|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
Location:
6425 Jefferson Rd. For
directions, click here.
Joseph
Slife, Lay Leader December
2, 2001 Let's
read together, Ephesians
5:25-30: In
this same way, husbands ought
to love their wives as their
own bodies. He who loves his
wife loves himself. After all,
no one ever hated his own
body, but he feeds and cares
for it, just as Christ does
the church -- for we are
members of his
body. This
passage in Ephesians 5 -- and on
into Ephesians 6 -- is
foundational to our understanding
of God's purposes and designs in
marriage and family life. And I
think every sermon I've ever
heard on this text goes in that
direction. But
these verses we read together
also teach us something else --
something that informs our
understanding of the church.
Specifically it tells us about
the disposition of Jesus Himself
toward the church. He loves the
church. The
name of this sermon is in the
form of a question: "Who loves
the church?" Well, I just told
you. Jesus loves the church.
Question -- Answer -- end of
sermon. Amen.
(laughter) Just
kidding. Because the answer
"Jesus loves the church" leads to
another question: How? How did,
or how does, Jesus love the
church? Love
is an interesting word. It can be
a noun --- but it also can be a
verb. Here's
one definition of the noun form:
"A strong, complex emotion or
feeling causing one to appreciate
[and] delight in...
another, and to... promote the
welfare of the other." Now
the verb form obviously is
related. We usually don't say, "I
have love toward you" (the noun
form) -- we say "I love you" (the
verb form). Love,
the verb, relates to the
implementation of what love, the
noun, is. Love, the verb, is when
love, the feeling or emotion, the
disposition, issues forth in
action. It is when the person who
has love expresses love, when he
or she isn't simply disposed to
promote the welfare of another,
but when he or she actually
follows through on that
disposition. Back
to the text, picking up a few
words into it: "Christ loved the
church and he gave himself up for
her." He acted. He gave. He
sacrificed. He laid down his
life. He love wasn't just in his
head or in his heart, but in his
hands. It was in how lived and
how he died. Sitting
in the chapel at Grace Episcopal
Church in Gainesville a few days
ago, I was thinking about this --
and I asked the Lord to show me
specific ways that Christ loved
the church. What were specific
things that He did that showed
love in action? And
within a minute or two I had
written down six ways that Jesus
put his love for the church into
action. This is not meant to be
an exhaustive list -- but it is
an instructive one. The
first thing we tend to think of,
obviously, is Jesus' death on the
cross. And I want to talk about
that in moment, but let me go
through the other five
first. "O
Come, O Come Emmanuel and ransom
captive Israel that mourns in
lonely exile here.... "O
Come, thou Dayspring, come and
cheer our spirits by thine advent
here. Disperse the gloomy clouds
of night, and death dark shadows,
put to flight." And
the chorus of response, despite
the loneliness, despite the
captivity, despite the gloom and
the darkness, "Rejoice, Rejoice.
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O
Israel." Jesus,
the long-expected Jesus, the
Messiah, the Christ, came.
Setting aside His divine
privileges as part of the
Godhead, not considering equality
with God something to be grasped
and held, but emptying Himself,
He came. He
came at great personal cost. He
came at great personal
inconvenience. He came -- because
we needed Him to come. He
put love into action. He
came. But
when He came to earth, He came as
a helpless child. He subjected
himself to His own creation and
was raised as all good Jewish
boys were raised -- studying the
Scriptures, learning the rituals,
memorizing the
prayers. Jesus,
the human being, learned. His
love of learning was apparent in
the brief account in Luke 2 of
His trip to Jerusalem at age 12.
When His mom and dad couldn't
find him, where was He? In the
temple courts, "sitting among the
teachers, listening to them and
asking them
questions." Jesus
loved by being at the House of
God. He He was dedicated to
learning about the things of God
and spending time with the people
of God. He
showed His love by
learning. And
He is still praying for the
church. Hebrews 7:25 says "He
is... able to save to the
uttermost those who come to God
through Him, since He always
lives to make intercession for
them." Jesus
put his love into action by
praying. He
discipled many people, of course,
through His mass teaching. Think
of the the time He feed the 5,000
and the 4,000. Think of the
Sermon on the Mount. But
His closest circle of disciples
was made up of 12 men. And of
those 12, he invested his life
most fully in 3 -- Peter, James,
and John. He
loved by discipling -- teaching
the things of God to a close
circle of learners, who would
then go on to teach and lead
others. Why
do we call Jesus the "man of
sorrows" -- not because he walked
around in the dumps, but because
He took our sorrows upon him.
"Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows," says
the prophecy of Isaiah
53. That's
why we can trade our sorrows for
the joy of the Lord. He
loved by bearing our
burdens. Jesus
not only paid it all, He gave it
all -- to use Abraham Lincoln's
words offered in another context,
Jesus gave the "last full measure
of devotion." How
devoted was He to promoting our
welfare, seeking our benefit? How
much did He love? We can measure
His devotion by the spikes in His
hands and feet and the crown of
thorns on His head. He
loved by giving His
life. Well,
that's a nice little devotional
message. Who loves the church?
