What Is A Church Member? And What Do They Do?

All right, good morning, Good News Church. All right, I want to begin today

by reading you one of my favorite church stories, okay?

I have told it here before, but I think it has been several years, so I'm bringing it back.

It is a classic, but if you know how it ends, don't spoil it for anybody around you, okay?

Squirrels had overrun three churches in town.

After much prayer, the elders of the first church determined that the animals

were predestined to be there.

Who were they to interfere with God's will, they reasoned, and so soon the squirrels multiplied.

The elders of the second church, deciding that they could not harm any of God's

creatures, humanely trapped the squirrels and set them free outside of town.

Three days later, the squirrels were back.

It was only the third church that succeeded in keeping the pests away.

The elders baptized the squirrels and registered as members of the church.

Now they only see them on Christmas and Easter.

Okay, so I love that joke, and I begin with it because I want to address a topic

that that joke brings up, which

is, why does church membership seem so ineffective for so many people?

Like, the reason that joke works is because there's some truth to it, right?

That we would say, yeah, it is weird that sometimes people get baptized and

become a member of a church and then are involved less than before.

Like, why is that? What's going on there?

So that's what I want to talk about today. Today, we are continuing the series

that we began last week, Church Unpacked.

So this is now our second step down the path of trying to understand church life.

Last week, we learned that church is a group of people, not a building. Do you remember that?

Therefore, synonyms for church would not be words like chapel or cathedral or

sanctuary, but it would be more words like congregation or assembly or gathering.

In the case of a Christian church, we are a gathering or a congregation that

is united by faith in Jesus Christ. Like we're not just any old gathering.

It is our faith in Jesus Christ that unites us together as a congregation.

Like the church is the people, like the Christian church is the people who believe

the gospel, the people who Jesus is their Lord and Savior.

So we learned that last week. So today in part two, I want to bring up two more

questions in order to explore the topic a little bit deeper.

So these are our two questions this morning. They're going to come up on the screen.

As a church, What are we supposed to be like? And as a church,

what are we supposed to do?

Okay, those are our two questions. As a church, what are we supposed to be like?

And what are we supposed to do? And so my plan is to spend about half the sermon

on the first question and about half the sermon on the second question.

So let's go ahead and start with the first question. As a church,

what are we supposed to be like?

So to answer that question, I'm going to go ahead and just start by just giving you my answer.

I'll just give it to you right away, and then I'm going to defend it from the

Bible rather than doing it the other way around.

I'm just going to start with it and then show you why I believe it.

So what are we supposed to be like as a church?

I think this is a correct answer. I think as a church, we are supposed to be

more like a partnership than a membership, okay?

I believe the church, according to the Bible, is to be more like a partnership,

more of a partnership than it is a membership.

So for that, let's go ahead and start with Philippians chapter one.

If you have your Bible with you, turn to Philippians chapter one.

I'm going to start reading in verse three.

This is Paul writing to the Philippians and he says, I give thanks to my God

for every remembrance of you. Let me pause here just to remind you.

This is a very personal letter. Paul is writing to the Philippians.

So he's not writing to one individual person. He's writing to a group of people,

but he's writing to a group of people that he personally knows.

These are his friends. Not every letter that Paul wrote did he write to people

he knows, okay? Like Romans was written to a church he hadn't been to yet.

But Philippians, these are people that he has been friends with for a while

and he loves them. And so as he's talking about praying for them,

he's saying like, oh, I love you guys.

I'm thankful for you guys. Whenever I pray about you guys, there is a smile on my face.

Why? Because I actually know and I'm actually really grateful for you.

So he says, I give thanks to my God for every remembrance of you,

always praying with joy for all of you in my every prayer because of your, now what's the word?

Your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.

He says, I really know you. I really care about you.

And I'm so thankful for your partnership in the gospel.

And when he says from the first day until now, he's saying like,

when I first met you, when I first told you about Jesus and you first became

a Christian church, like from that time all the way until now,

we have been partners in the gospel.

So we are on this mission together, holding to the gospel.

Preaching the gospel. You have been with me all along. Paul is now no longer in Philippi.

He has been a missionary. He's

even in prison at the time that he writes this for being a missionary.

And they have been supporting him financially, which is part of what he's referring

to here. I am so thankful for your support. I'm so glad we are partners.

