 
Toward a Healthy Church

By Tracy Robert Tyson

Smashwords Edition

(Copyright 2010)

Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1: Love

Chapter 2: Truth

Chapter 3: Prayer

Chapter 4: Holy Spirit

Chapter 5: Discipleship

Chapter 6: The Body

Chapter 7: Conclusion and Cautions
Preface

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Thank you for taking the time to think through these things with me. I trust if you are reading this, it is because you have a desire for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ to show His glory to the world. These thoughts grew out of questions in my own heart concerning the church. This book does not address everything, for there are many things almost all evangelical churches get right (the deity of Christ, the infallibility of God's Word, the resurrection, etc...) I live in America, and most of the churches I have seen and been a part of are American, so it addresses some things within our conservative evangelical American church. It is not my desire to be offensive or confrontational, but I do want to examine everything in the light of the Scriptures.

Whether I know you or not, I hope you will feel free to e-mail me with any feedback you have after reading this (thetysonfamily@gmail.com). My desire is to know the truth and faithfully follow our Lord. It is possible that I have missed some things or stated them wrongly. I know I have much to learn. Please feel free to share your thoughts with me. If I have not written gently enough or have seemed overly critical, please forgive me. I have written out of love for our Lord and His church. I have written this with the intended audience being conservative, evangelical church people.

There are some things in here you will probably agree with. There are other things many of you might not agree with. I would simply ask you to search the Scriptures to see if what I have shared is true. Some of what I am advocating is very different from the present church form. This makes me a little nervous, as the men I respect the most and have learned the most from are pastors with churches that are fairly traditional in their form. Yet, I do think I see something beyond this in the Scriptures.

I also want to say that some of the things I write about are not yet real in my own life. I have not arrived, but I am seeking these things. Particularly in the area of prayer, my life is not yet what it should be. I know that the church needs to pray more than we do, and also that I personally need to pray more than I do.

If you would like to sit down and talk through some of the concepts (by phone or in person), that would also be helpful. If you have anything that would be good to add, please let me know. Thank you for taking the time to read this. May the Lord continue to conform us to the image of His dear Son, and may He cause rivers of living water to flow from our lives into the lives of those around us who so desperately need our Savior.

Tracy
Introduction

"So for the sake of your tradition you have made void the Word of God." These words were spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ to the Pharisees nearly two millennia ago. Evangelical Christians in America today love to point our long, pious fingers at those hypocritical Pharisees. We mock them, talk about how blind they were, and label other people as Pharisees when we disagree with them. But are we ever in danger of being Pharisees ourselves? The Word of God tells us that the stories in the Old Testament were written as examples for us (1 Corinthians 10:11). The interactions between Jesus and the Pharisees were also written down as examples. While each of us would readily admit to being a sinner and say that we are only saved by God's grace, the reality is that each of us is in great danger of becoming like the Pharisees.

In retrospect, it is easy to see how wrong the Pharisees were, but it is not so easy to see where our own traditions invalidate the Word of God. It is easier to see in others. You can probably quickly list off a number of unbiblical traditions from various other denominations. But what about us? Is it possible that some of our traditions are unbiblical?

It's so easy to point our fingers at everyone else, while we dutifully recite that we live by every word of Scripture, for "all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness..." (2 Timothy 3:16) And yet while we are pointing out the speck in the eye of others, bystanders laugh at the fact that there is a plank in our own eye.

Much of American evangelical Christianity today is based more upon the traditions of men than it is on the Word of God. This is apparent to many serious observers and students of Scripture. I think that, with the best of intentions, we may have become conformed to the world and missed what God has for us. I believe that one area where evangelicals have used our traditions to make void the Word of God is in our concept of the church.

I want to be clear from the outset that this is not an attack on the church of Jesus Christ. That is in vogue in our day among emergent leaders and many young people. Popular books encourage rampant American individualism and assure us that we need to find our own path and our own way of following Jesus. But even men such as these are not teaching a new doctrine, for God spoke about such people in Jeremiah's day: "Thus says the Lord: 'Stand in the ways and see, And ask for the old paths, where the good way is, And walk in it; Then you will find rest for your souls.' But they said, 'We will not walk in it.'" (Jeremiah 6:16) Like the people in that day, many today are refusing to walk in the old paths. They know that something is wrong within the church, and yet instead of going to Scripture and seeking the Lord, they are remaking God in their own image.

Many young people today are dropping out of the church entirely. They find the church hypocritical and irrelevant and decide to follow Jesus on their own. Unfortunately, the accusations they make against the visible church in America have some merit. The only problem with dropping out of church is that the cure is worse than the disease. It is impossible to follow Jesus on your own. The Word of God shows that the local church is very important. William MacDonald is correct: "The New Testament assumes every believer to be attached to some local church; otherwise he would be free from the discipline of any assembly, and such a freedom would be fraught with the gravest perils for the individual." There is no concept, anywhere in the New Testament of a "private relationship" between a believer and God where he is not in fellowship with other believers in a local church. All believers are to be in a local church. In fact, the Word of God explicitly says that we know we have passed from death to life because we love the brethren, and he who does not love his brother abides in death (1 John 3:14). It is a great deception to think you can follow Christ and not be a part of a local church.

Elton Trueblood writes that "The best critics of anything stand on the inside. This applies to church, as well." It is only those who love the church who can help the church. All who hate, despise, or neglect the church are enemies of the One who bought the church with His own blood. The Lord Jesus Christ loves His church, He died for His church, He is in the process of purifying His church that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she will be holy and without blemish (Ephesians 5:25-27).

I am not someone standing outside the church and taking pot shots at it. The church is a beautiful thing. I myself am involved in a local church and love it. I struggle and fail in many points, and I am seeking to be more like Christ, but I have not arrived and do not have all the answers. I do have questions, and I want to take those questions to the Word of God, for I believe that the Word of God, rightly interpreted by the Holy Spirit, is sufficient and has answers to our questions.

To reiterate, the Lord Jesus Christ loves His church. It is incredibly important to be in a local church. If you are not in a local church, you are in disobedience to God's commands, and you are missing His designs for you. The Lord loves His church with a deep, abiding, unconditional love, and He calls us to love the church as well.

This does not mean that we must pretend everything is going well when it is not, but it does mean we must always be thinking, speaking, writing and praying for the church, because we love her. If we ever lose this, we are doing the work of the devil in tearing down the church for which Christ shed His blood. Let us remember that the Lord Jesus Christ ever lives to make intercession for the saints, while the devil is the accuser of the brethren. I pray that from this day forward we will always side with Christ and not with Satan in this great struggle.

You may be a good brother or sister who disagrees with some of what I have said already. I am not saying that if you do not conform to a certain church pattern, you are backslidden or apostate. Rather, I simply wish to say that, for many of us, God has more for us than we are currently experiencing. Our form hinders us from experiencing the width and length and depth and height of the love of Christ. May we long to know our Lord Jesus Christ more and become increasingly like Him.

The reason I am concerned with our church structure is not that I have an agenda to push, something to sell, or even a great desire to be proved right. The reason I am concerned is that the Lord Jesus Christ is infinitely glorious and majestic and beautiful. However, many of us go to church to worship that living God, but frankly find our time together to be boring. Such things ought not so to be, my brothers. I long to see us delivered from this deception, so that we might know and worship Christ in spirit and in truth.

I also want to acknowledge that I may be mistaken about some things. I am open to correction, and sincerely hope that some brothers will love me enough to show me my error, if I am not seeing these things correctly. When someone shows us we are wrong, they have done us a great service. I am seeking to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, as I ask what the Word of God has to say concerning church. May the Lord give me and all His children much wisdom.

Function Dictates Pattern

As you might imagine, there are many theories about what church should look like. Each purports to have strong scriptural support. To tell the truth, the New Testament simply does not say a whole lot about the pattern of the church. There are some instructions regarding the pattern. But the reason there are many different patterns of church government among serious, godly brothers today is that the pattern is not all that clear. I started studying the church thinking primarily about what the pattern should be. However a more fundamental question is: What is the function of the church? What is the church supposed to do? In the absence of clear guidelines on exactly what the pattern should be, there is some freedom in the pattern. So in order to pattern the church as the Lord would have us, the bigger question is, "What is the church supposed to do? What is it supposed to be like?" Once we know the answers to these questions, it will help us see a little more of what the pattern could be like.

Francis Schaeffer makes the same point in slightly different words:

Anything the New Testament does not command concerning church form is a freedom to be exercised under the leadership of the Holy Spirit for that particular time and place. In other words, the New Testament sets boundary conditions, but within these boundary conditions there is much freedom to meet the changes that arise both in different places and different times. I am not saying that it is wrong to add other things as the Holy Spirit so leads, but I am saying that we should not fix these things forever--changing times may change the leading of the Holy Spirit in regard to these. And certainly the historic accidents of the past (which lead to certain things being done) have no binding effect at all. It is parallel to the evangelical church being bound by middle-class mores and making them equal to God's absolutes. To do this is sin. Not being able, as times change, to change under the Holy Spirit is ugly. The same applies to church polity and practice. In a rapidly changing age like ours, an age of total upheaval like ours, to make non-absolutes absolutes guarantees both isolation and the death of the institutional, organized church.

I would add that when we speak of changing under the leading of the Holy Spirit, we know that the Spirit of God would never lead us contrary to the Word of God.

It is an interesting study to contrast the Old Testament guidelines for the worship of God with the New Testament guidelines. In the Old Testament, the guidelines are very, very specific. There are regulations concerning the color of the ephod, what the pomegranates on Aaron's robe should look like, what the hooks for the veil should be made of, etc. In the New Testament, there is not even a clear guideline to say whether we should meet in a building or outside or in a house. In the Old Testament, the priests had to wear a very specific type of clothing when they were ministering to the Lord. In the New Testament, there is not a great emphasis on what type of clothing we should wear. Provided worshippers are modest, there is a great variety of apparel which could be worn to the glory of God.

Why this great difference? The Word of God which came in the Old Testament was tied to one nation and culture. This does not mean that God did not care for other cultures. Far from it. God's design was for the Jewish nation to manifest His glory to the nations. For the most part, they were a miserable failure at this mission. Instead of being thankful that God had chosen them and seeing that God was glorious, they became proud that God had chosen them, and thought they were glorious. For a Gentile to follow God in the Old Covenant, he needed to become a proselyte. In the New Covenant, we are told to make disciples of all nations. The Gospel is not inherently tied to any one culture. The Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is applicable to headhunters in Papua New Guinea, Hindus in India, Muslims in Afghanistan, and secular humanists in the United Kingdom. A person does not have to become a member of another nation in order to follow Jesus. Each can repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and they will be saved.

So we see that the New Testament does not prescribe every detail of what the church should look like. Thus the church is able to adapt itself to different cultures. But thankfully, our Lord did not leave us in the dark concerning what the church should be like. The Scriptures have much to say about what the church should do. We are going to look at six major emphases from the Word of God concerning church. We could look at other emphases, such as God the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, worship, the new covenant, and many more, but for now we are simply going to focus on a few major emphases in the Bible that we see missing in many churches of our day. May the Lord give us grace to understand His Word, and be involved in building churches that bring glory to His Name.
Chapter 1: Love

"We cannot expect the world to believe that the Father sent the Son, that Jesus' claims are true, and that Christianity is true, unless the world sees some reality of the oneness of true Christians." \--Francis Schaeffer

"By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." (John 13:35) These are the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. He could have said, "By this will all men know that you are My disciples: if you have great worship times OR if you preach great sermons OR if you have a huge building OR if you have a good football league..." But He said none of those things. The Lord Jesus Christ said that all men would know that we are His disciples "if we love one another".

I know a man who preaches a good bit in various countries. He says that in all his travels, he has received many questions about his church: "What do you believe about the baptism of the Spirit? What do you believe about communion? Do you believe in the pre-tribulation rapture? Why don't you baptize infants?" But he says that never once has anyone asked him if the believers in his church love one another. This is because we have lost sight of what the Lord Jesus Christ actually taught. In so many instances, we are not fixing our eyes on Jesus, but instead we are fixing our eyes on many peripheral issues. While these issues are not entirely unimportant, they are certainly not the main issues. Love is the issue.

What does it mean to love one another? Love is a word that is thrown around a lot these days. Fortunately for us, Scripture is not silent on this issue. It gives some specific instructions on how we are to love one another. In fact, there are a great many "one another" commands in the New Testament, but they can all be housed under the big umbrella of loving one another. Here are just a few of the things Scripture has to say about our relationship to one another. (Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from the New King James Version of the Bible.)

Be kindly affectioned one to another (Romans 12:10)

Prefer one another (Romans 12:10)

Don't judge one another (Romans 14:13)

Receive one another, as Christ has received us (Romans 15:7)

Admonish one another (Romans 15:14)

By love serve one another (Galatians 5:13)

Don't bite and devour one another (Galatians 5:15)

Do not provoke and envy one another (Galatians 5:26)

Forbear one another in love (Ephesians 4:2)

Be kind to one another (Ephesians 4:32)

Forgive one another, even as Christ for God's sake has forgiven you (Ephesians 4:32)

Teach one another (Colossians 3:16)

Comfort one another (1 Thessalonians 4:18)

Edify one another (1 Thessalonians 5:11)

Exhort one another daily (Hebrews 3:13)

Consider one another to provoke unto love and good works (Hebrews 10:24)

Submit to one another in the fear of God (Ephesians 5:21)

Do not lie to one another (Colossians 3:9)

Confess your faults to one another (James 5:16)

Be hospitable to one another without grumbling (1 Peter 4:9)

Minister to one another as good stewards of the grace of God (1 Peter 4:10)

Be subject to one another (1 Peter 5:5)

These are most of the "one another" passages in the New Testament, but it is not an exhaustive list. Many of these are mentioned more than once, and to "love one another" occurs over a dozen times. When we think of "going to church", do we think of the above-mentioned things? Not usually. But we should, for these things are clearly stated in Scripture. It is plain to see that if we truly love one another, all of the other "one another" commands will naturally fall into place.

We are told how to love one another several times. Jesus says, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, you also love one another." (John 13:34) Elsewhere we read, "By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." (1 John 3:16) The Lord Jesus Christ Himself is our supreme example. He left heaven, came to earth, and laid down His life in order to rescue undeserving rebels. We are to love each other like that. Only God can give us the power to love in that way.

Let's look at some of the things Scripture has to say concerning love:

Matthew 22:36-40--"Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

Matthew 5:44--But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you.

John 13:34-35--A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.

John 15:12-17--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.

Galatians 5:13-15--For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." But if you bite and devour one another, beware lest you be consumed by one another!

Galatians 5:22--But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness

Ephesians 5:2--And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma.

1 Thessalonians 3:12--And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all, just as we do to you.

1 John 3:11-18--For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil and his brother's righteous. Do not marvel, my brethren, if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death. Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.

1 John 4:7-12--Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us.

1 John 4:19-21--We love Him because He first loved us. If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.

Revelation 2:1-5--To the angel of the church of Ephesus write, 'These things says He who holds the seven stars in His right hand, who walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands: I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars; and you have persevered and have patience, and have labored for My name's sake and have not become weary. Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place--unless you repent.

1 Corinthians 13:1-8--Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.

From these passages (and many others), we see the incredible importance of love in the Scriptures.

Love God

When Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, He responded by quoting Deuteronomy: "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength." (Deuteronomy 6:5) The first and greatest commandment is to love God. For the man or woman who does not love God, all they do is worthless, vain and wicked in God's sight. Isaiah tells us that all our righteousness is like filthy rags in God's eyes (Isaiah 64:6). So we can certainly say that loving God is absolutely essential to the Christian life.

Why is this the first commandment? Why should we love God with everything in us? We should love God because He is God! He is holy; He is love; He is perfectly just; His mercy endures forever; He is all-powerful; He knows all things; He loves righteousness; He hates iniquity; He cannot lie; He cannot change; He is perfect in every way; He has made us; He has redeemed us at great cost to Himself; He is Almighty God! Truly, God is worthy of all our praise. May we come to see the truth that God Himself is the great goal of life.

Our Treasure

The critical question for our generation--and for every generation--is this: If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ were not there? \--John Piper

Piper phrases the question well. Is God Himself what we desire, or do we merely desire the things He gives us? Jesus knew that many of those who came to Him did so only to see miracles. Others came because He gave them food. In the Old Testament, we find the children of Israel constantly complaining about what God gave them. In Jeremiah 44, they assert that they are going to worship the queen of heaven instead of the true and living God because when they worshipped her, they had more food than when they worshipped God. God is not a means to an end; he is not simply our ticket to riches or health or heaven; He Himself is the treasure.

I love the parable Jesus tells in Matthew 13:44: "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field." The Lord Jesus Christ is that treasure! The man in this parable didn't calculate and try to figure out what else he would get with the treasure. In fact, he sold everything he had just to get the treasure. And he sold all that he had with great joy because he got the treasure! This should be our attitude towards God, not only because it is right, but because to value anything above God is absurd!

In contrast to the parable in Matthew 13, we have the true story of the rich young ruler. This man came running, knelt before Jesus, and asked what he should do to get eternal life. He was religious and eager for eternal life, but then Jesus spoke these words: "One thing you lack: Go your way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, take up the cross, and follow Me." When the man heard these words, he was sad, and he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

The primary problem with the rich young ruler was not the treasure he could see, but the treasure he could not see. 2 Corinthians 4 speaks of how the god of this world (Satan) has blinded the minds of those who do not believe, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ should shine unto them. The rich ruler was blind. He valued some earthly junk that will soon pass away more than he valued the Son of God. If he could have only seen Christ as the treasure, he would have obeyed Jesus with great joy.

The Apostle Paul had similar circumstances to the rich young ruler. He was a zealous religious man who had a good reputation and high social status. In Philippians, we find how he regarded all of these things: "I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ." The things which the blind young ruler clung to as a great treasure, Paul referred to as rubbish (or dung). Paul once saw some of these things as a treasure also, until God opened his eyes to the real treasure. Once his eyes were opened to the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, he loved Jesus and everything else seemed worthless in comparison.

May God open our eyes to the reality that He alone is worthy! He is the great treasure! The greatest gift that God could ever give us is Himself. And He did.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus

Look full in His wonderful face

And the things of earth

Will grow strangely dim

In the light of His glory and grace.

Love Your Neighbor

The Lord Jesus Christ did not stop by giving the first and greatest commandment. He also quoted from Leviticus 19:18: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." I find it interesting that Jesus coupled these two things. He said this second commandment is like the first. This keeps us from two great deceptions. Both of these deceptions are common in Christendom today. As in many areas, each group is so busy warning the other of their danger, neither notices they have fallen from the narrow path into the ditch.

The first deception is the idea that if people love their fellow men and do good deeds, they are acceptable in God's sight. This is common among unbelievers and liberal denominations. Yet 1 Corinthians 13 reminds us that even if we give away everything to feed the poor, and give our body to be burned, but have not love, it profits nothing. The one who does many great deeds of service, but does not love the Lord Jesus has nothing. There are many men whom the world considers great philanthropists that do not love our Lord. In the eyes of people, such men appear great. But the Lord Jesus Christ said that the things which are highly esteemed among men are an abomination to God. The Scripture makes clear that to love God is the first and greatest commandment.

The second deception, which is probably more common among evangelicals, is to profess loudly that we love God with all our heart while ignoring our neighbor. 1 John is very explicit concerning these things: "If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen" (1 John 4:20) Earlier in the book, he tells us that if we see a brother in need and don't help him, the love of God doesn't dwell in us. John then exhorts us to love not in word only, but in deed and in truth. (1 John 3:17-18) So if we say that we love God, but we do not love our brother, we are merely deceiving ourselves. Everyone who loves God loves his brother also. The Lord Jesus Christ, in His infinite wisdom, shows the correct priority and order of these two commands. He shows how love of God and love of neighbor are both essential to the Christian life.

It is impossible to love our neighbor as ourselves without loving God with all our heart.

It is impossible to love God with all our heart without God's love causing us to love our neighbor as ourselves.

Love One Another

The great mark of a Christian is that we love one another. Jesus said, "By this all men shall know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." (John 13:35) Later in John, Jesus prays to His Father that His disciples would be one, so that the world would know that the Father sent the Son. (John 17:21) That is staggering. Think about it. Our unity is to be a testimony to the world that Jesus is truly the Son of God.

We often think of love and compassion for the world as the greatest evidence of Christ in our lives. Jesus said that as the world sees how we love one another, they will know that we follow Jesus, and that the Father sent Jesus. Francis Schaeffer explains it like this: "The world we live in doesn't believe in truth at all. They will not examine us to see if our doctrines are correct. But they can tell whether or not we love each other. May God give us grace to DO this."

Surely, this is one area where we have failed. We can look at all the extreme examples of how others have failed, but we need to take personal responsibility before the Lord here. Let the Lord search your heart. Are you demonstrating the unity of the church to the world? Is there bitterness in your heart towards any brother or sister? Are there any relationships that you have not attempted to reconcile? Are you praying faithfully for severed relationships to be restored? Perhaps you can put this book down right now and consider these questions. Ask the Lord to show you if there are any relationships in which you are not truly loving your brother. May the Lord give us grace to walk in the light and truly love our brothers from this day forward.

Love Your Enemies

Jesus also calls us to love our enemies. With divine authority, Jesus says, "You have heard that it was said, Love your neighbor and hate your enemies, but I say unto you, 'Love your enemies, bless those that curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who despitefully use you and persecute you.'" (Matthew 5:44) These commands are impossible to do apart from Christ living in us. We can tolerate our enemies, be kind to our enemies, and possibly even make our enemies think that we love them. But no man can truly love his enemies apart from the supernatural work of the Lord Jesus Christ in his heart.

Some may question whether this kind of love is truly possible. With men it is impossible, but with God all things are possible. We have numerous examples of a great love for our enemies both in the Scriptures and in church history. Corrie Ten Boom recounts one example of a simple African brother who loved his enemy:

Thomas's neighbor, who lived across the dirt street, hated God--and hated men like Thomas who loved God. The hatred grew stronger and stronger until the man began sneaking over at night and setting fire to the straw roof on Thomas's hut, endangering his small children. Three nights in a row this happened, and each time Thomas was able to rush out of his hut and put out the flames before they destroyed the roof and the walls. The fact that he never said an unkind word to his neighbor, only showing him love and forgiveness, made his neighbor hate him even more. One night the neighbor sneaked across the street and set fire to Thomas's roof. This night, however, a strong wind came up and as Thomas rushed to beat out the fire, the sparks blew across the street and set that neighbor's house on fire. Thomas finished putting out the fire on his roof and then rushed across the street to put out the fire on his neighbor's roof. He was able to extinguish the flames, but in the process he badly burned his hands and arms. Other neighbors told the chief of the tribe what had happened. The chief was so furious that he sent his police to arrest the neighbor and throw him into prison.

