What is the Church?

As I was thinking over the last few days as to what to discuss this morning, I thought maybe it would be beneficial to talk about church and really answer the question “What is the church?” That’s what I would like to focus on during our time today. I know a lot of this may be very familiar to many of you, but again, I think reminding ourselves periodically who we are and what we are to do as a church is important. Because just as “Christian” has become somewhat superficial within our society. I think “church” has become superficial as well. And I came to that conclusion, as I read an article by Barna research group, who conducted a study, and asked around 5K professing “Christians” what helped them grow in their faith and in their walk with the Lord? And there were many different responses, like prayer, bible reading, their family, their friends. But too much of my surprise, out of the top 10 answers, the Church was not one of them. Sadly, out of that group, 75% stated they didn’t even belong to a church or attends regularly. And when they were asked a follow up question as to “Why they didn’t attend a church?

40% said, “They find God in other places”
35% said, “Church is not relevant to their spiritual lives”

To me, that is a sad reality, because the church is vitally important, specifically in the life of a born-again believer. I believe it’s important because the Church is an institution built by God. Therefore, the church matters! Why does it matter? It matters because the Scriptures says it does. Paul says the Lord Jesus Christ loved the church that He gave Himself up for her (Eph 5:25). We see in that same letter, that God demonstrates His wisdom through the church and is glorified in the church (Eph 3:10; 20-21). Also, Jesus builds His church, and it’s He who gives the church success (Matt 16:18), “I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” So, as we bring our focus on this question, What is the church? I want to answer this questions in three ways.

First by Defining the Church (What does Church actually mean)
Next by Describing the Church (How is the Church explained within the Scriptures)
Lastly, the Doings of the Church (What does the church do, what is its purpose)

P1: Defining the Church (What does Church mean)

If you asked any random person today what the church is, they’d more than likely refer to a building of some sort. I remember being in a children’s Sunday school and the teacher asked the kids that question. And without any hesitation, they all pointed to the building that we were in. But the church is not a building, it is not a physical place. When I was young there was a Christian band that had a song titled, “You Can’t Go to Church” And the chorus of the song went something like this.

You can’t go to church as some people say
But it’s the common terminology we use every day
You can go to a building, and you can sit on a pew
But you can’t go to church because the church is you

Theologically speaking, this band got it right because the Church is not a building with pews, but a group of born-again believers who gather together. And that’s what the word “Church” means. In a general sense, it means an assembling or a gathering. The word used within the Greek is ἐκκλησία, , it’s a compound word meaning “those who are called out, ekk which means “out”; καλέω which means “to call.” So, it literally means “those who are called out.” It is used throughout Scripture around 120 times, and it speaks of two distinctions regarding the church, the universal church and local church.

The Scriptures explain to us that the church began on the day of Pentecost, Acts 2, and it will be completed when Christ comes and gathers His Church to Himself. Therefore, as Peter stood up in Acts 2, and called people to repent and believe in the gospel, on that day, Acts 2:41 states, there were added about 3000 souls and the church was born. And from that point on, as you study church history you see how the Lord continued to build His church through the progression of the church for the last 2000 years. And the church continues to spread throughout the world, where every tribe, nation, tongue are being added to the church every day. And when we see that within the Scriptures, it is speaking of the Universal church.

The Universal church can be defined as all genuine Christians throughout the entirety of the church age. They are members of “the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven (Heb 12:23), having been declared righteous because their sins have been washed away by the blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore, all true believers throughout church history, those alive today and those who already are in heaven, make up the universal church. Therefore, all those who place their faith in Jesus Christ alone are immediately placed by the Holy Spirit into one united spiritual Body, the church.”

But when we read about the church within the Scriptures, the majority of the time it is speaking of a local church body. I believe some 90 times when the word ἐκκλησία is used, its being used in the context of a local church. The local church is identified as a particular group of believers that gathers regularly to accomplish the purposes that God has ordained for the Church. So, the word “Church” can be defined as “an assembly or gathering of people who have been called out by God.”

