How to Church Pt. 1

Intro

Something that really bugs me is when people turn nouns into verbs. I can’t tell you how much it bothers me when people talk about adulting. One of the key ways to act like an adult is to treat nouns like nouns and verbs like verbs.

That said, I’m going to break that rule for the next couple of weeks for a series that I’ve called, “How to Church.”

What is it to be a part of Christ’s Church? That’s what I want you to think about as we begin tonight. Are you a part of Christ’s Church?

These next two weeks will focus on two defining characteristics that must mark everyone who is a part of the church.

Body

In Matthew 22, Jesus was approached by the Jews, by an expert in the Law, who asked Him a question: “Teacher, what is the great commandment in the Law?” This was a trap question meant to get Jesus to say something that would immediately cause division and disagreement. But Jesus answered perfectly as one would expect:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.

The greatest commandment that truly embodies all of the other commandments is this: Love God with everything you are.

In looking at How to Church it begins right there. Step one in how to church is to love God with everything you are.

It’s not even love God most, but love God exclusively.

ALL your HEART, ALL your SOUL, and ALL your MIND.

Every other love you have must flow out of your love for the Lord.

It’s not: “I love God and my family”

It’s: “I love God as I love my family”

It’s not: “I love God and Taylor Swift”

It’s: “I love God as I love Taylor Swift.”

Granted, this is a high bar for any of us to achieve.

How do we do this?

If this is foundational to what it means to be a part of Christ’s Church, how should this look for me day-in and day-out.

We don’t get to define that or choose our brand of Christianity that we want to embrace.

There are certain non-negotiables that come with being a true follower of JESUS

That’s were Romans 12:1-2 comes in to play for us.

Romans 12:1–2 (ESV)

1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

In Romans 1-11 Paul has laid out what amounts to a systematic theology filled with rich and deep doctrine about the gospel, and now in Romans 12-14 he transitions to instruction as to how we should live in light of the gospel.

Romans 12:1

Paul’s “appeal” is really more of an exhortation, a “let’s go,” and it’s made according to the mercies of God (aka Romans 1-11)

Romans 11:30-36

His exhortation for us is that we should “present our bodies as a living sacrifice”

OT sacrificial system

No longer do we bring bulls and goats to the Lord

Christ has fulfilled this

So what then do we offer to the Lord?

Not a gift but the giver that we offer to the Lord

Romans 6:13

P1: Offer Everything to Christ’s Lordship (v. 1)

Back in Matthew 22, the great commandment begins with our need to love God with all our heart and our soul.

All of our deepest realms of identity and desire needs to be submitted to Christ’s Lordship.

Notice the adjectives from Romans 12:1 that describe this offering of ourselves:

Living = persistent; daly; ongoing; not a one-and-done

Holy = set apart; sanctified; for God’s use only

Acceptable = if we offer ourselves this way we will find that the Lord is pleased with our offering

Lordship isn’t a one-time transaction with the Lord, but a daily commitment to worship Him with all you are. To love Him with all your heart and all your soul.

If you want to be a part of Christ’s church, He wants your full devotion; He’s a jealous God who isn’t interested in sharing your affections with anyone or anything.

This begins with a belief that this is what’s best for you, that it is a good thing to surrender all to Christ, that He has your best interest in mind even when it looks like the world is offering something better.

CS Lewis: It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased. (The Weight and the Glory)

Y’all, if you’re holding back from full surrender to JESUS because you don’t want to give something up, you are far too easily pleased.

If you If you think that going all-in with JESUS would cost you too much, you are far too easily pleased.

If you find yourself disagreeing with the plain reading of Scripture, looking for loopholes or alternate interpretations that make it more palatable, you are far too easily pleased.

If you’re presenting your bodies to the altars of sex, or friendship, or politics, or career, or identity, or career, you are far too easily pleased.

Paul describes this offering of ourselves to Christ as our “spiritual worship.”

