936. Why is Choosing a Church Important?

Welcome to The Daily Platform from Bob Jones University in Greenville, SC. Today on The Daily Platform, we're beginning a new study series called Church Matters. These messages were preached at Bob Jones University to help students choose a church home while attending college.

However, these biblical principles apply to everyone, helping us choose where to worship with the body of believers in Christ. Each semester, we have a discipleship theme, which this semester is Run the Race, and then we also have a doctrinal theme. And this semester, our doctrinal theme is entitled Church Matters. I'm not going to do most of these messages, but I'd like to begin the series by just sort of setting it up and really answering kind of the big questions like, why are we doing this?

And what is the purpose and what is the approach that we're going to take? This is in due part to some changes that we made in our church policy here at the university. And so I want to talk you through that and sort of give you the big picture as to why we do that. And then as we go through the semesters, we talk about church and church of biblical philosophy of ministry and worship.

Then we will dig deeper into the weeds and deal with some more specific things. But today, I'd like to do some high level conversation with you about why it is that the church matters and why we're doing here at the university what we're doing. So with that in mind, I'd like to ask you to take your Bibles and turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 3 today, 1 Corinthians 3. And I'd like to read a text of scripture that was very instructional for me as a young believer and how it was that I would respond to the church.

My background, I grew up here in the state of South Carolina in the capital city, Columbia. My father was a deacon and a Sunday school teacher in a Presbyterian church in Columbia. And so as far back as I can remember, and I remember at least K4, I remember that going to nursery. So from K4 all the way up to about my sophomore year in high school, we faithfully and regularly attended church. But I didn't become a believer until my first year of college and at the age of 19 years old after I became a Christian and I began to grow in the word, I began to grow in my understanding of the church. And really by the time I came to Bob Jones University at the age of 22 years old for grad school, I had established many of the convictions that I believe about the church today were really established in my college years. So your establishment of your thinking towards the church, especially in your college years, is very crucial because in some ways your church choice you could say is actually more important in the big picture than even your college choice.

Because it really has to do with your relationship with God and what God is doing in this world. So let's read this morning 1 Corinthians 3 verses 10 through 15. It's just some foundational verses this morning. Paul says in verse 10, according to the grace of God, which is given unto me as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, he's talking about the church, and another builds their own. But let everyone take heed how he buildeth thereupon.

So he's telling us that we are responsible. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man builds upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest for the day shall declare it.

Because it shall be revealed by fire. And the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. So he's talking about the judgment that will come upon all of us in the way that we have been involved in the building of the church. Verse 14, if any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burnt, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. As I said this semester, our doctrinal series is entitled Church Matters.

It's a biblical philosophy of ministry and worship. So two questions I'd like to try to ask and answer this morning. Number one, why is it that this series is so important? And then number two, what's going to be our approach? Let me begin with the big question, the question of why.

Why is this series so important? And I'd like to give you at least four reasons this morning. Number one, because of what we require as a Christian institution. As a student here at the university, you are required to choose and faithfully attend a local church in the greater Greenville area. Let me read to you right out of the BJU local church philosophy statement. You can actually read it online.

It says these words. The New Testament teaches that a local church is indispensable to the spiritual growth and the health of every genuine Christian. Because of these truths, we expect our faculty and staff to be active members in good standing of a local church. We require our students to regularly attend and faithfully serve in a local church as a part of the student experience. Failure to do so is a serious breach of our biblical conviction and institutional commitment to follow what scripture teaches regarding the local church.

We ask our faculty and staff to worship and serve in churches that are in agreement with our core doctrinal beliefs and theological positions and substantially aligned with our spiritual objectives. So why is it that we make this requirement of your faithfulness to the local church because the church is God's work in the world today? What did Jesus say in Matthew 16, 18?

I will build my what? My church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. When Jesus gave the great commission in Matthew 28, 19, it was in the context of a local church. For Jesus said, go ye therefore and teach all nations, literally make disciples. And then he follows up by saying, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.

