God has instituted the church so that we can collectively learn of Him. This daily devotional review what the church is and isn’t.
Devotions in the Self-Discipline Review series
All year, we’ve been looking at self-discipline. We looked at self-discipline as the operational plan for self-control because it talked about improvement.
We are reviewing everything and hopefully putting all of the building blocks together. What I am doing is going through all of the devotions for the year and pulling out the nuggets.
I am formatting this as a glossary page. If I already have one, I will combine them later.
Jesus is the head of the body. His church makes up the body. The church must be unified as the human body is.
Each disciple has been assigned a job to do — someone to whom they should witness. If we do not do our jobs, the body does not grow as it should.
We are all doing the same work — witnessing — but in different ways. I may witness through my songs and these words. You may have someone over to your house.
The message is still the same — ABCD.
We can only accomplish the work that God has given us to do. He has equipped us only with the skills we need (Are Spiritual Gifts Different?).
What Is Church?
The church is the group of believers who together worship God and Jesus Christ and work to proclaim His gospel and make disciples.
- The living and the dead who believe in Jesus are His church (The Life and Death Matter of Worship).
- Being a member of God’s church is about praising our Creator. We are to live our lives so that we imitate Him. We are to submit to His sovereignty (Design of the Temple).
- The early church was formed by Jews who had converted to Christianity. The Gentiles were then taken into the fellowship. The Gentiles did not start the church and incorporate the Jews (Is Election Really Mercy?).
- We are called to obey God’s Will — actively obey. If it says love, we have to love. If it says honor the sabbath, we attend church. If it says don’t lie, we don’t lie (God Teaches Us Obedience).
- The church is to be the salt. We are supposed to be the moral influence on society to show them how to be preserved, purified, and nourished (Getting Along with Others).
- If we look at how God set up his church, we see that He set it up based on giving. We should find the areas in our church where there are needs and try to meet those needs as God directs (Collecting for Others).
- For years, we have been saying that church is more than just a building. Now in this pandemic, we have seen the church bust out of those doors. The church is the people — wherever we are at (Putting Feet to the Plan of Salvation).
- Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane when He was arrested. All of the disciples except Judas were with Him. Trouble came — they were gone. Yeah, Peter tried to defend Jesus. In the end, though, all of the disciples ran away. How in the world was God going to build a church with these chickens? I mean, their resumes weren’t stellar. They had limited to no education. They only reached the bar mitzvah stage. They weren’t priest material. What most of them were was fishermen. Back in the day, that was considered a menial job. But these ordinary men did change the world. How did that happen? They received a gift. These men had the strength of faith to go from being obscure, unknown, common men to the leaders of the new church. But Jesus didn’t change them in a twinkling of an eye in order to facilitate the building of His church (The Gift of the Holy Spirit; Design of the Temple; What Is Missions?).
- It doesn’t matter who we are, where we live, what we look like, what job we have. If Christ is in us, we are part of the church and are perfect (The Perfection of the Church).
- Now, Paul’s directions for Titus in Titus 1: 7 were for church leaders. However, when we are witnessing to someone, they are seeing us as a church official. So, it would do us well to consider these as expectations for us (Expectations of a Steward).
- Even after we become believers, the way is unchanging. We grow our relationships with Him by seeking Him. Yes, that means we have to read our Bibles. We have to pray. We have to attend church services (What Is Truth?).
- Mankind may be elected, but that does not automatically make them the elect. The elect is God’s church — those who have admitted they are separated from Him, believe Jesus is our Savior and Redeemer, and confessed God as Sovereign Lord (Who Can Learn God’s Truth?).
- The church was not formed in the Garden of Eden. It was only formed after the Garden of Gethsemane and Calvary (Does God Really Call Us to Give Up Everything?).
What Church Isn’t
On the surface, everything looked hunky-dory at Ephesus. They looked like a good, solid church. They were loyal so they stuck. They didn’t compromise and let the worldview creep into their lives. They evaluated what they were told to see if the teller was a false teacher. They caught those who were. They faced and went through the trials and came out the other side without it wrecking them. The problem was with church at Ephesus is that they had fallen out of love with Jesus (How Do We Lose Our First Love?).
On the outside, they looked fine. They still had their programs going. They still were there every time the church doors were opened. But it wasn’t enough. What were they doing? Were they just going through the motions? Were they doing it grudgingly, even if they were loyal? Were they compromising with the worldview in their hearts by questioning God’s laws and commandments? The Ephesians could have been doing things for the wrong reasons. They could have been sliding toward the worldview (How Do We Lose Our First Love?).
Going and sitting in church on Sunday morning isn’t going to do much for us if all we do is listen. Pastor Chad, Pastor Tim, and Pastor John can preach bang up sermons. If we don’t compare what they are saying to how we live our lives, it is just words. If we don’t change where we see we are falling short, it is just words. God is in the business of change (Worshiping God the Right Way).
It isn’t enough just to say there is a God. It isn’t enough to plug into a ritual of a church. We have to become godly through the process of sanctification (Godliness as a Virtue).
We love and show reverence to God by following His laws and commandments. What trips us up is we think doing God’s Will is more personal. What career am I going to have? Who am I going to marry? Where am I going to church? Oh, yeah. God wants to be God of the little stuff, too. Sorry, that is little stuff to Him. Think spiritual, not physical. What do the laws and commandments tell us — what the character of God is. God isn’t as interested in what we do as He is who we are — and Whose we are. We will do as we are (Godliness as a Virtue).
The man with the withered hand (Mt. 12: 9-14) wasn’t saved because he went to church that morning. He was saved because he interacted with the Savior. He talked with Him, listened to Him, and did what He told Him to do (How Do We Keep the Sabbath?).
The perfect church is not focusing on our needs and desires. We don’t look to our biases and opinions. We focus on God. We need to focus on our spiritual life, not our physical life (The Perfection of the Church).
The unity of the church is essential. If the body is the church, baptism changed them — and us — all into one body. That baptism into one body by the Spirit brings us unity through one Lord. God wants His church to be unified and at peace. He is the God of peace, isn’t He? If we aren’t at peace, what kind of witness are we giving? (The Perfection of the Church; Are Spiritual Gifts Different?; Focus on Love, not Evil).
Does the church need to do a better job of being less judgmental? Yes. Does it have to condone others breaking God’s laws and commandments? No (God’s Adopted Church).
It would be easy to say that there should be no controversies. There should be no division within the church. Ooo, baby. Not going to happen. We have to know how God wants us to work through the controversies (The Council Has Spoken).
At first glance it may seem cold that Paul would say to not burden the church with widow care. If we don’t love and support our family, we are saying that the God’s doctrines aren’t true. His love is not true. The Trinity is not true, because that is about family. I can see Paul not wanting to take the focus off of the spiritual needs. We can’t take our eyes off God to focus on this world. We have to focus on Him (In Support of Widows).
We don’t want to be like the Roman church. It was zealous, but they were not living as God wanted them to live (Barr). We want to be living on God’s Truth. Our worship cannot be like the Jews. They didn’t have zeal. It isn’t about religion and ceremony. It is about strengthening our relationships with God. We need to change our characters to be like Him (How Else Do We Worship God?).
See Also
Father. We want to be Your church. We want to be the body with Jesus as the head. We want to be utilizing the church You have created to learn grow in grace and knowledge of You. Amen.
What do you think?
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