Part 7. The Church

The Church

The Church of Christ consists of all who are genuinely born again by the Spirit of God when they heard and believed the word of truth about Christ and His gospel of salvation (Eph. 1:13-14). Being born again by the Holy Spirit they were baptised into the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:13), receiving a New Inner nature, namely Christ in them, the Hope of Glory. It is rooted in Him that His streams of living water can flow from within them, namely the Love of Christ towards one-another and the world in need.  As long as they remain in Him, that is in His truth and love, they will bear much fruit (John 15:1-17). This fruit, the fruit of the Holy Spirit consists of self-giving love (as further explained by 1 Cor. 13), and is accompanied by joy, peace-making, words and acts of kindness, of goodness, as well as faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (particularly keeping the old-self, our flesh under control (Gal. 5:16-21) through the Holy Spirit, in whom we find our new-self, our new nature created in Christ Jesus. 

Local fellowships

Prompted by love the family members of the Church of Christ exhibit a natural desire to want to fellowship together and assist, encourage, help, teach, exhort and serve one-another so that together we can better serve our Lord, particularly in working with Him in His mission to the world.  These fellowships are visible local representations of the worldwide and eternal Body of Christ.  These fellowships can be as small as 2 or 3 with Christ in their midst (Matthew 18:20), or number many thousands.  In His teachings Christ never prescribed a certain format of how we should fellowship which implies that there is freedom in such matters.  Also the apostles do not prescribe one standard format of how we should fellowship. In the New Testament we find all kinds of forms of fellowship from worship in a national temple to street meetings, lecture halls and home churches.  The same applies to church leadership. In different times and contexts different models are applicable. For example when the apostle Paul talks to Titus he seems to put him in control of all the churches in Crete with the mandate to appoint local fellowship leaders in every town (Titus 1:5), which implies a rather hierarchical structure. However, the Jerusalem church had a leadership formed by a council of twelve apostles (Acts 6:1-4).  Again we find house-churches in Rome led by a few leaders (Rom. 16:3-5). However, regardless of the model we deem appropriate in our context, the aim remains the same: To equip the saints for service so that the body of Christ may be built up and together we grow in Christ, becoming more like Him (Eph. 4:12-13).  When together we become more like Him by being rooted in His Love, we get a better understanding of His enormous love (Eph. 3:14-19) and are then also able to serve Him better in the great commission to go and make all nations into His disciples.

Every single one of Christ’s disciples is entrusted with resources by God, these may be material or immaterial sources. They include finances, possessions, abilities, intellectual resources, emotional resources, supernatural gifts and so on which enable us to serve God by serving and helping Gods people and in reaching out to the world. There are various lists of gifts and abilities that God entrusts to His people in Scripture which indicates that these lists are not exhaustive and many more can be added. What is important to keep in mind is that whatever God has entrusted to us, it being spiritual or unspiritual depends on the Spirit in which we exercise these gifts.  Is it in the Spirit of Christ, in His Spirit of Love for God and for our fellow humans, or is it from a different motivation? Even the preaching and teaching of scripture done out of a different spirit than that of Christ makes it an unspiritual affair. Truth without love is very dangerous and damaging! The same applies to any other so-called spiritual activity. It is only spiritual if inspired and executed in the Love of Christ, only then it will be good for edification, exhortation, comfort and correction. It is only when we communicate the truth in Love that we grow up in Christ and are held together firmly (Eph. 4:15-16).