The Church: What Is It All About? - Part 1

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Thursday, August 18th. As believers in Jesus, assembling together is a command of God. Discover the purpose of the church as we continue the series Affirm Foundation, Six Essentials for Solid Christian Living. What's it all about? Why do people do what they do?

And besides that, who started it anyway? And not only that, is it necessary to belong to a church, to be a godly person, to walk in holiness before God? Does God say that it's absolutely important to be a member of the church, not to go to heaven? How would you even know which church to join?

What kind of criteria would you go by? So I think if you will listen carefully to this message, you'll be able to make up your own mind, listening to God, and knowing the truth about what the church is all about. So I want you to turn, if you will, to Matthew chapter 16.

This is a very important time in the life of Jesus because up until this time, He has not talked about His suffering and what He's going to face on the cross, though certainly He knew all about that. And it's interesting what happens in this passage to give you a little background. He's asking His disciples who people say He is, then He asks them who do they say He is, and then He turns right around and talks about suffering and dying. So it almost sounds like a little bit of confusion here.

How would you start something and then at the same time almost the next breath talking about the fact that you're going to lose your life. So beginning in verse 13. Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, who do people say the Son of Man is? Notice He identified Himself. Who do they say the Son of Man is?

And He was indeed identifying Himself. They said, some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, but still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. He said to them, but who do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered, you're the Christ, the Son of the living God.

What a wonderful answer. And Jesus said to him, blessed are you Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. I also said to you that you are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell will not overpower it. I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven. Then He warned the disciples that they should tell no one that He was the Christ.

Now think about this. He said to them, who do you think I am? They said, Peter said, you're the Christ, the Son of the living God. Then Jesus said, Peter, you didn't come up with this yourself.

This was revealed to you by my heavenly Father. Now this eighteenth verse is a verse that's been so misinterpreted and so controversial because there are people who believe that when Jesus said, I say to you that you are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell will not overpower it, that because the word Peter, petros, is the same word for rock, many people believe that Jesus meant that He was going to build His church upon a person, Peter. Well that's totally unscriptural to begin with and certainly it is not like the ways of God at all that He would build His church upon a man. What He's referring to, He's building His church upon this confession of His faith. Christ is the Son of the living God. That is the truth upon which our Lord built His church. Now, Jesus said, I'll build my church and I'll give you the keys of the kingdom. That is, when the body of Christ is declaring the truth, that truth is binding.

No person has the keys to bind anybody about anything. It is the truth of the Word of God. The truth, the revealed truth of God He has given to His church and that truth binds men and women. That is, whatever that truth is, we live by that truth. We violate that truth, then we suffer the consequences.

That's what He's referring to here. Now back to our question we started out in the very beginning. Why should anybody even belong to a church? What is the church in the first place?

And many people who are critical of it know absolutely nothing about it. And tragically, many people who belong to a church don't know much about it either. They just know that somebody told them they ought to join the church or some people join a church because it's good business or it gives them a little status or it makes them feel good. It solves their conscience. They don't get involved.

They don't give. They don't pray. They don't read their Bible. They're not living a godly life, but somehow if they can just go to church on Sunday, somehow that makes them feel better. Now the question is, what is this thing we call a church to begin with? Well, let's think about it this way.

There's a Greek word, ekklesia, ekk out of klesia, called. The church is composed of those people who have trusted Jesus Christ as their Savior and as he says, called, the called ones, called out of the world system in order to unite together to live a godly life as a godly community. The Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is a godly community of people who have chosen to receive Jesus Christ as their Savior and live unlike the world system but live unto God a godly life.

That was and is his intention. Now, what is the makeup of the church? What's the church made up of? Well, first of all, we just read that Jesus Christ is the head of the church.

Listen, he is the one who rules and reigns. He is the one who, through the Holy Spirit, gives direction and guidance to the leadership of the church. He has called men to be pastors and teachers of the church, giving them the responsibility of giving direction and guiding and teaching and instructing the body of Christ.

Staff members on any church staff also share in that responsibility. And the truth is the whole body shares in the responsibility of the mission of the church. But the head of the church is the person of Jesus Christ.

Now, watch this. Christ is not only the head of the church. He's the head of the church because he established the church.

It was his idea. He is the one who builds the church. And so we talk about building churches today. People talk about building the church.

We may build buildings. It is only God who builds the church because the church is not a building. Churches are people. We are the saved saints of God. That's what the church is all about. And so when we think of the makeup of it, it is Christ the head. Secondly, the makeup of the church is, watch this, it is composed of people who have received the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior, believing Peter's testimony that Jesus Christ is the Son of the living God, believing that he went to the cross and died for our sins and paid our sin debt in full, and having received him as our personal Savior, we have now become sons and daughters of God, only those who are children of God belong to the church.