That night Thomas came to the meeting where I was speaking (as he had done each night). I noticed his badly burned hands and asked him what had happened. Reluctantly he told me the story. "It is good that this man is now in prison," I said. "Now your children are no longer in danger and he cannot try again to put your house into flames."

"That is true," he said. "But I am so sorry for that man. He is an unusually gifted man and now he must live together with all those criminals in a horrible prison."

"Then let us pray for him," I said.

Thomas dropped to his knees and holding up his burned and bandaged hands, he began to pray. "Lord, I claim this neighbor of mine for you. Lord, give him his freedom and do the miracle that in the future he and I will become a team to bring the Gospel to our tribe. Amen."

Never had I heard such a prayer. Two days later I was able to go to the prison. I spoke to the prisoners about God's joy and God's love. Among the group who listened intently was Thomas's neighbor. When I asked who would receive Jesus in his heart, that man was the first one to raise his hand. After the meeting I told him how Thomas loved him, how he had burned his hands trying to put out the fire to save his house, and how he had prayed that they might become a team to spread the Gospel. The man wept big tears and nodded his head saying, "Yes, yes, that is how it shall be."

The next day I told Thomas. He praised God and said, "You see, God has worked a miracle. We never can expect too much from Him." He left, running off down the path, his face beaming with joy.

What an amazing story this is! And yet this story, like all stories pales in comparison to THE story. Thomas, a sinner like me, forgave and loved another sinner. The Lord Jesus Himself is our greatest example. He prayed, "Father, forgive them!" even while He was being nailed to the cross. (Luke 23:34)

The King over all kings washed His disciples' feet.

The One who had heard "Holy, Holy, Holy" for ages, heard, "Crucify Him!"

The One that sinless angels cover their faces for and worship was despised and rejected by sinful men.

The One who is holy became sin.

The One who gives life to everything and everyone--that One died.

The One who loves the unlovely, was tortured, mocked, and killed by the very ones He came to save.

The ones who killed the Christ were forgiven by the only One who could forgive them.

Praise the Lord! The Lord Jesus Christ, who had never sinned, freely forgave those who tortured and killed Him. He calls us, sinners every one, to forgive those who have sinned against us and to love our enemies.

Love the Lost

We are called to love those who are perishing. It is a sad reality in our day that many "churches" are little more than social clubs. We profess that Jesus Christ has saved us from hell. Yet all around us, people are perishing without Christ. They are going to eternal hell. Do we care? The Lord Jesus Christ has commanded us to make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:18-20). We are ambassadors for Christ (2 Corinthians 5:20). Jesus had great compassion for the multitudes of lost men he saw (Matthew 9:36). Jesus still has great compassion for the multitudes. Yet we often get wrapped up in so many things and forget that men are lost. The way God has ordained to save men is through His church preaching the Gospel.

Here are some sobering statistics that reflect how much we have lost our way:

Christians spend more on the annual audits of their churches and agencies ($810 million) than on all their missions workers in the non-Christian world.

Annual church embezzlements by top custodians exceed the entire cost of all foreign missions budgets worldwide.

Today's Christians spend more money on dog food than on missions.

More money is spent each year on chewing gum than on world missions.

A modern parable written anonymously shows what has happened:

On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur there was a once a crude little life-saving station. The building was just a hut, and there was only one boat, but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought for themselves, they went out day or night tirelessly searching for the lost.

Many lives were saved by this wonderful little station, so that it became famous. Some of those who were saved, and various others in the surrounding areas, wanted to become associated with the station and give of their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and new crews were trained. The little life-saving station grew.

Some of the new members of the life-saving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and so poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea.

So they replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in an enlarged building. Now the life-saving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they re-decorated it beautifully and furnished it as a sort of club.

Less of the members were now interested in going to sea on life-saving missions, so they hired life boat crews to do this work.

The mission of life-saving was still given lip-service but most were too busy or lacked the necessary commitment to take part in the life-saving activities personally.

About this time a large ship was wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boat loads of cold, wet, and half-drowned people.

They were dirty and sick, and some of them had black skin, and some spoke a strange language, and the beautiful new club was considerably messed up. So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where victims of shipwreck could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting, there was a split in the club membership. Most of the members wanted to stop the club's life-saving activities as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal life pattern of the club.

But some members insisted that life-saving was their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a life-saving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save the lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own life-saving station down the coast. They did.

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. They evolved into a club and yet another life-saving station was founded.

If you visit the seacoast today you will find a number of exclusive clubs along that shore. Shipwrecks are still frequent in those waters, only now most of the people drown.

Is this true? Have we done this? I fear we have. We could look at hundreds of statistics that show the church is spending an overwhelming majority of our resources on ourselves. We could look at our own lives and see how we are doing. The truth is that multitudes are perishing. A church must emphasize the reality that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. We must be greatly concerned with those around us who are perishing. May the reality of eternity and the lostness of men grip our hearts. May we follow in the footsteps of our Lord first of all, and then of people like William Carey, Hudson Taylor, Adoniram Judson, Amy Carmichael, John Paton, C.T. Studd, and a long list of others. Jesus came to seek and to save those who were lost. We are His body, and we are called to follow Him in this area, as in all areas.

"A church with no outreach exists only to serve itself. A church that exists only to serve itself is not a church at all. A church that is not a church at all should not even exist!" \--J. Mark Fox

He First Loved Us

Why do we love one another? How can we love our enemies? What does it mean to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength? The reality of Christ's love in our hearts does not start with us. It starts with God. "We love Him because He first loved us." (1 John 4:19) I remember Brother Jim, an old man in my home church, who would usually quote this verse when asked to share something. Love for God is not an emotion that we work up. It is not something that originates in us. We love God because He first loved us. Elsewhere Jesus tells us that the one who is forgiven little loves little, but the one who has been forgiven much loves much. (Luke 7:40-47) As we realize how much we have been forgiven, we can forgive others.

As we realize what truly happened on the cross, we begin to truly love Jesus. The Lord Jesus Christ, the perfect Son of God became sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21). He became a curse for us (Galatians 3:13). Jesus never sinned. He was perfect, and yet He took all of our sins on Himself and the Scripture says that "it pleased the Lord to crush Him" (Isaiah 53:10 NASB). We deserve the wrath of God and eternal hell. God is a just judge and does not merely overlook sin. No, he always punishes sin. So in order to be both just and merciful, He sent His perfect Son to die for our sins. Christ bore the wrath of God that we deserve, and we are credited with the righteousness of the perfect life that He lived (2 Corinthians 5:21). No wonder Paul said that he would boast only in the cross!

Romans 12:1 says, "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice." Present your bodies as a living sacrifice. That is a staggering command! But the rationale comes with it. In light of the fact that you deserved hell, and the sinless Son of God died and bore the wrath of God in your place...in light of the fact that you have been adopted into the family of God...in light of the fact that you will spend eternity with Almighty God...in light of those facts, present your bodies as a living sacrifice.

C.T. Studd, who gave away his fortune and left his career as a famous professional athlete to be a missionary, had a motto that is merely a restatement of Romans 12:1: "If Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him."

We must grasp this concept! If we do not see that love starts with God, we will only be frustrated as we try to work up love for God and people. It is only as we see how much God loves us, that we can begin to truly love Him and others. God is a debtor to no man. None of us loved God before He loved us. It is as we begin to see the glorious love of God and His sacrifice that we can really begin to love and follow Him.

Deed and Truth

Now, most of us would agree that love is a very important thing. I have never met a professing Christian who would disagree with the idea that we should love people. The only problem is that this is much easier to say than to do. John tells us that we should love not in word only, but in deed and in truth. (1 John 3:18) What does it mean to love in deed and in truth?

"Greater love has no man than this; that a man lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13)

"By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." (1 John 3:16)

Wow! The idea that we are to love each other in deed and in truth is no small thing. It is to lay down our lives for one another, as Christ laid down His life for us. Paul speaks of those who took joyfully the spoiling of their goods in order to come and visit him in prison (Hebrews 10:34). There was a deep love and sacrifice in some of those relationships. Practically, for us, this will always involve giving time to people, because it takes time to pray for people and to minister to them. It takes time together to truly get to know them. It may involve helping them financially. It may involve cutting other things out of our lives so we can spend time with people. True love always costs something, but it is always worth it.

Help or Hindrance

Now that we have seen Scripture clearly indicate love is an essential quality of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, we come to the pressing question: "Does our present church structure help or hinder us in truly loving the Lord, each other, our enemies, and the lost?"

Ask anyone in America if they go to church, and they know exactly what you mean. What this question means is: Do I take a part of my Sunday when I could be fishing, golfing, going to the mall, watching TV, catching up on work...Do I take a part of my Sunday and go to a building where we sing three or four songs, someone sings a solo, take an offering, and then someone stands up and preaches for awhile? This is typically what we mean by church. This is unfortunate, because I find no concept even remotely like this in the New Testament.

Recently I heard the catchy phrase, "Over-communication leads to success. Under-communication leads to a mess." So to be sure I am communicating, let me reiterate that God loves the church, and I love the church. God is Sovereign. He works through imperfect individuals (all of us) and through imperfect structures (all of them). Yet the fact that God works through our imperfections does not mean that we should accept them; rather we are to strive in every area of our lives to be increasingly Christ-like. Wherever we see anything that hinders us from being Christ-like, we should quickly lay it aside and run with patience the race that is set before us, always looking to Jesus. (Hebrews 12:1-2)

So in our present church structure, where the Sunday morning service is typically planned and quite formal, are we helping the body to grow in love one for another? The answer will vary some from church to church, but for most churches, the answer is no. This does not mean that the Sunday service necessarily hinders us from loving one another. But whenever we begin to regard Sunday morning service as "church", then it does hinder us, because it gives us a false concept of what church is.

I remember going to a church in a large city. The pastor is an very well-known evangelical preacher, so the church is very large. My wife and I and our three year old son were getting ready to go into the service, when we were met by one of the bouncers. I am not sure that is their official title at this church, but I can tell a bouncer when I see one. This particular man was better dressed, somewhat smaller, and with fewer tattoos than the stereotype, but he was definitely a bouncer.

The bouncer informed us that we would not be able to go into the service because we had a small child. I was not thinking fast, or the bouncer and I would have had a theological discussion about what Jesus said to his disciples when they would not let the children come to him. Anyway, we were directed to the overflow room, which is for people who have small children, come in late, or smell like they haven't showered for three weeks. In the overflow room, there is an enormous TV screen. We watched the service on a TV screen with a bunch of people we didn't know and returned home. It was a very odd experience.

Or was it?

Apart from the preacher being on a screen instead of behind a pulpit, how different was my experience from the experience of most churchgoers on a Sunday morning? We come in and chitchat while we wait for the "service" to begin. When this happens, we hear some announcements or bad jokes. Then we sing four songs chosen by the song leader. After this, we give some money. Then we sit and listen to someone preach for awhile. Then we go home.

It hit me that day that being in a separate room with a giant TV screen wasn't much different at all. This is our modern day concept of church. Perhaps this is why multitudes of professing Christians do not attend a local church. Many of them watch their favorite ear-tickling preachers on television at home. Their experience is little different than if they went to the building where these men preached. The only difference is that at home they can watch it in their pajamas while eating breakfast, and they don't feel obligated to give money. If they went to the service, they would have to take a larger part of "their day" to get ready and travel. But other than that, there is little difference.

I am not sure where the term originated, but the term "spectator church" seems to describe this format well. It does not give us the opportunity to get to know people, to minister to them, or to be ministered to by anyone besides the professional pastor and song leader. It does not give us the chance to encourage one another, exhort one another, confess our faults one to another, or pray for one another. None of these things usually happen in this context. When we consider the Sunday morning service to be church, we rob ourselves of the reality of the church I read about in the New Testament.

This is not to undermine the public teaching of God's Word, but merely to say that it is only a part of church. Suppose you have a friend whose only concept of the word "food" is going to MacDonald's and ordering a super-sized Big Mac meal. Is that food? It is a type of food. But if that's all the food your friend gets, he will be an unhealthy person. Similarly, listening to the public teaching of God's Word is a part of church, but if we equate it with church, we will have exactly what we currently have in America: "churches" full of unregenerate people or immature Christians, with very few mature brothers and sisters in most cases.

As an example of something the church could be doing - and we largely fail to do - let's say Becky comes to a service with a heavy heart. Her mother was diagnosed with cancer, her husband is fighting in Afghanistan, and her car just broke down. In your church, on a Sunday morning, if she shows up, can she share this? If she shares this, does the body weep with her, pray for her, counsel her, encourage her, help her, and love her? In general, the answer to all of these questions is no. If you answer yes to all of these questions, thank the Lord for the place He has you! It's rare in our day.

Evaluate and Act

So we have said that it's biblical to emphasize love in a local church, and we have said that our existing form does not lend itself to truly loving one another and loving those around us. What do we do?

The first thing we must do is to determine what is more important to us: our tradition or God's Word. This is an easy question to answer in theory, but to work it out is far more difficult. If the traditional Sunday morning gathering is a hindrance to what God has called His church body to be, what do we do? We have several options at that point, and they all depend on what is most important to us: our tradition and sense of comfort, or following God's leading through His Word and Spirit.

This is no small matter. We are back to the question of whether we are seeking to give the maximum or the minimum to the Lord. There is no Scripture that explicitly forbids the Sunday morning service as we know it. Yet there is much Scripture that indicates the practices in our churches should be different than they are. Do we seek merely to avoid blatant sin, or are we seeking to follow Christ in all things?

There will be a cost if we do this, but it will be worth it. Jesus told the rich young ruler to sell everything he had, take up the cross and follow Him, and promised him treasure in heaven. (Mark 10:21) Following Jesus is always worth it. I know of no one who has come to the end of their life and said, "I wish I had done what I wanted to do instead of what God wanted me to do." But I know many (myself included) who regret wasted years of believing the lie that I understand things better than God. No one ever loses out by following Jesus. He is worthy!

Once we have established that God's Word is more important than our traditions, we face the question of what really needs to change. The first things that must change are our hearts and minds. Much that happens in our Sunday morning service is not wrong, per se. It's just that we have treated the Sunday morning service as our major "church" experience. We must leave this notion behind. If your involvement in church is attending two or three services a week at a building, listening to sermons, chitchatting with a few friends and then going home, you are not truly in a church according to Scripture.

This is a strong statement, but it is true: If church for you is mostly sitting and listening to sermons, and you have no real fellowship with the saints and no desire to reach the lost, you are not in a church. And for millions and millions of churchgoers, that statement makes us uncomfortable and hits very close to home. Because that is exactly what "church" is for them. Yet it is a concept foreign to the Scriptures. Our loving Father knows that we desperately need each other, and He has ordered things so that we have fellowship with other believers. When we neglect that, we harm ourselves, and we dishonor our Father.

Our mindset must change. Believers do not go to church; believers are the church. The church is not a building I go to; it is a family I am a part of. The church is not a lifeless institution; it is a living organism. The church is not a 501C3 organization; it is a family. This is the great appeal of the emergent movement. They have correctly identified that the institutional church is mostly missing the boat in the area of relationships. Often, it is much form with no true and deep and lasting relationships. They have correctly said that church is real and relational and authentic. We need this, but we must also have truth, which the emergent movement misses. And so rather than a lifeless institution, they have created shallow social clubs with no call to surrender to Christ and no power to truly transform lives.

Can someone look at your life and see that you love other disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ with a sincere love? Does love for the brethren radiate out from you? Are you closer to the brothers and sisters at your church than your unsaved family members? If the answer to these questions is no, then we need to repent and seek God. The Lord Jesus Christ said this love for one another would be the great mark of His disciples. This love can only come from Him. If we ask Him to help us truly love one another, He will certainly do that in our lives.

So changing our hearts and minds about what church is would be one thing that must happen. Beyond this, there are many questions. Does the actual form need to change? I am not sure there is anything in a typical Sunday morning gathering that keeps you from loving someone. On the other hand, this kind of meeting gives very little opportunity for us to do that. Perhaps we might say that our services do not hinder this, but most of the real loving of one another must happen outside the corporate setting. Obviously, we should love one another wherever we are, but the New Testament does indicate that there is room for believers to exhort and encourage one another in a gathered meeting of the church. We should be able to fulfill God's commands to the church when we are gathered as the church.

As we look at love in the Scriptures, we see that our church pattern is not the best possible format for demonstrating true love for one another. We'll get to some practical suggestions for change later, but first, let's consider some other aspects.
Chapter 2: Truth

"Truth without love destroys. Love without truth deceives."

A church must emphasize truth. Jesus said, "I AM the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except through Me." (John 14:6) We must not merely emphasize doctrinal distinctives. Above all else, we must emphasize Jesus Christ Himself as the Truth. He alone is Truth.

If we only emphasize correct doctrine, we are in grave danger of simply having a cold, dead religion. This is easy to do. I find this tendency in my own life. After commending the church in Ephesus for their many good deeds, the Lord Jesus Christ strongly rebuked them because they had left their first love (Revelation 2:1-4). They were emphasizing correct doctrine, doing correct works, but they were not properly emphasizing the incarnate Truth of God.

Conversely, we see in our day a movement springing up which emphasizes some "jesus". They speak much of finding the authentic Jesus, re-inventing Jesus, searching for Jesus, and yet in reality, the "jesus" that they speak of is merely a figment of their imagination. The Lord Jesus Christ lived a sinless life, died an atoning death, rose with glorious power, and ascended back to His Father's right hand. Any other "jesus" is a false "jesus" who has no power to save. Let us not be deceived by those who do many good deeds and have great passion, but do not preach the Lord Jesus Christ.

False teachers can be clearly identified both by what they do say, and by what they do not say. In our day, there are powerful preachers who say a lot of good things about loving the poor, being real, not just playing church, and many other topics. But many of these same men state that they are not sure if Jesus is the only way to the Father. The Lord Jesus Christ, however, was sure of that: "I am the way, the Truth, and the Life. No man comes to the Father except through Me." (John 14:6) The Apostle John said that teachers who deny that Jesus is the Christ are liars and antichrists. (1 John 2:22) They are being followed by millions in our day because we do not love the truth. Oh, may God grant repentance!

When we speak of loving Jesus and following Jesus, we must be sure that we are talking about the real Jesus, as He is revealed in the Holy Scriptures by the Holy Spirit. This Jesus said that anyone who loves Him will do what He says. Anyone who claims to love Jesus but consistently disregards what He says is a liar. There are many great and precious truths that we could speak of, but there are a few truths that have been especially neglected in the modern American religious scene. To emphasize truth, we must start with the places where truth is being attacked or neglected.

The Gospel and Regeneration

Perhaps THE great truth that has been forgotten in our day is the truth of regeneration. This quote from John Piper illustrates the problem very well:

I want to say loud and clear that when the Barna Group uses the term born again to describe American church-goers whose lives are indistinguishable from the world, and who sin as much as the world, and sacrifice for others as little as the world, and embrace injustice as readily as the world, and covet things as greedily as the world, and enjoy God-ignoring entertainment as enthusiastically as the world—when the term born again is used to describe these professing Christians, the Barna Group is making a profound mistake. It is using the biblical term born again in a way that would make it unrecognizable by Jesus and the biblical writers.

Here is the way the researchers defined born again in their research: "Born again Christians" were defined in these surveys as people who said they have made "a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today" and who also indicated they believe that when they die they will go to Heaven because they had confessed their sins and had accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. Respondents were not asked to describe themselves as "born again." Being classified as "born again" is not dependent upon church or denominational affiliation or involvement. In other words, in this research the term born again refers to people who say things. They say, "I have a personal commitment to Jesus Christ. It's important to me." They say, "I believe that I will go to Heaven when I die. I have confessed my sins and accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior." Then the Barna Group takes them at their word, ascribes to them the infinitely important reality of the new birth, and then slanders that precious biblical reality by saying that regenerate hearts have no more victory over sin than unregenerate hearts.

Piper says the Barna group defines born again people as people who say things. This is certainly not correct biblical interpretation. Yet if it was confined to Barna group, we probably need not be too concerned. The major issue is that this strange doctrine is not confined to Barna, but is believed by millions of people, and actively preached from an unbelievable number of pulpits in our land.

Paul Washer asks the provocative question:

"Do you know what your profession of faith in Jesus Christ is worth?"

What do you think? What is your profession of faith in Jesus Christ worth?

Washer gives the shocking answer, "Absolutely nothing!"

Can this be true?

Washer is not saying that we should not actively profess that Christ is Lord with our mouths. Certainly we should. But he asserts that a mere profession of faith in Jesus Christ is worth nothing. We must come to this conclusion if we deal honestly with Scripture, for we read of many who will profess loudly that Jesus Christ is Lord, and yet from the lips of the very One they profess to follow will come the terrible words, "Depart from me." This is a sobering and uncomfortable truth, and so is widely attacked or neglected in our day.

It should go without saying that in order to be a part of a church, you must be a Christian. And yet, tragically, there are millions of regular churchgoers in America who will hear the Lord Jesus Christ say to them, "I never knew you. Depart from me, you that work iniquity." (Matthew 7:23) How did we get into such a mess?

Definition of Regeneration

We are no longer preaching the truth of regeneration. We are no longer teaching men that Christ came to save them from their sins (Matthew 1:21). We are no longer making it clear that a believer is a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). He has a new heart, and a new nature, he is no longer a slave to sin, but is now a slave to Christ (Romans 6:16-22). Scripture says that we who are believers are dead to sin, and cannot live in it any longer (Romans 6:2).

Today we focus almost solely on justification. Justification is a true doctrine. It says that sinful man is under the wrath of God with no hope for salvation. He has a bad record. But Jesus Christ dying on the cross is the answer to his bad record. Whenever a man repents and believes on the Lord Jesus Christ, he is justified. Not only is his bad record gone, but in its place is the righteousness of Christ. This is called the great exchange, and it is spelled out clearly in 2 Corinthians 5:21: "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." This is a glorious and beautiful truth. May it cause us to fall on our face and worship God! But it is not the whole truth.

Along with the truth of justification comes the truth of regeneration (or the new birth). It is regeneration that Jesus spoke of to Nicodemus when He said, "You must be born again." (John 3:7) It is regeneration that means a good tree produces good fruit, but a bad tree produces bad fruit (Matthew 7:16-20). God has inseparably joined justification and regeneration. Woe to the man who attempts to separate them! No sinner is justified who is not regenerated. Regeneration is the reality that every sinner has a wicked heart. He does wicked things because he is a wicked man. He does need his bad record cleared, but he also needs his bad heart changed, or he will continue to do such things. Regeneration is the reality that a believer is given a new heart. He is changed from a God-hating rebel into a son of Almighty God. This is a huge change! And it is evidenced by the fruit of someone's life.