Therefore, the Scriptures speak of a universal church, those around the world who are born-again Christians, and local assemblies, which are part of the universal church who specifically meet together on a regular basis in a localized location. Examples, Church of Colossae, Ephesus, Philippi, Churches of Galatia (which included many local churches in that area; Derbe, Iconium, Lystra etc.). But even though Paul is writing to local churches, they still apply to us today, because all believers are part of the universal church. So, when we think of definition of the church we can define the church universally and locally.

And although every genuine believer is a member of the universal church, that should not excuse anyone of excluding themselves from meeting regularly in a local church. Because being involved and accountable to a local body is vitally important for believers. Why? First “Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her” in Eph 5:25. So, you should gather together with likeminded people simply for the sake of Christ and what He’s done for us. And Jesus didn’t give Himself up for a building, but for a people, A particular people, His own people, those whom he called out. So, each person, who has been bought with the precious blood of Christ, should long to be bound together with a local assembly of born-again believers.

So, when I say, Welcome to Evansville Bible church, I’m not welcoming you to this building. I’m really saying, “welcome to the gathering of believers known as EBC, welcome to the assembly of people here! Because we are a people gathered together for God’s glory. And if that’s the case, and we are to gather together as a church, and we hold fast to the truth of the Scriptures. How does the Scriptures describe the church?

P2: Describing the Church (How is the Church explained within the Scriptures)

The New Testament has many analogies that describe the church, we’ll go through five of them today.

1. The Church is the Bride of Christ

This is a very important metaphor. In 2 Cor 11:2, Paul says “For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin.” Or a pure bride. Christ is the husband, the church is the bride, or pure virgin. And if you know anything regarding betrothal and marriage in that time. The betrothal period acted like the engagement period we have today. And it usually lasted about a year, but the “engaged” couple were looked at as husband and wife, although they would not come together intimately until the marriage ceremony which marked the completion of this marriage covenant. During the betrothal period the father took the responsibility to ensure his daughter remained faithful and pure to her husband. So, when the wedding ceremony took place, he could present her as a true pure virgin to her betrothed husband. Therefore, Paul was saying he was determined to present this church, being their spiritual father (which he declared in 1 Cor 4:15) as a pure virgin to Christ. That is why purity and holiness in each of our lives is so vitally important. We want to be pure at the presentation to our husband, who is Christ!

Listen to how John MacArthur comments on this, he says, “Having been engaged to Christ at salvation (Remember sealed and pledged with the HS), the Church will be presented to Christ and will celebrate at the marriage supper and reign with him in the millennial kingdom.” So, as the bride of Christ, the overall concern is for us as the church, to remain pure as we wait for our bridegroom to come. That’s 1 John 3:2b-3,

We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.
And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.

And that really coincides with what Paul was saying to the Ephesian church when he was talking about husbands and wives. Because we commonly think that passage in Eph 5 is about marriage, which it is, but the main objective is Christ and the Church, as Paul made that clear in Eph 5:32, although I’m talking about husbands and wives, I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church. We are merely instructed to mimic the relationship of Christ and His bride, the church Which Paul clearly states in Eph 5:25-27 is this,

just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,
so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,
that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.

Therefore, the church is the bride of Christ, and as a local body our goal is to live in purity and holiness as we wait for our coming bridegroom

2. The Church is described as a flock

More specifically a flock of sheep. Shepherding was a main occupation in that time, so this analogy would have been understood very well. David, being a shepherd wrote about the Lord being his shepherd in Ps 23

Christ as our chief Shepherd, He leads us, restores us, guides us, protects us, disciplines us, comforts us, prepares for us, heals us

Sheep are dependent on their Shepherd. Therefore, we as the church, are a dependent community, and our dependence is on Christ and His Word

3. The church is also described as a temple of Christ

We see this throughout the NT Eph 2:19-22 states,

you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household,
having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone,
in whom the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple in the Lord,
in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit.

