The Church Her Members

Okay, today's study. We're starting a whole new series on the Church. So as you see, there's one, two, three, four, five, six sessions on the Church. Roger was mentioning, when he called me the other day, about maybe condensing this or whatever. And I said, I'll look at it, but not Not this week. So anyhow, we may do something along those lines. But nevertheless, we're going to cover the church and her members. So let me ask this question. When you think of church, what do you think of? What's the first thing that comes to your mind when you think of church? When you think of the church, what's the first thing that comes to your mind?

People. People? Okay. Let me ask it this way. What do most people think when you talk about church? Building. Building, right? I mean, our frame of reference, most people's frame of reference is when they think of church, you think about a building. And what's interesting is, in scripture, it's never used, to my knowledge, in terms of a building.

But that's the way we think of church, and it would be neat if we could change the frame of reference of man in terms of what the church is. So we're going to look at today, in terms of how church is used. What's interesting is this. There's a secular meaning for church, and it never refers to people. And it doesn't even refer to a building.

But in the secular meaning, the word church or ekklesia in the Greek, and now I'm only looking at the Greek word, I'm not looking at the Hebrew word for church or assembly, but looking at the Greek word, it refers to a formal meeting of a political assembly. And it's used that way in the New Testament. Would you turn to Acts chapter 19, and just somebody tell me in Acts chapter 19, in their translation is it used as church or assembly. But just let me give you a quick background on chapter 19, the book of Acts. Paul was preaching and what was happening is that people were turning from idols to the Lord Jesus Christ. And so therefore they weren't buying idols anymore.

And all the craftsmen who were producing all of these idols got together and saying, hey, our business is in jeopardy. So they grabbed a couple of disciples and were going to put them up on trial. And they came together in this assembly to accuse them. And so as you look at verse 32 in Acts chapter 19, says, Some therefore cried one thing. This is this assembly now. And these merchants gathered together all these people. So, some therefore cried one thing and some another, for the church, or the assembly, was confused. Who has NIV or New American Standard? I haven't looked in either of the two. How is it translated? Assembly or church? that the assembly, or the ecclesia, was confused, and the more part knew not wherefore they were come together.

Then as you get down to verse 39, someone gets up and says, hey, but if you inquire anything concerning, this is interesting, this is King James, this must be the old King James, I took this out of the computer program. But if you inquire anything concerning other matters, it shall be determined in a lawful assembly and in a lawful meeting. And this meeting that these merchants pulled together was not a lawful ecclesia or a lawful church.

So you see how this word is used in the secular sense. always meant this way, as a lawful assembly. And then as you go down to verse 40 and 41, when he had thus spoken, he dismissed the assembly. He dismissed the meeting. So, it never refers to people in the secular sense.

Now, when you get to the New Testament, The New Testament meaning, there are two basic uses in the New Testament. The church, the ekklesia, called out ones, and that's what the word ekklesia means. The word is broken down. Ek is a preposition, means out, and klesia is to call. So it's to call out or called out ones. That's what the church is, called out once. So it's used two ways, as a living organism of all believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, in other words, the body of Christ.

So if we take a look, and you don't need to turn there, I'm trying to go through this very rapidly, if you take a look in terms of Ephesians chapter 1 and these passages of scripture where it talks about the church, that talking about the Lord Jesus Christ and have put all things in Ephesians 1.22 he's put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over all things to the church to the called out ones to his body in verse 23 which explains that which the church which is his body the fullness of him that filleth all so the church the called out ones the ekklesia who we are members of, we are the fullness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that a wonderful thing to be? In Hebrews 12, verse 23, it says, "...to the General Assembly and Church of the Firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect."

It's talking about the church of the firstborn. The church of the firstborn, the prototokos, the unique one, talking about the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the unique one. We are the church or the body of the unique one, the Lord Jesus Christ. And in Ephesians, 523, it talks about the Lord Jesus Christ being the head of this body, the head of the Church. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the Church, and He is the Savior of the body. So that where a man is the spiritual head of his family, so Christ is the head of the Church, of His body, they call that one.

Colossians 1.18 says that He, the Lord Jesus Christ, is the head of the body of the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He might have preeminence. So again, the head of the body, the head of this organism, is the Lord Jesus Christ.