I know so many pastors who are frustrated because they are trying to shepherd goats. I know so many young people who are frustrated because they have not one older person in their church to disciple them. Many churches realize things are not quite right, and so they have more activities, more seminars, more experts, more supplemental aids. These extras bury the problem under layers of activity, but they do not deal with the root issue. The problem in many of our churches is that many people who faithfully attend have never been converted. We can teach on any number of things, but if a person is not converted, all these things are irrelevant. The great need of every human being is to be born again. This is a radical change.

In the old days, men thought the sun revolved around the earth. When they realized that the earth revolved around the sun, it changed everything about their understanding of astronomy. Similarly, unconverted men (even religious unconverted men) think that God revolves around them. Conversion is when we acknowledge that God is central, and our lives begin to revolve around Him. This changes everything about how we live our lives. "And He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.." (2 Corinthians 5:15)

Unfortunately, our enemy has whispered to us that we need not be so old-fashioned and dogmatic about the truth of the Gospel. Where men of God once pleaded with sinful rebels who were under the wrath of Almighty God to fly to Jesus in order to be saved, now fast-talking salesman assure sinners that God is not angry with them and if they will only "ask Jesus into their hearts", God will give them everything their wicked heart desires.

But the true Gospel is inherently confrontational. "I have not come to bring peace, but a sword," Jesus said. We can't just have community and love each other and gradually people will become a part of our community and be Christianized. The cross means death to the self-life. All men need to be told they are wicked sinners who must be born again to enter the kingdom of heaven. It is because we have watered down the Gospel that we find the modern American church in its current mess.

The Gospel Defined

The Gospel, simply stated, is this: Almighty God created the universe and everything in it. He created man to worship and fellowship with Him. Adam and Eve listened to the devil's lie and rebelled against God. Since that first sin, every man has come into the world as a sinner. Each person is a sinner by nature and begins committing sin as soon as he is able. We all stand condemned before a holy God. God hates sin with a passionate hatred, and He punishes it wherever it is found. And so each and every person stands under the wrath of Almighty God.

Yet God is also love, and He is merciful. So He made a way for us to be saved from our sins. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, God in the flesh, became a baby and lived a perfect life. He was tempted in all points as we are, and yet was without sin. He was crucified like a common criminal, but His death was planned by God the Father. And on the cross, the Lord Jesus Christ bore the fury of God's holy hatred against sin. The wrath of God that I deserve was poured out on His Son! And the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ was imputed to all who will repent of their sin and believe the gospel! For all who repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, their sin-loving heart is taken away and replaced with a new heart that loves God! Oh, may this not be a dry intellectual truth! May it grip and change our lives!

Instead of emphasizing the gospel, churches have been very careful not to offend people. And so we have many people who have never been offended in "church". They have never felt the convicting power of the Holy Spirit. They have never cried out with Isaiah, "Woe is me! for I am undone!" (Isaiah 6:5) They know nothing of the reality of the cross, of following Jesus, or anything else, because this truth has been neglected. As a church, we must not neglect the truth.

Here are just a few Scriptures that speak of the great importance of truth:

Psalm 51:6--Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts, And in the hidden part You will make me to know wisdom.

John 1:14--And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

John 1:17--For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 4:23-24--But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."

John 8:32--And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

John 8:44-45--You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me.

John 14:6--Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

John 16:13--However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.

John 18:37-38--Pilate therefore said to Him, "Are You a king then?" Jesus answered, "You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice." Pilate said to Him, "What is truth?" And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews, and said to them, "I find no fault in Him at all."

Romans 1:25--[They] exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

Romans 2:8--But to those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness--indignation and wrath,

Ephesians 4:15--But, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head--Christ--

Ephesians 4:25--Therefore, putting away lying, "Let each one of you speak truth with his neighbor," for we are members of one another.

2 Thessalonians 2:10-12--And with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

2 Timothy 2:15--Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

2 Timothy 4:4-5--And they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

1 Peter 1:22--Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart.

1 John 1:6-2:4--If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.

My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world. Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, "I know Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

3 John 3-4--For I rejoiced greatly when brethren came and testified of the truth that is in you, just as you walk in the truth. I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.

And the Scripture also shows the condition and eternal destiny of those who do NOT have the truth.

Matthew 23:27-28--Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

Revelation 21:8--But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

Summarizing

If we do not have the truth, we have nothing, whatever else we have. From Revelation 21:8, we see that if a man is a liar, he will be cast into the lake which burns with fire and brimstone. To walk in the truth is a biblical synonym for following Jesus. Jesus Himself is the Truth (John 14:6). The Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of Truth (John 16:13). The Father desires men to worship Him in spirit and in truth (John 4:23-24). The fundamental difference between believers and unbelievers is that believers obey the truth and unbelievers do not (Hebrews 5:9). Paul speaks of those who received not the love of the truth, and says they will all be damned (2 Thessalonians 2:10). He exhorts Timothy to pay careful attention to his doctrine/truth, saying that he will both save himself and those who hear him (1 Timothy 4:16). Jesus spoke more about hypocrisy (lack of truth) than he spoke against murder, adultery, and theft combined. The Lord Jesus Christ hated hypocrisy. David reminded us that God is looking for truth in the inward parts (Psalm 51:6). Clearly, this is no small matter.

Again, there would be very little disagreement among believers concerning these statements, in theory. But in real life, there is a great difference. We all want to be honest, except when we don't want to be honest. Why don't we want to be honest? There are many reasons: fear of what people think, fear of offending people, wanting to cover up our sin, wanting to appear more spiritual than we really are, etc... But the question of truth is a life or death matter.

To be a church which truly magnifies the One who is the Truth, we must emphasize the truth. We live in an age which increasingly applauds Pilate's question, "What is truth?" (John 18:38) In bygone days, even when men disagreed on truth, almost all men agreed that there was truth. In America today, a great percentage of people do not even believe in absolute truth. Sadly, this has crept into many churches as well.

Many liberal denominations have long ago forsaken the truth of the historical Jesus, the virgin birth, the atonement, and the resurrection. "Churches" who do not believe these fundamental Christian doctrines are not churches, no matter how many people go to them or what the label over the door says. They preach another gospel, a powerless gospel, and they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.

Other Gospels

But the problem is much deeper than this. Even among conservative evangelical Christians, the truth is in much question. I recently spoke with a young lady who is going to Africa as a missionary. She is a very nice young lady, and I like her very much. However, when I strongly stated that Jesus Christ was absolutely the only way to be reconciled to God and go to heaven, she seemed surprised. She admitted that she has never read the Bible all the way through, but she is very familiar with Rob Bell, The Shack, and a lot of other emergent literature. She is a member of a very conservative denomination, and yet has fallen into the great emergent lie.

(If you are not familiar with the "emergent church", it is becoming a very popular movement. Attempting to describe the emergent movement has been compared to nailing Jello to a wall. But there is one thing that all emergent leaders have in common: They either neglect or reject the exclusivity of Christ. They downplay doctrine and the Bible in order to be more "authentic and relevant". They often will not come out and say what they really believe. But they can be easily identified by topics they avoid--sin, repentance, the atonement, hell, and many others. Some popular emergent leaders have referred to the biblical doctrine that Christ died to pay for our sins as "divine child-abuse". I personally know many who are being drawn into this lie, and it is a growing national phenomenon. Emergent leaders often speak much against traditional church forms, and some of their criticism is valid. However, they have not set themselves to seek God in prayer and search the Scriptures. Instead, they look to their own wisdom and worldly psychology to make the church more palatable to the masses. Please pray for the many who are being deceived by such false leaders and for the leaders themselves.)

Seeker-sensitive church growth gurus would encourage us not to offend people who are seekers. If we offend them, they might not come back. The reality, however, is that the truth is often offensive to people. C.T. Studd, who gave up his fame and fortune to share the Gospel with those who had never heard it, had this to say about love: "True love wakens a man to reality; sham love soaps him down to hell, greases his trail, in fact, to hell."

Many of the methodologies used by the biggest missions organizations in our days are highly syncretistic. Like my young friend, there are many missionaries going out to "preach the Gospel" to lost people, who have no understanding of what the Gospel is. Many missionaries are telling lost people they can continue practicing Hinduism or Islam and believe in Jesus at the same time. There are multitudes of "missionaries" who do many great social projects, but never actually share the truth of the Gospel with people. We have forgotten that we are ambassadors for the Lord Jesus Christ. An ambassador doesn't get to choose the message or change the message. He is sent to deliver a message from the leaders of his country. God does not need marketing agents to help him sell Jesus; He makes us His ambassadors to deliver His message to people who desperately need Him.

Paul Washer tells the story of a young man who wanted to go serve with him in Peru. He asked the young man how well he knew the Word of God. The young man admitted he didn't really know the Bible very well. Washer then asked if he spent a lot of time in prayer. The young man replied that this wasn't his strong point, either, but he was very passionate about wanting to go to Peru and give his life for Peru. Upon hearing this, Washer told the man: "Young man, Peru doesn't need your life. They need the truth of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ." This is true. We have nothing to give apart from Christ. It is the truth that sets men free, and nothing else.

The Results of Compromise

The problem, however, goes still deeper than this. It is always easy when we can point to others and see the sins in their lives. But the Holy Spirit is always exposing the sin in our own hearts. Do we fearlessly preach the truth of the Gospel, or do we compromise on some issues? Brother Yun, a Chinese house church leader, had this to say:

Many Christians in the West often ask why we are persecuted in China, and there is no persecution in the West. There are many ways to answer this question, but the first question we would ask is this: 'Do you boldly preach the Gospel to sinners both inside your churches and outside them?' When you do this, you will find out that there is persecution wherever you are.

Are we proclaiming the truth to our neighbors, to our co-workers, to our family? They are lost and going to hell. Do we care enough to share with them about Jesus? These are big questions, and they are not comfortable to deal with. Yet each one of us will have to deal with these questions, and it is better to deal with them today than it will be at the judgment seat of Christ.

Today, in many congregations, there are people living in open immorality, greed, pornography, and almost every other conceivable kind of sin. (I am not speaking of people struggling with such sins. God calls us to be merciful, as He is merciful. May we always be quick to forgive and show mercy to others, just as God shows mercy to us. But in many cases, people justify such lifestyles, and they refuse to repent.) God gives very specific instructions on how to deal with such situations in 1 Corinthians 5 and Matthew 18, and that is to put such people out of the church until such time as they repent. In our enlightened and sensitive age, however, we rarely follow such guidelines. Instead, we allow such people to be members of our churches without ever confronting them with their sin. Are we standing for the truth when we do this?

John speaks of walking in the light (1 John 1:7). What is this "walking in the light"? Walking in the light is walking in such a way that there is nothing hidden in our lives. We are open, honest, and transparent with God and with men. Such a life is not easy. But I have seen over and over, in my family, at my job, and in the church, how the refusal to do this makes true relationships impossible. If I am not honest with people, if I am not walking in the light, we cannot have fellowship. How many times is someone offended with a brother or sister, and instead of obeying the Word of God and going to that person, they go and talk to so many other people about the situation? This is called gossip, and it destroys our lives and our fellowship. It happens because we refuse to walk in the truth, as the Lord has instructed us.

Another issue is that of doctrinal indifferentism, which is the idea that our specific doctrine does not matter that much, as long as we all believe in Jesus. There is a grain of truth in this statement. We are commanded to avoid foolish questions, and exhorted to stay away from discussions of things which are not profitable (2 Timothy 2:16-23). But we are also to earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the saints (Jude 3). If we are not walking in the truth as revealed in Scripture, we are not following Jesus. Paul says if anyone preaches another gospel, let him be accursed (Galatians 1:8).

It requires wisdom to know which issues are foolish questions and which issues are of utmost importance. But we are always to take the Word of God seriously. We are to study it, to memorize it, to meditate upon it, and to obey it. May God give all of us a great love for the truth!

Love Not the World

"Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." (Romans 12:1) If we are not searching the Scriptures, if we are not memorizing and meditating on God's Word, if we are not in much prayer, then it is certain that we will be conformed to the world. There is no alternative. If we do not preach the truth of God's Word, we will inevitably become more and more like the world.

There is a great need for the church to be separate from the world. We see a clear example of this in Israel. God drove many nations out of Canaan because of their rampant idolatry and immorality. Israel, with a much smaller army, conquered all of these nations. Yet within a couple generations, they were longing to be like the nations around them. They intermarried with these nations, and they began to worship and serve their gods. Soon, they wanted a king so they could be like all the nations around them. God judged them by giving them what they wanted. In a short time, they were like the nations around them. They worshipped false gods, had a king who oppressed them, and even sacrificed their own children to idols. How foolish to forsake a loving God for this lifestyle! Jeremiah describes this process as forsaking the fountain of living waters and hewing for themselves broken cisterns that could hold no water (Jeremiah 2:13). They had God, but instead of treasuring and loving God, they wanted to be like the nations around them.

This is almost unbelievably foolish. The Word of God says that there is a way that seems right to a man, but the end of that way is death (Proverbs 16:25). So we are telling the world that they need to repent and follow Jesus, but we are longing to be just like them! Of course our gospel has no power! Of course the world says the church is full of hypocrisy! We are double-minded on this issue. Francis Schaeffer poses this question: "If we have to ask Egypt to save us, how can we tell Egypt that they need our Savior?" That is convicting. We must renew our minds so that we will not be like this world.

(Of course, this is not to say that we are not to love the people of the world. Jesus Himself was often accused of being a friend of sinners. It was the Pharisees who thought they were better with others and did not associate with "those sinners". We are called to love and spend time with people whose language and lifestyle may be very different from our own. We are called to love the homeless man who hasn't showered for three weeks. We are called to love the unwed mother who has had four children by four different men. We are called to love the alcoholic who swears with every other word he speaks. We are called to love the homosexual who has been shunned and demonized by various sections of the church. We are called to love the people of this world, and to separate from the things of this world. Unfortunately, we have often exactly reversed this: We love the things of this world and separate from the people of this world. May God open our eyes!)

What are some of the practical areas where the rubber meets the road? For the most part, the evangelical church in America speaks out on the big moral issues of our day. We preach against homosexuality and abortion. We also preach about smaller issues like drinking, smoking, drugs, etc... But two areas where the Word of God is clear, we rarely mention. Why? It seems that there are two reasons. First, because we are conformed to the world, we ourselves are often caught up in these sins and twist Scripture to fit our lifestyle. Second, because they are the great sins of our society, we are afraid to mention them lest we offend someone. What are these two areas?

1. Money

The first is money. The Bible has much to say about money. Yet it is not often talked about in our day. When it is talked about, it is primarily in terms of how to get out of debt and profitably invest our money. Yet being in debt is not the root issue, but merely a symptom of the root issue. If a man who is in debt gets out of debt but still loves money, he has merely masked his problem, and may actually be in worse shape than he was in before. Before, it was obvious that he wasn't handling his money well; but now he looks good on the outside, while his heart is still full of idolatry.

The Old Testament view of money is quite different than that of the New Covenant. In the Old Covenant, Israel was promised great material abundance if they followed God. Deuteronomy 28 says that they wouldn't get sick, they would have lots of crops and animals, and an abundance of children.

Strangely, we hear many preachers saying that God wants to make us millionaires, but few telling us God wants to bless us with 14 children. In the New Testament, we are NEVER promised earthly wealth if we follow Jesus. Instead, disciples of Jesus are promised suffering and persecution (2 Timothy 3:12). But we are given something far better than earthly wealth; we are given all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 1:3). This is infinitely better. If you are disappointed to learn following Jesus is not going to make you wealthy, please search the Scriptures and your own heart, and ask God to give you light on this issue.

Let's look at just five passages about money, and see if, as a church, we are accurately representing the New Testament teaching on money.

Matthew 6:24--No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

Ephesians 5:5-6--For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

1 Timothy 6:8-10--And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

Mark 10:23-25--Then Jesus looked around and said to His disciples, "How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God!" And the disciples were astonished at His words. But Jesus answered again and said to them, "Children, how hard it is for those who trust in riches to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

James 5:1-3--Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days.

Money and the Heart

We could look at many other Scriptures, but just with these few, we get the general idea of the New Testament teaching on money. Money itself is not evil. And it is a false teaching to say that poor people are more spiritual than wealthy people. The question is the attitude of our hearts toward money. And the Scripture says unequivocally that if you are a covetous person (you desire more money or more material possessions than you have), then you are an idolater, and you will go to hell. (Ephesians 5:5-6) This is strong. But covetousness is the same as saying that God is not a good Father. It is saying that He does not take care of me, and I do not like what He gives me.

God has promised to supply all our needs according to His riches in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:19). He has promised that if we seek His kingdom first, He will provide all that we need (Matthew 6:33). So when we are covetous, we are looking up to heaven and shouting, "God, you are a liar! You said you would give me what I need, but I need more than this." Essentially, we are attempting to use God as a means to get what we really want. That is why covetousness is idolatry. God Himself is the treasure. He will not be a means to anyone's ends. So one issue is our own attitude toward money.

The Use of Money

The other issue concerning money is that we live in a world where hundreds of millions of people are literally starving to death. Billions of people are lost and have never heard the Gospel. Yet in our land, we have unimaginable wealth. This is a tricky area to teach, because we cannot make rules that people must give away a certain amount of money. Yet if we are truly going to love our neighbor as ourselves, and if we are going to live for a kingdom that is not of this world, it will affect our wallet. Any form of Christianity that doesn't affect how you spend money is a deception. In the middle ages, it is said that the Knights Templar would be baptized, except for their sword. They wanted to be "Christians", but they wanted to be free to fight whomever and whenever they wished. The same thing is happening today. Many "Christians" are baptized, but they are holding their wallet out of the water to make sure that it doesn't get baptized also. But this is not true Christianity.

Whenever we begin to speak of money, there is often a reaction in people that goes something like this: "You're just trying to make me feel guilty." The Holy Spirit never condemns anyone, nor should we. And yet the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth, and He does convict. God specifically tells us, "But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him?" (1 John 3:17) Our brothers around the world do not only live in affluent countries. We have many brothers in need, and Christ calls us to open our hearts to them and help them. In the next verse, John tells us not to love in word only, but in deed and in truth. I know that I fall short in this area. May God work in my life, and in His children, that we might truly love our brothers and sisters, wherever they live.

A church cannot lay down a blanket set of rules regarding money, but we must encourage people to look at eternity. In the light of eternity, will anyone regret giving too much away? Or will we regret spending too much on ourselves? I do not desire to guilt people into giving money, for God loves a cheerful giver. On the other hand, we are all going to give an account to Almighty God for how we used the resources He gave us. I would rather someone be convicted now than have to stand before God and explain how it is we lived in such incredible luxury, while our neighbors starved to death.

"Deliver those who are drawn toward death, and hold back those stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, 'Surely we did not know this,' does not He who weighs the hearts consider it? He who keeps your soul, does He not know it? And will He not render to each man according to his deeds?" (Proverbs 24:11-12)

Also, for the sake of those who are perishing and starving, we must constantly challenge ourselves and our brothers and sisters to come away from the foolishness of living for this world. We must encourage one another to give our short lives for the kingdom of Christ. We must exhort one another to stop buying trinkets, so that Hindus in India, Muslims in Pakistan, animists in Indonesia, and Americans all around us will be saved.

These are not popular things to teach about in our day. They were not popular in Jesus' day either. Jesus once made this statement, "No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon." (Luke 16:13) Luke records the reaction of the Pharisees: "Now the Pharisees, who were lovers of money, also heard all these things, and they derided Him." (Luke 16:14) There are many lovers of money in our day, as well. To teach that you cannot love God and money will almost certainly mean that you will make people angry.

Francis Chan talks about how people were angry when he decided to give away the money he made writing Crazy Love.

They said, 'You should have at least held back some for emergency's sake.' And my response was...so what's going on in India is not an emergency? What's going on in Thailand is not an emergency? So you're telling me these little girls that are being raped all day long against their will over there in Thailand--that's not an emergency? An emergency is if something happens to Francis Chan and his pretty little family. Because, you know, God forbid, anything happen to me 20 years from now, but those little Thailand girls, those little Cambodians, those little Indians, those little Africans, forget about them! Worry about you. That's what's taught in the church! An emergency is only an emergency if it affects you and your pretty little family. How are you going to defend that with this book? Are you serious?!...You gotta be kidding me; that this is about us making sure that we take care of us first? That was the example of Jesus? Making sure that He's looking out for Himself first and it's only an emergency if it affects Jesus? No! He came down and laid down His life for His friends, and He says, "You know what? This is the example for you. You lay it down."

If we as the church begin to speak the truth about money, many people will be upset. But Jesus spoke about money often. If we are going to follow Him, we must not shrink back from speaking the truth in love. Let us be sure that it is in love, and not to make people feel guilty, or ourselves superior. But if we truly love men, we must tell them the truth. And the truth is that the Lord Jesus Christ is infinitely greater than any amount of money! If only our eyes were opened to the glory of God and the reality that we can know God, the nice words we sing would be true in our lives: "And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace."

So when we speak of emphasizing truth, we all nod our heads until it gets to specific truths that are absolutely opposed to all the lies that our culture - even our "Christian culture" - tell us. To stand for these truths will be to invite criticism. If you stand on unpopular biblical truths, you will be labeled as a legalist, a cultist, a fanatic, and many other things. Do not be discouraged. It happened to Jesus, and He promises that if we follow Him, it will happen to us as well. But the Lord Jesus Christ is our great treasure, and He is worth it all! No one will ever regret living for Jesus with all of his heart!

2. Entertainment

Another major truth that is unpopular in our day is the truth concerning worldly entertainment. A few short decades ago, and even today in some countries, Christians would never consider going to a movie. Today, millions of "believers" entertain themselves with videos which contain sexual innuendos, vile language, nudity, people having sex on the screen, and blasphemy. "Christians" actually pay to get this stuff in their homes. Does the Word of God speak to this issue? Indeed, it does.

1 John 2:15-17--Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world--the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life--is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.

James 4:4--Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

Ephesians 5:3-4--But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks.

1 Corinthians 10:31--Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

Philippians 4:8--Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy--meditate on these things.

If we run worldly entertainment through the grid of these five Scriptures, where does that leave us? Can we watch most television shows and movies to the glory of God? Are sitcoms true, honest, just, pure, lovely, and of good report? Do Hollywood romantic comedies always steer clear of the hint of immorality? To ask the question is to have the answer. We have grown used to sin, and it no longer shocks us. But God never becomes comfortable with sin. He hates it with a perfect and holy hatred. And He calls us to hate it as well.

