The Church Is…
Video – This Is Church (sermon spice)
Good Morning Maple Grove!
NOW THIS MORNING - we are kicking off a brand new series called, “Becoming The Church He Intended.”
AND – that makes sense, right?
THAT - seems like a logical and worthy pursuit for us, wouldn’t you agree?
I MEAN – that is what we should want to become….
The church, the church that Jesus intends for us who meet at 3210 Proffit Road…
NOT THE CHURCH – that I intend, or the other elders intend, or you intend, or the person sitting next you intends, or the world intends… BUT – the church that Jesus intends for us to become.
QUESTION – does anyone not want to become that?
OKAY – it’s good to know that we are all on the same page.
BUT LISTEN – it is one thing for us to say that…
• we want to be that church,
• we want to become the kind of Jesus followers that He intended…
YEAH - it’s one thing for me to stand up here for a bunch of Sundays and talk about what it means to become the church that Jesus intended… AND – for you to listen and maybe even agree. BUT – it’s quite another thing for us (for me, for you, for the person sitting next to you)… TO DO - what needs to be done, to make His intention our reality. Get It?
AND LISTEN – for that to happen it will require us…
(during the next several weeks…
• to be open to what God has to say about His church (and listen there is a very high likelihood that God is going to say some things we may not like, agree with and that make us feel uncomfortable)
• to be honest about where we really are (collectively and individually) in regards to His Church
• to be humble and admit where we have been wrong, and to spend more time looking at ourselves rather than at others and how they need to change or fall short.
• to not make this about ourselves and our opinions and preferences, but about Him
• to be willing to change and do whatever it takes
• to be ready – ready for what? For the enemy to come at us in order to stop us.
AND LISTEN – here’s the deal…
IF WE - were already the church and the Jesus-followers that He intended there would be no need for us to be doing this series.
HOWEVER – we are not… which is why we are here doing this series.
AND SO – for next (however many week) we are going to be diving into this book (especially the book of Acts)…
TO SEE - what the Scripture says about His Church.
BOTTOM LINE – His living and active Word is the place to start and to stay for determining what it means to become the church he intended… As Peter… ‘the grass withers and…”
NOW – I both appreciate and I am convicted by these words that Francis Chan writes as he opens up his book letter to the church.
Imagine you find yourself stranded on a deserted island with nothing but a copy of the Bible. You have no experience with Christianity whatsoever, and all you know about the Church will come from your reading of the Bible.
How would you imagine a church to function? Seriously. Close your eyes for two minutes and try to picture “Church” as you would know it.
Now think about your current church experience. Is it even close? Can you live with that? - Francis Chan
I can’t… and I do not think most of you can either….
I MEAN – that’s why you are here.
NOW - ‘church’ has been a part of my life in one way or another for about as long as I can remember…
As a child - church was a place that my mom on Sunday’s would wake me up to go to.
IT – was place where every now and then I put on a robe and lit a few candles. That was it, nothing more than that.
I MEAN – I never read a single verse of Scripture or opened up a bible.
As A teenager - my mom stopped trying to wake me up.
AND - church became totally irrelevant to me.
IT was place where strange people went, people who were absolutely against… everything!
LIKE – my ‘church going neighbor’ Mrs. Bobbly who was always quick to let me know how sinful I was…
(I still remember trimming the fence in our front yard…)
As a young adult (19-20) church was a place where I both met and began to learn about Jesus.
A PLACE - where the bible started to come alive to me.
A PLAVE - where I met a bunch of good people and served a little here & there.
BUT - it was not a place where I was ever really encouraged or shown how to get to know Jesus…or how He had called me to change the world for Him, one life at a time.
AND AS A PASTOR - for the last in 27+ years: church has been many things… IT – has been a place OF MY:
• Of my greatest joys and greatest sorrows
• Greatest hope and greatest hurt
• Greatest passion and greatest pain
• Greatest freedom and greatest frustration
THE TRUTH IS – during my 27+ years as a pastor there have been some pretty messy times… I
YOU SEE - I like you, when it comes to church have seen, experienced and been a part of…
The good, the bad, the ugly, and the extremely bad and ugly…
YET – despite all that mess, the dream that God placed within my heart for the church to really and full be…
• That city on the hill
• The light and hope of this dark and broken world
HAS NEVER – stopped beating…
NOW – granted that heartbeat did slow down and get faint a few times.