If we go through here, you've got questions just Raise your hand. Then, as you go through Scripture, it's interesting. As you go through this Word on church, and you take a concordance, and just go through all of the passages on the church, you see that there are differences. And so, in some of the words where equality is used, You see that it's talking about a local or organized church, like this church.

Holly Hills Bible Church is a local, organized church. In some cases, it refers to a singular group, like singular groups which met in people's homes, and they were called the church. A singular group meeting here in this building although the building is not called the church, but we are the church. We are this singular group. Now the interesting thing is, notice this, that church as it's used in the New Testament is called out once.

Referring to who? People? People. In the secular meaning, it never referred to people, but the meaning changed as it was used in Scripture, in terms of ekklesia, and it always refers to people. So it's a singular group, meaning in a house or, as I say, at Holly Hill Bible Church, and as you look at some of the passages in Scripture, You can see that, like in 1 Corinthians, you don't have to turn here, 1619, it says, the churches of Asia salute you, Aquila and Priscilla salute you much in the Lord with the church that is in their house. Notice that? So it was a group of people meeting in a house.

In Colossians 4.15, it says, Salute the brethren which are in Laodicea, and Memphis, and the church which is in his house." So they had churches in the house. Then it also, the word church, ecclesia, refers to several different groups in a city or locale.

So that as you look at that, like in 1 Corinthians 4.17, it says For this cause, I have sent you Timothy, who is my beloved son, and faithful in the Lord, who shall bring you into remembrance of my ways, which being Christ's, I teach everywhere in every church." So it's talking about churches in a locale, as Paul was teaching. And in 1 Corinthians 11-16, but if any man seemed to be contentious, we have no such no such custom, neither the churches of God." Talking about the churches in a particular locale or area.

And then Galatia, which is up in Asia Minor, where Paul went, and he says in Galatians 1-2, "...and all the brethren which are with me unto the churches of Galatia." So the word church then is used for several different churches in locale. Okay, so much for the meaning of the word church. What I'd like to do now is take a look, and what I thought we should do is, number one, understand what the word church means. when the New Testament talks about church, what does it mean? Then I thought what we'd do is take an overview look in terms of the word church. So what I tried to do here is present an overview in terms of church. So let me just do this first.

Let me go through the timeline. The timeline starts at creation, and this particular timeline ends at the rapture. And I've put down the next event after creation. I've got the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ coming to the world as flesh, and then showing Christ's earthly ministry, which ended at his ascension, when he was taken up, which was 40 days after his resurrection. Then, 10 days after the ascension, which is the day of Pentecost, so from the day of Pentecost until the rapture, we have what is called the Church Age. Following the Day of Pentecost, notice that I put in here a little transition period, because there was a transition period in the first early part of the Church. Now let me go to the events. So that's the timeline. Let me go through the events. So there's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight events that I have on this chart, or eight particular things I want to talk about.

Number one, when it talks about the Church, as you look in Ephesians 1-4, it says that we were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, and we are the Church. So, at least in the Lord's mind, He had the Church in mind before the foundation of the But the interesting thing is this, that as you go through the Old Testament, from the book of Genesis all the way through, you will never find the word church. You'll never see it. That is, you'll never see the church as the organism of the body of Christ. You'll never see any mention of the word church.

Somebody turn to Ephesians 5.32 and read that.

Ephesians 5.32 tells us why. Okay.

In the King James, it says this, this is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church. Question, what's a mystery? When you see the word mystery in the New Testament, what do you think of when you see the word mystery? Something mysterious? Okay, something hidden or unknown. It always means something that has never been revealed. It's been kept under covers, under cover, it's been kept a secret. And so the church was a mystery, or it was a secret, or never revealed before in the Old Testament.

Turn to Matthew chapter 16, verse 18. Because now, towards the end of the ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ, this is the first time, the first time ever, that the church is revealed. Look at verse 17. It says, Let's do it in the context. So let me start at verse 13, just to put all this in context.

When Jesus came into the borders of Caesarea Philippi, he asked the disciples, saying, Who do men say that I am? Who do men say I, the Son of Man, am? And they said, well, some say that you are John the Baptist, some say you're Elijah, others Jeremiah. or one of the prophets. He said unto them, But who do you say I am?

