"Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In Him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in Him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit. For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles- Surely you have heard about the administration of God's grace that was given to me for you, that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly. In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to men in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God's holy apostles and prophets. This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Jesus Christ. I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God's grace given to me through the working of His power. Although I am less than least of all God's people, this grace was given to me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages was kept hidden in God, who created all things. His intent was that now, through the Church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to His eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord". (Ephesians 2:19-3:11)
The above text from Ephesians clearly shows the missional aspect of spreading the good news, which Paul was called to spread to the Gentiles, and therefore the church would be established to make known to "manifold wisdom of God". Through that passage many things are made clear:
-The church is not a building, but rather the people being built and raised together
-The mystery of the gospel was the Gentiles becoming heirs with Israel concerning
the promises of God
- The calling of the church is to make known the wisdom of God, which is explainable and full of richness
- All of the wisdom and calling of the church comes through the eternal purpose of God through Jesus Christ
As missional people, set on fire with the gospel and love for others in our heart we become the church. As I read recently, it is not that the church has a mission, rather the mission has a church that makes all things possible (as illustrated through Ephesians 3).
We read about the church having it’s beginnings in the book of Acts, after the crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ. The Apostles are the sent ones to make the Church come to fruition by spreading the gospel to both Israel and the Gentiles. The Apostles go out and truly make it clear that the gospel is what many are searching for as they see thousands of people come to the saving knowledge and grace of Jesus Christ.
"Where the church is faithful to its Lord, there the powers of the Kingdom are present and people begin to ask questions to which the Gospel is the answer" -Lesslie Newbigin
St. Francis of Assisi once made the following statement:
"Preach the gospel, when necessary, use words"
I will admit up front, I see the importance of the proclaimed gospel (Romans 10), yet Francis' words ring a bell. Are we living the gospel? As the quote above by Lesslie Newbigin makes clear if we are living faithfully to our calling people will begin to ask the questions that allow for us to clearly explain the gospel in their context. How serious to do show your life to be about making disciples of Jesus Christ?
There is no doubt when we read about the early church and get a glimpse of what the church looked like in the first century we get a clear understanding of the body of Christ at work. Similarly we notice the same thing happening in the underground church in China. It is said that before the wide spread persecutions of Diocletian and other Roman leaders happened in the early Church there were about 25,000 Christians, but as the persecutions became widespread there was in increase in discipleship and by 310 A.D. there was about 20,000,000 Christians. Similarly in the persecuted underground Church in China before the persecutions of Mao Tse Tung and the Communist Party there were about 2 million Christians, yet after Mao's reign it was recorded that the discipleship during the persecutions between 1949 to 1979 rose to 60 million.
Imagine what that might look like in your location? What are we missing? Might I say..persecution. We are living as the missional people of the underground church who are extremely missional to the point that they won't even buy housing because they know they will soon be persecuted and probably lose their home because they see the importance of spreading the gospel and making disciples for Jesus Christ.
Today, in America we must turn and ask- is this what Jesus meant for his movement? It seems we are a far ways away from the discipleship/ missional attitude of the early church and even our persecuted brethren in other countries today. We face a crisis of regurgitated Christians going up for alter calls every Sunday, a lack of knowledge and substance concerning the glorious good news of Jesus Christ (half the time I don't even understand what is good about the "American- Christian" gospel), and we have lost sight of the freedom loving truth that made the New Covenant. It is so much easier for us to cuddle in our church buildings sing songs, learn some verses in the Bible, and feel religious because we don't do "the bad things the world does". A great study done by Gabe Lyons and some of his associates has proven that American Christianity has become the antithesis of what Christianity was in the first century, and ultimate what Jesus Christ wanted for His body.
So...what do we do?
Well as the body of Christ who is making known the wisdom of God we must first examine ourselves and see if we are truly of the faith. Look into the mirror of Scripture and the law of liberty given to us by the grace of God. As Alan Hirsch makes clear in many of his missional books (The Forgotten Ways, Untamed: Missional Discipleship, and ReJesus) we must vandalize our portraits of Jesus. As my lovely lady, Quanti, would say- "Where do you get your Jesus from"? We must re-introduce ourselves to the Jesus Christ of the Gospels and get rid of our faulty views.
We must see to truly become what the biblical church was. This will require breaking down our current constructs, looking at our social atmosphere, and truly being missional.
"A church which pitches its tent without constantly looking our for new horizons, which does not continually strike camp, is being untrue to its calling...We must play down our longing for certainty, accept what is risky, and live improvisation and experiment"-Hans Kung, The Church as the People of God
As the individuals who make up the body, called the Church we can begin with ourselves (oh..you thought this was going to be easy?).
"A great deal more failure is the result of an excess of caution than of bold experiment with new ideas. The frontiers of the kingdom of God were never advanced by men and women of caution"- J. Oswald Sanders
Let us begin to be courageous, bold, and zealous members of the body of Christ. A friend of mine has the church motto of:
"We exist to glorify God by pursuing and sharing our joy through the knowledge of Him".
I have always loved that statement because that is exactly it. If we understand why we exist everything we do will fall in line with that exact purpose. Are you pursuing and sharing? If we took that attitude about everything we did, just imagine what could happen? We need that primal energy!!
"The church is called to be a dynamic movement rather than a static institution...its leadership is drawn from those one the front line of the expansion of the church" –Alan Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways
If we take the above to quotes serious that would mean alot of Christians would be not counted among the membership and many of those calling themselves leaders would have a serious demotion. Our apathetic attitude coupled with passivity in matters of church leadership, evangelism, discipleship, and studying the Word of God has put us at odds with true Biblical Christianity. Consider Paul when he wrote to the Romans:
"I am obligated to both the Greeks and non-Greeks, both to the wise and to the foolish. That is why I am so eager to preach the gospel also to you who are at Rome. I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile (Romans 1:14-16)".
We must see the apostle Paul as the standard of what it means to be a Christian, one who is obligated, eager, and unashamed of spreading the gospel. In this..there can be no if, and, or buts.
"If passion is eliminated, faith no longer exists"- Soren Kierkegaard
The standard of faith is passion, it brings us to the James controversy- faith versus works. Simply put, your works (your passion) will be the outpouring of your works. At The Fellowship C.H.U.R.C.H. (the church I pastor) we pride ourselves on doing everything with passion, to the point that our membership papers say:
If you don't have passion, don't bother.
With the premise that our works, our passion, our outpouring will be the natural result of our faith, what can be said of the person with no passion? Makes clear the quote above by Sorek Kierkegaard, doesn't it? Well then...let that be the challenge- a challenge of having passion for God and the Gospel because it is impossible to please God without God ( Hebrews 11:6).
The church needs or rather boldly we can say is composed of believers who are living missionally in spreading the gospel. It is a two way street, without the passionate missional disciples there is no Church, and without the Church there is no missional discipleship. That my friends is the purpose of the church- we are the unit by which God makes manifest His will on Earth. We must stay plugged in, accountable to, and working toward Spiritual disciplines in the Church.
Our purpose? "Go , and....(Matthew 28:19-20)
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