So Paul did not see, when he thought about the Philippians, he knew them personally,

and he did not think of them as members of a club that he was recruiting for.

He thought of them as partners, like in a mission that he was on, right?

He thought of them as partners in the mission of holding on to the gospel and

spreading the gospel. I phrase it that way because I think that's basically

what he says as the letter goes on.

Our goal is to take this good news about Jesus Christ and to believe it,

to stand firm in it, to live as if it's true, and to share it with the rest of the world.

And so our mission is to take the gospel, which is the good news of Jesus Christ,

that Jesus died for our sins, that he rose again.

He is the Lord. He offers us eternal life.

We want to stand in this. We want to live in this, and we want to spread it

to people who do not know it yet.

And he's saying, that's the mission we're on. We're all partners together.

And so I've always thought here at Good News Church, if we were to start something

here like membership, if we were to have something like church membership here.

If we did that, I would call it partnership. Like I think as a church,

we would call it partnership because I think the image that Paul gives of the

church is a group of people that are like striving together toward a goal that

they're all partners in.

And so as I thought about this verse this week, I realized that this passage

is actually about Paul's relationship with this church.

It's not like he's, when he says your partnership in the gospel with the first

day and now, he's saying they are partners with him as a missionary.

And so it dawned on me this particular verse, he is not describing the Philippians

relationship with each other.

He's describing his relationship to them and their relationship to him.

And so then I thought, oh, is partnership the right word for the relationship

the church members are supposed to have like with each other?

Like people that are all part of the same congregation, is partnership the right

word for the relationship we have with each other?

And I think it is. I just think we have to skip ahead to a few verses because

he gets to it later. Like that's not what he's saying in this particular verse.

He's talking about his relationship to them.

But their relationship with each other comes up later on. In fact,

it comes up in the same chapter, Philippians chapter 1. So we just have to go

Philippians 1 · chapter mention

to verse 27, and we're going to see how he describes the way they are to relate

to one another. And I think partnership is the right word for it. So here we go.

Philippians chapter 1. On my Bible, we're at the same page, okay?

Philippians 1 · chapter mention

Just a few bit down. Verse 27.

Paul says, Just one thing.

Which is funny because he goes on for three more chapters in this book.

Just one thing. So there's preachers like that, aren't there?

Let me tell you one more thing. And then they keep going and going and going and going.

Paul says, just one thing. Live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.

Then whether I come and see you or am absent, I will hear about you that you

are standing firm. Now, this is interesting. What's the relationship they're

supposed to have with one another?

He says, I hope you're standing firm in one spirit, with one mind,

right? All that you're all of

one mind, working side by side for the faith that comes from the gospel.

So as he's describing this, he's saying, okay, here's how you are to live your life.

In a manner worthy of the gospel, your life is to revolve around Jesus and his

good news and what we all know and what we're all together on this.

And so what I'm hoping is if I ever get to see you, if I ever visit you,

this is what I want to see, and if I don't get to visit you,

this is what I hope I hear, like through the grapevine, that you guys are all

together on this, in one spirit,

with one mind, and then this I thought was so interesting, this phrase,

working side by side for the faith that comes from the gospel.

Working side by side sounds to me a lot like partnership, doesn't it?

And this is a description of how the Christians in Philippi are supposed to

relate to each other right this is how the church is to relate to one another,

we are co-workers on the same mission.

Okay, well, Mario, you said church is to be more of a partnership than a membership.

How is that different than membership?

And so I would say, well, maybe not at all, depending on how you define membership.

I mean, I suppose if you choose to define the word membership that way,

then there's not a difference.

But I would say many times in our lives and in our culture, we do not define

the word membership that way.

In our world, membership does not always mean co-workers united together toward a goal, right?

I mean, think about the places where we use the phrase membership or the term membership.

What are the ways we use membership? Let me, here's one. The country club.

I've heard a lot of people say things like, you know, I'm a member of the country

club or I wish I was a member of the country club or I used to be a member of the country club.

What does that mean, to be a member of the country club? It seems to me that

it is an exchange of money for goods and services, right?

Like there's a money, I think you pay monthly. I don't know,

I've never been in a country club. But I think you pay monthly in exchange for

access to the clubhouse, access to the meeting rooms, the restaurant,

the golf course, the tennis courts.

I've never been a member of a country club, but it doesn't seem to me,

correct me if I'm wrong afterwards, country club members, But it doesn't seem

to me it's a group of people united in spirit of one mind working side by side toward a goal.

