The Church is the assembly of redeemed people

Welcome:

Welcome to this gathering of Redmond Christian Church

Whether you are new here and it’s your first time or if you have been here many years, we’re glad you are here

We are gathered to worship the triune God together

We do that through singing songs of praise and worship, through offering of our money to support the gospel ministry of this church, through prayer, through taking communion to remember what Jesus has done for us, and through the reading of scripture and the preaching of the word of God

We are starting a new series this week called “What is the Church?”

Spoiler - the church is both a global, universal reality as well as a concrete, local reality where congregations of Christians commit in covenant relationship to live out their faith together

We want to read our church covenant each week to remind ourselves of what exactly we are committed to doing together as members of this particular local church

Introduction: What is the Church?

As we start this series, we are also making available a short supplemental book that I think you would find super helpful in understand what it means to be a healthy member of a local church

The book is called “What is a healthy church member?”

It is available for purchase in the fellowship hall - we are not making any money off of these books but just selling them at cost for your convenience

I’m not going to be preaching through this book, but it is nonetheless helpful in getting an easy, digestible picture of what it means to be a healthy church member

In our world today, to even mention the word “church” can be very tricky

There has been a great deal of hurt and sorrow in people’s lives by unhealthy, unbiblical churches

Much of that is legitimate, because many churches are unhealthy

Some of that isn’t legitimate, because it’s simply people who at one point or another didn’t like being told that they were wrong about something and left saying the church had done them some great wrong

But the church has misstepped often in human history, and it has led some in our world today to be very wary of churches and the thought of going to or joining one

There’s a very common sentiment out there that “I love Jesus but I don’t like the church,” or “I’m spiritual but I'm not religious” or “I’m a Christian but church just isn’t for me”

But you can’t read the Bible seriously without seeing “church”all over the place

So it’s not something you can really just blow off entirely and claim to have a thoughtful, well informed faith in Jesus

So we are preaching a series for the next seven weeks called “What is the Church?”

Here’s the main idea today: The Church is the assembly of redeemed people

I. Origin of the word “Church”

One thing that confuses us is that the word “church” has a lot of interesting but often confusing baggage attached to it

The word “church” comes from a greek word

κυριακη (kyriake), from κυριος (kyrios, “lord”) and οικια (oikia “house”)

Thus, it was originally a “house of the Lord,” or a place of Christian worship

This became kirika in Proto Germanic to cirice in Old English to chirche in Middle English to “church” in Modern English.

This word is not bad, but it did accumulate a lot of nuance and intuitive meaning throughout the ages

It came to have a hierarchical structure association (Roman Catholic Church)

It came to refer predominantly to buildings

This understanding has carried into much of the modern western conception of churches

The problem is, this word is not ever used in the NT

The NT does not use the word κυριακη at all, but rather εκκλησια

There has been push back in recent years against this institutional, building oriented understanding of church

Critics of this have rightly pointed out that theologically and biblically the church is not a building but rather a people

You do not “go” to church, but if you are a Christian, you are the church

Some have taken this idea so far as to say that a physical meeting place or gathering is irrelevant altogether - that the church is a people and not a place, so the place doesn’t matter

To this I say “not so fast”

In order to clarify this, we need to turn to the actual words used in the Scriptures that we translate as “church”

II. Biblical Words for “Church”

The Greek word in the NT that we translate “church” is the word ἐκκλησια, which in the LXX translates the Hebrew word קָהָל

Hebrew

the word קָהָל - qahal, generally translated “assembly” as a noun or “to gather, assemble” as a verb

Special Notes

A couple of times this word is used to refer to the whole people of Israel

People under the judgment of God were “cut off from the assembly of Israel”

Deuteronomy 23 has a list of people who could never enter “the assembly of the LORD”

Deuteronomy 23:3-4

Deuteronomy 23:3–4 ESV

3 “No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord. Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the Lord forever, 4 because they did not meet you with bread and with water on the way, when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you.