We could learn from a powerful scene in the movie, "Time Changer". A man from the 1800s has arrived in our modern world. He attends a church, and they invite him to go to a movie with them. We see him sitting in the theater, utterly entranced by the moving pictures on the screen. And then, in the next scene, we see him running out of the theater, yelling at the top of his lungs, "Stop this movie! You must stop this movie! The man on the screen just blasphemed the name of the Lord!" The Lord Jesus Christ bore the wrath of His Father in our place, and yet how lightly we take it when someone curses His name. A man would never go to a movie where his own wife is repeatedly called a whore, and yet we often treat it as a small thing to "enjoy" films which slander our Savior.

An older brother in India comments on the Scriptures regarding entertainment: "The great god most people worship today is entertainment. Many who worship this god think they are disciples of Jesus. But they are going to burn in hell. 'You can't be a lover of pleasure and a lover of God at the same time.'...In the last days, it will be very difficult to be a true Christian."

This is not to say movies in and of themselves are evil. There are a few (very few) movies which genuinely exalt the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that are spiritually edifying and cause us to seek the Lord. If we are honest, we would have to say they are the great exception rather than the rule.

According to these Scriptures, much of the entertainment that we are involved in is abhorrent to God. He hates it. Does that concern us? God hates most of what we watch on TV. Do we care? Again, these truths are not going to be popular, but they are truths based on God's Word. If we fear God, we dare not only teach the popular parts of God's Word and ignore the rest. Martin Luther once said this:

If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest exposition every portion of the truth of God, except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battlefield besides, is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point.

The other aspect of entertainment is not just the objectionable content that it has, but the time that it takes. Even if it is entertainment that is not overtly sinful, do we really have several hours a week to spend doing things that are useless in the light of eternity? What would we think of a fireman who got the call that a house was on fire, but he decided not to go because his favorite television show was on? As with anything else, we can take this to unbiblical extremes (though most of us are not in danger of this), but the portrait of the normal Christian life in the New Testament is never a picnic. We are called to be soldiers. We are in a battle. A.W. Tozer writes an essay called, "This World: Playground or Battlefield?" Even the title stings, for we have acted as if this world is our home to frolic in, rather than embracing the biblical truth that we are foreigners here, sent as ambassadors and soldiers for our Lord.

We must never forget that we are in a real spiritual war. We have a real Commander. We have a real enemy. The stakes are higher than we can ever comprehend. Both God and the devil understand these things well. The question is, "Do we understand?" Paul Washer says this: "We live in a land of entertainment. And that entertainment and all those hobbies have been fashioned with only one purpose: to so distract you, that you think about nothing important." Make no mistake. The world's system comes from the devil, and it is designed to keep us from Christ. The sad truth is that for many, it is working.

According to the A.C. Nielsen Co., the average American watches more than 4 hours of TV each day.

That is staggering. The situation among professing Christians is probably not much different. Among Americans who profess that Jesus Christ is Lord of their lives, it is rare to find people who spend more time with their Bibles than with their TVs. May God deliver us!

Steve Gallagher uses the Greek word kosmos to speak of this world's system, and makes a similar point:

Whether it is in the suspense of an unfolding plot or in the excitement of a sporting event, kosmos is present, whispering his age-old mantra: You can have a fulfilling life without God. In the programs I mentioned, and thousands more, there is no turning to God, no seeking His will, and no dependence on Him. The same title fits them all: Life Without God. Kosmos drives people away from God and turns them in every direction, so long as it is not toward Him.

The Scripture speaks of those who are lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. Oh, may we not be in that number!

Could a mariner sit idle if he heard the drowning cry?

Could a doctor sit in comfort and just let his patients die?

Could a fireman sit idle, let men burn and give no hand?

Can you sit at ease in Zion, with the world around you DAMNED?

Leonard Ravenhill

Straining Out a Gnat and Swallowing a Camel

Another important thing about truth is this: We must stand with absolute conviction where Scripture is clear. Where Scripture is not so clear, there must be special love among the brethren to cover our doctrinal differences. I know many people who are silent about issues like covetousness, but they are very dogmatic about their eschatology (doctrine of the end times). We have it backwards! The Scripture is clear about the sin of covetousness. It says that if you are covetous, you cannot inherit the kingdom (Ephesians 5:5-6). The Scripture is not so clear about the end times. But many have treated other genuine believers as if they were heretics for having a different eschatology, while never warning men that you cannot love God and money! Which did Jesus speak of more? Which is the greater danger? Loving money will destroy your family, your health, and ultimately your soul. You can have a "wrong" eschatology and still be a fervent and faithful follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. We can be sure this is true, because many of the great saints in history have held to different viewpoints concerning how the last days will unfold.

We MUST stop splitting hairs over minor doctrinal disputes while leaving the real issues untouched. Jesus told the Pharisees that they paid tithes of all their littlest herbs but they neglected the major things: judgment, mercy, and faith (Matthew 23:23). We are in danger of this. Here is a good quote from C.H. Mackintosh which sums up the need for both love and truth:

The grand difficulty is to combine a spirit of intense separation with a spirit of grace, gentleness, and forbearance; or, as another has said, 'to maintain a narrow circle with a wide heart.' This is really a difficulty. As the strict and uncompromising maintenance of truth tends to narrow the circle around us, we all shall need the expansive power of grace to keep the heart wide and the affections warm. If we contend for truth otherwise than in grace, we shall only yield a one-sided and most unattractive testimony. And on the other hand, if we try to exhibit grace at the expense of truth, it will prove, in the end, to be only the manifestation of a popular liberality at God's expense--a most worthless thing.

Francis Schaeffer also speaks to the relationship between love and truth.

To be really Bible-believing Christians we need to practice, simultaneously, at each step of the way, two biblical principles. One principle is that of the purity of the visible church: Scripture commands that we must do more than just talk about the purity of the visible church, we must actually practice it, even when it is costly. The second principle is that of an observable love among all true Christians. In the flesh we can stress purity without love, or we can stress love without purity; we cannot stress both simultaneously. To do so we must look moment by moment to the work of Christ and of the Holy Spirit. Without that, a stress on purity becomes hard, proud, and legalistic; likewise, without it a stress on love becomes sheer compromise. Spirituality begins to have real meaning in our lives as we begin to exhibit simultaneously the holiness of God and the love of God. Without this simultaneous exhibition our marvelous God and Lord is not set forth. It is rather a caricature of Him that is shown, and He is greatly dishonored.

May we look unto Jesus, and be led by the Holy Spirit, so that we may show a true picture of Christ to the world.

Chapter 3: Prayer

No man is greater than his prayer life. \--Leonard Ravenhill

What the Church needs today is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use--men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men--men of prayer. \--E.M. Bounds

"The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much." (James 5:16) "The Apostles gave themselves to prayer, and to the ministry of the Word." (Acts 6:4) "Jesus continued all night in prayer." (Luke 6:12) "As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Ghost said..." (Acts 13:2) "And when they had prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spoke the Word of God with boldness..." (Acts 4:31) "Pray without ceasing." (1 Thessalonians 5:17) "Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 5:20).

Prayer is incredibly important in a local church. William MacDonald says that nothing that matters is done without prayer. This is true. And yet, how little we pray. How many are the churches who do not schedule even an hour a week for saints to meet and pray! How many more are the churches where the "prayer meeting" becomes either another Bible teaching or, even worse, a gossip session. How many are the saints like myself who struggle to truly avail ourselves of prayer!

Prayer shows our dependence upon God. If we do not pray much, we know that we are proud. Humble people pray. Humble people realize God is their only hope. "God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble." (I Peter 5:5) Proud people have many plans in case God doesn't come through. A church should spend time praying together. We should praise our Lord, worship our Lord, commune with Him, listen to Him, pray for one another, for our elders, for those preaching the Gospel, for those we know who yet need Christ, and many other things.

The Scripture has much to say about prayer. Here are just a few verses from the ministry of Jesus, the early church, and the epistles which show the great importance of prayer in the life of Jesus and in our own lives.

Matthew 6:5-13--And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. "Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen."

Matthew 14:23--And when He had sent the multitudes away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. Now when evening came, He was alone there.

Matthew 21:12-13--Then Jesus went into the temple of God and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. And He said to them, "It is written, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer,' but you have made it a 'den of thieves.' "

Mark 1:35--Now in the morning, having risen a long while before daylight, He went out and departed to a solitary place; and there He prayed.

Luke 3:21--When all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus also was baptized; and while He prayed, the heaven was opened.

Luke 5:16--So He Himself often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed.

Luke 6:12--Now it came to pass in those days that He went out to the mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.

Luke 9:18--And it happened, as He was alone praying, that His disciples joined Him, and He asked them, saying, "Who do the crowds say that I am?"

Luke 9:29--As He prayed, the appearance of His face was altered, and His robe became white and glistening.

Luke 11:1--Now it came to pass, as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, that one of His disciples said to Him, "Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples."

Luke 18:1-8--Then He spoke a parable to them, that men always ought to pray and not lose heart, saying: "There was in a certain city a judge who did not fear God nor regard man. Now there was a widow in that city; and she came to him, saying, 'Get justice for me from my adversary.' And he would not for a while; but afterward he said within himself, 'Though I do not fear God nor regard man, yet because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.' "Then the Lord said, "Hear what the unjust judge said. And shall God not avenge His own elect who cry out day and night to Him, though He bears long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?"

Luke 18:10-14--Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, 'God, I thank You that I am not like other men--extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.' And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

Luke 22:44--And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.

Acts 1:14--These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers.

Acts 2:42--And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.

Acts 6:4--But we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word.

Acts 10:1-2--There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of what was called the Italian Regiment, a devout man and one who feared God with all his household, who gave alms generously to the people, and prayed to God always.

Acts 12:5--Peter was therefore kept in prison, but constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church.

Acts 12:12--So, when he had considered this, he came to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose surname was Mark, where many were gathered together praying.

Acts 13:2-3--As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, "Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." Then, having fasted and prayed, and laid hands on them, they sent them away.

Acts 14:23--So when they had appointed elders in every church, and prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord in whom they had believed.

Acts 16:25-26--But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were loosed.

Acts 21:5--When we had come to the end of those days, we departed and went on our way; and they all accompanied us, with wives and children, till we were out of the city. And we knelt down on the shore and prayed.

Acts 28:8--And it happened that the father of Publius lay sick of a fever and dysentery. Paul went in to him and prayed, and he laid his hands on him and healed him.

Ephesians 1:15-16--Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers:

Philippians 4:6-7--Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

Colossians 1:9--For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.

1 Thessalonians 5:17--Pray without ceasing.

1 Thessalonians 5:25--Brethren, pray for us.

I Timothy 5:5-6--Now she who is really a widow, and left alone, trusts in God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day. But she who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives.

Hebrews 5:7--Who, in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because of His godly fear.

James 5:13-18--Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing psalms. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain; and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.

Prayer in Scripture

This is only a fraction of the Scriptures dealing with prayer. Clearly, prayer is a central theme in the Scriptures. So what do we see when we look at what the Bible has to say about prayer?

First, we are commanded to pray. Pray without ceasing. Pray for us. Pray for one another. These are commands. God tells us to pray. Why do we pray? Prayer is something of a mystery. Some have suggested that God cannot do anything unless we pray. This is not true. God is God, and He can do whatever He wants. Yet it seems that, for the most part, God chooses to act through people. He does answer prayer. Let us thank and praise Him for this great truth!

Take a moment to reflect on how God has answered prayer in the Scriptures and in your life.

Second, in the Scripture we are encouraged to pray. We are encouraged primarily by the wonderful promises given concerning prayer. "Ask and it shall be given you, seek and you shall find; knock and the door shall be opened unto you. Whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive. If any man sees his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall pray for him and God shall give him life. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Delight yourself in the Lord and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." God has given us many exceeding great and precious promised to encourage us to pray.

There is only one greater promise given in the Scripture and that is this: "You shall seek for me and find me when you shall search for me with all your heart." God Himself is the greatest answer to prayer. Above all else, let us pray that He will give us Himself. For He is our treasure.

Third, Jesus taught us how to pray. Our Father in heaven...We are able to come to Almighty God, perfect, holy, creator of the universe, as our Father! Hallowed be Your Name...The great cry of every believer's heart should be that God's Name be hallowed. This should come before any request. This should burden our hearts more than any other thing, that the only Name that is Worthy is being blasphemed all over the world. Your kingdom come...Again, what we see here is different than our typical praying. My needs are not first here. God's Name and God's Kingdom must take precedence in our lives. God's Name is more important than my job situation. Christ's Kingdom is more important than Aunt Betty's cold. Your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven...How is God's will done in heaven? Perfectly. Let us never rest, never be complacent, while there are places in our own hearts and in this world where God's will is not done perfectly. Christ is worthy!

Only after praying for God's Name and kingdom do we see Jesus teach us to begin praying for our needs. This fits the picture of our lives revolving around God, and not trying to make God revolve around us.

Give us this day our daily bread...Notice this prayer is not individualistic. We do not say MY Father and give me MY daily bread. There is an emphasis here on the body. We also see a trust in God demonstrated by this petition. Give us our daily bread. God provides for us. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors... Jesus teaches us to pray for forgiveness, and He assumes that we are forgiving those who have wronged us. If we have truly seen the mercy of God demonstrated towards us at the cross, we can never hold something against another human being. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one...Jesus prayed this for us then, and He prays this for us now. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. Again, we see a radical God-centeredness in this prayer. It is prayer that is not based on what I want, but on who God is.

Fourth, we see examples of prayer in the early church. "They all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication. We will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word. Peter was kept in prison, but prayer was made without ceasing by the church unto God for him. As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate to me Barnabas and Saul for the work I have called them. And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away. For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you." The early church prayed. Paul prayed. Peter prayed. This was the norm. Tradition has it that James was referred to as "camel knees", because his knees were so hardened from time spent in prayer.

Fifth, church history teaches us to pray. According to E.M Bounds, Bishop Andrews spent five hours daily on his knees, John Wesley spent two hours a day beginning at 4 am, Luther said if he didn't spend at least two hours daily in prayer, the devil would get the victory, Samuel Rutherford rose at 3 am to pray, and Joseph Alleine spent from 4-8 am in prayer. Can you think of a man or woman whom God used mightily to advance His kingdom who was not a person of prayer? I know of many whom God has used who had theological differences, different temperaments, different gifts, different strengths, different weaknesses, but I know of no person mightily used of God who was not a man or woman of prayer.

Sixth, we have our greatest example in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. And He prayed much. In Luke 5:16, we read, "So He Himself often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed." This was not a one-time thing. It was a habit. He longed to be with His Father. At times, everyone would be looking for Him, and He would slip away to pray. At times, He spent all night in prayer. Nowhere in Scripture do we read that Jesus ever spent all night reading the Bible, but He did pass nights in prayer. I've heard it said we have no record the disciples ever asked Jesus to teach them to preach or heal the sick or raise the dead. But they did say, "Teach us to pray." Prayer was essential to His life. Jesus was a man of prayer. Hebrews tells us that in the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications with strong cries and tears. Wow! Isn't it amazing that the Perfect Son of God prayed so much? He had less to pray about than we do. He never had to repent of sin. Yet He was always in the presence of His Father. And this is how He knew the will of the Father so that He could say, "I always do the will of my Father". Hallelujah!

May we follow Jesus and be men and women of prayer.

Why Pray?

Prayer is another aspect generally accepted as part of the Christian life. It stirs no great controversy when someone suggests that we pray. We all accept this as a true doctrine. And yet for many in our busy land, we know little of the reality of prayer. We know we do not pray as we should. We read the Bible or we read stories from other lands, and we know that they pray more than we do. Most of us give lip service to prayer, but we do precious little praying, either together or individually. Why?

Fundamentally, prayer is a position of dependence. In prayer, I acknowledge that God is Sovereign. I praise Him, worship Him, and I ask Him to help me. We are too strong. We do not need God very much. And so we do not pray very much. It is a simple matter to gauge how much you think you need God. How much do you pray? Brothers and sisters in China spend much time in prayer. Yet here - where we are independent, strong, intelligent, rich Americans - we have little time for prayer. I speak to myself most of all. God, forgive me!

Everyone trusts something. It is impossible to trust in nothing. If I am not desperately depending on God, then I know I am depending on something else. In the Old Testament, God uses Egypt as a metaphor for trusting in the world. When we read what God says about trusting Egypt, we can insert whatever it is we trust in rather than Christ. Then these Scriptures directly apply to us.

"Woe to the rebellious children," says the Lord, "who take counsel, but not of Me, and who devise plans, but not of My Spirit, that they may add sin to sin; who walk to go down to Egypt, and have not asked My advice, to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt! Therefore the strength of Pharaoh shall be your shame, and trust in the shadow of Egypt shall be your humiliation...Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, and rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many, and in horsemen because they are very strong, but who do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek the Lord!" (Isaiah 30:1-3, 31:1)

Is this God's Word to us? Many of us have rejected the slick marketing campaigns of the world, and we don't use carnal fund-raising methods, but the question comes, "Do we pray?" Because even if we have rejected certain facets of trusting in the world, if we don't pray, we show we are not really trusting the Lord. We are still trusting something other than Him. It may look more spiritual, but it is still not trusting in the Lord Himself. Francis Schaeffer puts it this way: "If we say we believe God, but don't pray, we show that we are really materialists."

Paul Washer wrote a piercing article called, "Lessons from the Weak". In it, he addresses some of these issues more eloquently than I am able:

We live in a day of great ministries, great visions, great plans, great programs, and even greater expenses. Yet how much of this is nothing more than a pathetic substitute for the power of God revealed in the simplicity of the Gospel and the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the community and the individual?...Are the churches and ministries in the West too powerful to be used of God? Have we dressed ourselves in so much unbiblical armor and weaponry that we cannot even walk as Christians, let alone fight? If God did allow a great work among us, would we become boastful, and say that our own power had delivered us? Would we be like the Chaldeans who sacrificed to their own nets instead of giving glory to God?...Let us become weak that we might be strong, and blind that we might see...

Have we become too strong to be of use to God? Here in the West, the circumstances of our lives lead us to independence and develop in us a spirit of self-sufficiency. However, the strength of God always comes in proportion to our weakness, and His help always comes to the degree that we recognize our need.

Washer contrasts these attitudes in us to the saints in other countries:

[They] are not men of great stature or presence. They have no special gifts that can be used as a 'drawing card.' They are not great athletes with muscles to show, or wealthy business men who gave up promising careers to help Jesus. They are nothing more and nothing less than sinners who have been saved by grace. They are little men with little ministries who do little things with their little means. And yet they are the very instruments of God to bring forth His work in the world. For God is faithful to multiply their few loaves and fishes into a meal for the multitude...This is so ordered that God might get the greater glory for Himself.

"For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God." (1 Corinthians 1:26-29 NASB)

Prayer in the Church Setting

In our churches, do we pray? I would have to say the answer to this, even more than the answer to the other topics of Truth and Love we have addressed thus far, is an emphatic NO! It is rare to find a church that has even one night a week set aside for prayer. Among those churches that do have a "prayer meeting", it is often much talking with little actual prayer. Neither do our church services allow time for corporate prayer.

Our form and our expectations hinder us. We have much time for listening to a sermon and much time for singing. But rarely do we give much time to prayer. This was a practice in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, it was an emphasis in the New Testament church, and it is always an emphasis where the Spirit of the Lord is working. But among us, we have little prayer. This leads to the convicting question, "Do we really want what God wants?"

Many of us do not even know what it is to pray. It is similar to the invention of the airplane. Not so long ago, many mocked those who spoke of creating an invention that would allow men to fly like a bird. It took a long time for the airplane to be invented. But once the airplane was invented, many people started to build on that invention. For thousands of years, no one was ever able to fly. Yet within 70 years of the invention of the airplane, a man was flown to the moon! Once people knew it was possible, the power of flight was used in ways that would have been inconceivable a few short years before. Similarly, many of us have never seen believers truly praying together. When we think of prayer, we think of praying before dinner or to end a church service.

But there is more to prayer. I think of times when a few of us have gathered together and waited on the Lord. He has burdened us with specific things, and we have prayed for some hours. I think of walking back and forth to work and weeping as I prayed for brothers and sisters who were struggling. I think of praying with a brother and knowing that he was "praying in the Spirit." I think of times where it was the most natural thing in the world to pray over a lost pen or when passing a car accident. I think of earnestly and fervently praying, and seeing the Lord answer these prayers. Have you tasted this in your life? Do you long for more of it? May we cry out to God that He would make us men and women of prayer!

I also think of men of God throughout the ages. The Lord Jesus Christ spent all night in prayer. George Whitefield said, "Whole days and weeks have I spent prostrate on the ground in silent or vocal prayer." David Brainerd once prayed for hours in the snow. John Hyde of India would go to conferences, and spend the whole conference locked in a room, praying. For many of us, we do not even have a place in our brain to fit such information. Clearly, prayer is much more than we presently understand.

What is the answer to this prayerlessness in our churches? It seems like the first step is simply to acknowledge that we are failing and repent. We are not praying to Almighty God. We do not care much about His glory among the nations. We do not care much about those around us plunging into hell. We do not even care much about our own family and friends who are lost. We say we do, but we can see by our actions that we do not. For we are not praying. We think we are strong enough to handle these things on our own, and so we are not praying. As Corrie Ten Boom pointedly reminds us, "Prayerlessness is a sin." As with any sin, the Lord calls us to repent, individually and corporately. And He calls us to pray.

The next step could be to simply begin praying on our own and with brothers and sisters. When we come together, can we just sit and wait on the Lord and pray? Will He hear us? Will He answer? Could He direct our time together? I believe that He can. Oh, Lord, make us a praying people.

Now let us emphasize in closing that there can be no real progress in the church without prayer. We can go through a routine, and produce even seeming results, but nothing is accomplished for God apart from intercession. If we do not see this conclusion from Scripture, we will be soon driven to it by sheer necessity. \--William MacDonald

Ezekiel 22:30-31--So I sought for a man among them who would make a wall, and stand in the gap before Me on behalf of the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found no one. Therefore I have poured out My indignation on them; I have consumed them with the fire of My wrath; and I have recompensed their deeds on their own heads," says the Lord GOD.

Oh, may the Lord cause us to pray! May we ask Him to reveal Himself to us! May we intercede for those around us who are perishing! May we cry out with desperation for revival in our churches! The Lord has promised to hear our prayers and to answer, and yet we pray so little! What is this deadness in my heart that causes this? Why do I not pray? Oh, Lord, change me; change us; that we might truly be a praying people!

