Rediscovering Church, Part 4

• Rediscovering Church
God’s Covenant Community
• Genesis 12:1-3
• Criticisms of the church ...
“Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers. It tells people to go out and stick their noses in other people’s business.” – Jesse Ventura
• Criticisms of the church ...
“I’m not a vampire type, when some-body shows me the cross or some-thing like that. But organized religion gives me the creeps.” – Stephen King
• Criticisms of the church ...
• “I’m just not into church.”
• “The church is full of hypocrites.”
• The bride of Christ ...
• Ephesians 5:25 Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her..that He might present her to Himself a glorious church ... holy and without blemish.
• Individualistic society ...
• “Why do I need the church ?”
• Pursuit of personal fulfillment
• Reading the Bible individualistically...
• Philippians 1:6 He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ ..
• 1 Cor 3:16-17 Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?
• God’s Desire for Community ...
• Genesis 12:2-3 "I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make you a great nation.. in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed."
• Titus 2:14 that He might .. purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.
• Rev. 21:3 "the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them..they shall be His people.”
• Definition of “Church”...
• “Church” –
– Gr. kuriakon ‘the Lord’s …” (1 Cor 11:20; Rev 1:10) later ‘house of worship’
– Gr. Ecclesia assembly, congregation, gathering (over 100 t in NT) the community of God’s people
• OT roots of the Church ...
• The church a NT institution ..Matt 16:18; Eph 1:22-23; 5:25; 1 Tim 3:15
• The NT church is rooted in OT founda- tion of the community of God’s people
• 1 A Covenant Established...
Genesis 9:9
I will establish My
covenant with you and
your descendants after you ..
• The Covenant with Abraham...
• Genesis 12:2-3 I will make you a great nation; I will bless you ... in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed."
God’s Side of the Covenant (Gen 15) ..
• Genesis 15:5-18 "Look now toward heaven, and count the stars .. So shall your descendants be... when the sun went down .. behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces. 18 On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram..to your descendants I have given this land..."
• Covenant ( Berith )...
• A legally binding agreement between two parties; root meaning “to cut a covenant”
• Abraham’s side (Gen 17) ..
• Genesis 17:1-11 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am Almighty God; walk before Me and be blameless ... and you shall be circumcised .. it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you.
• Observations ..
• Both sides involve faithfulness ..
• God as superior showed His grace ..
• Deuteronomy 7:7-9 The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; 8 but because the Lord loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers..9 "Therefore know that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments...
• Observations ..
• Both sides involve faithfulness ..
• God as superior showed His grace ..
Deuteronomy 7:7-9 The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; 8 but because the Lord loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers..9 "Therefore know that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments...
• Man’s obedience grows from gratitude ..
• Motives for obedience ..
• Deuteronomy 10:12-18 "what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, 13 and to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command you today for your good? ..
• 17 For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality nor takes a bribe. 18 He administers justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the stranger”
• 2 God’s People as a Community..
• Expansion of the Covenant ...
• God Claims His People ...
• Exodus 3:7 "I have seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt ...
• Exodus 6:7 I will take you as My people, and I will be your God.
• God’s Deliverance ...
• Ex 15:13-18 In your unfailing love You will lead the people You have redeemed. The nations will hear and tremble — until Your people pass by.
• The Mosaic Covenant (Exod 19-24) ..
• Exodus 19:5-6 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine. 6 And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.‘.8 the people answered together, "All that the Lord has spoken we will do.”
• Exodus 20 Heart of the Law ...
• Exodus 20:1-2 "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage…
• Exodus 20 Heart of the Law ...
Response to God
Worship no other god (1-2)
Honor His Name (3)
Respect Him by recognizing the Sabbath (4)
Relating with Each Other
Honor the Family (5)
Sanctity of Human Life (6)
Pure in character (7-10)
• Utopian society ..
• A New Covenant Promised..
• Jeremiah 31:31-34 "I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and … of Judah —after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people… they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more."
•
• Value of Old Covenant
• Galatians 3:24-25 The law was a schoolmaster put in charge to lead us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.
• Effect of external law ...
• Romans 7:22-23 In my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.
• The blessing of God’s community ..
• “Church is a place of welcome and laughter, healing and hope, friends, family, and new life. It’s where you’ll find people learning to pray, coming to faith, struggling with temptation, finding new purpose, and new power to carry that purpose out. It’s where people discover, in getting together with others to worship the one true God, that the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. No church is like this all the time. But a remarkable number of churches are partly like that for quite a lot of the time.” - N.T. Wright
• Rediscovering Church
God’s Covenant People
• Genesis 12:1-3