The Church: God's Design and Purpose

I'm going to ask as many as that will come and pray at the altar today as we start this new year. You have prayer requests in your worship folder, you have personal needs, maybe there's stuff going on in your life that you need to simply just turn over to God. And I would like for the church today, say it with me, we are the church. Do it again, we are the church. I'd like for the church today to pray for this body of believers. This will be a defining year for First Southern Baptist Church as you begin to search and look for a coming pastor. We cannot, we must not enter into this lightly and certainly we cannot leave out prayer. So I'm going to ask as many that will, will come to this altar and pray with me and pray for this church as we pray for the coming year and for God's man to be the pastor of this church. Now if you don't feel led to come to this altar, that's okay. I just think it's a great place to pray. But as we start this new year, pray for whatever God's laid on your heart, but above all, let's pray as God leads us to a new pastor. So come and join me for a few moments in prayer. Dear Father, we come today and we let you know that we are a church and that we do want to come and worship you. Lord, we're not perfect. We've let you down many times. We've let each other down many times, but father, there is a spirit here that cannot be denied. We are your church. So we pray father, with all earnesty that you lead us and you guide us through 19 or 2016 and Lord, I want to thank you for Keith coming and his family being part of our, our membership here, our, our, our fellowship, Lord, I just want to lift him up as he delivers a message today. May we find grace and pleasure in what we offer you today. In Jesus precious name, I pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Debbie. Isn't that a good way to start the year? No better way than to open up our hearts and prayer to a God who hears us, who listens to us, who loves us, who cares deeply about us, and he cares about this church. You know, I've been going to church since I was a kid. And as long as I can remember, my mother took me to small Baptist churches in a little town called Clearview, Texas, outside of Borger, Texas, if you know where that is, come see me. But anyway, uh, we might, but anyway, it's a, it's a little, you know, it's all my life. I've been influenced by Baptist thinking, to be honest with you. And although as I've grown up and I've studied other religions and I've studied other denominations, I understand what a lot of other churches believe. And today we want to talk about what we believe about the church. Uh, as we begin, I want us to look at what we as Baptist teach about the church. Let's go ahead and go to the next screen there if we can. And there's, there's two screens here that I want us to read. The first one talks about, and this is the Baptist faith and message that was affirmed by, uh, the Southern Baptist convention in the year 2000. And so this is a, a document of faith, if you will. Uh, but it says some important things about the new Testament church. First of all, the new Testament church of the Lord Jesus Christ is an autonomous local congregation of baptized believers associated by covenant in the faith and fellowship of the gospel, observing the two ordinance of Christ governed by his laws, exercising the gifts, rights, and privilege invested in them by his word and seeking to extend the gospel to the ends of the earth. Each congregation operates on the Lordship of Christ through democratic processes and such a congregation. Each member is responsible and accountable to Christ as Lord. It's scriptural officers are pastors and deacons. While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to the men as qualified by scripture. Now this next part is the one I want you to hear. The new Testament speaks also of the church as the body of Christ, which includes all of the redeemed of all the ages, believers from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. I would be remissed if I were to say that Baptists are the only ones that make up the church. What we believe is that all believers, all those who've come to Christ, are the church. Paul believed that. He talked about the church of Corinth, and I'm going to be reading from that passage in just a moment. And 1 Corinthians is going to just read one verse as he gives a brief description of what the church is. And we're going to explore that just for a few moments this morning. But the church of Corinth wasn't perfect. Have you ever had one of those moments where you think everything is going just right in your life? When we moved here over 10 years ago, it was finally move-in day. I'd been living here for over a month in a fifth wheel trailer, and I was ready for my wife to be here with me. We had finally found the house that God had led us to. We loved our house, had some pretty good neighbors, Cliff and Kathy Burt. They just lived down the street from us. And so we were excited to get into the home. And as we moved in, the movers were moving everything in, and I had a Christian mover that was moving us. And he decided he would help me out a little bit, and he would hook up my washer and dryer. In the process, he was taking off some old hoses, and he not only took the hoses off, he took off the water valve, and