Chapter 4: The Holy Spirit

One of the most telling blows which the Enemy ever struck at the life of the Church was to create in her a fear of the Holy Spirit. No one who mingles with Christians in these times will deny that such a fear exists. \--A.W. Tozer

If there was no power of the Holy Spirit and no reality of prayer, how would my (our) life change? --Francis Schaeffer

After I arrived in the West, it didn't take long for me to realize that something fundamental was missing in the body of Christ. That missing thing was the power and presence of God. I don't say this to condemn anyone, but rather I point it out in the hope that it will speak to your heart and help the church. Thousands of churches today do not preach the Word with the authority and power that Jesus promised to all who follow Him. This is a tragedy, as such powerless churches end up relying on human wisdom to see 'results'. The fruit of such a half-baked gospel invariably produces a harvest of half-baked believers, most of whom will fall away at the first sign of trouble. --Brother Yun

The blight of the Pharisees in olden times was doctrine without love...It is no use to deny that Christ was crucified by persons who would today be called fundamentalists. This should prove most disquieting if not downright distressing to us who pride ourselves on our orthodoxy. An unblessed soul filled with the letter of truth may actually be worse off than a pagan kneeling before a fetish. We are safe only when the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, only when our intellects are indwelt by the loving fire that came at Pentecost. For the Holy Spirit is not a luxury, not something added now and again to produce a deluxe type of Christian once in a generation. No, He is for every child of God a vital necessity, and that He fill and indwell His people is more than a languid hope. It is rather an inescapable imperative. \--A.W. Tozer

John the Baptist was the forerunner of Jesus. He was sent to prepare the way for Christ. The Old Testament prophesied of the coming of John the Baptist. All four gospels record his ministry. In the four gospels, there is only one statement of John that is given in every gospel, and Jesus makes a very similar statement in the book of Acts. Do you know what this statement is? If you have a few minutes, why don't you look it up for yourself. Often, we remember things better when we come to the answer ourselves, rather than reading it from someone else.

Did you look it up?

The only statement of John the Baptist recorded in all four gospels is that the One who is coming will baptize you with the Holy Ghost. (Matthew 3:11, Mark 1:8, Luke 3:16, John 1:33, Acts 1:5) This is an important part of the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ. Yet in many circles, it is almost entirely neglected. Why?

The devil is an intelligent being. The fact that the devil is more intelligent than all of us is perhaps a good reminder to those of us who think that being really smart is at least as important as being godly. The devil knows that Jesus said there is a narrow way. He seeks with all his might to keep people from the narrow way. It makes precious little difference to him whether we fall off into the left ditch or the right ditch. He simply does not want us walking the narrow way. And he will blind us to as much truth as he is able. Many of us have seen that salvation is by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and have come to know Him. So the devil lost that battle, but he simply moves the lines back a little and seeks to blind us to many of the other exceeding great and precious promises God has given us.

Although it is a slight oversimplification, we can say that within American Christendom, there are two basic camps concerning the Holy Spirit. Both of these camps are unbiblical. Each camp reacts strongly to the extremes of the other camp and finds many proof-texts to back up their own position. And so both of them remain in the ditch, and they will never get out of the ditch until each one starts being concerned with the beam in its own eye instead of the speck in the eye of the other group. Before we take a look at these two positions, let's read some of the Scriptures concerning the Holy Spirit.

Matthew 3:11--I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Matthew 3:16-4:1--When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

Luke 4:14--Then Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and news of Him went out through all the surrounding region.

Luke 4:18-19--The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; to proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD.

Luke 11:11-13--If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!

John 3:5-8--Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."

John 7:37-39--On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water." But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

John 16:7-14--Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.

Acts 1:8--But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.

Acts 2:4--And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.

Acts 2:38-39--Then Peter said to them, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call."

Acts 4:8--Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, "Rulers of the people and elders of Israel:

Acts 4:31-33--And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness. Now the multitude of those who believed were of one heart and one soul; neither did anyone say that any of the things he possessed was his own, but they had all things in common. And with great power the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And great grace was upon them all.

Acts 6:3--Therefore, brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business.

Acts 7:55--But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

Acts 8:14-17--Now when the apostles who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them, who, when they had come down, prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. For as yet He had fallen upon none of them. They had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

Acts 9:17--And Ananias went his way and entered the house; and laying his hands on him he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit."

Acts 10:37-38--That word you know, which was proclaimed throughout all Judea, and began from Galilee after the baptism which John preached: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.

Acts 10:44-45--While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also.

Acts 13:2-4--As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, "Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." Then, having fasted and prayed, and laid hands on them, they sent them away. So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia, and from there they sailed to Cyprus.

Acts 13:52--And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.

Acts 16:6-7--Now when they had gone through Phrygia and the region of Galatia, they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia. After they had come to Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit did not permit them.

Romans 8:1-17--There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors --- not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, "Abba, Father." The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs --- heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.

1 Corinthians 2:11--For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God.

Galatians 3:2-5--This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh? Have you suffered so many things in vain --- if indeed it was in vain? Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?

Galatians 5:16-25--I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.

Sorting out the Extremes

This is by no means an exhaustive list. There are dozens of other passages which speak about the Holy Spirit. But I did want to write out some of them, so that it's clear the Holy Spirit is a major emphasis in the New Testament. It is absolutely impossible to live the Christian life apart from the power of the Holy Spirit! Paul rebuked the Galatians strongly for thinking that they could do this. And yet, for many of us, we are so afraid of the excesses of the charismatic movement, we are attempting to follow Jesus in our own flesh. This is deadly. Now let's look at the two camps and how we have missed the narrow path of truly being led by the Spirit.

The first extreme is found in many of the charismatic churches. In these churches, the gifts of the Holy Spirit (and specifically the gift of tongues) are emphasized out of all proportion to the Scripture. Many people claim to be "filled with the Holy Ghost" while living worldly and wicked lifestyles. They jump up and down and shout "Hallelujah!" on Sunday mornings, but cheat in their business on Monday afternoon. Brother Zac talks of those who speak in other tongues on Sunday mornings and yell at their wives in their mother tongues on Sunday afternoon. He says if you have some spirit that gives you other tongues, but can't control your mother tongue, then you may have a spirit, but it is not the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit will make you holy.

Also, in many of these churches, the gifts are not exercised according to the biblical pattern. Specifically, all things are to be done decently and in order (1 Corinthians 11:40). And if the gift of tongues is to be used, there should be an interpreter (1 Corinthians 14:27-28). These injunctions are disregarded in many charismatic circles. Much of the charismatic teaching on the gifts would state that tongues is the proof of the baptism with the Spirit, or even of salvation. Yet Paul deals with this issue by asking the rhetorical question, "Do all speak with tongues?" (1 Corinthians 12:29-30) In the context, the answer is clearly no, since Paul asks a series of similar questions, including the question of whether all are apostles.

In addition, in many (but not all) charismatic churches, doctrine and the word of God are often minimized. There is a great emphasis on being Spirit-led. This has led many to believe we will hear an inner prompting of the Spirit whenever we need to make a decision, so we do not desperately need to know the Word of God. It is true that the Spirit can lead us by an inner prompting, but the ordinary means that God uses is to have His Spirit reveal something to us from His Word. If someone is neglecting the Scriptures, which God has already spoken to them, it is certain that they are not being led by the Holy Spirit, who is the Author of the written Word.

Because of this de-emphasis of Scripture, some churches that emphasize the gifts of the Holy Spirit also emphasize the heresy known as the prosperity gospel. The prosperity gospel states that if you follow God, He will definitely make you wealthy. This lie originates with the father of lies, and is deceiving multitudes in our day.

The preceding points do not apply to all charismatic people or churches. But in general, in our country, these critiques of the movement are fair. The problem is that the conservative, evangelical churches have reacted against these tendencies so strongly that they have fallen into the other ditch!

Among many conservative denominations, they seem to actually be afraid of the Holy Spirit. They often quote passages such as, "Let all things be done decently and in order." (1 Corinthians 11:40) But they rarely, if ever, mention the preceding verse, which says, "Wherefore, brethren, covet to prophesy, and forbid not to speak with tongues." (1 Corinthians 11:39) Quick to take the biblical high ground, these brothers decry the excesses of the charismatic movement, but explicitly disobey the Scripture! They teach that prophecy has passed away, and so we should not seek it, and they explicitly forbid people to speak in tongues!

A.W. Tozer humorously speaks of this trend:

In spite of the undeniable lukewarmness of most of us we still fear that unless we keep a careful chec on ourselves we shall surely lose our dignity and become howling fanatics by this time next week. We set a watch upon our emotions day and night lest we become over-spiritual and bring reproach upon the cause of Christ. Which all, if I may say so, is for most of us about as sensible as throwing a cordon of police around a cemetery to prevent a wild political demonstration by the inhabitants.

So the conservative groups have reacted so strongly to charismatic excess that to even mention the term "baptism with the Holy Ghost" will cause people to be very wary of you, if not rebuke you outright. But the truth is that John the Baptist, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Apostles used this terminology. So if God Himself uses such terminology, it is certainly acceptable for us to use it. More importantly than the terminology they used, however, is the reality they experienced.

The Lord Jesus Christ Himself did not begin to minister until the Spirit came upon Him. Peter and the other apostles were transformed from cowards who denied the Lord into bold martyrs who gave their lives for Christ after Pentecost. Once the Spirit came upon these men, they were no longer the same! They were transformed! Without the empowering of the Holy Spirit, we cannot follow Jesus. We can live nice, decent, moral lives and have good doctrine; but to love our enemies, to rejoice in the Lord always, to count it all joy when we fall into various trials, to bless those who persecute us, to lose our lives for Christ's sake...To live out the Christian life, we must be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Yet instead of celebrating the awesome gift of the Father that the Third Person of the Trinity dwells inside of us, we have spent decades arguing against the Holy Spirit. Many people in conservative churches are uncomfortable because there is an element of mystery when we attempt to describe the workings of the Holy Spirit. They tend to accuse anyone who emphasizes the role of the Holy Spirit as being a mystic (which is a bad word to them). Yet Jesus Himself uses these words to describe the operation of the Holy Spirit: "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit." (John 3:8) Can we accuse Jesus of being a mystic (in a negative sense)? I dare not.

Perhaps the statement that hits the root of the problem best is what Brother Zac says (paraphrase of a message I heard):

Much of what I saw around me was a counterfeit baptism with the Holy Spirit. It created great emotion, but didn't make people holy and cause rivers of living water to flow from their lives. I didn't want that. But I cried out to God for what Peter and John and Paul got. I wanted the real thing, and I would not be deterred because many had gotten a counterfeit. The fact that the devil counterfeits it so much proves it is valuable.

This is true. Only real money is counterfeited. No one makes counterfeit monopoly money. They only counterfeit what is valuable.

What the Holy Spirit Does

Who cares what extremes others have gone to?! Let us come to the Word of God and examine the issue of the Holy Spirit. Biblically, we are commanded to be filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:18), we are told that God will give the Holy Spirit to all who ask Him (Luke 11:13), we are shown the difference between the fruit of the Spirit and the works of the flesh (Galatians 5:19-26), we are told that Steven was filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts 6:5), we see the Spirit poured out upon the disciples in many different situations (Acts 2:4, 4:31, 10:44, 19:6), we see the Spirit of truth being our safeguard against deception (John 16:13), we see that rivers of living water will flow from our lives if we are filled with the Spirit (John 7:37-39), we see that it is impossible to follow Jesus without being filled with the Spirit (whole New Testament). All of these things sound wonderful to me!

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth (John 15:26). The Sword of the Spirit is the Word of God (Ephesians 6:17). If people constantly speak of being led by the Spirit, but they have little or no knowledge of the Word of God, we should be skeptical. We are told to test all things, and to try the spirits (1 John 4:1). The other thing we know about the Holy Spirit is that He glorifies Jesus (John 16:14). This is another test of whether something is a genuine work of the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit will not glorify a man, or even glorify Himself; He will glorify Jesus. As the Holy Spirit works in any person, the cry of his heart will be the same as John the Baptist's, "[Jesus] must increase, but I must decrease." (John 3:30)

We also see it is impossible to truly understand the Holy Scriptures without the Holy Spirit interpreting them for us. Jesus said to the Pharisees, "You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life." (John 5:39-40) The Pharisees had a great intellectual knowledge of the Scriptures. But because they were proud and did not have the Holy Spirit, they crucified the very One to whom all the Scriptures pointed. Paul tells us that no man knows the things of God except the Spirit of God and the one to whom He will reveal them (1 Corinthians 2:10-11). We must be born again by the Spirit of God or we cannot even enter the kingdom of heaven, no matter how much knowledge we have (John 3:3).

Paul says that his preaching was not with convincing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power (1 Corinthians 2:4). There is a contrast in the Scripture between the Spirit and the flesh. As with so many Scriptural principles, there is no middle ground. You are either being led by the Spirit or you are being led by your flesh. Galatians 5:16-18 makes this very clear: "I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law."

We can grieve the Spirit of God (Ephesians 4:30)! Oh, how this should grip my heart much more than it does. We can grieve the Spirit of the God who sent His Son to die for our sins. What a tragedy that I should grieve Him. Yet how lightly I take it. Oh, that God Himself would be my one desire, my one pleasure, the One I treasure and seek after!

The fact that the Spirit testifies within us is one of the evidences we have of salvation (1 John 4:13). If we do not have the testimony of the Spirit, it should concern us. The Spirit of God is absolutely essential.

It is undoubtedly true that all Christians have the Holy Spirit. Scripture tells us that if we do not have the Spirit, we do not belong to God (Romans 8:9). But it would seem from the Scriptures that there can be a difference (although there should not be) between having the Spirit of God and being filled with the Spirit and being led by the Spirit. So is it right for people who are already believers to pray to be filled with the Holy Spirit?

The Lord Jesus Christ teaches believers to ask for the Holy Spirit. "If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" (Luke 11:13) It is clear that Christ is speaking to believers, because He was responding to His disciples' request to teach them to pray. Also, He refers to God as "your heavenly Father". Those who reject Christ are not sons of God, but rather enemies of God. John states that whoever denies the Son does not have the Father (1 John 2:23). So Jesus teaches believers to ask for the Holy Spirit, and to believe that God the Father will grant this request.

Also, in the book of Acts, the Holy Spirit is poured out on multiple occasions. It appears that many of these believers were present on more than one occasion. Specifically, the Spirit is poured out in an unusual way in Acts 2 and then again in Acts 4. Peter, John, and probably many others were present on both of these occasions. To be filled with the Spirit is not a one-time experience that fixes all your problems. Rather, it is an ongoing reality that we desperately need in order to faithfully follow our Lord and glorify Him among all nations.

Why Emphasize the Spirit?

First, the Holy Spirit is God. Do not belittle this point. God is triune. It is not simply God the Father and God the Son. There is God the Holy Spirit. To ignore or neglect the Spirit of the living God is a serious offense. We do not want to be guilty of grieving or quenching the Spirit of God.

Secondly, we should emphasize the Holy Spirit because the Word of God emphasizes the Holy Spirit. In the New Testament, the word "Spirit" or "Ghost" is used 228 times. That is a staggering number. This is not a small doctrine. In the book of Acts alone, the word "Spirit" or "Ghost" is used 53 times. It has been often suggested that the name of the book should not be "The Acts of the Apostles", but "The Acts of the Holy Spirit." The Word of God commands us to be filled with the Spirit, advises us to ask the Father for the Spirit, contrasts the Spirit with the flesh, warns us against quenching or grieving the Spirit, and tells us that we can't know God or understand the Scriptures apart from the Holy Spirit.

Third, the only alternative to living a life in dependence on the Spirit is living a life in dependence on my flesh. There is no third option. We are either daily depending on and being led by the Spirit, or we are being led by our flesh. It is easy to be deceived on this point, thinking we may not exactly be walking in the Spirit, but we are not walking in the flesh either. The Bible presents no such teaching. The Lord Jesus Christ gave commands that are impossible to fulfill unless we are filled with the Holy Spirit. One of the great deceptions of our day is that we water down Christ's commands to the point that all we really need to do is "ask Jesus into our hearts", live moral lives, and go to church. We do not need the power of the Holy Spirit to do these things. But to truly follow Jesus in the way the Bible teaches, we must be filled with the Spirit of God.

Fourth, if you look at the great moves of God historically, you will see that men and women were desperately crying out for the Holy Spirit. Those involved in these movements held many different theologies and had very different personalities. But one thing they had in common: They were desperate for the Spirit of God in their lives and ministries. May God save us from cold, dead intellectualism!

Fifth, Paul stated that he did not come with convincing words of man's wisdom but in a demonstration of the Spirit and of power. In a day when everyone has a method for how to grow the church, in a day when millions of dollars are spent on elaborate buildings, in a day when flashy entertainment is openly applauded by churchgoers nationwide; beware of man's wisdom! We need to be sure that the faith of our hearers will not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. Again, if we are not filled with the Spirit, we inevitably default to our own wisdom and clever methodologies. Faith that is built on such a foundation will fail when the storms begin to come. Let us build on the foundation of the truth of God's Word revealed to us by God's Spirit.

The Holy Spirit must be emphasized, not merely tolerated, among us. A simple reading of the New Testament will reveal that the Holy Spirit is utterly essential to the Christian life. Without the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit, it is absolutely impossible to live the Christian life. It cannot be done. We desperately need the Holy Spirit.

How the Holy Spirit Works in the Church

We have seen something of what the Word of God has to say concerning the Holy Spirit. Now we come to the Holy Spirit as He works in the church. As a corporate body, does the Spirit of the Living God have free reign in our midst? Are we waiting on the Lord and allowing Him to direct things as He chooses? Or are we closer to the condition C.T. Studd describes? "How little chance the Holy Ghost has nowadays. The churches and mission societies have so bound Him in red tape, that they practically ask Him to sit in a corner while they do the work themselves."

I fear that for most of us in conservative, evangelical churches, our "services" are so planned that we rarely give room for the Spirit of God to work. We live by our agendas and calendars. We plan every minute of our day. We are a busy, noisy people. We do not have time to wait on God. We do not have the patience to wait on God. We do not have the ability to quiet our hearts and wait on the Lord. How can we even hear God, let alone be led by Him?

This is not to say that God is not sovereign. God can do anything He pleases, but in accord with His character, the Holy Spirit typically comes where He is welcome.

Sometimes, we even leave a little wiggle room in our programs for God to do something unusual, but we do not come with that spirit of expectation. Fifty years ago A.W. Tozer wrote a little essay entitled "Faith Without Expectation is Dead". This essay speaks to us today, perhaps even more than it spoke to the generation in which it was written. In part, this essay says:

Expectation has always been present in the Church in the times of her greatest power. When she believed, she expected, and her Lord never disappointed her. 'And blessed is she that believed: for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord' (Luke 1:45).

Every great movement of God in history, every unusual advance in the Church, every revival, has been preceded by the operations of the Spirit always. His bestowals hardly surprised His people because they were gazing expectantly toward the risen Lord and looking confidently for His Word to be fulfilled. His blessings accorded with their expectations.

One characteristic that marks the average church today is lack of anticipation. Christians, when they meet, do not expect anything unusual to happen; consequently only the usual happens, and that usual is as predictable as the setting of the sun. A psychology of non-expectation pervades the assembly, a mood of quiet ennui which the minister by various means tries to dispel...

Christian expectation in the average church follows the program, not the promises. Prevailing spiritual conditions, however low, are accepted as inevitable. What will be is what has been. The weary slaves of the dull routine find it impossible to hope for anything better.

We need today a fresh spirit of anticipation that springs out of the promises of God. We must declare war on the mood of non-expectation and come together with childlike faith. Only then can we know again the beauty and wonder of the Lord's presence among us.

This is true. The Scriptures say that without faith it is impossible to please God. We must come to God and expect that He is going to do great and mighty things. We do not want to "work up faith" or chant some positive confession mantras. But we do want to come to God believing that He does not change, and that, as our loving Father, He desires to answer our prayers. We know God's revealed will in the Scriptures, and He promises that if we ask anything according to His will, we have what we ask for (1 John 5:14-15). "Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." (Hebrews 4:16) To come to meet with Almighty God and expect nothing is to display the bad fruit of unbelief in our lives. "He that comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him." (Hebrews 11:6)

William MacDonald speaks of how it happened that we have lost the openness and expectation that the Spirit of God will work in our midst:

The local church should ever recognize the sovereignty of the Spirit. By this we mean that He can do as He pleases, and that He will not always choose to do things in exactly the same way, though He will never act contrary to the Word. The very symbols of the Spirit used in the Scriptures--fire, oil, water, wind--speak of fluidity, of unpredictable behavior. Thus, wise Christians will be sufficiently elastic to allow Him the divine prerogative.

It was so in the early church, but soon people became uneasy with meetings that were 'free and social, with the minimum of form.' Thus controls were added and formalism and ritualism took over. The Holy Spirit was quenched, and the church lost its power.

Practically Emphasizing the Holy Spirit

If this is true, as we are arguing that it is, what can we do about it? What practical steps can we take in the right direction of being individually and corporately directed by the Spirit of God? It is a simple matter to see that all is not well, but a more difficult one to see what can be done.

Probably the primary thing that we need is to see our own need to be filled with the Spirit. We simply need to come as children and ask our Father to fill us afresh with His Spirit. And we should keep on asking until He does this in our lives. He delights to give us good gifts and to fill us with His Spirit, but often we are content just going about our day being nice people. Oh, that we would see our great need to be filled with the Holy Spirit! I cannot love my neighbor as myself, I cannot pray without ceasing, I cannot rejoice in the Lord always, I cannot love my enemies apart from the Spirit of God. And so I desperately need God's Spirit if I am going to live a Christ-like life.

Practically, it seems that we should teach in such a way as to show the importance of the Holy Spirit. And we should encourage people to read rapidly through the New Testament and note all the instances in which it speaks of the Spirit. As we do this, it will begin to change how we see the Holy Spirit, and we will start to see the great importance the New Testament attaches to the Holy Spirit.

Also, we can read and encourage others to take in stories of revival. This helps us remember that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. It reminds us that men and women like us, with struggles and weaknesses and sin, have cried out to God and experienced the power of the Holy Spirit in their gatherings.

The following example comes from a brother named Erlo Stegen in South Africa. He began earnestly pleading with God for revival. God responded over a period of months by convicting him of his own sin, and others in the congregation of their sin. They wept and repented before the Lord. They continued to pray and ask God to work in their midst. And then...

The day came when God rent the heavens, as it were, and came down while we were gathered together.

Suddenly we heard a noise like a great wind. I can only faintly suggest what happened and attempt to make it clear with a small example. It was similar to pressurized air escaping from an air pump, and as if that wind were blowing right through every one of us. The Spirit of God came down and nobody had to explain to anyone else, "Look, God is in our midst." Everybody was conscious of the presence of God without anybody saying a word. All I could do was to bow down and worship the God of heaven.