And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ. Thou art the Messiah. Thou art the one that was promised in the Old Testament. That's who you are, the Son of the living God. And so, here's Christ's response to Peter. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed it unto you, but my Father who is in heaven." So the only way Peter knew who Christ was is that it was revealed to him by God. And so in verse 18, here's what Christ says to Peter.

And I say unto thee, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church. The gates of Hades shall not prevail against it." First time the word church is used. And God says, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church. Is the church built on Peter? I mean, isn't that what it says? It says this. It says, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church. Isn't that what it says?

Okay. Two different words. So, all of us will be taking Creek. The Creek class will be learning this. It says, Thou art Petras. Thou art Petras. A little rock. And upon this rock, that uses a feminine form now, upon this rock, Petra, I will build my church. So, who is the Lord Jesus talking about? Who is this rock? Himself. That He was the rock. That He was the foundation of the church.

So, first time the church is ever revealed. the end of his earthly ministry. So then Christ died on the cross, was buried, resurrected, and he ascended. Now, before his ascension, I want you to turn to Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. And this is before he was ascended. I'm trying to think where should I start. Well, let's start at verse 4. And being assembled together with them, here's the Lord Jesus Christ being assembled with all the disciples.

He commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which says he, you have heard from me." And the promise that he's talking about is back in John, he's talking about the promise of the comfort of coming. Because back in John he says, I'm going to leave you." And they said, no, we don't want you to leave us. He says, if I don't leave you, then the Holy Spirit or the Comforter is not going to come. But when the Holy Spirit comes, he's going to do three things. He's going to convict the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, and of sin because they believe not in me, etc. So the Lord Jesus Christ, just before the cross, promised the the coming of the Holy Spirit.

So he's talking to them here in Acts chapter 1, just before he ascended, that they are to wait in Jerusalem for that promise of the Father. Then in verse 5, he says, for John truly baptized in water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. And the not many days from now was the 10 days between the Ascension and Pentecost. And then in verse 6, When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father hath put in his own power.

And then in verse 8 he says, and this is a passage of scripture that everybody has memorized, I think, but you shall receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

Okay, so he says, when the Holy Spirit has come, not many days from now, on the day of you shall receive power, the very power that it took to raise the Word of Jesus Christ from the dead, which is a dunamis power, which is a power far surpasses any power that anybody could imagine or think of. As you go through this word for this dunamis power, it is a power greater than I think it took for the world to create the heavens and the earth, to raise Jesus Christ from the dead. It is an incredible power. And he says, you will receive that power.

And so let's look at chapter 2, the fulfillment of what the Lord Jesus Christ said. So in Acts chapter 2, And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, like a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all of the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." Now, notice that this power that they received on the day of Pentecost was a power where These people who were gathered there could speak in other tongues. Were the other tongues unknown tongues? Were the other tongues what you hear today? The tongues that you hear today? The tongues movement?

I told you about the story when I was sitting in a restaurant here not long ago and there was a fellow sitting at a table across from me and a couple of guys sitting next to him. And this fellow didn't know this group of guys who were sitting next to him.

And he started speaking to them. And he said, and then he asked them, he says, do you know what I just said to you? And these guys said, we don't have a clue. And he says, well, I was speaking to you in tongues. And here's what I was saying to you. And I'm listening to this guy, and I'm saying, whoa. What did you hear? I heard a bunch of gobbledygook.

And then I was watching this guy. And he had his Bible. And he was looking in his Bible. And he must have had a cheat sheet with all of these different tongues or sayings in different languages. And all he was doing is repeating these words. And he was saying, well, I was saying to you this and this. And so he was trying to convince them that he had this power to speak in other tongues. Now, the word tongues there. is not an unknown tongue, but these are known tongues. These are known languages. In fact, the best translation of that word is language.

Because everyone assembled in Jerusalem, they were there for this feast of Pentecost. They were there from all parts of the world. And these people from all parts of the world heard the gospel in their own language. from these people, these disciples, who were born and raised and lived in and never traveled, probably, to any other part of the world. And so people were amazed.

