Imagine in your church a young man struggling with pornography and a couple whose marriage is reeling. How does the gospel honor these relationships? According to the Bible, a healthy church, a supernatural community of redeemed believers living together in committed love, should be the normal, biblical way to change and transform lives.
I would like to focus on the benefits, blessings, and responsibilities that come when we commit to the local church and why we should want to be part of these ‘exciting communities’.
- I want to persuade you that you will biblically be able to further honor the gospel by joining a healthy church to show your love in a committed way: love for the unbelievers.
- For Christians.
- For church leaders.
- And for God.
As we saw in the previous message, Paul teaches in Ephesians 3 that God demonstrates his wisdom to the world through the church. So, in practice, how does Paul apply this truth?It says in Ephesians 4. 1: “Wherefore, I pray you, imprisoned in the Lord, to walk in a way worthy of the vocation to which you have been called. “And then, in verses 15 and 16, the Apostle shows how we should live. like a church to be formed and the church built to walk in a dignified way.
See what God’s doing? Through the power of the gospel, the Lord builds a new society to show its glory. The foundation is not our work, but the work of Christ on the cross; However, the results are the good works of the body of Christ: evangelization, discipularity and the many commandments to one another.
My point is that the gospel creates an evangelical order, the Church, that protects and promotes the gospel; and membership provides the necessary structure for this evangelical order to take shape. Membership gives form, substance, and form to the body of the church, allowing the Word of God and the gospel to act in our messy lives.
This is how we honor the gospel in our local churches. I want to give you four reasons for love to join a church.
When Christians join a church and faithfully live the Word of God, they collectively help clarify to non-believers what Christianity really is. This clearly shows who is really Christian and who is not and allows a clear light to shine in the dark.
There are many practical reasons for this second reason. I want to highlight three:
God never wanted his children to live alone. Hebrews 3. 12-13: “Be careful, brethren, that none of you have a wicked heart of disbelief that diverts you from the living God; on the contrary, exhort each other every day, during the time called today, so that none of you will harden by the deception of sin.
By justifying ourselves to a church, we say that we cannot live christian life alone and that we need the help of other Christians, and that means we will only be accountable if people know who we are and are not willing to help.
One implication of this is that the church is made up of Christians who are willing to hold one another accountable, engage with each other, and, if necessary, discipline a member in sin without repenting. Let us remember that sin flourishes in darkness and dries. when unearthed (1 John 1. 9).
The aim is to create a culture in which we learn to give and receive pious encouragement (not flattery) and to give and receive constructive criticisms (not rude and destructive).
Weak and strong Christians need each other. Is it better to be trapped in the midst of the Lord’s flock than to be alone?Even if you think that’s going to diminish. If you know your heart, you’ll know how likely your heart is to wander. Also consider that God’s plan is to slow down so you can walk alongside others and help them move faster.
Older men and women are called to encourage and train young Christians (Tt 2) and young people are called to love older Christians Did God bring us together in one body and order us to take care of each other?Heb 10:24?25: “Let us also consider one another, to encourage us to love and good works. Let us not stop joining, as is the custom of some; rather, let’s make warnings and especially when they see the day coming. “. ?
In 1 Corinthians 12-14, we have the most extensive teaching in Scripture on spiritual gifts, and Paul clearly teaches that such gifts are given by God to share responsibility in the church and edify one another.
Some churches claim to have thousands of members, but only a small percentage attend Sunday services. What happened to the other members? Other churches, on the other hand, have several regular members who do not become members and submit to the authority of the church. For church leaders, this is a matter of concern, as they will be accountable to all the people whom God has placed. (He 13:17). How will you know who will be responsible for care and leadership if members do not attend church regularly or if people refuse to join the church?
The book of Acts shows that it was the Lord who added people to the church. Acts 9 shows that Jesus considers that pursuing his church is chasing himself. Christ refers as clearly and closely to the congregation of Damascus as “I”. the church is the body of Christ and that God bought his church with his own blood. Thus, when we love the Church, we love the same body of Christ, we love the Lord Himself.
Here are the four reasons and benefits of joining a local church: love for the unbelievers, Christians, church leaders, and ultimately God. This vision of the church is both stimulating and comforting. It’s a challenge because we have a biblical responsibility to take on. take care of others. But it’s comforting, because we know we’ll be taken care of too. My prayer is that you will clearly see how to honor the gospel through the local church.