the other for 5 verses. Verses 6, 8 and 10 all depict the danger and the damage caused by walking and living in sin.

Notice that each of these verses begin with the statement, “if we say…”. This is pride, the essence of sin, where I try to convince myself and those around me that I am walking in truth and light, whereas I know in my heart that I am walking in sin and darkness. That there is a separation in my relationship with God and others in the body of Christ.

When we give in to temptation and sin, we are uncomfortable in the light and the natural reaction is to separate from the body of Christ. Slowly we begin to attend church less frequently, we slowly start pulling back and pretty soon we are not in fellowship anymore.

If sin pulls us away from fellowship, what do we need to do? This is where the wonderful promises of 1 John 1:7 and 9 are so incredibly encouraging.

As the light of God reveals our sin, and we are prompted by the Holy Spirit, we repent of our sins, 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” God promises to forgive your sin, because of what Jesus has done on the cross.

When we sin, we damage our relationship with God. We struggle to pray and read His word. We experience to loss of Joy and peace as we are outside of the will of God. As a result of this, we also experience a loss of fellowship with each other.

But the wonderful promise is that repentance restores fellowship. I love to pray the prayer of David in Psalm 51:10, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” The cleansing of our sin is a creative miracle of God, and it is something that we need to do daily.

As we daily repent of our sins, we walk in the light, enjoying fellowship with God and we walk in fellowship with other believers.

One aspect of the church has become so clear in the last eighteen months, we need to walk in fellowship with each other. Hebrews 10:23-25 has taken on a renewed meaning to us all.  

When we are separated from the body of Christ, it is easy to be overwhelmed by fear as we see the world around us. It is a world controlled by fear.

Fear comes when we misplace our trust.

The prophet Jeremiah spoke to the nation of Judah when they were in a downward spiral of sin and idolatry. They were blindly heading towards judgment, much the same as our nation today (See Jeremiah 17:5-8). Jeremiah said that trusting in man results in a curse!

How many of us are trusting in man before we trust in God?

God calls us to be a part of the fellowship of believers so that we can encourage one another to keep trusting in the Lord our God.

Keeping the foundation of the Word of God and the Gospel as our starting point.

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Sermon, Sunday August 1, 2021, The Holiness of God

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Have you discovered the purpose for your existence?

That’s a deep question, but the answer is very simple and yet infinitely complex.

I am reminded of a frequently used phrase, “God loves you and has a plan for your life”.

While that sounds good and it is true, it is not the overarching truth. If we really think about it, the subject of the sentence is, “you” and ultimately that comes from our humanistic focus on self.

God is about God. It really is all about His glory being displayed in all the universe. That sounds harsh to our western ears, because we are so consumed with our own glory and achievements. But the reality is that God is the only uncreated One, from whom all other beings owe their existence, and He is infinitely holy.

Instead of, “God loves you and has a plan for your life”, I propose that, “God’s plan for your life is the display of His glory.”

I want to try to answer two questions:

  1. What is the glory of God?
  2. How do we display the glory of God?

In Romans 11 we see a chapter that some scholars say sums up the entire narrative of the Bible. It is all about God’s plan and purpose for the people of Israel. As Paul writes verses 33 to 36 of chapter 11, it is as if he is reaching the crescendo of a symphony and flows into praise of God.

Verse 36 is the cymbal crash of the chapter, “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen”.

God is the source, the means, and the goal of all things. That is so contrary to what we see portrayed in the world around us and sadly in many churches, where we ultimately see that the god that many people worship is created in their own image.   

  1. But what is the glory of God?

John Piper said, “The glory of God is the manifest beauty of his holiness. It is the going-public of his holiness.”

The word Holy means to be separate, a distinctly different being, in a class all by Himself. The holiness of God is the foundational quality of His character.

In Isaiah 6:3, the prophet has a vision of heaven where he sees the Seraphim calling to one another above the throne of God, “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”

The heavenly creatures, declare the holiness of God and then say that His glory is over the whole earth, not His holiness. The Glory of God is the public display of His holiness (see Psalm 19:1 and Psalm 8:1).

2. So how do we display the glory of God?

Verse 36 tells us that every believer has their source in God. So, as we live on this earth in this church age, we are part of the glory of God being displayed. We get to reflect His glory. We are designed to make the glory of God shine, making it visible to others (see Matthew 5:16 and 2 Corinthians 4:6-7). People seeing your life on display, should declare, “God is glorious!”.

Once again, we run into the idol of self and our culture of humanism. We must realize that God does not need us, but He chose to create us in His image for His glory (see Isaiah 43:7).

The Westminster Catechism begins with the question, “What is the chief end of man?”. To which they answered, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” If we really grasped this, we would realize that we have been created for so much more than we can ever imagine.

But our flesh rises up and says, “hey, what’s in it for me?” If we are honest, we might believe that God is not concerned about us, He is using us for His glory. However, when we live as God intends us to live, we are most satisfied. The answer to the first question of the Westminster Catechism is two-fold, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever.”

As we glorify God, we experience joy, the joy of living out our original design (see Psalm 73:25-26)

So, the question is, am I satisfied in God? Is He enough? Do I have full satisfaction in God, or do I chase after the things of this world? We chase after good things; friends, health, careers, family and also not good things; wealth, sex, fame, to name a few.

We chase after things, because we don’t find full satisfaction in God.

John Piper writes, “He is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”

We struggle to grasp this, because we are so easily satisfied with the things of this world.

C.S. Lewis described it perfectly, “It would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

  • We display the Glory of God, when we serve gladly and give sacrificially of our time and our resources.
  • We display the glory of God, when we put our agenda on hold to help someone or stop to pray for them.
  • We display the glory of God when we share the Gospel with someone.
  • We display the glory of God when we care for the widows and the orphans and stand up for the unborn.
  • We display the glory of God when we boldly take a stand against the immoral mainstream of our culture.

These are just some of the many examples of what it means to be living for the glory of God.

What if we woke up every morning with the prayer, “Lord display Your glory through my life today?”