That's not what member means there.

Okay, here's another one that I'm more familiar with. Okay, gym membership.

Okay, anybody here a member of a gym?

All right, yeah. I just recently became a member of Planet Fitness.

Okay, I think it was four or five weeks ago. Don't ask me how it's going. It's fine, it's fine.

Okay, so this is my understanding so far. I'm about a month in,

and this is how I understand it to work.

I pay a monthly fee to be a member, and I pay that monthly fee in exchange to

be able to use their equipment, okay?

I go there multiple times a week, and I don't know any of the other people there,

okay? They're all members too, and I don't know any of them.

When I walk in, like no, there's people there before me always.

And when I walk in, nobody like jumps off the treadmill and goes,

Mario, welcome teammate. Okay.

They just keep on walking. Okay. They ignore, they act like I didn't even walk in.

Okay. They just ignore me, which is fine. Okay. I ignore them too.

Okay. I don't talk to them. They don't talk to me. We all do our thing.

And we're not all working on a goal together. I don't think we're all even working

on the same goal at all. Some of the people that are there are there for weight

loss. Some of the people that are there are there for bodybuilding.

Some of the people that are there are there for endurance training.

We're all members, but we have nothing to do with each other.

And I think that could be part of the problem with Christians thinking that

their relationship to their church is a membership.

Because I have seen this happen a lot. People show up to a church and an offering

plate is passed, okay? And people are supposed to put money in it.

I know we don't do that here, but like that is a thing that is very common in

churches. If you've never been to another one, just let us know, that happens a lot.

And it's really funny. My daughter, this is not part, I probably shouldn't go

off script, but I just had a thought and it's really funny.

My kids have only really know this church. This is the only church they've grown

up in. And so they didn't know what other churches do. So one time we were on

vacation and we were at this church and we're sitting there and this person

comes up to my daughter when she's sitting in the pew and gives her a mint.

And she's like, oh, this is wonderful. This is for me. Yes. And she eats the mint.

And then a little bit later in the service This person walks up to her and gives

her a coloring page or something like that. And she's like, oh,

this is for me? That's great.

And then like 10 minutes later, someone walks up and hands her a plate full of cash and.

And she'd never been to any other church other than this one,

you know? And she was like, this is for me.

And her older brothers were like, no, no, pass it along. That's not for you.

Okay, that has nothing to do with the sermon. It just popped into my head.

All right, so this is something I've seen that has happened in churches. You're there at church.

The plate is passed. You put your tithe money into the plate.

And now there are expectations that goods and services should be brought to me in exchange.

I have paid my dues and now religious goods and services are to come my way.

I put my tithe in, the sermon better be good.

And the music better be the kind of music I like.

And if my wife's in the hospital, it better not be a deacon that goes and visits her.

It better be an ordained minister because I don't tithe for nothing,

okay? and that sort of thing happens. Have you seen this happen in church culture?

And we have set up this sort of consumeristic customer service relationship

to the church that is foreign to the New Testament.

Like if all you had was a New Testament and you read it, you would never come up with that.

It is not at all what God revealed to us.

Now, there is one sense in which I think you could think of church as membership.

And so I will show you that. It's in 1 Corinthians.

One sense in which we could say we're members of a church if you have your Bible

go to 1 Corinthians chapter 12.

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

Paul's talking to the Corinthians, a different church in this case.

And he says, this is chapter 12, verse 12.

For as the body is one and has many parts, and all the parts of that body,

though many, are one body, so also is Christ.

For we were all baptized by one spirit into one body, whether Jews or Greeks,

whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one spirit.

So the body is not one part, but many. So this is important.

So he's saying just like a physical body is made up of multiple parts and together

all those parts just make up one body.

He says, that's the way it is with Christ. And you could tell he's not just

referring to Christ's physical body here. He's saying us, the body of Christ,

like Jews and Greeks, slaves and free, all together different parts of one body.

So the body is not one part, but many. If the foot should say,

because I am not a hand, I don't belong to the body.

In spite of this, it still belongs to the body. And if the ear should say,

because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body.

In spite of this, it belongs to the body. If the whole body were an eye,

where would the hearing be?

If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be?

But now God has placed each one of the parts in one body just as he wanted,

saying like there's each person in the church with different abilities that

they have all together for a reason. They're not all supposed to do the same

things because they're all different parts of the same body.