And lo, I am with you always. When he said baptizing, that's a church ordinance. The great commission is actually the establishment of local churches through evangelization, through enrollment into the church, and through the edification or the teaching ministry of the local church.

So it's really a part of the great commission. And then in Hebrews 10 and verse 25, he warns us as believers, he says, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is. Church attendance is a habit.

It's a manner. And he says, don't forsake the assembling. That is, when do I go to church? When my church is assembling together. I should be a faithful, loyal, regular attender of my New Testament local church. And then Paul writes in 1 Timothy 3 and verse 15 about the importance of the church. He said, but if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. The foundation of the truth is found within the body of believers. So this is no small deal. It's a big deal. Therefore, as a Christian institution, it is crucial that we be aligned with God's purposes in God's plans in the world.

You could say it this way. Church matters. Also, since we make this a requirement of your education, that it is crucial that we teach a basic philosophy of ministry and worship to help guide you in your choices. So we're trying to be faithful to teach what is a sound biblical philosophy as you have to make these decisions. Now, the second reason why this series is so important is because many students for the first time in their life are making their own decision regarding a church.

The fact is, let me ask you this. How many of you would say coming to Bob Jones University from where I've grown up is actually the first time I personally have had to make a choice as to where I'm going to go to church? How many of you would acknowledge that?

Would you raise your hand? Okay. It's basically the large percentage of our student body. It's therefore a big deal. This is a big deal. You're going to be here, hopefully, for four years, three to four years. And so your weekends, your Sundays will be invested in a local church.

This is a big decision. So it's important to understand that Bob Jones University is not a church. We do not hold worship services here on Sunday morning. We do not have a pastor. This is not BJU Baptist Church. We are not a church.

If you come here on Sunday morning, we're not going to be here. We are a Christian liberal arts university. We have never aligned ourselves as an institution with one single denomination. We've never joined a church convention, a church association, or a church fellowship for 92 years of existence. However, we love and we support the local church. Furthermore, we have sought to align ourselves with people who believe the Bible, and who seek to love the truth, live the truth, proclaim the truth, and defend the truth.

We stand with them. So as a university, we have no authority over local churches. I do not call up pastors in Greenville and say, you need to do this. We actually have no means to appropriately evaluate churches. We don't have a team here that goes out and evaluates all the churches. Furthermore, we have no single denomination or individual church that we exclusively recommend. We don't say, this is the church all of our students should go to, but we do require that you go to church. Therefore, we have concluded that it is vital, it is vital in this decision-making process to have your parents' involvement.

And let me explain clearly why. When Bob Jones University was started by Dr. Bob Jones Sr., when he started the institution, here was his desire. He wanted students to come here, earn a degree, and go back home to their home churches and serve. He would not ask students coming to BJU from different denominations and traditions to change their denomination.

So I want to make that very clear. Fact is, for 86 years of our history, of the institution's history, we actually held Sunday morning worship services here on campuses. And during some of those years, we actually required that students go to the Sunday school class of their denomination. So here, Bob Jones, for example, we'd have a service, let's say, at 11 o'clock on Sunday morning.

All students came here. Before that, you would have to go to a Sunday school class. You had to go to the Sunday school class of your denomination. So if you are a Baptist, you had to go to Baptist Boys Sunday school class, Baptist Girls Sunday school class, Presbyterian Sunday school class, Methodist Sunday school class. The reason he did that, because he wanted people to stay within their denomination and they would have their own services here on campus. And so, in a way, it was very simple, or simpler I could say, to assure that the founder's vision for church affiliation would be maintained. Because you'd come to Bob Jones, go to the services here, go back to your home, and there really wasn't an in-between church, if that makes sense. But, six years ago, we changed the church policy, and we opened up the opportunity for students to go to Greenville area local churches. And I applaud that.