This is an interesting concept that doesn’t just mean that we’re not bringing physical offerings to a physical temple anymore.

It’s from a Greek word that has at its root the word that we transliterate into the English word, “logic”

Yes, it’s our spiritual worship because it is more about the internal state than the external actions, but beyond that Paul was suggesting that this response to the mercies of God is the logical thing, the right or fitting, response for a believer in JESUS.

Love the Lord your God with ALL your heart and with ALL your soul.

There is no room for divided affections in Christ’s church. Being a part of Christ’s Church is being all-in with Christ.

END P1

The command to love the Lord with all our SOUL begins to move from the internal commitment to Christ to the transformation of our desires and our wills.

Romans 12:2

These verses aren’t talking about two different things but verse 2 is an explanation of how we go about presenting ourselves daily to the Lord as a living sacrifice.

“Do not be conformed to this world”

To offer ourselves fully to the Lord we have to stop offering ourselves to the idols of our past.

To be conformed = to be squeezed into a mold or pattern

Ephesians 2:1-3

Galatians 5:19-21

1 Peter 4:3-4

One author described the world as “the sin-dominated death-producing realm in which all people naturally belong.”

To offer everything to Christ’s Lordship means that we have to separate ourselves from those things in the world that we have been giving yourselves to instead.

P2: Divorce Yourself from Worldly Living (v. 2a)

The word Church is derived from a Greek word that means “called-out ones.”

Christ’s Church is to be a place that is made up of those who have been “called-out” from the world and its pleasures.

If you want to be a part of Christ’s Church there needs to be a break with the world (repentance)

To be a part of the Church is to align yourself with the values of the Church which are the values of the Bible which are the values of God.

This is one of the reasons we do focus on issues of morality

Sex

Drugs

Alcohol

Gossip

Slander

Homosexuality

These are all elements of the world that we must rid ourselves of

1 John 2:15-17

Romans 1:32

Ephesians 5:3

1 Peter 4:3-4

Do not be conformed to this world

Come out from the world and its values

1 Peter 2:9-12

Ephesians 5:3-12

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

If some of these concepts bother you, if you feel like some of this is too harsh, let me remind you that all I have been doing is reading the plain words of Scripture.

If you don’t like these things it is because you have issue with God’s Word not my words. Your anger or frustration is not with me but with what you are hearing, which is the Word of God.

When you come to faith in Jesus, there naturally is a break with the world. It’s not that you’re sinless. It’s not that you’re a spiritual hermit. It’s not that you are afraid of unbelievers. But there should be a difference that is marked in your life.

You have left behind the values and morals of this world.

Your allegiance has changed. You are done with living for yourself and your pleasures.

You don’t make decisions based on what will make you happy but what will glorify the Lord.

You are willing to defer pleasure that the world offers now knowing that there are pleasures forevermore waiting for you in eternity.

You are willing to bear the reproach of Christ by speaking out against the sins that our world wants to normalize.

You care more about honoring Jesus than being accepted by unbelieving friends.

You don’t get overly excited or overly discouraged by the ongoings of the culture because you know the God who is sovereign over it all.

How to Church begins with your surrender to Christ and continues in transformation of your life.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul.

END P2

And all your MIND.

Romans 12:2

“…but be transformed by the renewal of your mind,”

“transformed” = metamorphao

This is a passive verb which means that we are receiving the action and not carrying it out ourselves.

You aren’t transforming yourself, you are being transformed

And what is it being transformed: our minds

Becoming a Christian is a total takeover of all of our faculties including the way we think about everything.

But this should follow naturally from what we’ve already covered, that Christianity begins with surrendering everything to the Lordship of Christ. That most definitely includes our minds and our thought-life.