So now God has placed each one of the parts in one body just as he wanted.

And if they were all the same part, where would the body be?

Now there are many parts, yet one body. Now let me go ahead and skip to verse 27 and make my point.

Later on, he says this. He says, now you, he's talking to the church here.

He says, now you are the body of Christ and individual, what's the word?

Members of it. So we go, wait, so we are members, right? Yep,

it says it right there. We are members. Now, this is important,

though, because that's our word.

But the word member here is not being used like I am a member of Planet Fitness.

The word member here is being used with the old definition of the word member, okay?

What the word member meant like 100 years ago or more. People use the word member to mean body part.

And that's the way it's being used. You are the body of Christ and individual

members of it. We do not often use the word member that way anymore.

One of the few places that we use the word member that way, and this was pointed out to me,

is if you're watching like Law & Order SVU and they're pulling out like these

dead bodies out of the harbor and you see the police officer get on the walkie-talkie

and they go on and they go, hey, we found some bodies in the harbor and they

were dismembered, okay?

And you're like, ooh, I hope they don't show that scene. Like I can imagine

it. I don't need to see that.

Okay, when they say the bodies were dismembered, you realize like,

oh, that means like their arms and legs and stuff were cut off.

That's the word dismembered, body parts removed. That's one of the few places

in our culture where we still use the word member to mean body part,

okay? But most of the time we don't.

And so what I'm trying to say is Christians are not members of the Christian

church like I am a member at Planet Fitness.

Christians are members like the relationship that a hand has to a foot.

And the relationship that a hand has to a foot is like partnership, right?

They both work together to get the body to do what it's supposed to do.

So that's point number one, okay? The first question was, what are we supposed to be like, okay?

Church is to be more of a partnership than a membership.

All right, next question, what are we supposed to do?

This question is so huge that I can honestly say we will be answering it for the rest of this series.

There's so much that we are to do that we are gonna be getting to this for the

rest of the Church Unpacked series.

The topics that we are hoping to cover over these next several weeks are things

like worship and evangelism and teaching and learning and giving and serving.

And so we will really be answering this for the rest of the series and in some

ways really for the rest of our lives.

But I just think I could still give you at least a partial answer today.

Like we got a little time left in the sermon. So even though that will give

you a bigger answer as time goes on, I think I can still answer what are we

supposed to do, at least in some general ways. Okay. This is what I'm about

to say. We'll not cover everything, but I think it will cover quite a bit of

how we are to relate to each other. So this is what I wrote down.

The church of Jesus Christ is to be united, right? One spirit, one mind.

The church of Jesus Christ is

to be united, helping to meet each other's spiritual and material needs.

So these are kind of two general answers to what are we supposed to do?

We are to meet each other's spiritual needs and we are to meet each other's material needs.

So let me go ahead and give you one passage for of these we'll cover two passages

the first passage I want to cover is the one about meeting each other's spiritual

needs so this is Hebrews chapter 3.

Hebrews 3 · chapter mention

If you go to Hebrews chapter three, I'm gonna read to you verses 12 through

13. It's one of my favorite verses.

It says, watch out brothers, so that there won't be in any of you an evil unbelieving

heart that departs from the living God, but encourage each other daily while

it is still called today so that none of you is hardened by sin's deception.

What a great verse, so practical, so great. There are, in this passage to me,

I think there is something that is unsurprising about this passage,

and then there's something that's kind of surprising about this passage.

The unsurprising part is the author here says that we are not supposed to have

evil, unbelieving hearts, okay?

We do not want to be hardened by sin's deception.

You would expect the Bible to say that. The surprising part is whose job is

it to make sure you don't do that? Whose job is it to look out for that according

to the verse? Let's look.

He says, watch out, brothers. That's interesting, plural. He's talking to a group of people.

So that there won't be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart that departs

from the living God. I guess there's two ways to interpret that at this point

before we get to the second half.

He could be saying, brothers, as a group, you need to be making sure that none

of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that departs from the living God.

Or I suppose he could be saying, I'm talking to you as a group.

Each one of you as an individual, make sure that you as an individual do not

have a heart that departs from the living God.

But then you get to the second part and you realize, oh, it can't be everybody

as an individual because of what he says next.

