What Is the Church?
EPHESIANS 5
25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.
We are currently living through a revolution that is on par with any other revolution, perhaps surpassing any other revolution we have ever been through in human history.
It has been called many things, the age of information, the fourth industrial revolution, or the digital age, all culminating in the rise of artificial intelligence and machine learning.
But most of us are at a time in this revolution when what we are experiencing is the manipulation of massive amounts of information, all being interpreted in a kaleidoscope of different ways, leading to vastly different conclusions about what is right and good. Everyone is accusing the other side of disinformation. We find ourselves in uncharted territory.
We are collectively lost.
When we have more information at our fingertips than ever before in all of history combined, what is being called for isn't more knowledge, it is more wisdom. And wisdom only comes from God.
As a culture we have placed great faith in science. Science has tremendous utility at helping us to understand, broadly speaking, what is. It is intended, through observation, hypothesizing, and experimentation, to help us understand the natural world. While science is very well suited for helping us to understand what is, it is a very poor instrument for helping us to understand what ought to be. It cannot explain transcendent truths, only physical truths. This is why religion and theology are the pinnacle of all knowledge, only by those vehicles can we discover eternal truths.
We’ve just finished up a series explaining the reality that we can’t see God’s truth clearly for a number of reasons. And while God has given us heavenly abilities through the various administrations of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer and in the life of the church, that still doesn’t answer the burning question. How do we know what is right?
It is no solution to simply quip the easy answer, “the bible, duh!”
Since the time of the Reformation credited to Martin Luther in the 1500s, more than 45,000 Christian denominations have formed globally. All of those denominations represent differences of opinion from various so called authorities on what is the correct interpretation of scripture. So simply saying “the bible” is not a satisfactory answer at all. At the end of the day, the question isn’t just “what is right,” but “who is right about what is right?”
Here is another common glib response to this question you will always hear from the easy answer guy, “well everyone in the church gets some things right, and everyone gets some things wrong. That’s why we need everyone to get the full picture of God’s truth”.
While this type of statement isn’t totally misleading, it isn’t clear either. Because not everyone in the body of Christ is right and wrong in equal proportions. Some groups are more right, and some more wrong than others. And those differences are very important to highlight as a positive testimony of God’s goodness and then to also root out and condemn for being a mischaracterization of God’s witness to the world.
So what is the true church? Let’s start with our working definition of the church from our confession of faith as Methodists:
“We believe the Christian Church is the community of all true believers under the Lordship of Christ. We believe it is one, holy, apostolic and catholic. It is the redemptive fellowship in which the Word of God is preached by men divinely called, and the sacraments are duly administered according to Christ's own appointment. Under the discipline of the Holy Spirit the Church exists for the maintenance of worship, the edification of believers and the redemption of the world”
When we use the word “catholic”, it refers to not needing to become a Jew to become a Christian. You don’t need to become an American or ascribe to capitalism or democracy to be a Christian. It means the church does not discriminate it’s membership based upon race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, class, or any other such litmus test. The only requirement for membership is belief in the biblical testimony about the person of Jesus Christ. You can’t believe in the Da Vinci Code Jesus or the Mormon Jesus and be baptized into the body of Christ, you must profess faith in the Jesus revealed in scripture.
But we still haven’t answered the question. Since most Christian churches profess faith in this Jesus and can lay claim to the same definition of the church as us, why aren’t we one? And if we aren’t one, who is the most right?
Let’s take a look at the three leading churches in the United States currently. These are the churches that define success and that set the tone for what other churches, regardless of denomination, aspire to be (obviously this isn’t true for all churches but I would argue for most churches):
1. Lakewood Church in Houston
With over 43,500 weekly visitors led by pastor Joel Osteen. Enough said.
2. Northpoint Community Church in the greater Atlanta Georgia area
“Earlier this year, Stanley brought controversy when he argued in a sermon that the Christian faith must be "unhitched" from the Old Testament. He claimed that "Peter, James, Paul elected to unhitch the Christian faith from their Jewish scriptures, and my friends, we must as well."1
He also says things like this:
"The invitation is to follow Jesus. That's it. The invitation is not to believe something...this was [Jesus's] invitation before they even believed, before they knew anything about Jesus."2
3 Lifechurch, headquartered in Edmond, Ok with campuses across the United States
“Life.Church, in Oklahoma, has about 30,000 weekly visitors. According to the church, they reach ten times that number, about 300,000 people, online every week.”3
As we are on the heels of the greatest celebration of America’s number one religion, football and the super bowl, Lifechurch is currently in a sermon series called 30 second theology. Theology of what you might ask? The gospel of Romans maybe, might be your guess? But no, how boring, you’re such a loser. It’s based upon the most popular super bowl commercials! Invite your friends!!!
Here is the teaser for the sermon series from their website:
“The Super Bowl is coming, and that means the biggest ads of the year are almost here. During 30-Second Theology, we’ll watch popular commercials in church, and Pastor Craig will use lessons from those ads to teach us more about God and the life He wants for us.
Plus, we’ll have fun and games for your whole family—including your kids!”4
Churches everywhere are getting in on the fun! In keeping with the example of churches like Lifechurch, here is how another mega church in Ohio is celebrating Jesus (but mainly football) in fun ways!
Is this as depressing as it seems? Or am I getting old and becoming the church curmudgeon? I’m open to that. But my better senses tell me we’ve got to do better than this. And we’d better get this thing called the church figured out real quick before it’s too late.
Think that’s being overly dramatic?
LUKE 18:8 Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
https://albertmohler.com/2018/08/10/getting-unhitched-old-testament-andy-stanley-aims-heresy
https://www.stephenjbedard.com/2022/11/24/is-andy-stanley-a-heretic-again/
https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/30-biggest-american-megachurches-ranked/29/
https://www.life.church/30secondtheology/