I came here one year after that policy had been in place. And not only do I applaud it, I'm not sure I would have come here as the president if we did not have that policy in place, because of my personal belief about the importance of the local church. So now, we are requiring all of our students to go to a local church on Sunday instead of here on the campus. However, it's important to realize that we do not control local churches. Therefore, in order for us to be in alignment with the founder's vision of the church, we have decided to require students to be in alignment with their parents.

Because that's really what the founder wanted. He wanted you to be aligned with your mother and father where you came from when you came here to the university. So, we have put the weight of church choice back on families. And in order to practically accomplish this, because there has to be a practical method, we require that all incoming freshmen receive their parents' validation of church choice by the end of the first semester.

So you don't have to make the decision within two or three weeks, but you do have to by the end of the semester. In other words, you can't church hop every single week and not land down anywhere. Now, we have put together a church list of some 120 churches that we believe reflects the kind of churches that the majority of our students come from.

We have done this very carefully. We recognize that about 75% of our students come from an independent Baptist or Bible church background. That's reflected in this list. This is the same list, more or less, that we had last year as a list for our students. But I want you to know that they're not the only churches in Greenville.

The fact is, there are about 400 gospel churches within a 20-mile radius of this campus. Obviously, we don't go to them all, visit them all, and so we're not going to put all of them on the list. If you're an upperclassman, you do not need your parents' validation if your church is on that representative list. It's not a restrictive list.

It's a representative list. If your church is not, then you have to, as an upperclassman, get your parents' validation also by the end of this semester. So I just want to make sure that that's very, very clear.

So, let me ask you a question. What could be more important than making the right choice about where you worship God? I believe this is more important, as I've said, than anything else in our Christian life in the long run. At this stage of your life, making a good decision about a church choice requires good counsel. And what could be better counsel than your own parents and your own pastor? Spirit-filled students want to be in alignment with your parents in this matter. Maybe perhaps you're frustrated, and some may be, that we require your parents' validation because maybe you think we're not treating you like an adult.

Well, think with me a moment. Are there not still lots of things where you're still under your parents, like car insurance? Or how about health insurance? Or maybe perhaps your parents' phone plan?

In other words, I think you're glad that you don't have to pay for all of these things that you're still under. Now let me ask you a question. What would be more important than for you to be in harmony with your mother and your father as to where you worship God? We are going to let this matter be between you and your parents because church matters. Then there's a third reason why we're having this series, and that is because of our accountability to God. The fact that we teach you biblical principles means that ultimately we are accountable to God for our decisions. This was my experience.

I mentioned it earlier. I attended church in Columbia. I was converted my freshman year of college. When I started going back to my church after I became a believer, I began to realize some things that didn't seem right. I didn't understand it all at once, but over time I began to realize that in effect the church I attended was a liberal church. That is, it denied the inspiration of the Bible. It did not teach salvation by grace through faith.

It really questioned a lot of the basic issues of Jesus, like his resurrection and his virgin birth. These were things that the church did not believe, and it denied. It was a liberal church. Over time, I realized that I could not stay in this church, and I wasn't going to change the church, so I ended up leaving. After that, I found myself looking for a church, and I had one thing I didn't want to do. I didn't want to be a part of a liberal church, and so I decided to go to a church that was committed to the scriptures. Because I felt no real loyalty to one church or one denomination, I decided I wanted to be a part of a church that was as close to the New Testament as possible. I knew that it would be based on biblical principle. I also realized, even in college, that there were differences among churches over doctrinal interpretations. I knew the Bible spoke to these issues, and I wanted to have scriptural clarity on these matters. And ultimately, I knew that above all things, I was going to give an account to God.

And how do I know that? Because of what we read this morning in 1 Corinthians. Where Paul says he laid the foundation of the church through the preaching of Jesus, and the church was built on top of that foundation. But people are judged in how that church is built. What kind of materials?

Are they going to use the kind of materials that are going to pass through the fire test, or will they be consumed? And so I realized I wanted to be a part of a ministry that built the church with materials that were fireproof. The kind of judgment that I would go through, that when I went through that, there would be right motives and right materials.