Let's go to one step further. There are people who belong to local churches, who have never been saved, never trusted Jesus Christ as their Savior, do not even understand what salvation is about. But they have been convinced by, persuaded by, or their parents, their grandparents say, well, you ought to join the church, and they got you in a church early in life, maybe as a kid, and you join, and that's why a lot of people got in so early. They don't know what it's about. Nobody ever instructed them to know what it's about, and so before long they leave the church and quit coming, quit going to church. So there's another group of people involved here, and that is those who are deceived. That is, they joined the church, never trusted Christ as their Savior, brought in while they were children, and made members of a local church, never having trusted Jesus Christ as their Savior.

Now listen carefully, if you listen and say amen. Whose fault is that? Is it the guy who sits in the pew, or is it the man who stands behind the pulpit?

The fault lies primarily right here. Because if a man of God stands in the pulpit and says, the only way to get to heaven is through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and entrance into this local fellowship. You join this church because you have been saved. You may walk a church aisle or whatever it might be, trusting Jesus Christ as your Savior. You become a member of this church after you're saved. You don't join a church to get saved. You receive Jesus Christ as your Savior, and then you become a member of a fellowship.

Whose responsibility is that? It is the responsibility of the pastor to make it very, very clear that the church of Jesus Christ is made up of the head who is Christ, and the saints who are those whose lives have been changed by the grace of God through faith in the atoning death of Jesus Christ at Calvary. Tragedy of tragedy is the millions of people who sit in church week after week, don't even know what the church is about, don't even know why they're there. They've just been going since they were a kid.

Never having trusted Christ as Savior. Nobody ever explained to them that it was absolutely essential to be born again. And so there they sit, week after week. Then they wonder, what do you mean, come to church more than once? In other words, they come because it solves their conscience. They come because they think they ought to.

They come very, very sincere. Listen, I'm not questioning the sincerity of lots of people because that's what they were told. Listen, we wonder why the church is weak. The reason the church is so weak is because there's so many people in the church, listen, who are not committed to Jesus Christ, who are not living a godly life. Nobody's ever explained to them what the church is all about, what its mission is, what its message is, and why we do what we do.

Where does most of the fault lie? It lies right here at the pulpit. Not all the fault because once a person's heard the gospel, then it's time to get right with God. You say, well, suppose I belong to a church and even I've even been baptized, but I all of a sudden realize I've never been saved, what should I do?

You say, what you should do? You should go to your pastor and say, you know, I realize I've never trusted Jesus Christ, but I've trusted Jesus Christ as my Savior this week. I want to be baptized scripturally now that I am saved, and I want to join this church as a saint, as a child of the living God. Now I'm ready to join this church. And you know what?

You'd settle a lot of things in life that need to be settled. And so when we talk about who makes up the church, who makes up the church are those who have trusted Jesus Christ as their Savior. Now, what is the ministry of the church? The ministry of the church is threefold, and I'm going to ask you to give it back to me, so get it down. First of all, the ministry of the church is the ministry to God. How can we minister to God? The first ministry of the church, listen, ministry to God, and that's worship.

We meet together. We don't just teach the Word of God. We meet together and we sing, and we praise the Lord, and we glorify Him, and we exalt Him, and we recognize His majesty. These songs we sing, all of these songs we sing, these hymns, these choruses, they're uplifting. Listen, they not only exalt the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, but they do something to us. The music feeds our soul, feeds our spirit, and we focus our attention upon Him.

What are we doing? We're exalting Him and honoring Him and recognizing the fact that He's our God, and we are devoted to Him, and we serve Him and love Him and honor Him and obey Him and walk in holiness before Him. We worship the Lord, and God is glorified in our worship. Now, this is the wonderful thing about worshipping Him alone in your own private bedroom or your living room or your den or whatever it might be.

You can pray as long as you want to, sing as long as you want to, sing as loud as you want to, and listen, when you're singing of the Lord by yourself, it doesn't make any difference what anybody else thinks, because you're singing to God, worshipping Him. That's the first ministry of the church. The second ministry of the church is the edification of the saints. That is, we come to worship Him, and part of our worship is edification. That is, we open the Word of God.