What happened then? The Spirit of God came over that place, over the whole area, and brought the people. The first person to come was a witch who lived seven kilometres away and was in charge of a training school for witches. God began at the very strongholds of Satan. To use the prophet Isaiah's words: "The mountains flowed down at Thy presence, as when the melting fire burneth." The fire burned as if everything were made of dry brush-wood. When I asked this witch, "What is it you want?" she answered, "I need Jesus. Can He save me? I am bound with chains of hell. Can He break these chains?"

I couldn't believe my eyes and ears! For twelve years I had tried in vain to convert witches, sometimes for weeks at a time, and they had always claimed that their powers were a gift from God. And now, suddenly, right out of the blue, a witch stood in front of me and told me that she was sick and tired of her life, and was bound with chains of hell.

"Who spoke to you?" I asked her.

"Nobody," she answered.

"Who preached to you?"

"Nobody!"

"Who invited you?"

"Nobody!"

"But I can't understand this. Where do you come from? What happened?"

"Why do you ask me all these questions? Don't waste my time! If Jesus doesn't save me right now, I will die today and go to hell!

I had never seen the likes. I continued by asking, "Are you prepared to open your heart to the Lord Jesus and let Him come into your life?"

"I am prepared to do anything."

"Are you prepared to confess your sins?"

"Yes!"

This woman repented, believed the Gospel, and was converted. Many others were as well. Our God is a mighty Savior! As we read of such things, may it stir a longing in our souls. May it cause us to cry out to God that He would do it again. May we be hungry and thirsty for God to pour out His rivers of living water into our lives, so that He might be glorified.

God can sometimes change things in an instant, and He occasionally chooses to do just this. Often, however, things do not change overnight, and God calls us to obey the light that we have in a certain area. Probably the most practical step towards having meetings that are led by the Holy Spirit is to gather to pray and ask God what He would like to do in our midst. This is scary for many of us. We do not know exactly what will happen if we do this. Perhaps we will come and pray and no one will get an answer immediately. Perhaps something wild and unbiblical will happen. Perhaps. But that is a danger when you open yourself up to life. It may get messy. It may be chaotic. But it is life, and it is good. And we can trust that our Father will give us good gifts. Let us press on.

Above all else, let us pray that God would make us hungry and thirsty for Himself. I recently met with a brother whose theology differs from mine. He might not agree with the way I define all the terms in this chapter. But he looked at me and wept as he spoke of the reality of the presence of the Holy Spirit in his life. It matters little what terms we use; what is vitally important is that we desperately want to know God and be filled with His Spirit. If we have all our terms right, but do not experience this reality, we have gained nothing. On the other hand, if we hunger and thirst for God, and believe Him, He has promised that we shall be filled (Matthew 5:6). May the Lord cause us to hunger, so that He might fill us! We have read and heard of revival and renewal and the manifest presence of the Lord in the Word of God and in history; oh, that we would experience it first-hand! He is the same yesterday, today, and forever! Hallelujah!

"If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?" (Luke 11:13)
Chapter 5: Discipleship

The aim of Christian ministry is not to build attendance on Sunday, bolster the membership role, get more people into small groups, or expand the budget (as important and valuable as all of these things are!). The fundamental goal is to make disciples who make other disciples, to the glory of God. --Colin Marshall

My primary identity as a Christian is not that I am an accountant or a carpenter, but that I am a disciple-making disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. \--Colin Marshall

Luke 14:26-35--If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it --- lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, 'This man began to build and was not able to finish'? Or what king, going to make war against another king, does not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? Or else, while the other is still a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks conditions of peace. So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple. "Salt is good; but if the salt has lost its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is neither fit for the land nor for the dunghill, but men throw it out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

Matthew 28:18-20--And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." Amen.

Matthew 10:37-39--He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it.

Matthew 12:46-50--While He was still talking to the multitudes, behold, His mother and brothers stood outside, seeking to speak with Him. Then one said to Him, "Look, Your mother and Your brothers are standing outside, seeking to speak with You." But He answered and said to the one who told Him, "Who is My mother and who are My brothers?" And He stretched out His hand toward His disciples and said, "Here are My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother."

Luke 9:57-62--Now it happened as they journeyed on the road, that someone said to Him, "Lord, I will follow You wherever You go." And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head." Then He said to another, "Follow Me." But he said, "Lord, let me first go and bury my father." Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and preach the kingdom of God." And another also said, "Lord, I will follow You, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house." But Jesus said to him, "No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."

1 John 2:6--He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.

1 Peter 2:21--For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps:

Matthew 16:24-26--Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?

Matthew 13:44--Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

Philippians 3:7-10--But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Discipleship is a very important emphasis in the New Testament. Jesus called to His disciples, "Follow me." He did not ask men to admire Him; He asked men to follow Him. The New Testament conception of the Christian life is a life in which we are growing to become more like Jesus, growing in holiness, growing in love, growing in grace, growing in sanctification. Jesus told Nicodemus that He must be born again. This is more than just a nice turn of phrase. This is reality. When we are born of the Spirit of God, we begin life anew. Discipleship is simply another way of saying that we are continuing in that life; we are growing to be like Jesus.

In the physical realm, once a baby is born, is that the end? Is the baby happy to have arrived, and now just waits around for 70 or 80 years to die? No, a baby must be nourished and fed and loved and cared for. If a baby does not grow after it is born, it is dead. This is not healthy. Yet we often treat the moment of salvation as if it is everything: "Now that person is 'saved', on to the next one." No! The New Testament NEVER pictures the Christian life as a one-time event. Conversion is merely the beginning. In the physical realm, if a baby is born, but never grows after birth, something is desperately wrong. Even so, in the spiritual realm, if someone is not growing, something is desperately wrong.

Decision or Discipleship?

The great call of the church is to make disciples of all nations. We are told to teach them to observe all that Christ commanded. For the most part, we are not doing this. We go out and knock on doors to try and get decisions; we have evangelistic crusades to get decisions; we talk to little kids about hell to get decisions; but we are not truly making disciples. The danger is that many who make such decisions never become disciples. The Lord Jesus Christ never told anyone to make a decision for Him. He never said, "Please accept me as your personal Savior." He never asked everyone to close their eyes while the piano played softly in the background so someone could put their hand up without being embarrassed. Instead, He called men to give up everything they had to be His disciples.

Today, we do not speak much about such things, and we have great crowds in many churches. Jesus sometimes had great crowds following Him, and He would say things like: "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple." Not surprisingly, such statements always thinned the crowd. But Jesus continued saying things like that. Why?

The Lord Jesus Christ is to be the supreme treasure in our lives. Paul says that he counted everything else, all his other accomplishments as dung in comparison with Christ (Philippians 3:7-10). Jesus told a parable about a man who found a treasure hidden in a field, and he sold everything he had to get that treasure (Matthew 13:44). That is what we are called to in the Christian life. Christ is to be all in all. He is everything! We are to love Him more than any other thing.

We do not always do this perfectly, but where we find something else engaging our hearts more than Jesus, we must repent, and ask Him to change us. Why should we treasure Jesus above everything else? Because He is worth more than everything else! One of the old saints used to say, "Every conversation in which Jesus Christ is not central is an absurdity." Every other thing in this world is going to pass away, but Jesus will remain forever. He alone is our rock! He alone is worthy! Every good thing that you have ever experienced in your life was purchased by Christ on the cross.

And so Jesus calls us to an exclusive devotion to Himself. From anyone else, these words would be the ravings of a megalomaniac, but from Christ, they make perfect sense. If we love our parents more than Jesus, we are saying that we value created, sinful beings more than the Perfect Creator of those beings. What foolishness! If I love mywife more than Jesus, again I am valuing the gift above the giver. Most vile of all, if we treasure money and wealth more than Jesus, we show that we value something that isn't even alive, that will soon burn up, more than we value the Son of God who gave His life for us. Oh, that God would open our eyes to eternity!

2 Corinthians 4:3-4 says, "But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them." For all who are not following the Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God says it is because Satan has blinded their minds. Whenever we see the reality of who Jesus is, we do not have to weigh things out; we know that He is the treasure, and with great joy we count everything as loss in order to come to know Him. It is only when our vision is blinded and clouded by the lies of the world and the devil, that it seems like a difficult choice between Almighty God and some trinket that will burn in a few years.

A Disciple

What does it mean to be a disciple? The dictionary defines disciple as, "a person who is a pupil or an adherent of the doctrines of another; follower". We are commanded to make disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is deeper than we think. We are to show people how to be followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. In order to do this, we must live for Jesus, and not for ourselves. Unfortunately, in our day, we have often reduced Christianity to a place where the entire Christian transaction takes place at one point in time. And once people profess to be "saved", we feel like they have pretty much arrived. The Scriptures paints a very different picture.

"Follow me." The Lord Jesus Christ made this statement several times (Matthew 4:19, 8:22, 9:9, 16:24, 19:21). Isn't it interesting that He did not walk around saying, "Admire me."? No, He said, "Follow me." Francis Chan compares discipleship to the game of follow the leader. He says we have created a thing where "follow the Jesus is different. You don't have to do what He does. You can just sit back and go, 'I'm flapping my wings in my heart.'" He continues, "When I tell my daughter, 'Hey, go clean your room.' She knows better than to come back and say, 'I memorized what you said. You said go clean your room. I had some friends over and we had a little study of what it would look like if we cleaned my room.'" While the image is very funny, the implications of it are deadly serious.

In our day, we have all but stated that to be a Christian means to give intellectual assent to a certain number of facts. If we can nod our head in answer to the questions asked us by an evangelist, then surely we are saved, right? This concept is not found in the Scriptures. In the Scriptures, we see Jesus calling men to believe on Him and follow Him with their lives.

1 John 2:6 tells us, "He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked." Does this mean that we will be perfect, exactly as Jesus was? Is this verse teaching sinless perfection? No, for only a few verses earlier, we get this statement: "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." (1 John 1:8) So if this does not mean that we walk in sinless perfection, what does it mean?

To walk as Jesus walked should be our great aspiration, our highest goal. I once heard a good illustration of this idea. It is like a young boy trying to walk in his father's footsteps through the snow. He will have difficulty, and he may fall, but he will get up and persevere. He desperately wants to be like his dad. That is to be my attitude with the Lord Jesus Christ, the perfect Man, who always did the will of His Father. I will never be perfectly like Him in this life, and yet if at any point I stop striving for that goal, I am in grave danger.

Isaiah 32 warns us several times against complacency: "Rise up, you women who are at ease, hear my voice; you complacent daughters, give ear to my speech. In a year and some days you will be troubled, you complacent women; for the vintage will fail, the gathering will not come. Tremble, you women who are at ease; be troubled, you complacent ones; strip yourselves, make yourselves bare, and gird sackcloth on your waists." Similarly, the prophet Amos proclaims God's judgment against those who are "at ease in Zion"(Amos 6:1). To be complacent is to be happy with the level of spirituality I have already attained. It is to ignore the Apostle Paul's example of pressing on, John's exhortation to patiently endure, or Jesus' promise to those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, and to say that I have gone as far as I want to go. The Bible does speak of an attitude like this; the Word of God unequivocally refers to this attitude as sin. (Proverbs 1:32, Isaiah 32:9-11, Zephaniah 1:12)

As a church, we would do well to avoid many of the theological controversies that swirl around us. Many of them are wasting our precious time while God's Name continues to be blasphemed in all nations, and while millions of souls go to an eternal hell without ever once having heard the Gospel. There are some issues, however, that we must deal with if we love God, if we love the truth, and if we love people. One such issue is what it means to be a Christian.

What is a Christian?

Certain famous conservative evangelical Bible teachers in our day have presented the idea that there are two classes of Christians: ordinary believers and disciples. Ordinary believers may be carnal and wicked people, while disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ are serious about following Him. They tell people that it is a good thing to be a disciple of Jesus, but it is not really necessary if all you really want is to go to heaven. These teachers explicitly state that people who live in open immorality, and even those who become atheists, are still going to heaven, if they have ever "believed on Jesus."

A.W. Tozer has this to say about such a doctrine:

Therefore, I must be frank in my feeling that a notable heresy has come into being throughout our evangelical Christian circles--the widely accepted concept that we humans can choose to accept Christ only because we need Him as Savior and that we have the right to postpone our obedience to Him as Lord as long as we want to!

Brother Tozer is correct. It is heretical to say that men may believe on a half-Christ. We cannot divide the Lord Jesus Christ as we wish and believe on only the parts of him that we like.

The Bible itself warns against such a doctrine: "For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.." (Ephesians 5:5-6) The Holy Spirit warns us of men who would deceive people with vain words, and tells them you can live a wicked life and go to heaven when you die. God also says of this false doctrine: "Because with lies you have made the heart of the righteous sad, whom I have not made sad; and you have strengthened the hands of the wicked, so that he does not turn from his wicked way to save his life." (Ezekiel 13:22).

Such a monstrosity is like a man trying to marry half a woman because he doesn't like the other half. All believers are disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. There are days that we struggle and fall short. But a man or woman who does not even attempt to follow Christ is not a Christian. Plain and simple. Jesus could not have made it any plainer than He did.

The church must not regard discipleship as a luxury add-on for people who are really serious about following Jesus. If we are not disciples, then we do not know Christ. This is serious business. We are commanded to go into all the world and make disciples of all nations, teaching them to obey all that Jesus commanded. It is not enough merely to "get people saved". We are called to love the Lord Jesus Christ, to obey His Word, and to help others do the same.

Practically Speaking

What does it mean to be a disciple? Brother Zac Poonen has some excellent teaching on this subject:

Luke 14:25-35 reveals these conditions of discipleship very clearly.

There Jesus spoke about a man who had laid a foundation for a tower, but couldn't complete it, because he was unable to pay the cost of construction (v.28-30). That proves that it does cost something to be a disciple. Jesus told us to sit down first and count that cost before even starting to build.

God doesn't want us to wait for many years after our sins are forgiven, before understanding what discipleship really costs. Jesus told people about the cost of discipleship as soon as they came to Him...

The first condition of discipleship is that we must cut off the natural, inordinate love that we have for our relatives.

Jesus said "If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, he cannot be My disciple" (v.26).

Those are strong words. What does it mean to `hate'? To hate is the same as to kill (1John 3:15). What we are asked to put to death here is the natural affection that we have for our relatives.

Does that mean that we are not to love them? No. It certainly doesn't mean that. When we give up our human affection for them, God will replace it with divine love. Our love for our relatives will then be pure - in the sense that God will always be first in our affections, and not our relatives.

Many don't obey God because they are afraid to offend their father, mother, wife, etc. The Lord demands the first place in our life. And if we don't give Him that place, we can't be His disciples...

After His resurrection, the Lord asked Peter whether he loved Him more than everything else on earth, before making him a shepherd in the church (John 21:15-17). Only those who love the Lord supremely are given responsibilities in His church...

If we can say, like the psalmist, "Whom have I in heaven, Lord, but Thee? And besides Thee I desire nothing on earth," then we have truly fulfilled the first condition of discipleship (Psalm 73:25)...

The second condition of discipleship is that we must hate our own self-life. Jesus said, "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own life, he cannot be My disciple" (Luke 14:26).

He amplified that further by saying, "Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple" (Luke 14:27). This is one of the least understood of all of Jesus' teachings.

Jesus said that a disciple would have to "deny himself and take up his cross daily" (Luke 9:23). More important than reading our Bible daily, or praying daily, we have to deny ourselves daily and take up our cross daily. To deny our self is the same as to hate our own life - the life that we have inherited put that self-life to death. We have to hate that life first, before we can slay it.

Our self-life is the main enemy of the life of Christ. The Bible calls this `the flesh'. The flesh is a store-house of evil lusts within us that tempts us to do our own will at all times - to seek our own gain, our own honor, our own pleasure, our own way, etc.

If we are honest, we'll have to admit that even our best actions are corrupted by evil motives that arise from our corrupt lusts. Unless we hate this `flesh', we will never be able to follow the Lord.

This is why Jesus spoke so much about hating (or losing) our life.

In fact, this phrase is repeated six times in the gospels (Matthew 10:39; 16:25; Mark 8:35; Luke 9:24 ; 14:26; John 12:25). This is the one saying our Lord repeated most often in the gospels. Yet it is the least preached about and the least understood!

To hate our own life is to give up seeking our own rights and privileges, to stop seeking our own reputation, to forsake our own ambitions and interests, and to stop seeking our own way etc. We can be disciples of Jesus, only if we are willing to go this way.

The third condition of discipleship is that we must give up all our own possessions.

Jesus said, "No one of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions" (Luke 14:33).

Our possessions are what we possess as our own. To give them all up means that we no longer consider anything as our own.

We see an illustration of this in the life of Abraham. Isaac was his own son - his possession. One day God asked him to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. And Abraham laid Isaac on the altar and was ready to slay him. But God intervened and told him that the sacrifice was not necessary, because he had proved his willingness to obey (Genesis 22). After that, Abraham recognized that even though he had Isaac in his house, he no longer possessed him as his own. Isaac now belonged to God.

This is what it means to give up all our possessions. All that we have must be laid on the altar and given up to God.

God may allow us to use some of those things. But we cannot think of them as our own any more. Even if we are living in our own house, we must consider the house as God's; and that He has allowed us to stay in it rent-free! This is true discipleship...

And so we see that true discipleship involves a radical change of attitude towards: (a) our relatives and loved ones; (b) our self-life; and (c) our possessions. Unless we face these issues squarely and honestly, it will be impossible to fulfill the whole purpose of God for our lives. Unless preachers proclaim this message of discipleship without `watering it down', it will be impossible for them to build the Body of Christ.

A disciple of Jesus has an exclusive attachment to Jesus. A disciple loves Jesus more than father, mother, brothers, sisters, all his possessions, and even his own life. That is what Jesus said. We cannot ignore it, or we will be in grave danger of perverting the words of Christ. I am not sure exactly how this will work itself out in every area of life, but I know that we must stress the importance of it to ourselves first, and then to others. For this is the way Jesus taught, and we are His disciples.

While we know that there will be no perfect church this side of heaven, we are to be constantly striving that each one of us be a godly, mature brother or sister. A church will not be made up of perfect people, but it should be composed of disciples. If we fill churches with people who are not attempting to follow Jesus, then it will be impossible for us to manifest the glory and wisdom of God. Discipleship is essential to healthy church life.

Just as one example, how often is there conflict between people in a church? This is one of our greatest problems. Most missionaries who return from the field come back not primarily because of the heathen they are trying to reach, but because of relationship difficulties with their co-workers. Why is this? The Word of God says that "only by pride comes contention." If two people are in conflict, we can be sure that at least one of them (usually both) is acting in a proud manner. Where we are following Christ and loving Him and His kingdom more than our own lives, many of these issues go away. Most of the conflict we have with people stems from the fact we think they are not treating us as well as we deserve. This is a serious sin and shows we still have a long way to go to become like Jesus, who never fought for His own rights (I Peter 2:23), never was offended by something someone did to Him, but always cared supremely about the will of His Father. Brother Zac phrases it this way: "Only one who loves himself gets offended. One who doesn't love himself but loves God never gets offended...We get offended because we get hurt, our self-life gets hurt by the way somebody treated us."

In writing about the conditions of discipleship, the danger is that it can come across as harsh. But it is not harsh. Consider this example: Suppose a man has 9 girlfriends, and one day he picks one out and decides to marry her. The big day approaches, and they get married, but the man still has his 8 other girlfriends. What would you say about such a man? That is wicked and immoral. Will he have a happy marriage? Certainly not! Marriage is to be an exclusive relationship. It may be difficult for the man to break off his other 8 relationships, but he must do this in order to be faithfully married to his wife. Similarly, our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ is exclusive. He does not want us to split our affection between Him and so many other things. He knows what is best for us. And the best possible thing we can do with our lives is to love Him with a pure heart and undivided devotion. May we press on to perfection, that we might love Him more and more each day, for He is worthy of all of our praise!

What To Do?

Again, we come back to the simple question: What do we do about this? Once we are convinced that the Lord has called us to be disciples and to make disciples of all nations, what do we do? The answer is to repent and return to the old paths. But again, we see that this is not an easy path to tread. Colin Marshall points out one of the difficulties:

By far the greatest obstacle to rethinking and reforming our ministries is the inertia of tradition--whether the long-held traditions of our denominations and churchmanship, or the more recent traditions of the church growth movement that have become a kind of unspoken orthodoxy in many evangelical churches.

Making disciples can never happen in an hour or two a week. How did the Lord Jesus Christ make disciples? He lived with the 12 for 3 years. He did not start a seminary with lots of classes and give them 300 books to read. I am not saying this is necessarily sinful. But what we see in Christ is that He lived with these guys. They did not just get knowledge from Him; they saw His life. If we are going to make disciples, we must be willing to spend time with people. We should do regular systematic Bible study and give them good resources, but this by itself will not do the trick. They need to see what it really looks like to follow Jesus in the everyday details of life.

It is possible to have a lot of knowledge about God and not truly be a disciple of Jesus. In fact, that is a great danger in our culture. In conservative American evangelicalism, there are multitudes of people who have a great deal of Bible knowledge. Some of them are truly seeking to know God and love Him with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. But sadly, many are not even seeking this. They are content to have a lot of Bible knowledge. Again, I believe the Word of God is absolutely essential to our lives, but we must not make the mistake of equating the transmission of knowledge with the making of disciples.

Just as making disciples cannot happen in an hour or two a week, it cannot happen if the only one doing it is the preacher. Christ has called every single believer to be a disciple who is actively involved in making disciples. If we would do this, we would find that many believers who have not grown much, growing quickly, as they take seriously the challenge to disciple others. And we would see others who have sat in church for years and seen little progress in their lives, growing as a godly man or woman speaks to them about where the Word of God really touches their lives.

Colin Marshall gives a great illustration of the importance of individual ministry by contrasting it with the way churches typically approach the issue:

If we never think about people individually and work out where they are up to, and how and in what area they need to grow, how can we minister in anything other than a haphazard, scattergun way? It's like a doctor thinking to himself, 'Seeing each of my patients individually and diagnosing their illnesses is just too difficult and time consuming. Instead, I'm going to get all my patients to assemble together each week, and I'll give them all the same medicine. I'll vary the medicine a bit from week to week, and it will at least do everybody some good. And it's much more efficient and manageable that way.

Richard Baxter, an old Puritan, said that he found that many people received more spiritual profit by his spending a half hour with them individually than they had by sitting under his preaching for 10 years! Of course, one man does not have enough time to visit very many people individually each week, which is why this is often neglected. If we saw, instead, that we are all called to do this, we could effectively minister to many more people. If we do not see this, but continue to think of ministry as something that happens primarily in large groups listening to sermons, the church in our country will always remain a quarter-inch deep. It is essential to the health of the church that we come to understand discipleship, and that we seek the Lord about how to do it.

