The Church is God’s Idea, Part I
I had the great privilege of growing up in church. My father was a pastor and our family attended church at least three times each week (Sunday morning/evening and Wednesday), often for marathon sessions. My parents emphasized the priority of the church by, among other things, insisting that nothing, including my beloved participation in hockey, would preempt it. I resented it at times but, with that as with most things, the older I get the wiser my parents become.
Yet today many churches have fallen on hard times due in part to supposed irrelevance. An increasing number of professing Christians have concluded that it’s preferable to be “spiritual but not religious.” We’re told that the fastest growing religious demographic is “none”, many dismiss church with “I don’t believe in organized religion” (Hey, join us – no one ever accused my church of being organized -:) or the ad nauseum claim that “the church is full of hypocrites” (Has it ever occurred to the hypocrite detectives that the reason they themselves cannot be so accused is because they have no public and lofty standard like the Bible? If you are your own standard, you can always meet it.).
But make no mistake, God’s Word does extol the church, because it’s God’s idea, and His family, carrying out His work. It was Jesus who said, “I will build my church” (Matthew 16:18). Scripture refers to the local assembly as, “God’s household, the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth” (1 Timothy 3:15). And the Lord’s mission advances through churches, resulting in a multiplication of new churches (Acts 13-14, 16-18).
So, are pastors justified in saying as we often do, “The local church is God’s chosen instrument for achieving His purpose in this age”? This blog and a follow-up next week will show that the local church is indeed the means God has chosen to carry out His work.
The Rest of the Story
The most well-known statement of the Great Commission is in Matthew 28:19-20:
Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.
However, it may come as a surprise to many that this is not the only biblical statement of the Great Commission. Luke also records Jesus’ final instructions to His followers:
He [Jesus] told them, “This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.” (Luke 24:46-49)
Luke offers some additional details of the Commission: 1) the content of the preaching will be “repentance” and “forgiveness of sins”, 2) it will begin at Jerusalem, 3) the apostles are to wait in Jerusalem until they receive the power to start the mission.
Did the apostles receive the promised power and indeed begin the mission from Jerusalem? Luke continues the narrative in the book of Acts, offering yet a third account of Jesus’s Commission:
In my former book [the gospel of Luke] … I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. [Jesus said to them,] “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:1-2, 8)
The Pentecost Connection
Luke then recounts the events that transpired during the feast of Pentecost in the city of Jerusalem. After recording the baptism of the Holy Spirit (the promised “power” of Luke 24:49 and Acts 1:8) in 2:1-13, he details the results of Peter’s mighty sermon (2:14-36):
When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. (Acts 2:37-38)
Note that the elements of the Great Commission provided by both Matthew and Luke are present. Peter’s appeal to the crowd is based directly on Jesus’s command just a few weeks earlier: baptism (Matthew 28:19) as well as repentance and forgiveness of sins (Luke 24:47) are all present. Note as well that, coordinate with the beginning of the Great Commission, is the beginning of the church:
The principal evidence that the church began on the day of Pentecost concerns the baptizing work of the Holy Spirit. The Lord declared that this particular and distinctive ministry of the Spirit was still future just before His ascension (Acts 1:5). On the day of Pentecost it first occurred (cf. Acts 11:15-16). Now, what is it that Spirit baptism does? The answer to this is found in 1 Corinthians 12:13: it places the believer in the body of Christ. Since this is the only way to enter the body (i.e., by the baptizing work of the Spirit), and since this work of the Spirit first occurred on the day of Pentecost, then the conclusion seems obvious that the church, the body of Christ, began on the day of Pentecost.1
The significance of Acts 2:38 for an understanding of the centrality of the church can hardly be overstated. It provides the bridge from the risen Lord’s mandate to the apostles’ establishment and extension of the church in obedience to His command.
In part two (coming soon) we’ll see that not only did the Church and Great Commission begin at the same time, they also move forward together. Without the Church, there is no mission.
Ken Brown is the pastor of Community Bible Church in Trenton, MI. We republish his article by permission.
Photo by Peter Dlhy on Unsplash
- Charles Ryrie, A Survey of Bible Doctrine (Chicago: Moody Press, 1972), pp. 157-158. [↩]