Edification means that we become involved in asking some questions. What does the Word of God teach? What is it saying to us? My responsibility as a pastor is to open the Word of God and say, here are the principles of Scripture. Here's what the Word of God teaches. I cannot even imagine somebody standing behind a pulpit, reading a pastor's Scripture, laying their Bible down, and then speaking for the next 20 or 30 minutes and never refer to the Scripture. Totally, absolutely beyond my comprehension that anybody can edify the church and listen and never open the Word of God. Secondly, if you go to church and you don't hear anything worth practicing, you don't hear any principles, you don't hear anything worth opening your Bible for or writing down, you need to ask yourself the question if you're in the right church. There are many, many, listen, hundreds and thousands of godly men out there preaching the Word of God, who believe the Scripture from cover to cover, who want to edify you, who want to build you up, who want to strengthen you, who want to help you become the person God wants you to be. Part of the ministry is opening the Word of God, edifying the people of God.

That's what it's all about. And I believe anybody who goes to church and spends an hour or whatever it might be, you ought to walk away having brought something away that spoke to your heart, that'll help you, listen, live a godly life that week, encourage you, comfort you, strengthen you, or convict you of sin or whatever it might be. First ministry of the church, listen, first ministry of the church is what? It's to whom?

It's to God. And that is what? Worship. Second ministry of the church is to whom?

Saints. And that is what? Edification. Third ministry of the church is to the world and that is what? Evangelism and missions.

Third ministry of the church is evangelism and missions. Now look, what did he say to those disciples? Before he left, he said, As you go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

He says, teaching them to observe all the things that I've commanded you, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. The ministry of the church is getting the message of the atoning death of Jesus Christ to the entire world. That's the ministry of the church. It can't be just worship. It can't be just edifying the saints. It must be also getting the truth of the gospel to people who've never heard it.

Why? Because that's the ministry of the church. Evangelism, telling our people we work with, telling our friends about Jesus Christ, why we believe what we believe, who our Lord Jesus Christ is and why they need him. That's part of the ministry. So when somebody says to you, What's the ministry of the church?

What are you going to tell them? First of all, the ministry is to whom? It's to God. And what's the ministry? Worship. Second ministry is to whom?

Saints. And what's the ministry? Edification. Third ministry is to whom?

The world. And what's the ministry? Evangelism and missions. That is the ministry of the church. Some little churches, small churches are doing every bit of that. And some big churches are not doing any of it.

And so it has nothing to do with size. Now once in a while you'll hear somebody talking about building a mega church. That is not even a scriptural term. First of all, pastors can't build churches. We say, Well, he's a great church builder.

You've missed it. He may build a building and he may build an organization. Only God can build a church. Only God can build a church. And he builds the church through his son Jesus Christ. And listen, through the power of the Holy Spirit, God forbid somebody call me a church builder. I'm not a church builder. We're just edifying the saints. Mega churches, what's that?

That means it's big. So what? There's some pastors out there, churches of 30 or 40, 50 members who love God just as much as we do. They give their money. They tie their income. They pray. They do missions work through their denomination or in their community, whatever it is.

You know what they're doing? They're doing exactly what God called them to do. Don't judge a church by its size. Big does not mean right and small does not mean wrong. And because the man is a pastor of a small church, it doesn't mean he's less talented or less godly than the man who's pastor of a big church.

We need to get all off of those human judgments of men, godly men out there who are doing their best. So the church has a three-fold ministry. And so when somebody asks you, well, why do you belong to a church and what's that church up to and what are they doing? You can tell them. You say, well, here's the minister of the church, three-fold. And you have exactly what to tell them. Now, let's think about something. Here's the danger.

Because to keep all three of those balanced is a challenge. For example, here's a church that loves to worship. And they spend most of their time worshiping. And they praise the Lord and they sing. I'm like the fellow who said, I don't mind somebody jumping four feet off the floor and shouting hallelujah and praise God. As soon as their feet hit the floor, tie their income, then you'll know that they're sincere.

You know it's for real. But if it's all this and jumping up and down and hollering and screaming and carrying on, listen, here's what happens when you get out of balance. And if that's the majority of the worship service, usually, I wouldn't say always, but most of the time, they're doctrinally very weak. And secondly, they're very weak in their evangelism and missions. Secondly, if a church is all edification, what happens? We just want to teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach. You know what happens?

You can get real dry. There must be worship. There must be evangelism. You can't have one without the other and have it balanced like God intended for it to be. Likewise, if a church is all missions and evangelism, and I have seen churches, I've seen churches that were so mission-minded, they gave most of their money to missions, and it was missions and missions and missions and missions.

And you know what? If you don't have a strong local base after a while, you don't have anything to send to missionaries. You can't support them because there's nothing there. You have to build a strong base. It must be doctrinally sound unless you send out people in the mission field who don't believe the word of God.

So it's got to be balanced. You've got to have worship. You must have instruction, edification, and you must have missions and evangelism. Thank you for listening to The Church. What is it all about? If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by intouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia. .