Brides, Buildings, and Motel 6's

Recently, while eating lunch with some friends, the topic of "the church looking different from the world" came up. Later that week, I received a message asking me to describe what I think looking different than the world actually looks like in practice.

When asked to summarize it, it was kind of hard.  First of all....I scanned my brain for folks that I think do look different than the world.  Honestly...I could count the ones that stand out to me on one hand.

African Reformed Baptist, Conrad Mbewe on Western Christianity:
"Western Christians have filled their lives with too many things (toys?) that have robbed them of eternal perspectives. Electronic gadgets, holidays, sports, recreation, and so on have almost become idols. Even church must be about having fun. The church has little time in the lives of its members to prepare them for eternity. There is a greater consciousness of eternity here in Africa. Perhaps it is because we have fewer toys to dull our spiritual senses and death is all around us."

Oh, what I look forward to learning from our trips to Ethiopia and I am sure the Lord will use our Ethiopian children to teach us many things from the eternal perspective.

My response to my friend was to turn the question around. "What does the world look like"? To be honest...the reason I  answered like that is because I needed to give the question some deeper thought..I needed to head to Scripture to see how I should articulate an answer that would be pleasing to the Lord. This is a subject that I struggle with a lot.  It has perhaps driven me deeper in to the Word than any other since becoming a Christian.

You see-when I picture the Church...I know enough to not picture just the building with people gathered inside that call themselves Christian.  Honestly...if that was the criteria for weighing how the Church should look different than the world...there would be nothing to work with. So-what is the Church?  The church is Christ's bride. 

Ephesians 5:27

Husbands love you wives 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 himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.

Acts 4:32-35

And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul; and not one of them claimed that anything belonging to him was his own, but all things were common property to them. And with great power the apostles were giving testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,and abundant grace was upon them all. For there was not a needy person among them, for all who were owners of houses or land would sell them and bring the proceeds of the sales and lay them at the apostles feet, and they would be distributed to each as any had need."

 

Considering this is how the early church looked....we can't even begin to compare the American church with the one found in Acts. 

 Ultimately, we need to determine what the Church is supposed to look like...because when as Americans we think church, we think "group of people who call themselves Christians who gather in a building on Sundays and do good works in the community(sometimes)". We think of a group of ladies that gather once a week with coffee and a book from Lifeway. We think of that big building on the corner that has programs for every age. This is the dead end I kept hitting when studying this question. I could not see the Church described in the Bible when I looked at the broader American concept of church. I could not see what I pictured as church looking any different than the world. In a culture where we have denominational publishing houses coining terms like "entrepreneurial church" we have a problem. In a culture where more money is spent on salaries and buildings than missions we have a problem. In a culture where companies exist to do market research and supply focus groups on how to expand or plant a church we have a problem. In a culture where we need to have super heros show up and tshirt guns going off during the service to encourage kids to come we have a problem. I don't see many folks who's lives have radically been changed for Christ. I don't see many if any folks risking life and limb to make disciples for Him. Where is the Church??

A Christian friend had this to say on the subject:

 " In the real Church people are having Church daily in their hearts and in the company of others of like mind.  In this Church environment I see people being truly saved, growing in their faith, having victory over sin, and rejoicing above the circumstances of this culture-daily."

 

Hallelujah! A picture of the Church...alive and active. Of course I didn't doubt it existed...the Lord tells us that He would build His church and not even the gates of Hell would prevail against it. I just longed to see the Church that the Bible tells us about and was having a hard time wrapping my brain around how it looks in today's culture.

 

So from here on out...I will not use the term church flippantly. When I say the word Church...it will be in the proper context. The body of TRUE believers...the Bride of Christ. Not the visible church, not the building we gather in, not the Sunday school class we attend, and not any particular ministry or program of these aformentioned groups. The Church is simply put, the body of TRUE believers.

 

This begs the question....how are you seeing/doing/living Church in your life?  Christ gave us the other members of the Body to do life together...to help us make disciples for Him...to display His love to the world. If our concept of church is skewed, how can we take this concept to the unbeliever? If our definition of church includes the unbelievers, the unconverted that visit our weekly gatherings regularly, it is an incorrect definition. How does the unbeliever that never enters these weekly gatherings see that we are doing life any differently than a moraly acceptable Junior League member who goes to a building once or twice a week for a gathering and then volunteers in the community?

 

"A true faith in Jesus Christ will not suffer us to be idle. No, it is an active, lively, restless principle; it fills the heart, so that it cannot be easy until it is doing something for Jesus Christ."

George Whitfield

 

The one thing that should immediately set us apart as the Church is our desire to share the Gospel with the unbelieving world. Our command as believers is to make disciples.This is what the Church does first and foremost. If we are not leaving that gathering on Sunday morning with that number one objective in mind....we have dropped the ball. The clearest most concise way we should look different than the world in our desire to share our hope with the world in the form of the Gospel.

 

How we live in community with other believers should also be readily evident to the unbelievers. We should stand out as "different" even "radical".  Are we "of one heart and one soul" like it tells us in Acts 4:32?  Do we gossip about other believers...do we sacrificially give to help other believers...do we live in excess...do we stress over obamacare and politics and IRAs?  Or-do we do life with other believers in a way that makes us "different". 

 

 My particular "tribe', our "living room church group" as we call ourselves,  has decided to take this calling seriously this year. We are going to attempt with the help of the Holy Spirit to be "of one heart and one soul". As we together navigate how the Church is called to live, we are going to do our best to honor the Lord and look different than the world. We gather every Sunday, share a meal, often an intimate communion, a lesson. We. Share. Life.  My prayer for my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ is this...if you have not already- find your tribe... and be the Church that the unbelievers can reconcile with the one they may read about in that Gideon Bible at the Motel 6. Give them a picture of the true Church.

 



 

Lord, when I leave this gate every day, help me to bring the Church to the world, not encourage the World in the church.