Imagining a Biblical Church
Over the last few years, I’ve encountered many people who long (on some level) to give their lives to Christ and live as He did, do life together, and experience church as Christ intended it… but have a hundred reasons why it’s impossible or unlikely. It could be that the culture would never accept it, or that people would leave the church if it looked like what’s in the Bible, or that they could never do it due to their own failings. In truth, I often think it’s a crazy idea myself.
Yet still I find myself asking… what if?
I am by no means claiming to have all the answers. This is just an idea… a vision, if you prefer more grandiose terms. You will undoubtedly read this and disagree with some of it, or think it impossible or highly unlikely.
Certainly it is, except through profound dependence on Him.
It is also my intent to write more specially on each of these things in the future, but I just wanted to throw a rough “napkin sketch” of the building out there before I start talking about the individual bricks. So bear with me:
What if a small group of people started from scratch? What if we wiped away all our ideas, preconceptions, and traditions regarding church and Christian life, and just started with the Bible? What if we resolved simply and audaciously to live according to what it describes and prescribes? What would our lives and our gatherings look like if our lives were truly wrapped around Him first, with everything else in our lives submitted to and conducted according to that? How often would we gather? What would those gatherings look like?
What if members of that gathering held each other accountable to centering everything on Him, and not just living life with church/Christianity as an add-on? What if the church culture had that expectation, and told people up front: We desperately want you here with us, but know that we are resolved to give Christ everything? Everything is on the altar, because this is the treasure in the field. What if complacency was no longer our expectation?
What if making disciples of all nations became our central activity and mission, even within our own jobs? What if we dedicated ourselves to it the way an olympic athlete does? What if we conducted ministry through that lens? For example: a men’s ministry that helps men learn what their role is in the Great Commission and how they can shepherd their family to value God and His mission above everything?
What if we dedicatedly worked toward sending and supporting those who go to unreached peoples, refusing to accept complacency in regards to the millions of people going to Hell without hearing the name of Jesus? What would our activities and announcements look like then?
What if we committed to being closer than blood relatives to each other? What if we truly took care of each other’s needs, and did life together on a daily (or almost daily) basis? Could we really do that only meeting once a week?
What if we gathered several times a week in order to worship, evangelize, and do ministry together? What if serving God and furthering His Kingdom were the top priorities, and other things like sports, hobbies, relaxation time, TV shows, games, and whatever else fell in the “if we have time” category instead of vice versa?
What if the church was familiar with gangsters, prostitutes, addicts, orphans, widows, the sick, and outcasts? What if we spent a lot of time focusing on the ones that no one wants to focus on, simply because that’s what Jesus did? What if we simply followed His example and apparent heart displayed throughout the Bible regarding the “least of these”?
What if each person was expected to play a part in discipleship of new believers and each other? What if we didn’t need a youth group because the whole church took raising the next generation seriously and personally, even if that meant learning how to speak their language and spending time at their level? What if the generations were expected to respect, love, and work together so that the whole Body of Christ worked and worshipped together instead of just accepting generational divides as “natural” (as if “natural” could be an acceptable thing in a fallen world)?
What if meeting in each other’s houses was natural because of our regular involvement in each other’s lives, and so we never had to worry about buildings or facilities?
What if our worship services were truly centered around God? What if we listened to the Spirit for how long gatherings should last, what we would do during them, and what songs to sing? What if each person came ready to bring a song or word or prophecy or encouragement? What if we were singly focused on what pleases Him the most in our gatherings instead of pursuing our own preferences and comforts?
What if we created an internal culture of vulnerability, mercy, forgiveness, and courage instead of a group of guarded people who all put on a facade in order to look holy?
What if we worshipped like we meant it, prayed like we needed it, and studied the Word as if our lives depended on it?
Wouldn’t you want to be a part of that? Even if your flesh cringes at the idea of such a commitment, doesn’t your soul thirst for such radical dedication? Doesn’t your redeemed spirit desperately crave such single-minded devotion? Is there not incomparable freedom to be found in letting all else go?
Again, I am not naive to how difficult it would be, nor am I ignorant to the seeming impossibility of it. Even if it were attempted, there would be a thousand details yet to be worked out.
Yet in order to decide the best route to get somewhere, we have to know the destination first… and this destination sounds fantastic to me. What about you?
That sounds like sacrifice, pain, even crucifixion. Didn’t Christ do that so I wouldn’t have to? Do I really need to love to that extreme? Do I even want to? I love my feel good times with God, studying his word, evangelizing when convenient, giving when I have enough, walking in the Spirit when it’s not to heavy. Jesus prayed in the garden, “If your willing, let this cup pass from me…” I pray…”Let this cup pass”
I have my own what if questions.
What if the church today, with its long history of man-made theology, is NOTHING like what the Bible teaches? What if the Nikolaitan structure that God hates has morphed so deep into the roots of “Christianity” that He hates what the Christian Church is doing to His people? What if the centuries of theology passed down through the generations of Catholicism and Puritans and Methodists and Lutherans and Calvinists etc, is based on a misunderstanding of Scripture?
What if mankind was not totally depraved because of Adam and Eve’s sin? What if YHVH is talking to all those who listen the way he talked to Cain before he killed Abel? “Why is your face fallen? Is it not if you do good, you are to be accepted?” What if this world is not fallen because sin entered it, what if it were fallen because we humans keeps bringing sin into it by choice? What if Christ is not the center of the Church because he sacrificed himself willingly so that we wouldn’t have to? What if Messiah, who is from the beginning, came to fulfill the sacrificial system so that He could gather His scattered people from the ends of the earth, but has not annulled the Law of Moses? What if YHVH is still calling His people to be set apart as He commanded from the beginning and it isn’t as hard as Christians keep telling us? What if Messiah’s Gospel is an earthly kingdom as taught in Ancient Hebrew teachings and heaven is not a place that people go when they die, but rather a place where the throne of YHVH and that is not meant for human souls to stay?
What if a truly Biblical gathering isn’t such a hard sacrifice after all? Is it a sacrifice to be there for those that you love? Is it a sacrifice to talk to your wives and spend time with them? Why then, is it such a sacrifice to spend time with YHVH and to be there for people you encounter daily? Yeshua, my Messiah, didn’t come sacrificing wealth and comfort for lost people. He came to destroy the works of haSatan and to speak Truth and Clarity where there was confusion concerning His Word, which was from the very beginning. What if He did not mean to teach sacrifice in all things, but to teach obedience to His own commands from the beginning? My Messiah did not come to annul His own Word from the Old Testament with a New Covenant, He came to make it clearer to those who have ears to hear it. Christianity’s Messiah came to set them free from sin, only to focus on their sins so they could “bring them to the altar” and feel bad about themselves and thankful for their Christ. No wonder there is so much complacency and so many people crying “it’s too hard.”