Let us gently, lovingly, extricate ourselves from all traditions of men that we may follow the Lord Jesus Christ as we are led by the Spirit of God through the Word of God to the glory of God. The Lord Jesus lovingly calls each one of us to be His disciples. If He did not love us, He would continue to let us mess around with the filth of the world. But He loves us enough to call us away from these things and unto Himself.
Chapter 6: The Body

The tendency is for Christian life and fellowship to be reduced to an hour and a quarter on Sunday morning, with little or no relationship, and very little actual ministry taking place by the congregation themselves...For all its historic strengths, the professional pastor-as-clergyman approach speaks loud and clear to church members that they are there to receive rather than to give. As a model, it tends to produce spiritual consumers rather than actives disciples of Christ, and very easily gets stuck in maintenance mode. Outreach or evangelism, both for individual congregation members and the church as a whole, is down the list. In many respects, this way of thinking about pastoral ministry reflects the culture and norms of a different world--the world of 16th and 17th century Christianized nations, in which the whole community was in church, and in which the pastor was one of the few with sufficient education to teach. --Colin Marshall

I cannot but believe that the present practice of confining the public teaching of the church to an official class has done harm. Why should one man be forever speaking, and hundreds of people who are able to teach, sitting dumb to listen or pretend to listen to him? --Alexander Maclaren

The members of a Christian fellowship should be closely interlocked, one with the other. God has not called us to be an assortment of dismembered limbs thrown together in an anatomy laboratory, but to be united one with the other as parts of living organisms like the human body. But there is a price to be paid if this is to become a reality—the price of each member denying himself for the sake of others. \--Zac Poonen

At the beginning of this chapter, I want to be very clear about what I am not saying. I am not saying that it is bad or unimportant to preach the Word of God. Preaching and teaching the Word of God is an essential function in the body. God makes this very clear by the fact that He has appointed some to be pastors and teachers.

I am also not saying that there should be no leaders in a church. The Bible has a great deal to say about this issue, and it is beyond the scope of this book to deal with it fully. But in the New Testament, it seems the primary leadership of a local church is to be the elders. The New Testament pictures elders (plural) leading a local church. This is not to say that they are dictators or exercise authority as the pagans do. Instead, they lead as our Lord Jesus led, by example and by serving. Yet they do lead. The qualifications for any kind of church office in the New Testament are primarily about the character of a man.

There is mutual submission in the body of Christ. In one sense, the elders are to be submitted to all the brothers and sisters. But there is another sense in which the body is to submit to the elders. As they make decisions and seek the Lord's will for the body, the people should know that God has appointed these men elders, and unless they do something blatantly unbiblical, we will follow them. It is similar to a marriage. In a sense, my wife and I submit to each other. But in another sense, God has called me to lead our family, and she to submit to me. This only works if the elders love the people and lead out of love and not for selfish ambition.

This is why our current system of hiring preachers by having tryouts has produced such terrible results. The church is not a football team. A football team cares little about the character of its athletes. In football, if a man is good at what he does, we want him, no matter what his character is. Sadly, the church has adopted this attitude, as well. And yet in the Scripture we see the emphasis on a church leader's godly character, not on how well he preaches.

In 1 Timothy 3, we see 16 qualifications given for a bishop (also translated overseer or elder). Out of these 16 qualifications, how many focus on how gifted he is to preach? Please check the answer for yourself, before I give it to you. How many?

1.

There is 1 out of 16 of these qualifications which deals with how well a man can preach. And it doesn't say he must be dynamic or charismatic; it simply says he must be apt to teach. The other 15 qualifications deal with a man's character. We have gotten it so backwards. Most churches ask a man to come and preach the Word of God to them every Sunday when they know little or nothing about his character.

How much scandal in the body could be avoided if we would simply follow the Bible in this area. If we chose men that we knew well and had watched their character for a number of years, we would not have as many preachers running off with the church secretary or the church money. We would know the man's character, and we would not place an ungodly man in leadership. Also, if we followed the Scripture, and the elders were a part of the body instead of being viewed as an outsider, we could encourage them and make them a part of all the "one another" passages we have spoken of.

Instead, our system perpetuates a great distinction between the pastor and the people. It is ungodly and brings great harm to the body of Christ. May the Lord give us grace to follow Scriptural principles in choosing elders and deacons. They are of great importance to the body. To a large extent, the elders lead the body, and the body will become what the elders are. Choosing godly, mature, biblical elders is incredibly important.

Individual or Body?

One day as I was driving around the rural town in which I live, I saw a sign at a local school: "Happiness is independence." Many of us believe this is true. What could be better than being independent? We all applaud the "self-made man". Such thinking has deeply permeated our culture, even in the church. A surprising number of people quote the Bible verse, "God helps those who help themselves." The only problem with this, of course, is that the Bible contains no such verse, and it contradicts what the Bible actually does say.

The epistles in the New Testament were written to the church. Because we are a part of an individualistic culture, we take almost everything in the Bible and apply it to ourselves. There is some value in this, but we must remember that the letter to the Corinthians was written to the church in Corinth, the letter to the Philippians was written to the church in Philippi, etc... These letters were not written to an individual believer; they were written to the church.

Is each one of us individually the body of Christ? No. Is each one of us individually the bride of Christ? No. We are these things as a church. God has so ordained it that no one of us has all the gifts we need to manifest Christ to the world. No one individual can represent Christ to the world. We are a body, and each one is only a part of it. You are only an arm or a knee or a heart or a liver. You need other brothers and sisters. Each one of us by himself is terribly imbalanced. We need each other.

A church must emphasize that we are all members of the body of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ did not call us to be spectators. If one member of my physical body decides to be a spectator, we have a name for this: paralysis. If one member is paralyzed, I may still be able to function, but I will be handicapped. But how well would I function if only two or three parts of my body actually worked, and the rest of the body was paralyzed? There is no such thing as a member of the body who is called to merely come and sit and listen to sermons. Such an idea is impossible to find anywhere in the New Testament. Every Christian is an ambassador for the Lord Jesus Christ. Every Christian is a soldier. Every Christian is a vital part of the Body.

Independence is a highly-prized virtue in our society. We are taught that to depend on others is a bad thing - to be avoided at all costs. Even in good, solid, biblical churches, I believe we struggle with this. The Word of God has many metaphors it uses to describe the church, but "island" is not one of them.

Perhaps the two most commonly used metaphors for the church in the Scripture are the idea of a body and the idea of a family. Both of these concepts are very much interrelated. There are many passages in the New Testament that speak about the body, but we are going to focus primarily on just two: Ephesians 4 and 1 Corinthians 12.

Ephesians 4:1-16

I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore He says: "When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, And gave gifts to men."

(Now this, "He ascended" \--- what does it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.) And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head --- Christ --- from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.

The early part of this chapter emphasizes the fact that there is only one body. We are to keep the unity the Lord has given us. Interestingly, we are not commanded to create unity, for this is impossible. Rather, we must keep the unity the Lord has given. There is only one body, one Spirit, one Lord. We are not free to divide as we see fit. To divide from other brothers based merely on our personal preferences or opinions is unbiblical. We are one body.

Commenting on Ephesians 4:12, Jim Petersen makes this observation: "The church today is not equipping believers to do the ministry. Instead, we are expecting pastors to do the ministry." This is true, and it is a great failing in our churches. Each one must be equipped to do the ministry. If you had a football team with only one person who actually knew how to throw and catch, your team would not do very well. Similarly, if we have a body with only a handful of people doing the ministry, we will not be doing well.

Petersen also asserts, "To shine as lights in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, people must see our lives." This is true. Satan has specifically designed our individualistic culture in order to blind the minds of unbelievers. Because people in our society live such private lives, it is easier for them to ignore Christ.

Sometimes my family goes to pass out tracts and talk to people about Jesus. I believe many of these people just think it is some religious thing we do. They assume that our lives look a lot like theirs, but we go to church on Sunday, and pass out tracts occasionally. If people saw us living our lives, they would see that, although our lives are not perfect, they are radically different from the world. If we could live more open lives, the world would have to deal more with the reality of Christ. Many would still reject Him, but is it possible that it would make a difference for some? I believe it is possible.

Parts of the Body

In Ephesians 4, Paul also speaks of how this body has been put together. Who put the body together? God did. Sometimes we think we get to put it together, but the Scripture says that God gave some to be in the various offices. It says God has placed all the members in the body as He saw fit. God makes the body what it is. We are not always given the reasons why God does things, but in this case we are.

God has given different offices and gifts "for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." And then He tells us what the goal is: "Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." God's goal for His body, His church, is that we would be perfect, and that we would become like Jesus. That is what we are to shoot for; that is the purpose and desire and plan God has for His church.

Then we have another reason given in verse 14. He says that we should no more be children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine. Why would we be carried about? One significant reason we are easily swayed and tossed to and fro is that we are not heeding the instructions in the preceding verses. We are not really functioning as a body. We are not all doing the work of the ministry; we are not all edifying one another. Instead, we have bought the lie that this is the realm of a few chosen professionals. We have not really grasped that when only three or four members of the body function, the body is handicapped. If your arms and legs do not work, your body is not functioning as it should.

William MacDonald wrote a convicting, insightful commentary on these verses:

Now this plan [from Ephesians 4] produces benefits that are apparent at once. It results in a rapid expansion of the Christian faith. Individual Christians become mature through exercising their God-given functions. By thus becoming mature, they are less susceptible to the teachings of the false cults so current in the world today. And the church thus expanding and maturing gives a more accurate representation of the body of Christ upon earth.

Contrast with this, the system which is so common in Christendom today. One man is selected as minister of a church. He preaches the sermons, baptizes the converts, conducts the communion service, and otherwise performs the religious duties of the congregation. The people listen to the sermons faithfully week after week, but in an unfortunately large number of cases, would be quite unwilling to assume any active participation, reasoning that they are paying someone else to do this for them. They become, in short, professional sermon-tasters, with little real personal acquaintance with the truths of God's Word. And the ever-present danger is that these people, reared in an evangelical environment, remain mere 'children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive' (Ephesians 4:14).

Anyone who has spent time in an average American church knows this to be true. Many are the people that I know personally who have sat under good preaching for 15 or 20 years, but who have no discernment at all. They can hear the Word of God preached truly and applaud that. But in the same breath, they speak of well-known men who preach that God would never want us to suffer, but to be happy, wealthy, and successful in a worldly sense. And they applaud this as well. How is this possible? It's possible because they are not truly functioning as a part of the body, and so they are carried about with every wind of doctrine.

1 Corinthians 12 gives us another picture of the body:

Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be ignorant: You know that you were Gentiles, carried away to these dumb idols, however you were led. Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit. There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.

For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body--whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free--and have all been made to drink into one Spirit. For in fact the body is not one member but many. If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I am not of the body," is it therefore not of the body? And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I am not of the body," is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling? But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased. And if they were all one member, where would the body be? But now indeed there are many members, yet one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you"; nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary. And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor; and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty, but our presentable parts have no need. But God composed the body, having given greater honor to that part which lacks it, that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually. And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles? Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? But earnestly desire the best gifts. And yet I show you a more excellent way.

The Way of Love

1 Corinthians 12 gives us a clear picture of the church as the body of Christ. The question that continues to come back to me is, "Are we living out this reality in our lives?" I know some good brothers that love the Lord. We go to church together, and when we see each other, we talk about God and the Scriptures and what He is teaching us. But I think it would be a far stretch to say that we are living like we are a body. We are friends. But we are not living like we are a body. I am still more concerned with my own concerns than I am with my brother's. The things that matter the most to me are the things that immediately affect me. I am not truly bearing my brother's burden with him. We are living lives that are still fairly individualistic. How do we change?

In the Scriptures, there seems to be a clear sense of community. Even the unbelieving world used to say, "Oh, how these Christians love one another!" Thus, the words of Jesus were fulfilled. When was the last time you talked to an unbeliever who said those words? Leonard Ravenhill quipped that the world used to say, "Oh, how these Christians love one another, and now they say, 'Oh, how these Christians shove one another!'" While there are some exceptions to this sad commentary, it is truer than we would like to admit. When I ask unbelievers what they think of the church, there are two things that they say immediately: They are hypocrites, and they want our money. Unfortunately, the American "church" often deserves this criticism. But even among churches which teach the truth of God's Word, would unbelievers be awestruck by the way that we love one another? Not usually. We have been conformed to our individualistic society. Oh, that we would truly love one another!

We read of the church in Acts that they had all things in common. When I am speaking with people (as opposed to writing), I can hardly get these words out of my mouth before they caution me against taking the Bible too literally, or else they look around for my hammer-and-sickle flag. This is a slight exaggeration, but many people are extremely defensive about this passage. When a person can hardly even utter the words of Scripture before we begin defending ourselves, this is an indication that something is desperately wrong.

These words in Acts are not a mandate against private property, but they are an indicator of where our heart is. John tells us that if we see our brother in need and don't share with him, the love of God does not dwell in us (1 John 3:17). Do we treasure our earthly possessions or our fellowship with the saints more? Which is greater? Which will last? All our earthly possessions are going to burn. If we cling to them too tightly, they will testify against us as they burn (James 5:3). This is frightening. The communion of the saints, however, is not going to burn. It is eternal.

Do we live in the reality of the fellowship of the saints which the Lord wants us to experience? Are we exhorting one another daily so our hearts won't be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin? Are we praying for one another, loving one another, encouraging one another, confessing our faults to one another? Or are we living isolated lives and occasionally coming together to listen to a sermon?

Living in Community

We desperately need to get away from the idea that the church is a place we go to. The church is what we are. We are not the church only when we are in a meeting. We are always the church. To be the church is to live in community. We know little about this. But this is what the Lord calls us to. We should and must meet together in structured meetings. But we must also spend time together in other settings. We must love each other. The church is talked about as a family. What would your family be like if you had "family meetings" once or twice a week but never spent time with each other except at such meetings?

When we live together, we get to know each other as we are. It cuts out the pretense. We are not putting on a show. We are being who we really are. We get to love people as we spend time with them. We do not have to pretend to be something different than we are. We get to spend time together in mundane settings, in times of great pain, and in times of great joy. As we get to really know one another, we will know how to pray for one another. We will know each others' strengths and weaknesses. This will help us. Perhaps I am blind to the fact that I am not treating my wife as I should. One of the most helpful things for me will be to spend a lot of time around godly brothers. Someone may lovingly point this out to me. Or perhaps I will just observe a man who interacts with his wife in a loving way, and the Lord will use that as a good example and encouragement to do that.

We also do ministry like this. People become like Jesus as they see Jesus lived out in our lives. Which will be more impacting to a new believer: to hear a sermon about how God is with us in our trials, or to be at your house when you get the call that your best friend died suddenly, and to see your family pray together in this situation? Which is more impacting: to hear a sermon about loving the poor, or being with you when you stop and pick up a homeless guy and take him to McDonald's?

Also, the Lord has given us all different gifts. Perhaps one brother is great at working with troubled young people. If we run across such a person, we can put him in touch with this brother. Perhaps a sister has a real heart for the elderly. We can call on her to help with this ministry. One brother is gifted to teach the Word, another to practically serve, another to listen and pray. As we learn each other's strengths and weaknesses, we will know how to minister together as a body. We do not all have all the gifts. We are not called to disciple the nations by ourselves. The church is given this call. We can help each other show Christ to a world around us that desperately needs Him.

Relationships are all about time. To truly demonstrate that we love people, we must spend time with them. As a fellowship of believers, we must spend time together. This is not a burden, but a great joy. It can be difficult if we are not used to it, but it is wonderful and freeing and life-giving. People should feel free to show up on each other's doorsteps if they are having a problem, if God has revealed something fresh to them, or just to visit. We should be having friends over for dinner to talk about what great things God has done for us. If you need to dig a ditch at your house, call a brother to help you. It will go faster, and you will be able to have fellowship while you do it.

Many people think these things sound good. What hinders us from actually doing them? I think there are two main factors.

Busyness

First, we are living busy lives. We do not have the time. In most cases, this is simply a matter of priorities. Most people are busy not because they have to work 70 hours a week to get the basic necessities of life. Most Americans are living busy lifestyles to buy more and more stuff for themselves they do not truly need. Others are involved in so many activities, there is no time for the people of God. Still others spend so much time amusing themselves with television, internet, or other things, that there is no time for the church. We must get our priorities straight. Christ's kingdom is what matters. We should think of every decision we make in light of whether it advances the kingdom of Christ or not.

Second, we are conformed to our current cultural norm of living isolated, independent lives. This is not biblical, nor is it the historic norm. We must be willing to give our time to love others. We must long to be in fellowship with God's people. We also must not be afraid for them to see our weaknesses and our sin. The devil always seeks to isolate believers from one another, but God calls us to walk in the light. God is the only one to whom we ultimately will give account. May we allow Him to teach us to be open and honest with our brothers and sisters, and to love and serve each other. In addition, if we need help with something, whether it is spiritual or practical, we need to ask our brothers to help us. This is a blessing both for the person who is being helped, and for the person who gets to help. Jesus spoke the truth, "It is more blessed to give than to receive."

As just one practical example, I think of a brother who needed a roof put on his barn. He called the folks at church to help, and we came and brought our families. The sisters made a meal and watched the kids while the brothers put a roof on the barn. Afterwards, we had a meal and talked about the greatness of our God. This same brother grabbed two or three others and put a roof on my house in 2 days, and it was the same scenario. It was a great blessing, and we really enjoyed the time together. In one situation, I asked my brother for help. In another situation, he asked me for help. In both of these, there was nothing awkward. It was a great blessing to have my brother help me out, and it was also a great blessing to be able to help him out. And on the days we did these projects, we enjoyed sweet fellowship in the Lord. To live in community is a win-win situation.

So when we talk about the church, let us always remember this is far deeper than merely changing the form of our meetings. We are talking about a major lifestyle shift. It is the shift away from an unbiblical independent isolation towards the more biblical idea of being a family. It is important how we meet together as a whole body, but it is also important that we long for fellowship with our brothers and sisters, and that we spend time together outside the regular meetings. May the Lord give us grace!

Bringing it Home

In the Word of God, we see the church pictured as a body. In the body of Christ, each person has a part to play. 1 Corinthians 12 shows us that we should despise no part of the body, but be thankful for each one. Each believer has been placed as a different part of the body and been given different gifts (both natural and spiritual) in order to fit beautifully into that place. The ministry of the body is three-fold. We are to minister to the Lord. We are to minister to one another. We are to minister to the world.

Are we doing this?

Is each member of our local body faithfully discharging his duties?

Do all of us know what our place in the body is?

Are we all serving?

Are we all loving?

Are we all giving?

When someone is struggling, is the body there to encourage, support and love them?

Does our current church system help or hinder the ministry of the body?

These are not idle questions! This is the difference between following traditions of men and the Word of God.

Perhaps the most dangerous aspect of our current church pattern is that it robs us of the ministry of the whole body. Are we allowing God to set the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He pleases? (1 Corinthians 12:18) Or do we have certain preconceptions about what the body looks like? For the most part, it seems like our modern church "service", which is our primary time of meeting together as a whole body, is not fulfilling the Scriptural mandates that it could.

Church services are usually focused on one of two things: singing or preaching. Both of these things are good and important. Preaching and teaching, in particular, is vital to the health of a body. We are not trying to take it away; we are trying to add to it. It is like someone whose diet consists chiefly of french fries. I am not telling them they can never have french fries again; I am just telling them that they cannot be healthy if they eat nothing but french fries. Similarly, sermons are very good, but we cannot be healthy believers if all we do is listen to the Word of God. In fact, Jesus told a story about those who hear His words and do not do them. We have turned it into a cute children's song, but the Lord Jesus Christ said that the foolish man who built his house on the sand is a picture of those who hear His sayings and do not do them. (Matthew 7:26) In many of our churches, where the Word of God is preached faithfully each Sunday, much of the congregation hears the sayings of the Lord Jesus Christ and does not do them. Does this concern us?

Let us never detract from the teaching of the Word of God. It is the Word of God that transforms lives, and God has uniquely gifted some to teach it. We should encourage this, and listen eagerly to a brother sharing the Word of God with us. In my own life, God has greatly used a multitude of sermons from various brothers. So I am not arguing for the abolition of the sermon. Rather, I am saying we need more than this; we must have some format where all the brothers and sisters are free to participate and are encouraged to do so, in addition to allowing those with a teaching gift to teach the Word.

In our present church culture, only a very small number of people are able to actively participate in any one service. There is usually a song-leader and a preacher, and perhaps a few other people sprinkled in. But there is no accommodation for the body to wait on the Lord, to pray, to edify and encourage one another. This all is relegated to "some other time". And for a few of us, this does happen at other times. But for most people, it does not.

Someone pointed out to me recently that we see a picture in the Old Testament of the reality of everyone coming prepared to give. In Deuteronomy 16:16-17, we read, "Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Lord your God in the place which He chooses: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Tabernacles; and they shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed. Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God which He has given you." So when they came to these feasts, they were not to come empty-handed, but they were to come with something to give. In a similar way, we can be coming to worship the Lord together, with something to share, something to give, something the Lord is doing in our hearts.

Are we doing this?

When we gather with God's people, do we come with something in our hearts that will be a blessing to the Lord and to His saints?

This does not mean everyone needs show up prepared to preach. But if God is real in our lives, certainly we can testify of what He is doing! We are all different, with different personalities and gifts, but we can all take part. Sometimes people say they just don't like to talk much. And yet I have found that people talk about what they love. How many times have I asked someone what the Lord is teaching them lately and I get a blank stare; but then someone comes up and asks them about something trivial like football or the weather or where they are going for lunch, and suddenly they have lots of words. If we are seeking the Lord, He will show us how to participate in the body in whatever way He has specifically designed for us.

Sit or Participate?

Most people who have been around the American church for any length of time readily acknowledge that in most churches, there are a relatively small number of people who are truly following the Lord and actively ministering in the church. There are a few people actually being the church in the large crowd of spectators. This is not God's will. If we saw the church as a family of people living in community instead of as a building, it would greatly help this problem. Also, if our services were more participatory, I believe it would bring some correction to the problem. Prayerfully, many who are now spectators would come to see the reality of the body, be drawn into participation and truly be a part of the church. But there would probably be some that would want nothing to do with a church, where the body truly functioned as a body and was not made for spectators, and they would leave.