How could they be able to speak our language? And we can understand what they're saying. So there's never There's, in Scripture, in the New Testament, anything about an unknown tongue that is gobbledygook. It's talking about languages, always talking about understandable languages. Okay, they had the power to speak those languages.

Now, what I find interesting is this, that here comes the start of the Church, And it starts on the day of Pentecost. And Pentecost was a day of celebration. It was 50 days after the Passover and it was a time when a celebration of the harvest and celebrating the first fruits of the harvest. And I find that to be interesting in terms of the firstfruits. It's a day of joy. It's a day of firstfruits, the ripened of a crop.

And so here we have, on the day of Pentecost, the firstfruits of the Lord Jesus Christ, those who trust and believe in him. And so that was the start of the church. Now, there are people, there are teachers, that do not believe that the church started on the day of Pentecost. They will tell you that the church started sometime after the day of Pentecost.

And they fall into different groups. They are called ultra-dispensationalists. And ultra-dispensationalists teach that the church started sometime after the day of Pentecost. There are what are called the moderate ultra-dispensationalists. They believe, well, one group of the moderates believe that it started in Acts chapter 9.

Acts chapter 9 is when Paul became a believer, when he was on the road to Damascus. They felt that that was the start of the church. Reason? Because all of the revelation concerning the church was given to who? Paul. the totality of the revelation given about the church was given to Paul. So they say, well it's logical that if the total revelation was given to Paul and Paul became a believer in Acts 9, that's when the church started. Then there are others that believe, in the moderate camp, that it started in Acts chapter 13. And Acts chapter 13 was the first missionary journey of Paul and Paul going out with the So they feel that that's when the church started. Then there are others. This is the extreme group of ultra-dispensationalists that say, no, the church didn't start until Acts chapter 28, at the end of Acts chapter 28. And at the end of Acts chapter 28, Paul is in Rome.

He's under house arrest. And he's talking to the Jews. And he's talking to them about the gospel. He's talking to them about the Lord Jesus Christ. And many of these Jews reject Christ. And Paul says, and he quotes from the Old Testament, in terms of how difficult it is for them to hear. And he says, now God is going to turn to the Gentiles. And so because these interpreters say, well, now God is turning to the Gentiles, and that's the start of the church.

But there's a thing that happened several years ago when I was teaching here. I don't know, I guess I was teaching a prophecy or something, and I was talking about prophetic events and talking about the church and the church starting at the day of Pentecost, and someone came up to me and said, don't you understand the church didn't start in the day of Pentecost?" I said, really? When did it start? Well, it started sometime after. Well, when? Well, it was sometime after.

I said, well, that's hard for me to understand because the Apostle Paul, in his declaration to when he was before the different trials that he went under, and he appeared before Agrippa and all those guys, and Felix. And one thing that he continually says is that he persecuted the church. So, hold it. Paul becomes a believer in Acts chapter 9. So I told this fellow, Paul becomes a believer in Acts chapter 9. He says that he had before then persecuted the church before Acts chapter 9. So the church, in Paul's mind, had to exist before Acts chapter 9.

In fact, on the day of Pentecost. And so the answer came back from this fellow. He says, oh, well, there were two churches. See, there was a church on the day of Pentecost, and then another church. Well, so this is where ultra-dispensationalists are coming from. and to go through Scripture and just reading it to decipher two churches in the New Testament, it's beyond me. I can't do it. Okay. So much for the start of the church. There is a transition period after the start of the church.

So you find that as people are going out and proclaiming the Gospel and asking, have you received the Holy Spirit? And people would say, no, have you been baptized in Christ? No, I've been baptized in John's baptism, and I never heard of the baptism of Christ. And so the Gospel then was shared with these people. But they were believers. So there was this transition period here. So that on the day of Pentecost, all of those who believed in God didn't necessarily understand the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So there was this transition period here. But as I said before, from Pentecost to the Rapture is the Church Age. And just looking at, in terms of what's happening in the church age, and I've tried to summarize it in two squares here.