water began to go everywhere. Now, you need to understand, I was new to this house. I didn't know where the turn-off valves were in this house. I do now, but I didn't then. And we were running everywhere. It looked like the three stooges just slipping and sliding, and water was going everywhere. And what I thought was going to be a perfect day after a month and a half of not being able to sleep in my own bed, I thought I was finally going to get to sleep in my own bed. And we finally turned the water off, and we couldn't get a plumber out that day. I think it was a Saturday. And so we had to go stay somewhere else that night. I can't remember where we stayed, but we had to stay somewhere else because we didn't have any running water, and we were both hot, stinky, and didn't smell well. We needed a shower, okay? So we found another place to stay. The perfect day turned into one of those, Houston, we have a problem. Well, that's kind of what happened with the church at Corinth. God established this church. It was a wonderful group of people, but they had a problem. They had failed in some theological issues that they had in scripture studies. They had some sexual immorality issues that they had to address. And Paul addresses those in the book of Corinthians. But yet they were God's people. They were the church. They were an imperfect group. But God used that church at Corinth to be able to expand and to reach others for Christ. So we'll get into that in just a moment. Before we do, let's have a word of prayer as we talk about the church. Father, thank you for this time. As we look at these passages of scripture for a few moments, may you just guide our thinking and our direction, Father, in a very positive way about being what you've called us to be, the church. In Jesus' name, amen. First Corinthians chapter 1, verse 2. After the regular salutation that Paul gives in verse 1, he gives this in verse 2. The church of God that is in Corinth. To those sanctified in Christ Jesus, call to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours. A couple of things. Actually, there's four points this morning. Very quick. The first point is simply this, is that the church was designed and established by God. Did you notice there in that very first phrase? The church of God in Corinth. Now, that's not the denomination, the church of God down the street. This is the church that God had established and had started through Paul and through other missionaries. This was the church that God had established and started in this town of Corinth, this important marketplace in the world where people would come and go and hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. When I was a kid, one of the first experiences I had with church was in Powell, Oklahoma. Now, if you know where Powell, Oklahoma is, you better come see me because we might be kin. Powell, Oklahoma is a little bitty place right on the Oklahoma border of Texas and right between it is Lake Texoma. My grandmother lived about three miles from the lake and about two miles from there was her little church. Now, it was a Pentecostal church. Now, I think that song that was written called The Day that the Squirrel Went Berserk and the First Self-Righteous Church and that Sleepy Little Town of Pascalula, it was a fight for survival that broke out in revival. They were jumping pews and shouting hallelujah. I think they probably wrote that about my grandmother's church. I mean, it was a true Pentecostal church and as a kid, it scared me when I saw grandma raising her hands and dancing around like this, you know? But that was their style of worship and I still to this day remember my grandfather with his wire-rimmed glasses singing down at the cross. And Sister Hale was the preacher and she preached about hell even though her name was spelled H-A-L-E. And she would preach and she would preach and she would preach and somewhere after one o'clock, she was preaching and it was a long service. But it was that foundation that we had in our family that secured my mother enough that we would go to church and that she would see that her kids were raised in a church without squirrels. Just kidding. Fast forward a few years, about 30 or 40 years, almost 30 years ago. 30 years, fast forward 30 years. Our family moved to Houston, Texas from a small town of liberal Kansas to a town of 3 million, now over 5 million people. We joined a church, a mega church. First time we'd ever joined and been a part of a church that big in our lives. The building was set over 2,000 by itself. We ran two services. We were a little worried whether we should even join that church, but God led us to that church. Jeanette and I first got involved in Evangelism Explosion and for 13 weeks, 16 weeks, we lived in the church, our kids too. We learned how to share the gospel. We did it faithfully every week and it was a great experience. We got involved in Sunday school. We got involved in the choir. The choir was bigger than most churches in Kansas and Nebraska. There was 300 in the choir. Had a 25 orchestra piece. That was big. That was big. And yet my wife, I wasn't planning on sharing the story, but my wife shared in Sunday school today that six months after we had moved to Houston, her father suddenly passed away. Unexpected, 60 years old, passed away. And we had been engaged in this big church. There's