How About It, Church?

It’s funny what you remember about your upbringing.
I was taught to always look people in the eye when I talked to them.
I was told to always write thank you notes in a timely fashion.
I was reminded to always use the appropriate title when addressing someone.

That person worked very hard to acquire that title, my mother told me over and over.
If the person was a doctor, I was to address him as such.
If the person was a policeman, I was to address him as, Officer.
Sir or ma’am was required when I was not sure of the person’s title.

There would always be the “mom look” if I had forgotten.
Much of that training has been incorporated into my adult life.
Much of that same training was part of what my children learned as well.
It is a matter of respect, my mother would say.

I thought of her words as I sat in church with my daughter.
My daughter was becoming a member of the church she will attend when she gets married.
I went to the service to share that special day with her.
It was good to see the congregation she will be a part of and listen to the pastor.

As the pastor preached, he applied God’s words to our lives.
He spoke about being a disciple of Jesus and about making disciples.
As he preached, he kept addressing the congregation.
He kept calling the people the same thing over and over.

It was one word that encompassed so much meaning.
He addressed the congregation as Church.
I loved when he did that.
I thought of all the work that went into that title yet none of it was ours.

The work that was done to secure that important title was done by Jesus alone.
No work on our part could merit that title.
In fact, in the minds of many people, church is simply a building.
That couldn’t be more wrong.

Mark Dever said it best in his book, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church.

…church is a thoroughly Christian word. Church does not fundamentally mean a building; only in the secondary sense is it that. The building is simply a place where the church meets – thus the New England Puritan name for the church building was “meeting house…” According to the New Testament, the church is primarily a body of people who profess and give evidence that they have been saved by God’s grace, for His glory alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone…A church is a local body of people committed to Christ, to regularly assemble and have His Word preached and obeyed, including Christ’s commands to baptize and to celebrate the Lord’s Supper.

When the pastor addressed all of us as Church, he was saying so much more.
He was identifying us with the risen Lord Jesus who bought us with a price.
Jesus paid the price with His life when He died on the cross and then rose three days later.
To be called the Church is to be wonderfully reminded of who we are.

Have we forgotten?
Have we stopped identifying ourselves with the Risen Lord Jesus?
Have we become more about the building and not about the identity we have in Christ?
Have we lived up to the name we have been given?

I remember reading something that someone wrote about the church building.
Churches should not have names; they should only have addresses.
I have pondered that statement often.
What if that was the reality?

Since the correct use of the word Church means the body of believers, an address is fine.
An address would let you know where the Church was meeting.
Nothing in the name would set one church building apart from another.
Christ must be central, the Gospel must be preached, and the Lord’s Supper must be celebrated.

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of the bread, and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. (Acts 2:42-47)

Churches have become more like a business with a marketing strategy to increase numbers.
If only we would remember that it is God who does the growing.
If only we remember that Church is the people and not the building.
Church is about the believers who gather together in Jesus’ name.

The modern day Church looks more like the world than like Christ.
There is very little to distinguish it from the world.
Nonbelievers find it very hard to see the difference.
The Church has become weak as it gets farther away from its Center.

Holy Father, protect them by the power of Your name – the name You gave Me – so that they may be one as We are one…I have given them Your Word and the world has hated them, for they are not of this world any more than I am of this world. My prayer is not that You take them out of this world but that You protect them from the evil one, they are not of this world, even as I am not of it. Sanctify them by the truth; Your Word is truth. (John 17:11,14-17)

Do we profess and give evidence that we have been saved by God’s grace?
One of the last things Jesus prayed in the upper room was that His disciples would be one.
How are we doing?
Do we know and believe that God’s Word is truth?

Does the world see a difference in us because we are believers?
Are we more interested in expanding our buildings than growing His Church?
Does the world know to Whom we belong?
Does the world hate us because we belong to Him?

My mother would have loved the title of Church the pastor gave us as he preached.
Someone worked very hard for that title.
That someone was not us.
That Someone was the Lord Jesus.

How about it, Church, how are we doing?
Are we one as Jesus and His Father are one?
Does Jesus define us?
With the Holy Spirit’s help, we will again live up to that name.