Number one, Christ is building his church. He's doing it numerically, and he's doing it spiritually, so that as you go through the book of Acts, and the gospel is being proclaimed, you'll see statements saying that many were added to the church that day. And so what it's talking about, the adding to the church that day, it's talking about numerically. But then as you get into Paul's epistles, you see that Christ's focus is is not only on numbers, not only on people coming to Christ, but the focus of the Lord Jesus Christ is to grow spiritually.

So, building his church spiritually. And so, in Ephesians chapter 4, he gives apostles and he gives teachers for the edification of the saints. for the building up of the saints. And not only that, is that we are to edify each other. So we are a body of believers to be built up spiritually, edifying, building each other up spiritually.

So that's Christ's purpose for the church. Now the church's ministry, is, as I've summarized it, is the forming of Christ in the lives of his people. So that as a teacher, as a pastor, a teacher, the Lord, Ephesians chapter 4, appoints pastors, teachers. And for that ministry, in terms of forming the Lord Jesus Christ in every believer.

Romans 8.29 summarizes it by saying that God's purpose is to conform us to the very image of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Let me ask you a question. What is our part in that? God's purpose is to conform us to the very image of the Lord Jesus Christ. And how does that happen? What's our part in that? What's the process? So you have God's purpose. He wants to conform us to the image of Christ. He wants to share the very glory of the Lord Jesus Christ with us.

Okay, to believe, all right. So, each one of us here believe. Does that cause us to grow? Okay, continually trust, so we continually trust In every situation in our life, every trial that comes in, we trust the Lord. We say, Lord, I have no control, this is yours. We really trust the Lord in that. Does that cause us to grow? Is that forming Christ in us?

Okay, why don't you read 2 Corinthians 3.18.

Okay, so here's the process that we would all unveil face, beholding as in the mirror. And the mirror is what? We behold in the mirror the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, who He is. And as we do that, We are being transformed into His very same image from glory to glory, from one state of glory to ever-increasing states of glory as we behold Him in this mirror. What's the mirror that we're beholding Him in?

And Crystal's holding up her Bible, the Word of God. It's the only It's the only vehicle that we have to know the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, to be transformed into that image. So as we study Scripture, as we behold Christ in the Word of God, we are being ever transformed from glory to glory.

That's the process. So why do we focus on the Word in this place? That's the Lord's focus, because that's the only way that His purpose is going to be accomplished in terms of Christ being formed in us. Okay, so that's the Church Age. Now, we're going to go through some more detail in all of this, but this is an overview.

At the end of the Church Age is And we've been in the study of the rapture, Christ coming in the clouds in 1 Thessalonians 4, coming in the clouds for his saints, and we had a whole chapter on that, Christ coming for his saints. And the interesting thing is, turn, if you will, to Ephesians chapter 5. in terms of what happens when he comes for his church. Ephesians chapter 5. We start at verse 25.

It says, Husbands, love your wives even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. that he might sanctify, and sanctify means what? Set apart, that he might set apart and cleanse it with the washing of the water by the word. Verse 27, that he might present it, or her, to himself, a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. And so look what happens in terms of the end of the church age, is that Christ will present every one of us to himself, holy, spotless, without blame.

And we'll see him as he is. and we'll be just like him and spend eternity with him, fellowshipping. I don't want to say every day because there's no time, but we'll be fellowshipping with him for all eternity. And Scripture teaches us that we'll be continually learning about him. What does that tell you is that if we're going to be ever learning about Him for all eternity, what does that tell you about the Word of Jesus Christ? There's always more, which says that He is infinite. He is infinite. The Lord Jesus Christ is not finite. He is infinite in His glory, and we'll continually be learning about Him and His infiniteness. And there's no end. Try and comprehend that this week. I can't. I can't. Okay. That's kind of where we're going in the next five weeks, I guess. Any questions? That's close.

Our Father and our God. How thankful we are for your revelation to us about the mystery that was hidden from the foundation of the world, the church, your body, the called-out ones, and the Lord Jesus Christ. And Father, how thankful we are that we responded to the call and that we are your chosen ones. And we thank you, Father, for the one in whom we are chosen. And we thank you for his love for us, his care for us, his grace and mercy and just infinite love towards us. We pray, Father, that as we behold Him, that your purpose would be accomplished, that He would be formed in us, that others would see Him through us and come to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. In His name we pray, with thanksgiving, Amen.