no way we could know all 3,000 people in that church, but we knew our Sunday school class. We knew some friends. We knew some neighbors that were members of that church. And I had forgotten that when I got the phone call, my mother called me, that I had called one of our church member fans and said, can you go over and be with my wife because I can't be there. I was working downtown and I had to make my way back to the suburbs of Houston. And neighbors began to just come over from the church and from the Sunday school class and they began to help us to get ready to fly out to go to be with our family. And when we got home, there was grocery bags upon grocery bags of food waiting for us and they served us food throughout the week. You see, you grow bigger sometimes by growing smaller. Your small groups are so important. If you're not in a small group, why aren't you? Being in Sunday school is so important. Being a part of a small group because that's where some of the most important things happen. But here's what my point is. Whether it was Powell, Oklahoma or Houston, Texas, the function of the church never changes. And we're going to read about those functions in Acts chapter 2 in just a moment. But basically, that church in Powell, Oklahoma was doing the same thing that that church in Houston, Texas was doing. They were doing evangelism. They were doing discipleship. They were doing fellowship. They were doing ministry. They were doing worship. And all those things are important and they're all a part of what God has called the church to be and called the church to do. And God designed and established the church that way. He started it all the way back in the Old Testament. As we look at Abraham and we look at Sarah, God credited it to Abraham, righteousness. He called Abraham out. He said, Abraham, you will be the leader. You will. Out of your seed will come nations. And your responsibility is to share the message about Yahweh, about God, so that people will come to know me. It will be your people, your family, your nations that will spread that gospel. And then eventually, as we studied in our Sunday school lesson, the Messiah came, Jesus Christ came, and when he died and was buried and resurrected, he then came back and then he ascended to heaven and he left a responsibility to the disciples and said, now, this Holy Spirit is going to come upon you. And when that happened, the New Testament church was birthed and things began to happen. We are the bride of Christ, as the scripture uses as a metaphor. And as the bride of Christ, we are not an organization. We are a organism. It's not about programs. But it's about spiritual health of God's people. And where we are on this spiritual journey, this process of being a disciple and growing and learning what it means to be a disciple. Our book that we studied this week says, the absence of community will create a hindrance not unlike a train with a track or a car with no wheels. The identity may be in place, but there's no purpose to the existence. May I present to you this strong word. God designed and established the church for his purposes, not ours. And his purpose is that we would fulfill the great commandment and the great commission. And that, my friend, has never changed. That has never changed. It will never change. We are the church. And we are to be about fulfilling the purpose that God has called us to be. To follow the great commandment, to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, strength, to love others, and to go into all the world and make disciples. Second point this morning. Not only did God design and establish the church, the church consists of believers. It is defined by those who have been called. Look at the scripture there. It says, those who have been called to be set apart as believers. The word there is sanctified. To those sanctified in Christ Jesus. The word sanctified means to be set apart. Now, here's the thing. We can only be of the church that Christ established and started by becoming a believer in Jesus Christ. A believer, as believers, we find our significance not in our performance as preachers or singers, but we find our significance in our position within Christ. It is Christ that makes us the bride. It is Christ that makes us the body. It is Christ that makes us the church. Now, here's the sad part. You can be a believer and not be involved in the local church or not use your gifts in the universal church that Christ has established as the body of believers. But on the other hand, you can be in church and not be a part of the church. Because if you've never accepted Christ as your personal Savior, you're not a part of the body of Christ. Therefore, you're not of the church. That may be a hard teaching, but it's the truth of the gospel. And when we teach the truth of the gospel of Christ, we need to be courageous with preaching and teaching the truth of God's Word. And we must come unto Jesus to know and to be a part of that. The bride idea has been around for a long time, even in the Old Testament. Testament in Isaiah chapter 62 and verse 5, it says, For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your sons marry you. And as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you. The New Testament Church is depicted as the Bride of Christ. And in the book of Revelation, Jesus is going to come back