Because not only did I fear the Lord, but I feared the fire. I did not want to make a decision based on what I wanted. The worst decision you could ever make in attending church is, what do I want?

The question is not what I want. The question is, what does God say? And then you pray and ask the Lord to lead you. So by the time I came to Bob Jones University, I had already made many of the choices about the local church. And I had clarity in my mind because I sought the scriptures. As a student at Bob Jones, while you're here, this is a crucial time for you to think these things through and seek to follow God in his word.

Why? Because we're accountable to God because church matters. And then the fourth reason is because of the nature of worship. When it comes to the worship of God, I want to be very clear that man never gets it right without divine revelation. The natural mind always leads to idolatry.

Always. Think about it. The first two commands in the scripture reveals the most common sin of man.

And what is it? It's always idolatry. The creation of a God in our own image, a God in our own mind, and what I want God to be for me. Therefore, worship has always been regulated by truth. We worship God, Jesus said, in spirit and in truth. We worship God according to revelation. For example, under the Old Covenant, God was to be worshiped according to God's strict commands. Man could not come up with his own ideas, so God gave a blueprint for worship. He gave it on Mount Sinai.

What did that include? Things like the tabernacle, sacrifices, special days, the priesthood, a regular schedule or itinerary. But when we come to the New Testament, that worship is not physical like the Old Covenant, but it is spiritual.

Why? Because Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of all of those pictures that we find in the Old Testament. He is the ultimate tabernacle, the high priest, the ultimate sacrifice. So, the New Testament worship is actually spiritual, not so much physical, but we are not permitted to worship God as we please. Worship is always for God's pleasure.

It is about Him. It is not for our entertainment. It's not for me just to feel good, although I can feel good by going to church. It is a place where God is to be worshiped. As I mentioned in the New Testament, the practice of worship is not material like the Old Testament. Our worship is focused on the Word of God and the person of Jesus Christ.

Our worship should be primarily based on the revealed principles that are found in the New Testament, and that's what we're going to teach you this semester. So, practically, Greenville, South Carolina is filled with churches where you can go and truly worship God. However, there are churches where you should not go either because of doctrine or worship.

We live in a world where the tendency is to be very market-driven. If I make a church choice based on what I like or with a consumer mentality, like choosing a restaurant or a phone app or whatever, then you're making a really bad decision about worship. When it comes to church, I should passionately desire to do all things for the glory of God and not for the attraction of man. The New Testament warns us to be careful.

There are wolves in sheep's clothing. There's bad theology. There are man-centered motivations for building churches based on what men want out of a church. Paul said it, wood, hay, and stubble, instead of what God wants in a church.

And in this series, we are going to present a grid or a filter through which you can make sound decisions, a grid that includes eight doctrinal and theological markers that support a God-centered model of worship. It's not Presbyterian. It's not Baptist. It's not Methodist. It's just very clear principles. This will be contrasted with a man-centered, attractional model that is very prevalent today within our culture. So why are we doing this?

Because of the nature of worship and because church matters. Now, I got to one of two points. I'm not going to go through the second point, which I'll do another time. But I want you to understand this is a really big deal. And I hope that over the course of the semester, you will be strengthened and your faith will be built up as you understand the biblical principles of worshiping God. Father, thank you for your word and thank you that church matters.

In Jesus' name, amen. You've been listening to a sermon preached at Bob Jones University by Dr. Steve Pettit from the series called Church Matters. I'm Steve Pettit, president of Bob Jones University. Thank you for listening to The Daily Platform, the Bob Jones University School for Continuing Online and Professional Education offers convenient and affordable online programs. Whether you're seeking to expand your skills, pursue a passion or develop a ministry on your own time, qualified and engaged instructors will help you reach your goals. For more information, visit scope.bju.edu or call 888-253-9833. Join us again tomorrow as we continue this series on church membership here on The Daily Platform.