The vast majority of the time, this word describes a literal assembly of the people of Israel

To hear the instruction of the Law

To sing and worship God

To pray and seek God

To eat, feast, fellowship

Offer sacrifices

Confess sin

OT Theological Takeaways

To be an Israelite, a redeemed member of God’s people, meant to be part of the assembly of Israel - there is no such thing as an Israelite who is not part of Israel

The people of Israel were especially the people of God when they assembled to worship and serve him together

Greek

The Greek word ἐκκλησια picks up this thread and carries it on

This was not really a religious or spiritual word

In the Greek and Roman world:

It referred to a regularly summoned legislative body

It referred to a casual gathering of people

This is why Paul specifies that he is talking about “the ἐκκλησια of God”

The NT uses this word in a couple of ways

114 times

18 times it refers to the universal church made up of all of God’s redeemed people from all places of all times

This is in line with the OT use of קהל to talk about the entirety of the people of Israel

Colossians 1:18

Colossians 1:18 ESV

18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.

67 times it refers to concrete local expressions of that universal reality - local congregations - and it really spoke of this in a couple of ways

The community of Christians living in a specific geographic area (The church of the Thessalonians, the Church of God that is in Corinth, the churches of Galatia)

2 Corinthians 1:1

2 Corinthians 1:1 ESV

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the church of God that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia:

The actual gathering of the people of God (1 Corinthians 11:17-18)

1 Corinthians 11:17–18 ESV

17 But in the following instructions I do not commend you, because when you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. 18 For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you. And I believe it in part,

To worship the triune God

To pray

To listen to the preaching of God’s word

To confess sin

To celebrate communion

To exhort one another to obedience to Christ

III. Application: What is the significance of these biblical words?

First, they speak consistently of a communal, corporate reality of God’s people

There is no such thing as a Christian who is not part of the church, whether they acknowledge it or not

In the OT, it would be nonsensical to talk about an Israelite who was not part of the assembly of Israel

In the NT, it is nonsensical to talk about a person who has responded to the gospel with faith and trust in Jesus who does not belong to his people, the ἐκκλησία

If you are a Christian, you can no more say that you aren’t part of the church than you can say you as a human aren’t part of humanity

You can be frustrated by the church, you can be hurt by the church, you can long for a healthier church congregation than what you have experienced before, you can be disappointed in the church, but you cannot not be in the church - that is definitionally impossible

Second, that corporate reality has always had a universal, timeless sense as well as a concrete local sense, and both of these are beautiful realities

It means that becoming a Christian joins and unites you to a body and people with a heritage that reaches back 2,000 years and stretches across the entire globe into all cultures, peoples, nations, and languages

It means that by committing yourself in covenant relationship to a local congregation, you get to experience life and faith together with other Christians in a concrete, edifying, faith building way

And this is actually the far more common way that both the OT and NT talk about the people of God, the ἐκκλησία

Sometimes people tend to emphasize the universal, global reality of the church and neglect the concrete expression of that body in the local church

That’s a viewpoint with very weak biblical basis - to say “yes I believe in the universal church” but to then downplay local congregations is to just not acknowledge the clear biblical data

You cannot do life and faith together with “the universal church” - you do life together with actual people in a local, concrete setting

This is why I so love the local church, even though I’d be the first to admit that she has some mud on her dress

Despite all of her struggles, disappointments, hurts, bruises, sins, pains; she is is still the bride of Christ and the hope of the world

Finally, these terms carry an unmistakeable sense of “gathering” or “assembling”

What this means is that the people of God in both the OT and the NT are in a sense especially the people of God when they assemble to worship him together.

The church is defined in part by it’s gathering and assembling

The definition of a healthy church is more than simply a gathering, but it’s certainly not less than that

Illustration: Avengers, assemble

The avengers are defined by the fact that they come together to fight

If they never come together; they are not the avengers - they are just individual superheroes who fight crime

Illustration: A sports team

It is substantially defined by it’s meeting together to practice and play games

There is more to being a sports team than gathering to practice and play, but it’s definitely not less than that

The sports team that never practices together or plays together is by definition not a team

This does not mean it ceases to be a team when it’s not at practice or at a game

A team can forego practice and games for a temporary time period, but it cannot decide to adopt a new normative stance that it does not practice or play

So, during this season of COVID, the Portland Trailblazers spent a time not practicing or playing; they did not in that time cease to be a NBA team; however, if they had decided to adopt a new norm of not practicing and not playing, they would effectively be disbanding their team

Additionally, the Portland Trailblazers are uniquely and especially the Portland Trailblazers when they gather to practice and play

Likewise, a church is defined in part by it’s gathering and assembling

The church that chooses on a normative basis not to meet is definitionally not a church