He says, make sure you don't have an evil, unbelieving heart that departs from

the living God. And he says, but encourage each other. And that seems to be

saying like, instead of having an unbelieving heart.

That departs from the living God, instead, encourage, what's the next two words?

Each other. Oh, well, wait a minute.

You cannot encourage each other as an individual, right? Like,

nobody can each other alone.

Did you know this? Nobody can each other alone. So he's saying,

watch out, but then he's saying to the plural brothers, you need to together encourage each other.

Why? What are we encouraging each other? To make sure what doesn't happen?

So that none of you is hardened by sin's deception.

The job of guarding against sin's deception was given to the church,

get this, as a group project.

Who knew?

We are called out as a gathering, as a congregation to encourage and admonish

and disciple and teach and exhort each other,

so that we keep each other on track spiritually.

It's not a bunch of individual people all in their relationship with God.

It's a bunch of people in their relationship with God as a group keeping each

other on track. That's what I mean by meeting spiritual needs.

That I'm doing things in your life and you're doing things in my life and she's

doing things in her life so that we do not have an unbelieving heart that departs from the living God.

Okay, now earlier I said the church of Jesus Christ is to be united,

helping to meet each other's spiritual and material needs.

So we just covered spiritual, but why did I say material?

I said that because we are both material and spiritual beings.

Did you know this? Like we are spirits, we are bodies.

Like you're a spirit and you're a body and so am I. We are spirits and we are

bodies. If you didn't know that, now you know, okay?

And if you only acknowledge one of those two things, it seems to me you're going

to be ignoring like half of life, okay?

If you think that you are just a body, okay?

There is no spiritual anything, like I'm just a body. In fact,

I'm a body, a physical, material body in this physical, material world,

and that's all there is. What you can see, hear, taste, feel, smell, that's it.

Like I'm just a body in a physical world because that's all there is.

I think you're gonna be missing out on a lot because you know that there are

things that are immaterial and yet real. You know this.

I mean, love is real. I don't think I've ever met a person that denies that,

that says there's no such thing.

Love is real, and yet it is immaterial, right?

You can't touch it, feel it, taste it, smell it. Fear, fear is real.

Like we all know, in fact, it's real, and it has the ability to change a whole

vibe of a family or a culture.

The wrong kind of fear could destroy a culture. The right kind of fear could

actually be good for some people.

But fear is definitely immaterial. You can't go get a gallon of it or pour out a gallon of it.

So if you think you're just a body, you're missing out on the immaterial that

is certainly real. But also, if you over-spiritualize and go,

well, no, I'm just like a spirit, you will not be interpreting the world correctly

because we are an embodied people that live in a physical world.

And so let me show you an example of the church meeting not only spiritual needs, but material needs.

For this, we're gonna go to Acts chapter two. This will be the last passage we look at this morning.

Acts chapter two, I'm going to start reading in verse 41. Acts 2,

41 says, so those who accepted his message were baptized. Let me pause there real quick.

So the his here is Peter, like famous Peter, like when people tell jokes,

like you go to the pearly gates and there's Peter. Okay. This is prior to him dying though.

Peter is there in the Roman empire in the first century in Jerusalem,

and he is preaching to a large group of people about Jesus. He is sharing the

gospel with people who did not know it, had never heard it before.

So those who accepted his message, meaning Peter's message about Jesus Christ,

they were baptized, right? That's what you do with someone who believes in the

message of Jesus Christ.

They were baptized, and that day about 3,000 people were added to them.

3,000 people became Christians, right? 3,000 people became followers of Jesus

because of Peter's message about him.

And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, to the fellowship,

to the breaking of bread, and to the prayers.

Then fear came over everyone, and many wonders and signs were being performed through the apostles.

Now all the believers were together and held all things in common. Next slide.

They sold their possessions and property and distributed the proceeds to all as anyone had a what?

A need. It's referring to a material need. If you can sell property to fix it, it's a material need.

Has anyone had a need? "'Every day they devoted themselves "'to meeting together

in the temple complex, "'and they broke bread from house to house.

"'They ate their food with a joyful and humble attitude, "'praising God and

having favor with all the people.

"'And every day the Lord added to them "'those who were being saved.'" More

and more people were becoming followers of Jesus.

So let's go ahead and go back. I just want to zero in on a couple of verses. Look at verse 42.

It says, and they, now remember the verse before this was, 3,000 people heard

his message and they were baptized and they joined the church.