HOWEVER – every time a painful and negative situation would try to beat that dream for His church out of me…
BOTH - God and the beauty and power of what the church really could be always resuscitated that heartbeat bringing the dream back to life…
AND LISTEN - I know that many in this room have experienced the same journey and YET STILL HAVE this same dream!
I KNOW – you do, it’s why you are in this room this morning April 28th the Sunday after Easter.
NOW – for me the dream of what the church really could be was born when I began looking at the church we see in the book of Acts. What an amazing and inspiring story that the Holy Spirit breathed through the pen of Paul!
FROM - 11 scared men behind locked doors – they formed a community of believers that literally turned the world upside down. Literally bringing down the Roman Empire without raising a shield or lifting a sword.
This church – these people, were radically devoted to God and his word. Whatever God told them to do, they did.
Whatever God told them to stop doing, they stopped doing. Wherever God told them to go they went…
AND WHEN – the government told them to stop talking about Jesus or die – they literally choose death – and thousands died.
This church – these people, loved each other in radical kinds of ways.
They took off their masks and shared lives with one another. They laughed and cried, and prayed, and sang and served together in authentic Christian fellowship…
Those who had more shared with those who had less until socioeconomic barriers melted away.
People related to one another in ways that bridged gender and racial chasms, and celebrated culture differences.
Acts chapter 2 tells us that this community of believers, this church, offered unbelievers a vision of life that was so beautiful it took their breath away.
YES - It was so bold, so creative, so courageous, so dynamic that they couldn’t resist… AND - Acts 2:47 tells us that the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
MGCC – imagine being a part of something like that… being part of a movement like that. YEAH – sign me up!
AGAIN – this new series is about becoming the church that He, that Jesus intended. AND – like I said, last week… on Easter Sunday… I am not sure of all we will be talking about during this series, or how long this series will be.
HOWEVER – I do know that I want to spend the first 2 weeks looking at some of the terms or concepts that the bible uses to describe the church, in a conversation I am calling…
“The Church Is…”
AND – here’s the deal.
SOME - of the ‘The Church Is’ truths that we will be talking about, will be pretty quick (they will not take much time to unpack), WHILE - others will take a little more time.
BUT BEFORE – we dive in… I want to read a quote from the book ‘Letters To The Church.’
BTW – I would encourage you to pick up a copy…
It’s raw, it’s real… and it’s challenging and convicting.
Chan writes…
God designed the Church to be much more than what the majority of us experience in America. There are many of us who believe this and want change.
The good news is that God wants this change even more than we do. And He doesn’t just want these changes; He commands them! We can move forward in confidence, knowing God wouldn’t command us to do something unless He also empowered us for the task.
Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.
The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne. Revelation 3: 19–21
Chan continues…
AFTER - giving a very strong rebuke to the church of Laodicea for being lukewarm, Jesus simply asked them to open the door.
BEFORE - you get overwhelmed by all that is wrong with the Church, remember that He is not placing an insurmountable burden on your shoulders. He is asking you to fellowship with Him and join Him in what He is doing.
We should be filled with faith and anticipation, remembering what He did at the Red Sea and the empty tomb.
Take a deep breath.
Lay all your stress at His feet.
Explain to Him your confusion regarding the difference you see between your church and the Church you read about.
Tell Him your dissatisfaction with the lack of power in your life…
And then he writes…
I became a grandpa recently. It’s weird to be able to type that sentence. The older I get, the more aware I am that the end is near. There is no time to care about what I want in the Church. There’s no time to worry about what others are looking for in a church. I will be facing Him soon, so I have to stay focused on His desires.
Prayer
OKAY – let’s do this MGCC…
LET’S – begin unpacking some powerful, the church is statements
I. The Church Is…Christ’s (it belongs to Jesus)
Matthew records these words in Matthew 16…
Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”
He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.
And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. - Matthew 16:13-18
UNDERSTAND - MGCC is not my church, the elders church or your church… It’s His church.
We did not build He did
On this rock I will build my church – Matthew 16:18
QUESTION – so what is the rock upon which Jesus will build His church? The truth that He is the Christ the son of the living God.
YOU KNOW – I find it very interesting that in Matthew 16 that Jesus, as soon as He reveals His identity that the first thing He starts to talk about is the church. And – I am convinced that this is because the church and who Jesus is…
ARE – (attached, intertwined, linked) inseparable…
Inseparable – (adjective)… incapable of being separated or disjoined; seemingly always together.