and claim His Bride, the Church. And then at that point, we'll know who the Body of Christ is because we will be with Him. It all begins by knowing Him as personal Savior. And then I promised you that we would read Acts chapter 2, and I want to read verses 42 through 47. We've read other verses all morning long from this passage of Scripture, but this talks about those five functions of the Church. They're all within this text. Most of them are in this text. And so let's begin in Acts chapter 2, verse 42. It says, And they devoted themselves to the apostles, to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. The discipleship, fellowship, worship are all right in there. And all came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed, hear that word, all who believed, that means all who had faith in Jesus, were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and their belongings and they were distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. That's ministry. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with gladness and generous hearts. Praising God, that is worship, and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. That is evangelism. That's the Church. That's what you and I are a part of. That's why we are here. That's why we exist as the body of believers who believe in Jesus Christ. We're here for a common purpose and a common goal. So God established and designated the Church for His purpose. Only believers consist of the Church. And the third thing is the Church then pursues holiness. Notice in that scripture it says, called to be saints together. That word saints, if you look at it in the Greek, is the same word for holy, for holiness. To all those who are pursuing holiness, the Church. Folks, if you're a believer in Christ, you are a body of believers, you are, say it with me, we are the Church. If we are the Church, we ought to be pursuing holiness on a daily basis. Now, what's the result of pursuing holiness? Well, we demonstrate the love of Christ. When we are living holy lives, people can't help but see Christ and the love of Christ in us. In 1 Peter chapter 1, Peter, this one that was called, who saw Jesus and when Jesus asked him, Peter, who do you say I am? You, you are the Messiah. You are the Son of God. And Jesus said, Peter, you get it. You got it. And Peter, upon you, I will build my church. And he became one of the most influential starters of church movement, the new age, the church movement, the church age that began with Pentecost. And in chapter 1 of 1 Peter, verse 16 and 17, he quotes an Old Testament scripture. He says, just as you have been holy, I am holy, you must be holy. As God says, just as I am holy, you must be holy. And so it becomes our call in life to pursue holiness. But later on, down in that chapter, Peter writes in verse 22, having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, since you have been born again, not of a perishable seed, but of imperishable through the living and abiding word of God. Man, there's some great promises in that text right there. Number one, because we are living that purified life, because we are pursuing holiness, we are to demonstrate love by our obedience to the truth of the gospel. We are courageous in our preaching the gospel. We are to be compassionate, I mean truly compassionate, just as the New Testament church was. As they saw a need, they did whatever they had to because they loved one another and things were different. And our compassion doesn't drive us to be selfish. Our compassion doesn't drive us to be wealthier than everybody in the world. Our compassion causes us to love people the way Jesus loved people, to love each other earnestly. That leads us to my last point real quick this morning. If we honestly have this passion, compassion, which then drives us to being a great commission church, if love is our driving force, how in the world can we have disunity in the local church? It happens, it happened to the church at Corinth, didn't it? If you've studied the book of Corinthians, you know that there was some disunity in that body. Theological, morals, just some hard issues that were going on that they needed to address. And they needed to get back to this fundamental principle that they love one another. Now, we are an imperfect people, but the church needs to be united in its purpose. We need to remember why God has called us to be the church. It's not confined to walls or buildings, not confined to pastor or teachers, it's the church, it's you and me. And when we surround ourselves with God's people, we need one another. We cannot do it alone. We find strength, we find grace when one of us may be falling down or one of us may be having a tough time in our life. We need to surround one another, we need to pray for one another. It takes all of us, folks, and when I say all of us, I'm not talking about just us as Baptists. It takes all of us to do the kingdom work. God has called all of us. We may have some denominational interpretive differences, but let me tell you, most of my evangelical friends in the church world, they believe this and we have this in common that Jesus Christ is the one who died on the cross. Jesus Christ is the one that atones for our sins. Jesus Christ is coming again someday to take us all home. And those core values will always bring people to Christ. It