So they would be, they've been Christians for like five minutes.

That's them, okay? Of 3,000 people, they've been Christians for five minutes.

They devoted themselves, now this is interesting, to the apostles' teaching.

That's really important.

The message that Peter and the other apostles were teaching,

that's the thing that unites them. Like the way that they became the church,

was by accepting Peter's message, right?

So the thing that unites us together is the truth of Jesus Christ.

So they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. That's the thing.

We are devoted to this message of Jesus.

They also devoted themselves to the fellowship, okay?

What does the word fellowship mean here? I think it's referring to the partnership

that Christians are supposed to have with one another.

In fact, if you go back and look it up in the Greek, and I did,

the word that's translated fellowship here, koinonia, is the same word that

was translated partnership back in Philippians when he said,

I'm so thankful I have this partnership with you.

These people were devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to this

sharing partnership that they have with one another.

They also devoted themselves to the breaking of bread and to the prayers,

which I just thought was interesting as I read it this week because I was thinking

about how we are like bodies and spirits, right? that we are material and spiritual

beings. And I just, as I read it, I thought like, oh, that's interesting.

If you were only a spirit, you would not need bread.

And if you were only a body, you would not need prayers, right?

Like if we are just a spiritual being and all this spiritual stuff only matters,

then why would they have been eating together? There's no reason for that.

There is reason for that.

We are embodied spirits. But then if all we are is bodies, well,

what would we need to pray for? If all the world is is just that which is physical

can be seen, there's no reason to shoot up prayers to nowhere.

But we are people and bodies who are spirits. And these people said,

we are united by this message. We are in partnership with one another.

We're eating this physical bread together.

And we are praying for one another because there is something out there that we cannot see.

Okay, verse 45. So it says that believers were together. They held everything

in common. And then it says, they sold their possessions and property and distributed

the proceeds to all as anyone had a need.

So we see that there were miraculous things that were happening at this time among the apostles.

They're sharing all their stuff. And then we see people starting to like have

sales and transfer things into cash in order to help people that had material needs.

What we see here is the early church, kind of the earliest church,

and they were valuing people over things.

That was the right call. They were valuing people over things.

Now, I don't believe that this story in Acts is some kind of mandate for communism.

Some people do that some people read that and go oh we're all supposed to share

everything and so what it means is because of the way that this happens in this

story it means that everybody everywhere is all supposed to like not have any

private property everybody just shares everything

um i do not think that this story means that christians can't have like private

property um actually i think that commands throughout the bible commands like thou shalt not steal,

actually assume private property have you ever thought about that before like

you actually couldn't steal something if everything belonged to everybody.

And yet the Bible says, no, there's some stuff that's not yours.

You're not allowed to take that.

Okay. So I don't see that this is some mandate for communism,

but then what is it? I'll tell you what I think I see here is this is,

this is radical generosity by

people who valued their brothers and their sisters more than their stuff.

And we should imitate them in that regard.

And I think part of the reason that they did it is because they understood they

are not just spiritual beings, that they are material beings,

and there were material needs among them.

In fact, I came across this quote this week. I think I'd heard it before,

and then I looked it up, and I just thought this was fascinating,

so I'm going to share this with you.

This is, I don't do a lot of church history around here. I'm not a church historian.

I don't even know a lot about it.

So I just usually teach you the time period of the Bible, and I don't talk about

the centuries that came afterwards. However, I did find this.

It's from the year 362, I think it is. Well, you don't put it up yet. I'll read it.

I think this is from the year 362. Yes, it is. Emperor Julian was the emperor

of the Roman Empire at this point, and he wrote a letter to someone,

and we have an excerpt of the letter.

We have the manuscript of the letter, and I just wanted to read to you this

section of it. So, okay, if you put it up there.

Emperor Julian of the Roman Empire in the fourth century said,

For it is disgraceful that when no Jew ever has to beg, and the impious Galileans

support not only their own poor, but ours as well, all men see our people lack aid from us.

Okay. So the emperor has a political problem and he's complaining about it in a letter.

Okay. In the fourth century, what is it he's complaining about?

He says, no Jew ever has to beg. I think that that's him saying like the Jewish

people were taking care of one another.

And then he says, and the impious Galileans. Okay.

And this I believe is his code word for Christians. Okay. In fact,

you can look this up. I think scholars all probably agree on this.

