Church
First Things First • Sermon • Submitted
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What is the Church?
What is the Church?
Light of the World
City on a Hill
Salt
“You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.
“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid.
No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.
In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.
“You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.
“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid.
No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.
In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.
Bride of Christ
Body of Christ as a Symbol for Unity.
“Hands and Feet of Jesus”
Salt of the Earth
God’s People
A Community of Faith
Temple of God
Royal Priesthood
The Flock of God
Body of Christ as a Symbol for Unity.
“Hands and Feet of Jesus”
The Body of Christ
The Body of Christ
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.
If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.
And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.
If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be?
But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose.
If all were a single member, where would the body be?
-19
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.”
1 cor 12:
The fact that we are his body has serious implications for what we do outside of the church as well.
We are te Body of Christ.
Our Identity as the Church
Our Identity as the Church
Israel (not going, not doing, not telling, it was about BEING)
I will take you as my people, and I will be your God. You shall know that I am the Lord your God, who has freed you from the burdens of the Egyptians.
Jesus (Not about doing )
The Purpose of the Church
The Purpose of the Church
The church is called to praise and glorify God, to establish Jesus Christ’s kingdom, and to proclaim the gospel throughout the world.
God’s Mission in the Old Testament
To Be a Blessing
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.
I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
genes
To be Set Apart- Permeated everything they did.
Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.
You shall each revere your mother and father, and you shall keep my sabbaths: I am the Lord your God.
Do not turn to idols or make cast images for yourselves: I am the Lord your God.
When you offer a sacrifice of well-being to the Lord, offer it in such a way that it is acceptable in your behalf.
It shall be eaten on the same day you offer it, or on the next day; and anything left over until the third day shall be consumed in fire.
If it is eaten at all on the third day, it is an abomination; it will not be acceptable.
All who eat it shall be subject to punishment, because they have profaned what is holy to the Lord; and any such person shall be cut off from the people.
When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest.
You shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the alien: I am the Lord your God.
You shall not steal; you shall not deal falsely; and you shall not lie to one another.
And you shall not swear falsely by my name, profaning the name of your God: I am the Lord.
You shall not defraud your neighbor; you shall not steal; and you shall not keep for yourself the wages of a laborer until morning.
You shall not revile the deaf or put a stumbling block before the blind; you shall fear your God: I am the Lord.
You shall not render an unjust judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbor.
You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbor: I am the Lord.
You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself.
You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.
You shall keep my statutes. You shall not let your animals breed with a different kind; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed; nor shall you put on a garment made of two different materials.
If a man has sexual relations with a woman who is a slave, designated for another man but not ransomed or given her freedom, an inquiry shall be held. They shall not be put to death, since she has not been freed;
but he shall bring a guilt offering for himself to the Lord, at the entrance of the tent of meeting, a ram as guilt offering.
And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of guilt offering before the Lord for his sin that he committed; and the sin he committed shall be forgiven him.
When you come into the land and plant all kinds of trees for food, then you shall regard their fruit as forbidden; three years it shall be forbidden to you, it must not be eaten.
In the fourth year all their fruit shall be set apart for rejoicing in the Lord.
But in the fifth year you may eat of their fruit, that their yield may be increased for you: I am the Lord your God.
You shall not eat anything with its blood. You shall not practice augury or witchcraft.
You shall not round off the hair on your temples or mar the edges of your beard.
You shall not make any gashes in your flesh for the dead or tattoo any marks upon you: I am the Lord.
Do not profane your daughter by making her a prostitute, that the land not become prostituted and full of depravity.
You shall keep my sabbaths and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord.
Do not turn to mediums or wizards; do not seek them out, to be defiled by them: I am the Lord your God.
You shall rise before the aged, and defer to the old; and you shall fear your God: I am the Lord.
When an alien resides with you in your land, you shall not oppress the alien.
The alien who resides with you shall be to you as the citizen among you; you shall love the alien as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.
You shall not cheat in measuring length, weight, or quantity.
You shall have honest balances, honest weights, an honest ephah, and an honest hin: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt.
You shall keep all my statutes and all my ordinances, and observe them: I am the Lord.
If a man has sexual relations with a woman who is a slave, designated for another man but not ransomed or given her freedom, an inquiry shall be held. They shall not be put to death, since she has not been freed;
The Purpose of the Church
The Purpose of the Church
The church is called to praise and glorify God, to establish Jesus Christ’s kingdom, and to proclaim the gospel throughout the world.
The church is called to praise and glorify God, to establish Jesus Christ’s kingdom, and to proclaim the gospel throughout the world.
Christ-like Church
Christ-like Church
Two Things Jesus Did that Serve as a Pattern For us Today
1. Announcing God’s Kingdom
a. Through Preaching and Teaching
God’s Mission in the Old Testament
b. Its Principles and its Challenges towards the people.
Was not about going, telling, or even doing, it was about Being (Identity)
c. Remarkably, John’s Gospel speaks over 40 times of Jesus being “sent.”
To Be a Blessing ()
2. Embodying God’s Reign
A Priestly People
To Embody the Holiness of God through because they were set apart for God through their practices.
a. He not only preached about the Good News of the Kingdom, he lived it out. Lived out the principles of the Kingdom of God.
i. “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receives their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them”
By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Jonah’s Story
b. “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”” (, NRSV)
If the Church is God’s Body then we must know how Christ did God’s Mission.
Announcing God’s Kingdom
Its Principles and its Challenges
Proclamation of God’s Kingdom
A Kingdom that Demanded action
Embodying God’s Reign
“Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them”
Jesus always spoke the things that the Father spoke, Jesus did the things his Father do. His ministry was an overflow of his relationship with God. Its not so much about doing or telling, but being. If we know who we are as the church of God what we do ans say will be an overflow of our relationship with God.
Flemming, Dean. Recovering the Full Mission of God: A Biblical Perspective on Being, Doing and Telling (p. 72). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.
Remarkably, John’s Gospel speaks over 40 times of Jesus being “sent”
The Purpose of the Church
The Purpose of the Church
The church is called to praise and glorify God, to establish Jesus Christ’s kingdom, and to proclaim the gospel throughout the world.
Flemming, Dean. Recovering the Full Mission of God: A Biblical Perspective on Being, Doing and Telling (p. 114). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.
Edify his Kingdom
Edify his Kingdom
Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received.
Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.
1 Corinthians 3:9
For we are God’s servants, working together; you are God’s field, God’s building.
Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and
like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God,
built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.
In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord;
in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God.