Jesus does. How did He show it?
He came, He learned, He prayed,
He discipled, He bore other
people's burdens, He gave his
life. Now,
we could all leave here with love
in our hearts for Jesus over what
He's done for us in demonstrating
His love -- and we should. But I
think God would have us do
more. To
get at this, let me give you a
multiple choice test. God
wants us all to: I
know that this is tough to figure
out, but the correct answer -- at
least the only one we can be sure
about from the Bible -- is c:
"God wants us all to be
Christlike." How
do we know that? Well, Jesus
Himself offered a truism in Luke
6 that has bearing on this. He
said, "Everyone, after he has
been fully trained, will be like
his teacher." We
are what? We are disciples,
learners -- learning from Christ.
Our goal is to become more and
more like him. Peter says God's
purpose and provision for us is
"to participate in the divine
nature" -- that is to have the
very nature of Holy One become
part of our nature. In
the current issue of
Gateway
Today,
our own Jeff West has written
about this -- about how the same
God who formed Jesus physically
in the womb of the Virgin Mary
forms Jesus in us
spiritually. The
Apostle John wrote this in 1st
John 2:6: "Whoever claims to live
in him must walk as Jesus
did." God
wants us to become increasingly
Christlike. Well,
how do we do that? The answer to
that question is worthy of a
whole series of sermons and maybe
pastor Jerry will preach them --
but let me give you the short
answer: four letters that point
us in right direction. Not WWJD
but DWJD -- do what Jesus
did. We
move toward Christlikeness by
following His example. We can
follow His example in many areas,
but for right now, let's focus on
the example He set before us in
what I've been talking about
today -- Christ loved the
church. He
loved her -- and He turned His
love from a noun into a verb by
coming. We
can do what Jesus did -- by
coming, by showing
up.
The song we sing to Jesus at this
time of year is "O Come, O Come
Emmanuel" -- but the song we sing
to one another is "O Come All Ye
Faithful." The
church needs people who will love
her -- verb -- who will love her
by coming, by participating in
her work, her meetings, her
ministries, her life. And I use
the word her because the church
is the bride of
Christ. One
of the greatest ministries you
can have to the Body is the
ministry of coming. Whether it's
to a worship service or a small
group gathering, a women's
retreat or work day to rake
leaves, you bless the body, you
love the church by
coming. Because
in learning, not -- as
Henry
Blackaby
says -- not just for the purpose
of information but for the
purpose of transformation, we
become mature, solid, steady
believers, people who rightly
divide the word of truth, who are
not blown about by every wind of
doctrine, but who are rooted and
grounded in a biblically informed
view of the world and of life and
of human nature -- and of
God. We
love the church by applying
ourselves unto learning -- by
reading good Christian books, by
attending discipleship class, by
paying careful head to the
preached word. We
can love the church by
learning. We
love the church by praying for
her -- yes, praying for the
church at large, but most
specifically by praying for the
body where you are. We
have people who do that here. Men
who come here just after 6 in the
morning on Thursday to pray for
Gateway, folks who come on
Wednesday evening to pray for
their brothers and sisters, folks
who in their own closets of
prayer day after day cry out to
God for this church and for its
people and for its ministries and
for its future. We
can do what Jesus did. He loved
the church -- verb -- He loved
the church by praying. Who
are you discipling? Do you have
someone or several someones in
whom you're investing your
spiritual life -- teaching them
about Christ, helping them reach
spiritual maturity? Alton
Thornton is a great asset to this
church. Every week he diligently
teaches young boys and girls the
things of God in Sunday School.
He's investing what God has given
him in boys who will grow to be
men and girls who will grow up to
be women who will carry Alton's
influence with them all their
lives. All
who teach in the church are
taking this ministry of
discipling very seriously. But
you don't have to be a teacher in
the church to be a discipler. I
taught adult Sunday School here
for five or six years, and now
I'm teaching the Jr. High class
-- but my primary field of
discipling is among three boys
whom God has graciously given
into my care. Someday,
they'll be grown and gone and God
may have other things for me, but
right now, they are my primary
focus in the area of
discipleship. And
if you're a father or mother of
young children, I would suggest
to you that God has given you a
discipleship ministry right under
your own roof. But
whether its in your family or in
your church or by mentoring a
student or having a Bible study
with some coworkers, do what
Jesus did: be a discipler. By
doing so, you love -- verb -- you
love the church, by raising up
mature Christians and future
leaders. But
we can weep with those who weep.
We can, as I mentioned, hold
people up in prayer. We can get
beside our pastor and be like
Aaron and Hur and keep his arms
lifted before the
Lord. The
point of this is that no one in
the church should have to bear
something alone, because the
church is to be a loving
supportive community in which we
help each other -- as Kathy
Tasker writes about in her
current article in
Gateway
Today.