takes all of us here in this community to reach great bend for Christ. I believe that with all my heart. You know, some time ago I was working with the church and I was working with the committee and there was an agreement, a covenant agreement among the committee that there would be an element of confidentiality. And I broke that confidentiality and I didn't intend to, but I said something to someone that got back to the chair of that committee and he called me as he should have. He said, Keith, we signed this agreement that everybody would be confidential about what we are doing. And he pointed out my error and my first inclination, you know what it was? I'll be honest. It was to lie about it. Well, I didn't do that. Or, well, I thought I was exempt from that covenant. That's not what I did. That's what my sinful side wanted to do. I'd already made a mistake. Here's what I did. I said, you're right. You're absolutely right. You have every right to hold me accountable and basically to correct me and to discipline me. Would you please forgive me? See, I could have got mad. I could have got angry, but that would have been disunity. That would not have been good. That would have been bad. Let me tell you, folks, God is not a God of disunity. That's Satan's work. God gives us all the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit is a God of unity. And we need to be united in our purpose. Tom Rainer, I didn't bring that book, Jeanette. There's a little book there called I'm a Church Member. There it is. Thank you. Anybody read this little book? Yeah, it's a good little book, isn't it? Now, I bring this up here because I want you to know what I'm about to read to you comes from Him and not from me, okay? And I don't really like to preach and say these kind of things because they tend to be a little negative. But I want to put a disclaimer on here. What I'm about to read to you is not about this church, okay? I don't want to give any indication that what I'm about to read to you, I'm trying to say this about this church. What I want you to do is I read these things. I want you to evaluate yourself this morning because we are the church, right? Let's say it with me. We are the church. So what I want you to do is I read these things. I want you to evaluate, okay, yeah, I'm doing good in that area. No, well, maybe I need some help in this area. But I want you to ask yourself, is there anything in any of these 10 things that I'm about to read that I might be creating some disunity within myself or within the local body of believers? Now, what they did was they took a survey, LifeWay. This is Southern Baptist entity. It has trustees from Southern Baptist churches. They have a great research team and they did a research and they were studying what were the dominant behavior patterns of members of churches that were inward focus. Because I believe if we are inward focus and not outward focus as a church, we can create disunity and we need to be unified in our purpose. So here they were. Again, internalize this, evaluate yourself as I read these things. Number one, worship wars. Worship wars. One or more factions in the church want the music just the way they like it. Any deviation is met with anger and demands for change. The order of service remains constant. Certain instruments are required while others are banned. I'm not going to comment on these because, again, these are not my words. These are his words, okay? Actually, they're the words of church members that they found in a survey. Number two, prolonged minissia meetings. The church spends an inordinate amount of time in different meetings. Most of the meetings deal with the most inconsequential items while the Great Commission and Great Commandments are rarely the topics of discussion. Number three, facility focus. The church facilitates, develops iconic status. One of the highest priorities in the church is protection and preservation of rooms, furniture, and other visible parts of the church building and grounds. Number four, program driven. Every church has a program, even if they don't admit it. But when we start doing a ministry a certain way, it takes a programmatic status. The problem is not with programs. We all have programs. The problem develops when the program becomes an end instead of a means to a greater ministry. Number five, inwardly focused budget. A disappropriate share of budget is used to meet the needs and comforts of the members instead of reaching beyond the walls of the church. Number six, inordinate demands for pastoral care. All church members deserve care and concern, especially in times of need and crisis. Problems develop, however, when church members have unreasonable expectations for even minor matters. Some members expect the pastoral staff to visit them regularly, merely because they have membership status. Number seven, attitudes of entitlement. This issue can be a catch-all for many of the points named here. The overarching attitude is one of demanding and having sense of serving special treatment. Number eight, greater concern about change than the gospel. Almost any noticeable changes in the church evoke the ire of many, but those same passions are not evident about participating in the work of the gospel to change lives. Number nine, anger and hostility. Members are consistently angry. They regularly express hostility