Unity A Divine Or Human Accomplishment

Unity A Divine Or Human Accomplishment - Even though Jewish and gentile believers did not comprehend all that God did in Jesus Christ, God still did it. We conclude by reading two statements from Paul.

To the Roman Christians, Paul wrote:
For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith; if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; or he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness. (Romans 12:4-8)

To the Corinthian Christians, Paul wrote:
For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. (1 Corinthians 12:12-14) Bible Study at God's Message.

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church of Christ Ekklesia Sermon Podcasts

The Naked Church - Chapter 21 - Naked No Longer

The Naked Church - Chapter 21 - Naked No Longer

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Over the course of these pages we’ve examined the failure of contemporary Christianity to bring believers into a vital relationship with the Living God. Our wealth and influence only pretend to mask emptiness that leaves many brutalized by our systems, and still others disillusioned by God. I have no doubt that we are as naked as the Laodicean church in Revelation. I am not alone in saying that, for many voices in recent decades have pointed out the deficiencies of our systems and the pain they inflict on many.

Though the terms I’ve used have been clearly distinguishable hues of black and white, I’ve done so only to make the grays more visible. The shades of compromise are the most deceptive.

My purpose in exposing the church’s nakedness is not to breed cynics who jeer from the sidelines, but to show us how we have been willingly duped because of our own vested interest. We can all find ways to fit our own desires into religious forms, giving us the illusion of safety, but not its reality. For us to admit such nakedness risks all that we enjoy about it, and also the accusations of friends and family that we are critical or bitter. Certainly it would be easier to stay silent and make the best of the status quo.
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter 21 - Naked No Longer

The Naked Church - Chapter 20 - A Real Jesus in an Unreal World

The Naked Church - Chapter 20 - A Real Jesus in an Unreal World

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Not only can God make it here, but it’s the only place he does make it. He is not afraid to meet people in the real world, where every battle is not won, where people hurt and die, where all don’t repent and are saved. He’s not afraid of hospital rooms and screams of anger by people who misunderstand his love. He knows better than we that everything in this age will not end in temporal joy, and that rarely are the righteous rewarded in the world.

He is not a God who can be real only in stained-glass hues on velvet pews. If that’s the only place we’re finding him, then we’re not finding the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. What we’re finding may be an aesthetic feeling or a surge of compassion, but not the God of the universe filling our lives with the reality of his presence.

God only stays in a church building if that’s where we leave him, and that’s where many people prefer to have him. He’s there when we need him, but he won’t meddle in my business,
my family, or my recreational time. But this is written for those to whom God’s presence is good news—those who want to know him more fully, not less so.
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter 20 - A Real Jesus in an Unreal World

The Naked Church - Chapter 19 - Stained Glass and White Linen

The Naked Church - Chapter 19 - Stained Glass and White Linen

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The larger question, however, is whether Jesus is relevant to anything in our lives. Os Guiness reiterates that indictment: “The damning comment has been made of Christianity that it is privately engaging but socially irrelevant.”1 Until the church can answer the difficult questions that emerge from the application of our theology into real human experience, the world will only sit back and laugh. To them our gospel is irrelevant, a placebo designed to set the ignorant at ease and not a real answer for desperate needs.
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter 19 - Stained Glass and White Linen

The Naked Church - Chapter 18 - Clothed with Power

The Naked Church - Chapter 18 - Clothed with Power

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The voice on the phone was calm. “Reverend Jacobsen, this is the emergency room at Kaweah-Delta Hospital. There’s been an accident involving people from your congregation.

Could you come down here right away?” Even beneath the nurse’s professionalism flowed an unmistakable current of urgency. I phoned my co-pastor and left immediately. As I drove I began to pray. Only then did I realize how little I knew about the situation into which I was headed. Who was it? What kind of accident? The Spirit of God knew better than I, so I let him do the praying for me as I opened my heart to God’s presence. I was almost there when the thought raced across my mind: “I want that child to live.” What child? Was that you, God?
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter 18 - Clothed with Power

The Naked Church - Chapter 17 - Where Has All the Power Gone?

The Naked Church - Chapter 17 - Where Has All the Power Gone?

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Whether or not people liked Jesus or agreed with him, the thing that most impressed them was his sense of authority. Even his enemies marveled at the power that flowed from his life. And that is an amazing statement about a man who had no wealth, political clout, or wide following. Jesus drew his authority from a far deeper well.

People saw it in the synagogues where he taught simple lessons: “They were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who had authority” (Matthew 7:28,29). They saw it when he cast out evil spirits with just a word. The people wondered, “What is this? A new teaching—and with authority! He even gives orders to evil spirits and they obey him” (Mark 1:27).

They saw it when he rebuked the violent storm on the Sea of Galilee and immediately it grew calm. “What kind of man is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!” (Matthew 8:27).

Jesus had authority where it counted. It didn’t reside in his mannerisms, volume, or charisma, but in this simple fact: What he said and what he did made a difference.
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter 17 - Where Has All the Power Gone?

The Naked Church - Chapter - 16. The New Testament Community

The Naked Church - Chapter - 16. The New Testament Community

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Recapturing the personal aspect of Jesus’ ministry will not be easy in an age that regards a computer-addressed form letter to be a personal touch. “I love each of you so much,” the pastor says with a smile to the Sunday morning crowd, and we’ve come to believe him even though he doesn’t know our name or one detail about our lives. Before we’ve even left our seats he has slipped out the building by the back door and is already on his way home..
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter - 16. The New Testament Community

The Naked Church - Chapter - 15. Programmed to Death

The Naked Church - Chapter - 15. Programmed to Death

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How easily Satan must have thought he could snuff out the light of God’s kingdom in the world once Jesus had ascended to the Father! Only 120 followers remained, and they were huddled away in fear. Though the Day of Pentecost must have been a setback.
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter - 15. Programmed to Death

The Naked Church - Chapter - 14 Righteousness That Comes from Faith

The Naked Church - Chapter - 14 Righteousness That Comes from Faith

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Just knowing Jesus, however, wasn’t the only thing for which Paul hungered. He also wanted to be like him: “I consider[all things] rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from law, but that which is through faith in Christ.” Paul didn’t see righteousness as competing with his pleasure; it was his pleasure.

But Paul made it clear that the righteousness he sought was not one which comes by observing law. He knew that kind of righteousness all too well. Just a few verses before, he talked about his life as a Pharisee: “As for legalistic righteousness, [I was] faultless.” Before he came to know Jesus, Paul knew the bondage of trying to please God by a system of rules and regulations. He knew its frustration and rigidity, and that it never succeeds.--snip--

God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter - 14 Righteousness That Comes from Faith

The Naked Church - Chapter - 13 Confessions of a Christian Materialist

The Naked Church - Chapter - 13 Confessions of a Christian Materialist

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Since that day I’ve reevaluated a number of major Christian tenets. I know I risk sounding heretical here because in this culture we have married materialism to Christianity. We have even given its offspring a biblical name—stewardship—and under its protection we pursue material security, prosperity, and comfort, thinking these to be only an extension of our obedience to God. As I’ve looked closely I’ve found four concepts which are readily accepted in Christendom today, but which are actually nothing more than myths.\

1. The abundant life includes financial security.
2. Riches are the gift of God.
3. It takes money to minister.
4. God’s first priority for my life is material.
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God's Message - The Naked Church - Chapter - 13 Confessions of a Christian Materialist Podcast