On the one hand, this should break our hearts. But on the other hand, it should not surprise us. This has always been the case when the church is operating as it should be. In Acts 5, after God killed Ananias and Sapphira, we read, "So great fear came upon all the church and upon all who heard these things. And through the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were done among the people. And they were all with one accord in Solomon's porch. Yet none of the rest dared join them, but the people esteemed them highly." Do you see this? The people had great esteem for the church because it was pure and powerful, but unbelievers were afraid to join. Today unbelievers laugh at the hypocrisy and impotence of the visible church. Tragically, many of the things that they say are often true. Yet even now God is ever merciful, and if we repent, He will forgive, cleanse and restore us.

If we had meetings where the Holy Spirit was free to move, and all the brothers and sisters were free to participate, some people would leave. Those who do not want to walk in the light would be very uncomfortable in such meetings because they could not be anonymous. And yet in the Scriptures we do not see anonymous believers. We see believers in fellowship with other believers, that they might follow the Lord Jesus Christ together. We should earnestly pray for brothers and sisters who do not want this, but we cannot decide how to run the church based on what people think, as is often the case today. We must follow the Lord Jesus Christ! We must obey His Word! The other thing that would happen is that if we were truly worshipping the Lord, praying and sharing our lives with one another, we would be truly making disciples, which is what we are called to do.

Honestly, I am not sure exactly how this would work out in practice. 1 Corinthians 14 indicates that several people could share during a meeting, but it also gives some guidelines and states that all things must be done decently and in order. We are not advocating a free-for-all where everyone just blurts out whatever pops into their head. As we seek the Lord and practice what the Bible teaches about participatory meetings, surely He will show us what it looks like and give us grace to do it. We do want to be careful to obey all the Scriptures.

In reality, however, few of us are in danger of having wild, chaotic disorderly meetings. That is why we have emphasized the Scriptures that speak of participatory meetings. We do want to be biblical in this, but for the vast majority of churches and people in America, the pattern we have allows very little room for this. So we should attempt to bring some correction to this imbalance. Obviously, in doing this, we do not want to become imbalanced in the other direction, but to walk as the Scripture has shown. May the Lord give us grace.

We are to be making disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to be showing people how to live the Christian life. The truth is that there are many people we only see once or twice a week. During these times, is it possible to show people what it is like to love one another and follow Jesus? Can we spend time with them one on one? Can we minister to their needs? Can we ask the Lord to pour out His Spirit upon us? Can we come with a great expectation that Almighty God is going to do a work in us and through us?

Uncharted Ground

For many of us, this is scary because it is uncharted territory. Almost all the believers we know meet in institutional churches where tradition runs deep.

Perhaps we have seen people pull out of our denominational churches and form their own churches, but with a wrong spirit. Francis Schaeffer, who knew something of the struggle in his own day, had this to say:

When a church comes to the place where it can no longer exert discipline, then with tears before the Lord we must consider a second step. If the battle for doctrinal purity is lost, we must understand that there is a second step to take in regard to the practice of the principle of the purity of the visible church. It may be necessary for true Christians to leave the visible organization with which they have been associated. But note well: if we must leave our church, it should always be with tears, not with drums playing and flags flying. This is no place for naturally bombastic men to bombast.

Perhaps we know too many people who have said that their relationship with God is private. And we know that the New Testament assumes that all believers will be in a local church. There is no concept in the Bible of private Christianity.

Whatever the reason, whenever we talk about changing structures, many people become very uncomfortable. Many of us simply want that old-time religion. We have the attitude that it was good enough for my grandparents, so it's good enough for me. May God deliver us from old-time religion! We need to return to the old paths of crying out to God for revival and renewal and fresh revelation of His Son Jesus Christ! Old-time religion will kill us. Old-time religion is a nice name for man's traditions which cause us to ignore God's Word. We need the reality of the risen Christ living His life through us! We need to be filled afresh with the Holy Spirit each day! We need the confidence of having a heavenly Father who loves us and who is Sovereign!

We want to go forward into the reality of following Christ in every area of our lives, and yet we must count the cost. To advocate changing the church structure will surely bring us into conflict with people that we love dearly. May we be gentle and loving, and yet may we not allow the opinions of men to keep us from doing the will of God.

Brother Yun from China challenges us to follow Jesus in every area of our lives, no matter the cost:

We can talk all we want about the wine of the Lord in our lives, but it will be of little value unless our wineskins are able to contain the wine. When Jesus talked about this, I believe He was talking not only about our lives as being the wineskin, but also, in a broader sense, about the church being the wineskin...To be honest, I believe that in their current condition and structure, many churches (the wineskins) are unable to contain the presence of the Holy Spirit (the wine). This is demonstrated when zealous young believers, full of fire from heaven's altar, are placed in the prevailing church structures. Within a short time their enthusiasm has been dampened down, and the spark of life and faith in them, which thrilled the heart of Jesus, is extinguished as they are forced to submit to systems of church life that are neither biblical nor helpful...

What has gone wrong is that Satan has deceived the church leaders in Europe and many other parts of the world, so that over time Christianity became something to be practiced inside a building instead of being a pulsating, life-transforming encounter with the living God that spills over and impacts the unsaved world. Christians have stopped having true faith in Jesus and have learned to rely on their pastors or priests. Unless the Western church returns to its biblical roots, it will continue its downward slide to irrelevance and oblivion...

One of the most poisonous influences on many of God's people today is that they are not allowed to actively participate in the body of Christ. Millions of sheep are told to sit in pews each Sunday and listen to speeches made by professional clergy. As each week passes, the listeners become more and more entrenched in their pews, and the pastors end up performing Old Testament roles that are no longer valid. If they are not careful, pastors can slip into a role in which they become mediators between God and the congregation. Some even claim that God only wants to speak to their congregations through them, because they are the leaders. This is Old Testament priesthood teaching, and it is killing the flock that Jesus paid the ultimate price for...

Perhaps the most dangerous dynamic in churches today is the division between the "clergy" and the "laity". This can lead to two separate classes among God's people--something that grieves the heart of the Father. Although most pastors and ministers I know are people who simply love God and seek to serve Him, a church dynamic may exist whereby leaders are elevated above other believers. This is a terrible path to tread. It results in the current proliferation of weak, spoon-fed believers who never or rarely lead anyone to faith in Christ. This dual class system is reinforced every time the pastor ascends to a pulpit, positioned above the people. It is further reinforced by the use of elevated titles such as 'Reverend, Pastor, Bishop', and so on...

In the West there is also an unhealthy dependence on church buildings. This fixation cannot be justified by any New Testament Scriptures. Billions of dollars are invested in the construction and maintenance of elaborate buildings, while comparatively very little is spent on worldwide evangelism and missions. There needs to be a huge shift away from the view of 'church' as a building and back to the biblical view of 'church' as simply a gathering of believers who come together to honor God's Word and encourage one another. God is pleased with such a simple gathering...

For those who are frustrated because the wineskin is incapable of containing the new wine of God without bursting at the seams, I encourage you to obey the Word of God and meet together with other believers in a way that is consistent with the New Testament. I don't believe the setting is as important as the spiritual dynamic that operates in your meetings. There are many church services that have the presence of God, and many house church meetings where individuals have gained control over other believers. It is not the kind of building you meet in that is the issue, but the kind of system you are part of...

Does everybody have an opportunity to actively participate in your gatherings, or are they dominated by one or two people who do almost all the singing, preaching, and praying?

If you are serious about God and desire to be free to know Him more than ever before, then you may need to give serious thought to the wineskin you are part of. I don't tell you this to condemn you or anyone else. Rather, I share these things because God's heart is broken by the way so many of His children are bound by oppressive spiritual conditions. This also severely damages the witness Christians have among the culture and society in which they live.

Change is never easy, and in your pursuit for a biblical form of wineskin, you may pay a heavy price.

Let us not be afraid to go forward and to follow the Word of God. Wherever our traditions do not line up with the Scriptures, may we cut those shackles off our feet and run to Jesus.

Here are two brothers who have somewhat different ideas about what a gathering time among believers might looks like, but both are helpful ideas towards a more biblical church.

J. Mark Fox, a pastor in the northwest, has this to say:

There is always an open microphone time at Antioch, and many of our men are very comfortable standing up and sharing something with the congregation, whether it is an illustration or a Bible passage that emphasizes something I preached that morning, or whether it is something else they feel led to share about. Just having that avenue every Sunday does two things, at least. First, it gives an opportunity for anyone in the body of Christ to minister a brief word of encouragement, or offer up a thanksgiving or a testimony. You know why that's important? Because Sunday morning service is not a spectator sport! It is not a show that features the leading characters, the pastor and the worship leader. It is a participatory event, featuring the Lord Jesus Christ who is enabling His supporting actors and actresses to speak the parts He has given them for that particular scene. You know what happens to a man who rarely or never gets to participate in a Sunday morning service of worship? He dries up or he blows up and leaves. So, giving the body a chance to be the body on Sunday morning is a huge blessing to the body and, I believe, brings honor to the Son.

Second, I believe that open mic time allows the Holy Spirit to complete the sermon that the pastor began. I have been overwhelmed at times by what the members of the congregation will speak to one another after I have finished preaching. There is insight there. I am not the sole recipient of the Holy Spirit or of wisdom from God's Word or knowledge of His ways. I am so thankful that the Lord has given the people at Antioch confidence that they can hear from God and they can share what they hear with the rest of us. Is that dangerous? Yes, there is the potential every time somebody opens his mouth, including me, that something wrong, even damaging, might be spoken. But do you want to know what the greater danger is? The greater danger happens when we make sure that no one but the 'trained professional' speaks. The danger there is that if he is wrong, no one will call him on it. If he is wrong, many will not even realize it because they have grown lazy and complacent in their own study of the Scriptures. Why should they study when they can just come and sit at the pastor's feet every week and soak up his teaching? Pretty soon, the pastor could say that Acts 2:38, 'Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit' means that every single believer speaks in tongues and that if you don't speak in tongues then you are not saved. If the people in the pews are not students of the Word, if they have grown fat and lazy listening to their great leader, they will believe this deception and even begin to preach it themselves. If I tried to pull that stunt at Antioch, there would be at least a dozen people who would stand up after the sermon and ask me if I really meant that every believer speaks in tongues.

Folks, listen. In 21 years, the open mic time has yielded about 3 times when someone stood up and said something that was off the wall or unbiblical or just plain off base. In each of those times, that person was gently corrected and the congregation was instructed as to the truth of the matter. But I cannot tell you how many hundreds of times members of the congregation have stood up and shared something powerful, something challenging, something encouraging, something touching or heartfelt that has lined up with Scripture and has helped the church to mature. I could NOT have shared all of those things, nor would I have even known HOW to share all those things. We are a body, made up of different parts, and the body grows as the parts do what they are supposed to do.

C.H. Mackintosh says something similar:

We have but little conception of what an assembly would be were each one distinctly led by the Holy Ghost, and gathered only to Jesus. We should not then have to complain of dull, heavy, unprofitable, trying meetings. We should have no fear of an unhallowed intrusion of mere nature and its restless doings--no making of prayer--no talking for talking's sake--no hymnbook seized to fill a gap. Each one would know his place in the Lord's immediate presence--each gifted vessel would be filled, fitted, and used by the Master's hand--each eye would be directed to Jesus--each heart occupied with Him. If a word were spoken, it would tell with power upon the heart. If prayer were offered, it would lead the soul into the very presence of God. If a hymn were sung, it would lift the spirit up to God, and be like sweeping the strings of the heavenly harp. We should feel ourselves in the very sanctuary of God and enjoy a foretaste of that time when we shall worship in the courts above and go no more out.

Chapter 7: Conclusion and Cautions

We have looked at six major biblical emphases on church. These are not the only things emphasized about the church, but they are some of the major ones. First, the Lord calls us to truly love one another. Second, we are to emphasize that Jesus Christ is the truth, the new birth is essential, and we must deal with the characteristic sins of our age. Third, we must truly pray together. Fourth, we must emphasize and experience the daily working of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Fifth, we must call people to an exclusive attachment to the Lord Jesus Christ; we must all be disciples of Jesus. Sixth, we must realize and practice our position as a vital part of the body, and take part in the ministry of the church.

In discussing what the church should be, we must emphasize the right things in the right proportion. I have outlined six major emphases I see in the Scripture. Yet, even in these things, we must be sure we are emphasizing them correctly or we will have a distorted, imbalanced body.

For instance, if I have a great emphasis on the body living in community together, but I do not emphasize the truth of the Gospel, what I have is a hippie commune, rather than a church. Hippie communes are attractive to some folks, and you may be able to get a lot of members, but it will be ultimately worthless to God and to men.

Similarly, Francis Schaeffer asks:

Do I fight merely for doctrinal faithfulness? This is like the wife who never sleeps with anybody else, but never shows love to her own husband. Is that a sufficient relationship in marriage? No, 10,000 times no. Yet if I am a Christian who speaks and acts for doctrinal faithfulness but do not show love to my divine Bridegroom, I am in the same place as such a wife. What God wants from us is not only doctrinal faithfulness, but our love day by day. Not in theory, mind you, but in practice...Our call is first to be the bride faithful, but that is not the total call. The call is not only to be the bride faithful, but to be the bride in love.

These are just two examples. We need to emphasize one truth without negating others. This is very, very difficult for us to do. It seems that, for the most part, various groups or denominations have gotten one truth, and they camp on this truth and emphasize it, and feel like they are far more advanced than the ordinary believers around them. For some, their particular theology has become the great emphasis. For others, it is missions. For others, it is having a family-integrated church. For others, it is the gifts of the Holy Spirit. None of these things are bad, but if we stress any one of them over other truths, or worse yet, if we stress them more than Christ Himself, we place ourselves in the precarious position of having our minds corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ (2 Corinthians 11:3).

Jesus Christ Himself is our wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption (1 Corinthians 1:30). We must always beware that some other thing, even some other good thing, does not replace Him in our affections. We desperately need to know the Lord. May He give us much grace.

Another thing we must beware of is emphasizing the pattern of the church more than the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. We can have the greatest church pattern in the world, but still be like the Ephesian church who left its first love. Above all else, we need a sincere and passionate devotion to Christ.

Brother Zac states this well:

Our Lord did not come primarily to give people a doctrine, or a church-pattern or to make them speak in tongues or even to give them an experience! He came to "save us from sin". He came to lay the axe to the root of the tree. And the root of sin is: Being centered in ourselves, seeking our own and doing our own will. If we do not permit the Lord to axe and uproot this "root" from our lives, we will be Christians only superficially. Satan may however deceive us into imagining that we belong to a higher class than other Christians, because of our doctrine or our experience or our church-pattern!

If we get the pattern and everything else right, but it has no life, no fire, it is worthless. If we still live for ourselves, all this talk about church is only so much hot air. May we truly live our lives for the glory of the One who is worthy!

So while this book is about the church, it can never be divorced from our individual lives. You can attend the greatest church in the world and be a member in good standing, but still go to hell when you die. Christ calls us to Himself. We are to love Him above all else. Even though it is a cliché, it truly is a personal relationship with Jesus. Few of us know the reality of this. We throw around the term. But to how many of us is the Lord Jesus Christ more real and precious than our dear spouse? We must ask the Lord to work in us.

Yet even though the relationship is personal, it is not private. We are called to exhort one another daily, while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin (Hebrews 3:13). We do need each other. There are times in my life when reading the Scriptures has become dry, and prayer a routine. One thing the Lord often uses in me in such situations is a few hours with a brother who is on fire. There is something about spending time with a brother who lives in the presence of God that is tremendously encouraging. It causes me to want to follow hard after God. I know of no greater compliment than to say that, after spending time with this person, I have a much greater desire to know God. It is God Himself we need above all else.

Another caution comes from J. Mark Fox, who speaks about the danger of becoming frustrated with the imperfections in the church:

Some of you have been there...to the place of frustration. You have looked and looked, and you cannot find all the pieces that you like in a church. Guess what? You never will. That's my guess, based on more than 21 years of experience as a pastor. There is no perfect church, not simply because every church is filled with sinners like you and me. There is no perfect church, period. No church, even the one you help to start, will have all and be all that you want. If it is, you probably are a control freak and though it may seem perfect to you, it will not be 'perfect' for anyone else. In fact, keep it up and you will be worshipping all by yourself one day!

This is a good caution. We have looked at some of the areas where we as the church are falling short. Perhaps there are some of us who are tempted to take our ball and go home. Perhaps some feel the church can never measure up. Fox reminds us of the all-important truth that there is no perfect church, because there are no perfect men except Christ. Brother Zac says that many people come to the church where he is an elder and say they are sick of all the other churches in town. He urges them not to come to the church until they are sick of themselves. We must first of all see our own bankruptcy and our need to be filled by the Spirit of God before we can help others. May God deliver us from a critical and fault-finding spirit. Let us be faithful and thankful where the Lord has placed us, while always looking to be more biblical and to glorify Christ more by our lives.

For those who are pastors and elders, search the Scriptures to see if the things written here are true. If you believe they are, seek the Lord as to how to go about implementing some of them. We never want to compromise on God's truth, and yet we do want to wait on the Lord for His timing. To attempt to change everything at once may be rash rather than wise. There is no formula for how God may work these things out. But God is faithful, and His grace is sufficient for you. Do not fear men. May God give you grace to hear His voice clearly and obey it.

For those of you who are not pastors or elders, search the Scriptures to see if the things written here are true. If you believe they are, discuss them with your elders. Again, it will not be healthy to go demanding everything change at once. But it would be good to see if they are willing to look at God's Word with you and willing to look at some of these issues. If your elders are godly men and willing to discuss these things with you, be patient with them. You probably do not fully appreciate the burden they have for the entire congregation. Pray for your elders, that the Lord would give them much wisdom in leading the church and try to be a blessing to them and to the body (Hebrews 13:17). Remember that all of these things must start in our own lives first.

If, on the other hand, the elders are not interested in looking at what God's Word has to say concerning any spiritual issue, that is cause for concern. If you are in a church where the leaders seem content to go through the motions, and there isn't a real hunger for God in their lives, it would be good to pray for them. Seek the Lord on their behalf. Go and talk to them about your concerns. Ultimately, if the elders or leaders of your church do not really love the Lord, the church will never be what it is supposed to be. At some point, you may want to consider finding or planting a church.

If you do this, be careful. Do not take such a decision lightly. It is serious. Do not leave with unresolved bitterness in your heart toward any person. This is never God's will. Attempt to share with your elders all that is on your heart without defending yourself. Simply share where you believe the Lord is leading you, and any concerns you have about the direction the church is heading. Trust the Lord to place you in a fellowship of like-minded believers. You may find one in your community or God may use you to plant one. You do not need a seminary degree, a laser-light show, a lot of money, or even a building in order to plant a church. Seek the Lord with all your heart and pray for God to bring others who are seeking Him as well. He is able!

The practical outworking of these ideas will be different in various contexts. But as we seek the Lord, He will lead us and show us how to work them out practically. One of the big issues we will have to deal with is time. Americans are a busy society, and in order to truly do what we see in Scripture, we'll have to cut many other things out of our lives. If we can only meet for an hour at a time, we will be severely limited. If we want our fellowship with other believers to be shorter, so we have more time on our couches or our boats, we should be concerned. May the Lord give us grace to cut out whatever is necessary, so we might spend time with Him and with fellow believers.

One Idea

I am still thinking through a lot of this, and asking the Lord to teach me. But as of right now, I would structure a meeting of the church something like this:

We would come together and spend some time singing and praying. Each one of us should come prepared and expecting to meet with the Lord and each other. Each brother or sister would be free to pray as he or she felt led. Someone could start a song and we could all join in. The idea would be to turn our hearts to the Lord, to praise God, to worship God together. This time would go on for as long as the Spirit leads us to do so. It might be 20 minutes or 3 hours. One of the elders would be responsible for being sensitive to the Lord for when the time to move on has come. Generally, I think it would be good to assign one of the brothers ahead of time to share the Word of God. It would be good for the brother to share, and then afterwards have some time to discuss what was shared. Specifically, it would be good to prayerfully think through how this should apply to my life, and how it will change us. Then we would have a time for anyone to share whatever the Lord has put on their hearts. This could be a praise, a Scripture, a teaching, a prayer request, a warning, an exhortation, a prophecy, a tongue and interpretation, a discussion of how to minister to those around us, or anything else the Lord has put on someone's heart. Then we would have time to pray, as the Lord leads. Again, one of the elders would seek to be sensitive to the Spirit's leading during this time. We should expect to pray not token prayers, but to really come and pray for one another and intercede for the lost, and ask the Lord to do great and mighty things in our midst. When this time is over, it would be good to have a meal together and a time of fellowship.

This is not a formula or pattern, but simply me thinking through what some of these principles might look like practically. The Spirit of God might lead us to do things very differently than what I have written above, and we always want to be open to that. It seems like many of the other things would simply grow out of what the Lord places on our hearts as we wait on Him together. There is no formula, but as we seek the Lord, He will lead us into fruitful times together. He is faithful.

It would also be good to practice living our lives together during the week, and not just meet on Sundays. If I am struggling in my marriage, I should be able to call a brother. If someone needs help roofing a house or digging a ditch, he could see if I'm available to help. Fellowship and life together is not restricted to meetings, but a mindset that we need to adopt. We are to truly live our lives together in order that Christ might be glorified, we might be encouraged, and the kingdom might be advanced.

As is apparent, I have more questions than answers. I do not write as one who has attained or experienced all the things I describe. I do write as a man who is hungry for the reality I read of in the New Testament. No, the church will never be perfectly Christ-like until we are with Him in glory. But we dare not be content with anything less than Christ-likeness. Let us press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. He alone is worthy!

"And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all...to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord...Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen...Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish." (Ephesians 1:22-23, 3:10-11, 3:20-21, 5:25-27)

The Lord Jesus Christ has purchased His bride with His own blood. Who is his bride? The church! And He has promised that He will present us to Himself a glorious and beautiful church, absolutely free from sin, and we shall ever be with the Lord! Hallelujah!

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Thank you for taking the time to read through this book. If you have any questions or feedback (positive or negative), please contact me through thetysonfamily@gmail.com. I would honestly love to hear from you. It is a joy and privilege to know the Lord and fellowship with brothers and sisters who love Him.

God bless you as you press on to know Him more.

Resources

The following are some of the main resources I have used while thinking and writing this book. If you are interested in this topic, you would be blessed by reading these books. All of these brothers have walked with the Lord longer than I, and have much more experience dealing with many of the issues I have addressed.

The Holy Bible

A Christian View of the Church by Francis Schaeffer

Christ Loved the Church by William MacDonald

Living Water by Brother Yun

One Body in Christ by Zac Poonen

The Trellis and the Vine by Colin Marshall and Tony Payne

Planting a Family-Integrated Church by J. Mark Fox

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