IN FACT – John in his Revelation paints this incredible powerful picture of Jesus, one that causes John to fall flat on his face and guess where Jesus is standing… Right in the middle of His church.
SO REVELATION – opens up with John who was exiled on the Island of Patmos (the Roman version of Alcatraz) having this incredible vision of seeing Jesus in all His glory…
When I turned to see who was speaking to me, I saw seven gold lampstands. And standing in the middle of the lampstands was someone like the Son of Man. He was wearing a long robe with a gold sash across his chest.
His head and his hair were white like wool, as white as snow. And his eyes were like flames of fire. His feet were like polished bronze refined in a furnace, and his voice thundered like mighty ocean waves.
He held seven stars in his right hand, and a sharp two-edged sword came from his mouth. And his face was like the sun in all its brilliance.
When I saw him, I fell at his feet as if I were dead. But he laid his right hand on me and said, “Don’t be afraid! I am the First and the Last.
I am the living one. I died, but look—I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and the grave. Revelation 1:12-18
This is the meaning of the mystery of the seven stars you saw in my right hand and the seven gold lampstands: The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches. – Revelation 1:20
MGCC – the church belongs to Jesus and Jesus is standing right in the middle of those lampstands.
NOW – is that cool or what?
AND LISTEN – because He is right there, John reveals in chapters 2 and 3 that Jesus knows. That He knows…
• Our deeds, hard work and perseverance
• About our suffering, poverty and opposition
• Our love, faith and service
• When we pretend to others that we are alive to Him, when the truth is we are dead.
II. The Church Is… The Called Out Ones
NOW - the word that Jesus chose to describe His people was an ancient Greek word ‘Ekklesia.’ In the New Testament the word occurs 114 times.
The word originally described the regular assembly of the citizens in a free city state. The citizens were ‘called out’ by the herald to gather and conduct the public business.
SO - the word came to mean the ‘called out one.’
The church are those called out from the world (by the Gospel), to go into the world (with the Gospel)… because they are the hope of the world.
We are called out from the world by the Gospel..
B/S – the gospel as Paul says in Romans 1:16
The Gospel… is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes…
The Gospel calls us out from the world Calls us out…
FROM A LIFE - that is empty, dark, hopeless, all about us and separated from God…
TO A LIFE – that is full, bight, hopeful, reconciled and all about God.
We are called to…
To go into world with the Gospel
We are called out by God to take His Gospel into the world…
YOU SEE - we are must not keep the good news (of forgiveness, salvation and restoration) to ourselves, but as Jesus said we are to go out and make disciples of all nations.
Baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
YES – we are called out of the world (by the Gospel) to go out into the world with the Gospel…
because the local church is the hope of the world
The church is what?
Bill Hybels in his book Courageous Leadership talks about the moment when that truth that the local church is the hope of the world first seized Him…
• Airport in San Juan
• A 9 year old beating a younger boy
• Broke up the fight
• But eventually had to board the plane
• He wanted to forget about what he had seen
• But the Holy Spirit made he wrestle with the question…
“what could change the trajectory of this young boys life”
He writes…
I scrolled through every option I could think of…
• Governments could pass new legislation.
• Businesses can provide sorely needed jobs
• Wise educators can teach useful knowledge of the world
• Self-help programs can offer effective methods of behavior modification.
• Advanced psychological techniques can aid self understanding.
And all of this is good.
But can any of it transform a human heart?
I believe that only one power exists on this sorry planet that can do that. It’s the power of the love of Jesus Christ, the love that conquers sin and wipes out same and heals wounds and reconciles enemies and patches broken dreams and ultimately
changes the world, one life a time.
And what grips my heart everyday is the knowledge that the radical message of that transforming love has been given to the church.
That means in a very real way the future of the world rests in the hands of local congregation like yours and mine. It’s the church or it’s lights out.
Without churches so filled with the power of God that they can’t help but spill goodness and peace and love and joy into the world, depravity will win the day; evil will flood the world.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. Strong, growing communities of faith can turn the tide of history, they can!
Don’t bother looking else where the church is it.”
The church are those called out from the world (by the Gospel), to go into the world (with the Gospel) because they are the hope of the world.
III. The Church Is… Maple Grove
I know that this might seem like an odd and unnecessary statement to make, ‘Maple Grove IS the Church.’
