They come in all sizes – a dozen people gathering in a storefront chapel to thousands thronging a cathedral sized edifice. They have differing missions: some feed the hungry, some teach the young, some reach out to seekers, some supporting many world-wide missions. Their practices vary widely from very formal to extremely casual, from holding to ancient tradition to cutting edge innovation, from highly ritualized to free form. They are led by young and old, black and white, educated and uneducated. Yes, I am talking about the Church.
Bill Hybels, pastor of Willow Creek Church in Barrington, Ill, writes: “I believe that there is nothing like the local church when it is working right. …Its beauty is indescribable. Its power is breathtaking. Its potential is unlimited. It comforts the grieving and heals the broken in the context of community. It builds bridges to seekers and offers truth to the confused. It provides resources for those in need and opens its arms to the forgotten, the downtrodden, the disillusioned. It breaks the chains of addictions, frees the oppressed, and offers belonging to the marginalized of this world. Whatever the capacity for human suffering, the church has a greater capacity for healing and wholeness… Still to this day, the potential of the local church is almost more than I can grasp. No other organization on earth is like the church. Nothing even comes close.”
The church I am privileged to lead will have her annual meeting this coming Sunday. The various ministries will report on their activities and financial reports will be presented. Reading over those reports in advance, I began to weep with joy, giving thanks for the people that serve Jesus at the Assembly. What I saw was miraculous, evidence of God’s Spirit at work in ordinary circumstances. Washington Assembly is not a large church, nor is she rich, but the breadth of her reach is amazing! On any given week, she is touching hundreds of people- feeding families, providing education to children in her Christian school, inviting people to experience the Presence of God in worship, reaching into local prisons with hope, training boys and girls in faith, and counseling the confused- just to mention a few things. It is not professional staff members doing this work. A volunteer network that includes dozens of faithful men and women makes this possible!
Are you part of a local congregation? It is the place where God will most effectively use you in His work, the place where the gifts of the Spirit He’s invested in you are brought to full fruitfulness and matured. "The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t." (1 Corinthians 12:25, The Message) Christians cannot function as God intends without being ‘in the Body.’ Yet, many dismiss the church as unnecessary in disobedience to the Bible’s clear teaching. Others show a real lack of respect for the church by allowing other activities to pull them away from regular attendance, by putting other lesser commitments in the place of their commitment to worship and service. Again the Scripture is so clear that the Believer must give the highest priority to being part of the Body. "Think of ways to encourage one another to outbursts of love and good deeds. And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back again is drawing near." (Hebrews 10:24-25, NLT)
I’ve heard many people criticize their church and/or their pastor – sometimes reasonably, often unfairly. It is true that some churches do ‘church’ better than others. Some leaders are more effective and mature in the Lord than others. But, becoming a critic, a person who works towards the destruction of a church, is a terrible thing. That person is attacking what God loves! Yes, indeed! The Church, which includes local congregations, is His Bride. He doesn’t take lightly those who come against her, those who dismiss her, and those who cause her pain. In Ephesians 5, we learn that “Christ’s love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness.” If He gives her such love, how can we so easily attack, criticize, dismiss, and destroy her?
I know why many tear up the church, both those who lead and those on the other side of the pulpit. Selfishness- that’s it, pure and simple. The moment any person says, “I’ll have my way here,” the Enemy of God steps in to fan the flames! Pastors who see their church as a vehicle to meet their needs, as a place to find ego gratification, as belonging to them- will become abusive shepherds who tear down the church they are called to love. Congregants who think that the church exists to make them happy and/or to conform exclusively to their expectations will fight, squabble, and hinder the pure work of God. All must remind themselves, again and again -- The Church belongs to God, to serve His purposes.
Church – you need her, I need her! Let’s love her, give ourselves to make her great. Let’s raise our level of commitment to her, allowing nothing – not hobbies, not family gatherings, not work nor play - to become more important than being part of her, week by week. Let’s pray for her to succeed, to be a place where the Light of Christ shines brightly in a very dark world.____________________________
A Glorious Church
Do you hear them coming brother,
Thronging up the steeps of light,
Clad in glorious shining garments,
Blood washed garments pure and white?
Do you hear the stirring anthems
Filling all the earth and sky?
'Tis a grand, victorious army,
Lift its banner up on high!
'Tis a glorious church,
Without spot or wrinkle,
Washed in the blood of the Lamb! -- Ralph Hudson
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