Doctrine: What is the Church? (Part 2b)

As we progress in our understanding of what the church is, we will now continue to break down the definition that I gave in part 1b.  Here we will discuss the 2nd part of the definition which reads… 

“…diversified and unified by their spiritual gifts, committed to the ‘proclamation of the Scriptures,’ daily being obedient to the Great Commission set forth by Christ…”

Diversified and unified.  The common local church today is one color .  We have white churches here and black churches there.  We have spanish speaking churches.  We have high class/white collar churches.  This is not the way the church is supposed to look according to Scripture.  The church I currently attend and serve at is all white.  I don’t know if we have one black member at our campus (we are a multi-campus congregation).  This is not say that we do not reach out to our surrounding community and strive for a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic congregation, but the reality is, I’ve only seen a handful of black people visit on Sunday morning.  Scripture repeatedly points us to a multi-ethnic congregation around the throne in the New Heavens and Earth.  A people of every tribe, tongue, and nation will inhabit Heaven.  Why don’t our churches look like this now (this is a rhetorical question)?  Churches should strive for a diversity of ethnicity as we live between the ‘already/not yet’ unity of being one in Christ Jesus.

by their spiritual gifts.  I realize that the definition reads “diversified and unified by their spiritual gifts” and I just ranted above about the fusion of every tribe, tongue, and nation into one local church.  And now I digress… every person adopted by the Father through the blood of Jesus into the family of Jesus has a spiritual gift set that works to serve, edify, and build up the body of Christ (see 1 Corinthian 12).  I would encourage all Christians to serve in their local body.  It is only through serving in your local body and having Titus 2 relationships that men and women can come to learn what their gifts are.  

committed to the proclamation of the Scriptures.  I will state that this is the most important mark of the church.  The church does not exist without the preaching of the Word of God.  Romans 10:17 says, “faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”  It is crucial to understand that the church is preluded by Scripture.  The church is built on the Bible and not the other way around.  We must be a generation that is committed to the proclamation of King Jesus.  We must preach with boldness and love.  We must have a high view of preaching!

daily being obedient to the Great Commission set forth by Christ.  There is a fantastic biblical movement taking place right now known as the missional movement.  In this movement, local churches are placing an extremely high emphasis on teaching their people to be missionaries where they are at in life (i.e., work place, grocery store, playground, friendships, neighborhoods, etc.).  It is crucial that this generation of Christians must see themselves as missionaries in their cultures.  Local churches must also be the primary sending agencies of missionaries to foreign contexts.  It is not enough to simply rely on mission organizations.  We must daily be obedient to the Great Commission set forth by Jesus in Matthew 28.  We must have a high view of evangelism and discipleship.  We must be a Great Commission people.  We must have Great Commission local churches.