BUT – please stick with me as I try to explain, what I mean by this and WHY it is so important that we both know and believe that Maple Grove IS the church.
YOU SEE – there is this concept, this idea out there about the church and it has been around for a long time (since the early 5th century)
IT WAS - first taught by Saint Augustine the Bishop of Hippo
A region located in Northern Africa, on the coast of eastern Algeria…
AND – this concept, this idea about the church developed by Augustine was embraced 1000 years later by leaders of the Protestant Reformation like Martin Luther and John Calvin.
AND - basically it was the idea
That there are actually two churches, the local church that you can see, touch and attend…. AND – the real, universal, spiritual and invisible church that you cannot see.
NOW – this idea of the ‘invisible’ church came about for two primary reasons…
#1 - Because the church in Augustine’s time (which was the time of the Imperial State Church)… was a mess
IT - was full of sin, corruption and even murder.
I MEAN – if the church did not like what someone was doing, teaching or saying… they did not bother to hold a meeting they would just kill them.
AND SO - Augustine in trying to deal with this tension that…
On the one hand ‘here is what’ the church should be according to the book of Acts and the rest of the NT,
YET – on the other hand, here is what we really are.
R U tracking with me…
UNDERSTAND – a major catalysts for this concept of their being a real, universal, invisible church was this dichotomy, this massive disconnect between the IDEAL of church that Augustine saw in the Scriptures and the REALITIES that he saw and experienced in the church.
AND - the second catalyst (for developing this concept of the invisible church) WAS - the fact that Augustine before his conversion to Christianity at the age of 32, was a Neo-Platonist (Which mean he believed in Greek dualism, which taught the physical world is evil and the unseen spiritual world is good)…
RU you still tracking with me…
SO – Augustine is like, “yeah I agree, the church I see does not come close to matching what I see in the NT… and probably never will be.
But that’s okay, because the church I can see is only a reflection of the - real, invisible, universal, spiritual/not physical – REAL church that I cannot see…
BOTTOM LINE – this idea of the invisible church was a very convenient way to get the local church and her leaders off the hook…
I MEAN – since the local church is not the real church then there is no reason to get all worked up about trying to conform it to what we see in the book of the Acts or the rest of the NT.
“No the local is not perfect and it never will be. But hey, these imperfections don’t really matter because we are not the real church anyway.”
YOU SEE – (and stay with me)
IF the local church is not the real church then the authority to live under the NT is eased…
IN FACT – it is pretty much lifted all together
SURE JESUS SAID…
• to forgive anyone who sins against us
• to love our enemies
• to only use our tongues to build up and not tear down
• to care for the orphan and widow
• to put others before ourselves
•
BUT – that is totally unrealistic…
I MEAN – even Jesus knows we could never do or be that…
AND SO – we have these 3 extremely influential church leaders (Augustine, Luther and Calvin) embracing this concept of there being 2 churches…
The local church (messy and not too pretty at times) and the universal/invisible/perfect/REAL church
BUT LISTEN – just because they embraced it, and taught it does not make it true.
UNDERSTAND – the bible knows of only one church and it is the local church.
AND YES – we like they do face many imperfections in the church…
BUT MGCC – just because we are not yet what we should be does not mean that we are not the church.
I MEAN – if the church in Corinth was the church….
BOTTOM LINE – what I am trying to say and I know I am not saying it very well…
WHEN – what we read in the NT and what we see in the church does not match up…
THAT - does not mean we just throw in the towel and give up on the ideal. INSTEAD – it means that we must continue to chase after and NEVER give up on becoming the church that He intended.
AMEN???
OKAY – let me wrap this point up by mentioning the 2 extremes that we must avoid… whenever we look at the church that we are and compare it to the IDEAL that we should be…
1. We must avoid the extreme of becoming so enamored with the IDEAL, that it causes us to hate on the church and it’s imperfect people.
2. We must avoid the extreme of letting the IDEAL so discourage us (man, that so not us) that we give up on the church and on the dream of who we can and must be...
B/S
The Church is Maple Grove
Let’s repeat that
NOW – I know I spent a lot of time on it and I know that it was probably not ‘funnest’ teaching I have ever given…
‘Funnest’ - adverb. 1 – an activity that brings great enjoyment 2 – causing people to nod their heads, clap their hands, say amen and shout ‘hallelujah, what a great time we are having.