This is exactly why it’s been so painful for the church to be forced temporarily into different and decidedly not ideal circumstances

This is also why “online church” is not ever going to become the new normative experience for the people of God

Online church can fill a need in specific circumstances, but it is not an assembly of the people of God, and therefore it is definitionally not church

I’m not trying to be mean, I’m just saying the church is not whatever we imagine it to be or whatever we pragmatically think would be most efficient or effective; the church is nothing more or less than what the Bible says it is

This is not to shake a finger at people and shame them because they are reluctant to participate in a church community; there are many reasons why people are that are fair and understandable

We have a lot of grace in this season because it’s such an unprecedented time; I am NOT saying that if you are choosing to stay home in this season for a good reason that you have ceased to be part of the church: of course not!

I’m saying that the gathered, assembled church has been here for 2,000 years and it’s here to stay; the future of the church is in fact not in online only venues, it is not in forsaking gathering together, it is in gathering together to worship, learn, pray, confess sin and grow together into the likeness of Christ

To say that you are a Christian or follower of Jesus but not part of the church is nonsensical and unbiblical

The Church is the assembly, but not just any assembly; it is the ἐκκλησία of God.

IV. The church is formed by the grace of God in the gospel

This is unique: As I said, an ἐκκλησία in the ancient world was not a uniquely Christian thing: it was simply an assembly

Some assemblies came together around civic and legislative lines: the assembly gathered out of a common civic responsibility to conduct legislative business

Some assemblies came together around common business trades, interests or ideas

This is still true today: there are a lot of different groups that assemble around a lot of different things

Sports

Government committees

Hobby groups

Book clubs

But the ἐκκλησία of God is not based around any human centric things: she is instead made of up of people who God has redeemed by his grace

The ἐκκλησία of God is formed by the grace of God in the gospel to redeem people and reconcile them to himself

In his farewell to the church in Ephesians in Acts 20, Paul says to the elders of the church: Acts 20:28

Acts 20:28 ESV

28 Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.

In a few short words, Paul is powerfully reminding the leaders of the Ephesian church to see the church correctly: as the people whom God purchased with the life of his son

Though every human being stands before a perfect and holy God guilty of sin, idolatry, and rebellion, God in his grace has offered Jesus Christ his Son, who lived a perfect life and died in our place.

Through faith and trust in Jesus, his perfect life is counted to us as righteousness, and we are forgiven of our sin, reconciled to God, adopted into his family, and then formed into his people, his ἐκκλησία.

Couple of practical application things:

You should look at the local church like Jesus bought her with his blood.

You might be tempted to think Paul is saying only that Jesus bought the universal church with his blood, which he absolutely did

But in the context, how is he speaking of the church? The church and the flock that the Ephesian elders are supposed to pay careful attention to and care for!

They were supposed to look at their own local congregation and see her as one whom whom Jesus obtained with his own blood.

The person who looks at the stains and difficulties and brokenness of the local church and then stands over her in judgment doesn’t really understand the gospel and doesn’t really get Jesus’ love for his church

Such a person also forgets that the church doesn’t exist because a bunch of holy, perfect, wonderful, godly people just decided to get together and form a church

The church exists because of the grace of God in the gospel, where God has given his the life of his son in exchange for sinners and rebels

We are not saved by our own moral strength or personal righteousness but rather by the grace of God on wretched sinners

So of course the church is messy and difficult! She is the assembly of people who have been redeemed but are learning to live as the people of God

Therefore you should do everything you can to help, serve, protect, and promote the health of your local church as a committed member

First, it means prioritize assembling with your church

Second, it means praying for your church

Third, it means serving your church according to the gifts God has given you

Fourth, it means preserving the unity of your church

Conclusion

At our core, as a church we are a gospel community that gathers to live out our faith in Jesus

We are not based around anything other than the gospel

Not political endeavors

Not sports teams

Not business relationships

Not common vocations

Not being in the same class or club at school

And that’s a wonderful thing!

Look around: look at the different kinds of people here

High school students trying to get through these four years

Old retired grandmas and grandpas

Young momma’s chasing toddlers around

Hunters, hikers, farmers

Computer nerds and gamers

Scholars and academics

And yet we all come together because we all have such a critical thing in common: we have been bought by the blood of Jesus

So let us praise God for redeeming us into his ἐκκλησία, his church, and let us commit to assembling regularly together to live out our faith in Jesus