P3: Adopt the Mind of Christ (v. 2b)

Illustrate: Before people go to Texas and experience real BBQ, their minds are darkened and they are foolish in their understanding. Claiming to be wise they show their foolishness through suggesting that Lucille’s is good. BUT, once they go and experience the truth, they come back with a different mindset, a transformed mind, and they have adopted the proper perspective on the false gospel of CA BBQ.

A worldview is the lens through which we view and interpret the reality around us.

Naturalism is a worldview that says that there is no God and everything that happens has a naturalistic explanation.

Postmodernism is a worldview that says that everything is an interpretation of another interpretation, so we can never arrive at objective truth.

Nihilism is a worldview that says there is no afterlife, no eternity, no God, and ultimately no valid reason to continue existing.

The Christian worldview, which becomes ours at our conversion, states that there is a Creator God who has created all things, who exists outside of time and is sovereign over the world’s timeline and over the lives of His creation.

This is a fallen world because of sin

Sin is a universal problem

There is objective right and wrong

Truth is knowable

There is an afterlife

God has made Himself known

The end of physical life on earth is the beginning of eternal life

When we are saved our minds are transformed.

2 Corinthians 4:4

Ephesians 2:3

Ephesians 4:20-24

“be transformed by the renewal of your mind.”

This is a passive event, but it doesn’t mean you don’t have a part to play.

Our minds are being renewed from the point of our conversion to the moment of our death. It’s a process of reprogramming that isn’t a singular event like our justification but part of our sanctification.

It is as we are being transformed that we are less and less conformed to this world.

Are you availing yourself of that which will transform?

Are you putting yourself in the way of the Word of God?

Philippians 4:8

Are you thinking on these things?

So much sin begins between the ears with thoughts that are left unchecked, with fantasies that are entertained and acted upon, with hateful thoughts that turn into rash words, with idolatrous and covetous dreams that become a surrogate for satisfaction in Christ.

The Church is a place for the transformation of the mind.

We don’t come here to debate or argue or to attempt to persuade someone that the Bible needs updating.

We don’t come to Church to sit in authority over the Word of God but in submission to it.

We don’t come to Church thinking we already know what we need to know but we come looking to be taught and instructed in the areas wherein we must grow.

The longer you walk with JESUS the more you will realize that you think differently from the world.

Illustration: Look at the argument from the Supreme Court this past week over the legal precedent for Roe v. Wade. Think of the women who were chanting about abortion pills and taking them as they protested the hearing. Think of the wickedness of the NY congress cheering and celebrating the passing of a late-term abortion law a few years ago. How can someone be so wicked? How can someone be so base? How can they not see what God’s word has made so plain?

Romans 1:21-22

Ephesians 4:18

1 Corinthians 1:18-21

No one reasons themselves into eternity. It is only an act of God whereby the blindness is removed, their minds are transformed, and they are able to truly “discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

To be a part of Christ’s Church is to surrender everything to His lordship which means a divorce from this world and its systems that is realized as we are transformed by the renewal of our minds.

Conclusion

Some of you here are in the church building but you’re not really in Christ’s Church. These are the things that matter in the big picture, and there’s really no wiggle-room on any of this. Jesus was abundantly clear that we are to love God with ALL of our HEART, with ALL of our SOUL, and with ALL of our MIND. This is the Way.

If y’all want to be a part of Christ’s Church, This is the Way. Surrender everything to the Lordship of Christ; Divorce Yourself from the World’s System; and Increasingly Adopt the Mind of Christ.

Application Questions:

Read Romans 10:9. What does it mean to confess with our mouths that Jesus is Lord? Does this go beyond our words? If so, in what way?

Read 1 Peter 4:3-4. What was Peter saying here? How does this verse help us when we consider counting the cost for following Jesus?

Read Colossians 3:1-4. How would you define “the things above?” What are some practical ways for us to “set our minds on the things above?” What are “the things that are on earth?” Why should we not set our minds on these things?

How important would you consider morality in the life of a Christian? Should we be concerned when a friend is compromising in their morality? What should we do in that situation?