The Church as a Fellowship of Believers

People were lifting Jesus up. They weren't lifting him up high enough. This was the son of God, one with the father. And Jesus restocked, are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock, I will build my church, my ecclesia, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. [00:39:11] (35 seconds)  #OnThisRock

Jesus is saying he is creating a new people of god, and he is going to be the ruler of this newly constituted assembly. This was a clear claim to be the Messiah, the ruler foretold by the prophets, the anointed one of god, the son of David who would rule on David's throne over god's kingdom has arrived on the scene. he is creating the true assembly of god. The word church in the New Testament is Jesus' assembly. [00:42:44] (45 seconds)  #JesusNewKingdom

And we told them, don't call this place where we worship the sanctuary because in the New Testament, the sanctuary is the people of god. Rather, call it the worship center. The second thing we did was as soon as we moved into our new building for Sunday morning services, we begin to hold Sunday evening services in a local county park because we wanted our people to know the church isn't a building. It's a people. With time, those those services in the park faded away, but the understanding of the church as a people never did. And that more accurate biblical terminology stuck. [00:35:48] (42 seconds)  #ChurchIsPeople

Jesus is saying, we see in existence today the assembly of god's people are called Israel, those who are under the old covenant. But I am making a new covenant. I'm constituting a new people. They'll be drawn from Israel. They'll be Israelites amongst us new people. From all who call upon my name, whether Jew or Greek, my life will be in them, and they will be in me, like members of a human body. [00:48:37] (44 seconds)  #OneBodyInChrist

But the church, the assembly in the New Testament is more than the assembly in the Old Testament could ever be. For we have become part of Christ's body. We've been joined to God in spirit, born of the spirit, children of God, infused with the life of Christ. The church is not a building, it's not an organization, though it helps us if it's organized a little bit. a people who are in Christ. [00:50:03] (41 seconds)  #ChurchAsBody

And, eventually, we did get a building. And when we did, we were concerned as leaders that our people would begin to focus on the church as a building like I had when I was growing up. And so we made two important decisions. First of all, talked to our people very specifically about the terms that they use. We told them that the new church don't call it the church. You're not going to church. It's our ministry center. You're going to the ministry center to be with the church. [00:35:13] (35 seconds)  #MinistryCenterMindset

There has been the assembly of God's people in the past, the whole people of Israel. But I'm establishing a new people of God, and they will be my people, my assembly, my church. was saying, is giving the assembly to me. One with the father. See, this old phrase, my church, I had no idea when I first began this sermon. Like, woah. This this is far more radical than you might think. [00:42:00] (44 seconds)  #MyChurchBelongsToJesus

But as time went on, I began to adjust my thinking, and I I realized that the church wasn't a building. It was a people. In fact, for the first three hundred years of the church's life, they didn't own a building. They worshipped in homes, in public spaces, even underground in catacombs. Oh, this this is a picture of a when Tammy and I launched a a new church in Holland, Michigan, the the fact that the church was a people became so much more real to me, because we didn't have a building. The first decade, we met in three different schools, and, some of them were rather inadequate. [00:33:48] (42 seconds)  #ChurchInHomes