1 Peter 2:4-5 states,

And coming to Him as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God, you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

These verses state we are a holy and worshipping community which enjoys intimate fellowship with God through Christ. I appreciate how the systematic theology book “Biblical Doctrine” describes this,

“In the OT, the temple was the centerpiece of Israel’s worship. It was the place where God’s people went to worship him through the mediation of a priest. A veil separated the people from the Most Holy Place, in which the presence of God was manifested. But in the NT it reveals that believers are the temple of God and that every Christian has access to God through Christ…(remember upon Christ’s death the veil in the temple was torn from top to bottom, giving us direct access to God through Christ)…therefore Christ is the builder, we are the building, and the church is where God’s glory is manifested most clearly on earth.”

Sadly we forget that, and that is why Paul reminded the Corinthians in 1 Cor 3:16, Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that Spirit of God dwells in you?” We are living stones in God’s temple, and we offer our bodies as living sacrifices for him (Rom 12:1, why? Because that is our spiritual service of worship). So, as we reflect on this metaphor of being Christ’s temple, our thoughts should be geared towards not only being a pure and dependent community but a holy and worshipping community

4. The church is described as a family

The Church is a family! If you remember in the gospel of Mark, as Jesus’ physical family arrived to Capernaum from Nazareth to take Him away because they were saying He had lost His senses. As they came, he was teaching in a house, and they send someone in to get him (Mark 3:32-35)

A crowd was sitting around Him, and they said to Him, “Behold, Your mother and Your brothers are outside looking for You.”
Answering them, He said, “Who are My mother and My brothers?”
Looking about at those who were sitting around Him, He said, “Behold My mother and My brothers!
“For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother

He made a distinction regarding his physical family and spiritual family. He was speaking of those who belonged to him. And that’s the church, His bride, and flock, and family. We are a family, Paul speaks to Timothy in 1 Tim. 5:1-2 referring to the members of the Church as family members such as fathers, brothers and sisters. He tells the Ephesians they are of the household of God in Eph 2:19. He even begins the letter to the Ephesians by explaining to them the amazing truth of their adoption into God’s family, something that more than likely blew their minds (Eph 1:5)!

The honor of being adopted into the family of God is overwhelming. To be united with Christ as co-heir, with a stronger bond than that of our blood family is breathtaking. I think if we understand this metaphor, it will help us realize the importance of our own spiritual family. Do you look to each other as family? We should! And that’s the uniqueness of the church. Have you ever run into someone you’ve never met, and talking to them, you learn they are born-again, and upon that realization, it feels like you’ve known each other all your life? That’s because you are family. And we are united together with something that can never be broken, be are united together in Christ. Therefore, we bear each other’s burdens, we weep with each other, we rejoice with each other. And as a committed family, we demonstrate that by being compassionate, kind, gentle, patient, forgiving, and ultimately loving toward one another which is the perfect bond of unity (Col 3:12-14). Jesus mentions this specifically in John 13:35, By this they will know that you are my disciples, they will know that you belong to Me, if you have love for one another (John 13:35). So, we aren’t just a group of people who meet on Sunday mornings, we are family!

5, The church is described as Christ’s body, with Christ being the head

Without the head you can’t survive, right? Many of you know my background was in Nursing. Well one of the reasons I liked nursing so much was when I took the anatomy and physiology classes. I was captivated by the human body, the structure, the perfect design and how it all worked. Paul must have been captivated with it as well because he wrote about this numerous times in his epistles. 1 Cor 12:12 & 27, He says, For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ…Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it. And as members of this one body, Paul speaks of the functions this body had and how it survives. Eph 4:15-16,

but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,
from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

Here speaking the truth in love, he says in love, as each individual part works and exercises their giftings, and that causes growth in the body. So, each individual member is vitally important within the body. He explains this further in Romans 12:4-6

For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function,
so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.
Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us

This reminder should encourage because as we the church are one body, We are connected to our head, which is Christ. Should bring us great comfort knowing that truth. Biblical Doctrine does a great job explaining this when it says,

“The imagery of the body is unique in illustrating the relationship between Christ and the church. God created the human body as a marvelously complex organism…As an interdependent and unified whole, it cannot function if divided into parts. Likewise, the body of Christ is a unified whole. There are many religious organizations and functions, but only the church is the body of Christ, of which every true believer in Christ is a member. The Lord Jesus can be no more separated from his church than a head can be separated from its body.”

