Re (1): when is a church not a church?

Jean,

It has taken me some time to get to your post this week, not because I have not been interested in responding, but simply because I have been caught up in the foray of life. :) Concerning your question, I would agree with you at least on one crucial point: any church that does not invite the active participation of the Holy Spirit—the third person of the Trinity—is not going to have much power to back it up. However, I do not necessarily think that the way the Spirit manifests is always going to be the same for every occasion. We read that God is a God of order and we know that for everything He does there is a reason and a season: nothing is wasted in God’s economy. While the fruit of the Spirit—“love, joy, peace, patience, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, fidelity, meekness, self-control: against such things there is no law” (Galatians 5)—should always be manifest, the gifts of the Spirit are given as the need arises. I think we need to look at the Bible as a whole when it comes to evaluating the quality of our churches, but if there was a mandate found in a single group of verses I would personally ascribe to the true church, it would be along the lines of Colossians 3:12-16:

Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.

Do you notice how it says “But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection”? Love is the unifying element, the bond that holds all other things together in harmony and balance, the perfect system of checks and balances manifest in the Trinity and found in the midst of all true believers. From love springs the proper perspective for all else that we do: we speak truth in love, we admonish in love, we correct in love, we instruct in love, as long as we do what we do out of a heart of love, even the harshest things become acts of love. If, however, all the other fruit of the Spirit is not bound together by love; if the various gifts of the Spirit (such as those described in the second chapter of Acts as you suggest and flushed out more thoroughly in 1 Corinthians 12-14) do not flow out this heart of love—then, as 1 Corinthians 13 acknowledges, they are worthless.

So to me, I would emphasize the fruit of the Spirit over the gifts of the Spirit, for the gifts mean very little if the heart is not in the right place. Again, it is possible in the economy of God that the heart is in the right place, but the season is one of waiting, in which case the gifts would not be needful while the fruit would still be ripe and abundant. In any case, it is the Lord that not only brings the harvest, but it is He who makes the seed to be planted, causing it to spring forth from the soil of the soul. We are the clay: He is the potter; our job is merely to yield, His is to shape. The true church is the church who waits upon the Lord and knows the sound of the Gentle Shepherd’s voice. This may or may not resemble the second chapter of Acts in all its particulars, though it will resemble the early church in that those on the outside frequently exclaimed: “See how they love one another.” It will resemble the early church in that they communed with one another in each other’s homes and were joyful before the Lord, pooling their resources out of love for the collective good of all. This is a picture of the true church.

“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. “You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. “No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. “You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. “These things I command you, that you love one another. (John 15:11-17)

Indeed, He is the Vine, we—the true church and body of Christ—are His branches. The world will know us by our love; any gifts we might possess beyond this are only secondary to the thing that binds all else together. Beyond this, all gifts are meaningless if we fail to acknowledge their Giver.

God bless,
Eric

• Re(2): when is a church not a church? - By linda March 2, 2003 at 08:37:44 PM