toward the church staff and other members. Number ten, evangelistic apathy. Very few members share their faith on a regular basis, more concerned about their own needs rather than the greatest eternal needs of the world and community in which they live. In almost every one of these behaviors, church members were looking out for their own needs and their own preferences. Now, let me share with you that I am guilty of some of these. And if we're all honest, somewhere along the way, we all get a little bit, one of these. And we start being inward focused. It happened at Corinth. It happened early in the New Testament church. Peter and Paul had some words. They had some differences. It's going to happen. It's okay to disagree as long as we can still say, I love you. I care for you. And that's what happened. Even to this day, that chairman of that committee, he still tells me, I love you. And I love him right back. Because we were able to forgive. We were able to move beyond that. But when we exhibit inward focused ideals that are self-serving, it can cause this unity. Each church is made up of imperfect members. Let's admit it. It's made up of imperfect pastors. We all have made mistakes. We all have sinned. And the truth of it is, there are times we are all hypocritical. We preach one thing and then we go out and live something else through the week. Church unity is torn apart when we're unwilling to forgive. I know this is tough stuff. And I love you. And I don't like to preach these kind of tough things. But I need to preach tough things to myself sometimes. And I need to understand that God, we need to care for one another. Don't get me wrong. And let me just say this. This church does do a good job at loving and caring for people in need. And I am grateful. When Jeanette was sick a few weeks ago, folks came over and gave us some food. And without exception, almost all of you would ask me, how's Jeanette? I'm praying for her. I'm praying for her. You do some amazing, wonderful things here at this church. The church is a great church. And I love this church. But what I'm asking you to do is not to evaluate the church by these words. I'm asking you to evaluate yourself. How can you be the body of Christ and to be what God wants you to be? The church. You are the church. I am the church. Say it with me. We are the church. And I think Paul, and I close with this this morning, I think Paul describes it perfectly well what the church is to be in Colossians chapter 3 and verses 12 through 17. Paul addressing the church at Colossae. Put on then, in verse 12 of Colossians 3, put on then as God's chosen ones, the church, holy and beloved, the church, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, bearing with one another. And if one has a complaint against another, forgive each other as the Lord has forgiven you. So you also must forgive. And above all these, put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts to which you indeed were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing songs and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. That is the church. The church in action. It's not a destination. When we come here, the local congregation comes to worship our God and glorify Him. When you leave this place today, 24-7, you are to be the church. Maybe one of those 10 things you would say, I'm struggling with one of those things. And I may have created some disunity with someone in this church. Maybe today there's some anger that you've had towards someone in this church or some other church. And God is telling you, I need to seek forgiveness and I need to extend forgiveness for whatever. If God is speaking to you today, how are you going to respond? Are you going to be the church? I hope so. Father, thank you for this word. Thank you for speaking to my heart, Father, because I have failed you. And I want to be your servant, Father. And I want to be the church, the body of Christ. I want to be His hands, His feet, His voice. I want to show the love of Jesus Christ to others. Help me to be faithful to do that. Help me to be strong to do that, Father. And Father, whatever you're saying to these folks today, Father, I pray that it is truly you saying it, not me saying it, that they hear from you and that they respond to you, Father. For it's in your name, the name of Jesus I pray. Amen. We have a time of invitation. The invitation is a time for you to respond. If God has spoken to you, if the Holy Spirit has spoken to you, if you have a desire to Prompted your heart and you need someone to pray with we would invite you to come and pray if you've never accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Savior We invite you to come and we would be able to lead you on how to do that if you need to come to for any other reason you come But above all be obedient and respond accordingly to what God's telling you to do Let's stand and we sing our song of invitation You gotta Do it Follow the よし Yes, or jesus Oh Jesus Thank you for being here today, we're gonna close with a song in just a moment, but the invitation is never closed People will understand if I don't shake their hands out here If you need someone to pray with or you need to visit with me Please come and see me out here and I'll be glad to spend time with you praying with you talking with you God bless you. May you have a great day