Therefore, in Christ we are united in this one body, and God has placed you here to glorify Him and edify one another. So, what we see within this metaphor is unity and relationship all for the Glory of Christ. Thinking of all these metaphors, how the Scriptures describe the church. As professing believers we should long to be part of a local body just as much as we long for the pure milk of the word. And it has nothing to do with a physical building or denomination, but with a body of believers, called out ones, gathering together. That’s what the author of Hebrews exhorts to his readers in Hebrews 10:24-25,

let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds,
not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

We gather together, to spur one another on, to encourage each other day after day in order for us not to be hardened by eh deceitfulness of sin, (Heb 3:12). I love what Charles Spurgeon says regarding the church, and he really destroys the misconceptions of what we’ve defined the church to be in our day and culture, he says,

“The church is not formed to be a social club, to produce society for itself; the church is not to be a political association, to be a power in politics; it’s not even to be a religious confederacy, promoting its own opinions: it is a body, created of the Lord, to answer His own ends and purposes, and it exists for nothing else!”

So, if the Lord builds His church for his own ends and His own purposes, and we exist for nothing else. What then does the church do?

P3: The Doings of the Church (What does the church do)

We’ll look at three general areas regarding the purpose of the Church.

First the Church Worships God

The first questions in the Westminster shorter catechism is “What is the chief end of man? To glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Therefore, the Church’s primary role is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Wayne Grudem in his systematic theology states, “Worship in the Church is not merely a preparation for something else: it is in itself fulfilling the major purpose of the Church with reference to its Lord.” The worshiping of God is not just singing, something we label as “worship”, worship is everything the Christian does, therefore singing is merely a small part of worship. Worshipping God is the attitude and motivation for all things. The church is called to be separated from the World, and it starts with our worship of God, we either worship Him or the creation, as Romans 1 states.

Next the Church is to edify believers

The edification of the believer is through their maturity in Christ That’s what Paul proclaimed to the Colossians in Col. 1:28, “We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ,” And to the Ephesians he says something similar, Eph. 4:11-13,

And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.

The maturity of the believer is the end of the Great Commission (Matt. 28:19), which is discipleship, which is training in godly living and sound doctrine. Grudem states again, “It is clearly contrary to the New Testament pattern to think that our only goal with people is to bring them to initial saving faith.” We are disciple makers, yes, giving the gospel, praying for salvation, but it does not stop there, we strive to make every person complete in Christ! As Jesus said, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you (Matt 28:20). So, the church worships God, then edifies the saints, and lastly, we evangelize the lost.

Evangelizes the Lost

Peter Sammons, wrote, “The Christian Church has one work which it will never do again. The Church will always glorify God, even while in heaven, and the Church will one day be in complete maturity, completely edified in glory, but the one action which the Church will only do on earth is to evangelize the lost.” Therefore, we heed the words of Paul in Col 4:5 “Conduct yourselves with wisdom toward outsiders, making the most of the opportunity.” (we pray for opportunities? They are all around us, we need to pray for boldness). The church is called to live that they will establish the credibility of the Christian faith and make the most of every evangelistic opportunity.

So, we worship God, edify each other and evangelize the lost. That’s what we do, because that’s what Jesus told his followers to do. Be my witnesses, as you worship me, and encourage and edify each other, others will see and you will be given the opportunities to proclaim the gospel to a lost and dying world, first in Jerusalem, then in Judea and Samaria, then to the ends of the world. And we sit here today because of that faithfulness. So, as we leave today I pray we have a greater appreciation for the church. That we’ll not forsake our assembling together, that we will use our giftings to worship and glorify the Lord, and build up one another, but that we will go out and proclaim the gospel to this lost and dying world. I pray that is the vision for each of us here at EBC.