He says Galileans here. That's his word for Christians. Maybe he didn't want

to say Christ or Christ's name.

So he just kind of makes that, oh, this thing that came from Galilee.

Okay, but there are these people back then called the Galileans.

And I think he's referring to Christians and impious is his way of saying,

I don't like that they don't worship the pantheon of Roman gods.

The impious Galilee, these Christians, they support not only their own poor, but ours as well.

They look out for each other's material needs. And then there was an extra and

they started looking out for people that aren't even Christians and helping them.

And it makes us look bad.

Isn't that crazy? That Christians were doing that in the fourth century?

We need to keep that up.

Okay, so to sum it all up, this is what I'm trying to tell you today.

The Christian church is a gathering or a congregation united by Jesus Christ,

into a partnership, not a customer business relationship, okay?

A partnership with one another where we meet the spiritual and material needs.

And when I say we, I mean all of the Christians, not just the professionals.

So we're united by Jesus Christ into a partnership where we meet spiritual and

material needs on behalf of Christ, the head of the body.

That's Church Unpacked. Now, let me go ahead and end with this illustration.

One time I saw this video on YouTube of this herd of buffalo that were going

across this African savanna.

And one of the buffalo was smaller and slower than the rest of the pack and

sort of got left behind a little bit as the buffalo were going along.

You may have seen this video as well. It's very, like it went viral.

Millions of people saw this video.

So the buffalo pack is walking off the frame and then there's this little buffalo

that's there and then four or five

lions attack the little buffalo that is isolated from the rest of the pack.

And the guy who's filming this like on his camera um he's like making comments

you know you can tell they're like oh no that buffalo is not going to make it

you know because just all these lions are mauling this buffalo um,

and so he's like oh he's not going to make it and then if you've ever seen the

video you probably know what happens next so the buffalo that had walked off

like they turn around and they go back and they rescue the little buffalo from the lions.

The herd of buffalo turn back around, go back to where the little one was,

and they attack the lions.

And it is incredible. Okay, this video, really, it's eight minutes long.

You do not need to see all eight minutes. There's just like five seconds in

the middle that you really need to see.

One of the buffalo goes up to one of the lions, and they have these huge horns,

and he just goes like this, and you see the body of the lion just go flying

through the air. He just launches the lion, like, off camera, just.

And then the other buffalo come and they all chase the lions away and the little

buffalo gets back into the herd.

Now I tell you that because I think it's like, I guess there's some things you can learn from that.

A single little buffalo does not stand a chance against four or five lions.

But four or five lions do not stand a chance against a hundred buffalo.

Like they just, I mean, if those hundred buffalo would have all like just said,

let's all stampede right now, they could have just squished all those lines

into the dirt. That would have made the video better.

But they didn't. They just chased the lions off. The lions went on to abuse, I'm sure.

But they could have. Like, a hundred buffalo could have just destroyed those

lions. But being separated from the pack made that little buffalo very vulnerable.

So I say that because there was this meme that I've seen online that I think is great.

And people, it's been, someone texted it to me and I just thought,

oh, this is wonderful. So I'm going to just put it in my own words.

But it goes something like this. Maybe you've seen it.

It's a question and an answer. And the question is, can you be a Christian and not go to church?

And the answer is yes, just like a buffalo isolated from the herd being mauled

by lions is still a buffalo.

And the reason I like that meme is because the author is communicating several

things all at once by way of metaphor.

First of all, he's communicating you don't become a Christian like by church

attendance, right? Which is good. That's true.

But he also is communicating just because you do not become a Christian by church

attendance doesn't, like, that being true, why, even that being true,

why would you want to isolate yourself from the rest of the herd?

It's dangerous. It's not the way God designed things to be.

All right, Lord willing, we'll get to more next week. Let's pray.

Lord, I thank you for this series. I thank you for your words and scripture about church.

I pray that you would make us into a partnership.

Pray that we would be on your mission to hold to the gospel and to spread the gospel.

That we would meet spiritual and material needs. Just pray that you would shape

us in the church you want us to be.

Pray you'd help us to do our part. Jesus, thank you for saving us.

Thank you for loving us. Thank you for calling us out of like the darkness we

were in and into your family.

We love you and we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Let me end with these good words from God's Word.

This is from 1 Corinthians. But now God has placed each one of the parts in

one body just as he wanted. That is good news.