NEVERTHELESS – it is a vital because I want you to know that
Everything we have and will be sharing about what the church is,
Maple Grove Is…
Because Maple Grove is the church…
OKAY SO… The church is…
• Christ’s
• The called out ones
• Maple Grove
IV. The Church Is… The Body Of Christ
NOW – this truth, that the church is the body of Christ is perhaps Paul’s favorite image or metaphor for the church.
IN FACT - He uses the metaphor over 30 times in his letters…
Check Out what he wrote in the first chapters of both Colossians and Ephesians…
The Son is the image of the invisible God, the first born over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. – Colossians 1:15-18
And he is the head of the body, the church
AND LISTEN – a head is incomplete without a body and a body is incomplete without a head.
And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
- Ephesians 1:22,23
The church (MG) is the ‘fullness’ of who?
And Jesus does what?
The church is the body of Christ.
QUESTION – was the body of Christ important, key, vital to God’s redemptive plan in the first century?
Abso-stinking-lutely…
Is the body of Christ important, key, vital to God’s redemptive plan in the 21st century?
Abso-stinking-lutely…
In their book, ‘The Second Incarnation, a theology for the 21st century church’ Rubel Shelly and Randall Harris write.
“Just as the invisible God made Himself visible and tangible in Jesus Christ, so the now-invisible Christ is making Himself visible and tangible to the world through His church”
UNDERSTAND IF JESUS – is going to make contact with this lost, hurting and broken world it will be through us, His church.
LISTEN – in a very real way we are… the voice, the hands, the feet, and the love of Jesus in this world…
God’s second incarnation.
NOW – the first incarnation was crazy… that a limitless God would choose to limit Himself and put on human flesh.
THAT – among others things the One who had been All-Present in eternity could not be in Bethlehem and Jerusalem at the same time.
UNDERSTAND – Jesus did not have to do this, but he did it in order to accomplish His mission.
Yeah – the first incarnation crazy.
The second incarnation… Crazy-err!
R U kidding me?
NOT ONLY – does God the Spirit choose to live inside of us…
BUT GOD – chooses to limit His redemptive work to us, to me, to you – to His church?
While Christ in His person is altogether complete without the church, Christ in His earthly function is incomplete without His spiritual body… We are called to complete, execute, and perform in our collective life what He desires to have done in the world. What we do in our world, we must do in order to be faithful as His body. - Rubel Shelly and Randall Harris
We are called to…
complete, execute, and perform in our collective life what He desires to have done in the world
The church (MG) is the body of Christ…
What a powerful image to chew on.
AND – what a unifying image it is meant to be.
UNDERSTAND - to a church that was seriously divided Paul spent 19 verses talking about and reminding them of how they (and in any church for that matter) were ONE BODY.
The human body has many parts, but the many parts make up one whole body.
So it is with the body of Christ. Some of us are Jews, some are Gentiles, some are slaves, and some are free.
But we have all been baptized into one body by one Spirit, and we all share the same Spirit… - 1 Cor 12:12,13
AGAIN – the fact that we are all part of one body is intended to unify us…
feet can’t say I have no use for legs… I don’t need you.
UNDERSTAND – there is no greater honor on earth than to be part of God’s church… may we never lose our wonder.
(NFL Draft illustration)
QUESTION – when was the last time you were awestruck by the fact that you are part of Christ’s body?
No one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. – Ephesians 5:29,30
Every believer needs to stare at those verses long enough to be stunned. I mean really stunned. Paul referred to it as a profound mystery.
If achievement is your idol, you won’t make time for mystery. You will rush to the next sentence so you can finish this book rather than meditate on the miracle that you are a human being who is currently joined to a God “who dwells in unapproachable light” (1 Tim. 6: 16).
Slow down long enough to marvel. The sun is ninety-three million miles away, and you are unable to stare at it.
You obviously can’t touch the sun and live, so how is it possible that we are currently attached to the One who shines brighter than the sun? High angels cover themselves with their wings in His presence (Isa. 6: 2), yet you are a member of His body.
Why would Someone so extraordinary choose to care for you like His own arm?
Please tell me you didn’t just keep reading. Please tell me you paused for even a minute to worship.
You can’t be that busy.
The church is…
• Christ’s
• The called out ones
• Maple Grove
• The body of Christ
LISTEN – becoming the Church that He intended, begins with understanding what the church (according Scripture) is…