And
we can help each other in so many
ways -- with something as simple
as a word of encouragement, or a
heartfelt prayer. We can help
someone financially, or with
child care, or by offering a
listening ear. We can give a ride
to someone who's car is in the
shop, or provide meals to someone
who is sick. We
can love the church by bearing
one another's burdens. Jesus,
of course, gave his literal life
in a unique, substitutionary way
for us -- but He also gave His
life in a way that we can
emulate: He gave His life for the
church in the sense that the
church was his priority.
Singular. Priority. Everything He
did was somehow related to
ensuring the life and health of
the church. Where
does the church fall on our list
of priorities? Plural. We
have lots of things that compete
for our focus and attention --
and probably many of them are
good things. And we say they're
all priorities. But where on that
list is the church? Third?
Fourth? Ninth? Tenth? Is it on
your list? Does
the life and health of the church
ever cross our minds as something
that ought to be central to how
we spend our time and our money,
of what we're doing with our
lives? Have
you ever just sort of assumed
something was true, only to find
out one day that it isn't true at
all and you have adjust your
thinking? That
happened to me recently. I was
searching for something on the
Internet and happened across a
church Web site somewhere -- and
I started reading a column by the
pastor. And he said this: "The
church is not a volunteer
organization." The
church is NOT a volunteer
organization. We
often act like it is. We often
run things as though we were the
Elks Club or the Garden Society.
"We need a volunteer to head up
this or that." But
I decided that this particular
pastor is absolutely right. We're
not volunteers. We're not
volunteers at all. The reality is
we've been drafted by God and
deployed on the field. I
didn't get saved because I
volunteered. I didn't receive
spiritual gifts because I
volunteered. God said, "You.
Come. Gotta job for you. Now,
go." I
never chose to be a part of this
church. I didn't. God sent me
here. I am as sure of that as
anything. I'm not a
volunteer. And
if God has sent you here, you're
not a volunteer either. You're
here to do a job. And in doing
that job, you love -- verb -- you
love the church. You act to
promote its welfare. Now,
finding what that job is is
difficult for some of us. We're
reluctant, we're uncertain, we're
scared, or maybe we're just
tired. But
God of the universe, the one who
created us and redeemed us and
called us has sent us on a
mission -- you, me, all of us,
and we're not
volunteers. Now,
part of the role of church
leaders is prayerfully identify
and train those whom God has
called to certain tasks in the
church -- and to put 'em to work
and to oversee that
work. I
have a confession to make. As
your lay leader, nominated and
approved to that position by this
body, not as a volunteer but as
one commission to the task, I
have not done a very good job of
identifying and
training. I
have failed you in that. But, as
our brother Al Clements said from
this pulpit last week, when you
fail in the Kingdom, you don't
stop. You get up and keep going
toward what God
intends. And
in 2002, God being my helper, and
with cooperation from the rest of
you non-volunteers (laughter), I
want to do a better job of
helping you love the church
through effective service in and
to the Body. We
need four people for our new lay
leadership team on small-group
ministry. We need four people for
our lay leadership team on
evangelism. We need four people
for our lay leadership team on
visitor follow-up. And there's
more, but that's enough for
now. I'm
not asking for volunteers. I am
seeking those whom God has called
and gifted, so that you can love
this church in the way God
intends for you to love her,
through your actions that promote
her welfare. But
whether you end up on a lay
leadership team or not, you can
love the church by coming -- even
at personal inconvenience, by
learning, by praying, by
discipling, by bearing one
another's burdens, by giving your
life into making this church
everything God has intended it to
be. Who
loves the Church? Jesus loves the
church. As Ephesians 5 says, He
feeds her and cares for her --
and gave Himself up for
her. Let's
DWJD. An
audio tape of this sermon is
available
Gateway
Church gathers
for worship
Sundays
at 10:30 a.m.
(Hwy. 129) in Athens,
Georgia.
Ministry
of the
Word:
Recent
sermons
Our quarterly e-magazine
Gateway
Today
For the Gateway family
Pastor
Jerry's Weekly
E-Mail
A
GATEWAY SERMON
Who
loves the church?
Gateway
Church,
Athens GA
Husbands,
love your wives, just as
Christ loved the church and
gave himself up for her to
make her holy, cleansing her
by the washing with water
through the word, and to
present her to himself as a
radiant church, without stain
or wrinkle or any other
blemish, but holy and
blameless.
Jesus
'loved' by taking
action
Number one,
Christ
demonstrated his love for the
church by
coming.
This, of course, is what we
commemorate during this season of
the year. During the time of
Advent, we put ourselves in the
place of those who for thousands
of years longed and waited and
prayed and watched for Messiah to
come.
Second,
Jesus
loved the church by
learning.
Now, stick with me on this.
Jesus, being God the Son, has
sums of knowledge that are vast
and unfathomable.
And then, number three:
He
prayed.
Oh, how He prayed for the church.
Before he chose the 12, the
Scripture says He prayed all
night long. He often arose early
to pray. In Luke 22, in talking
with Simon Peter, Jesus says that
He has been interceding
particularly for Peter regarding
the devil. "Simon, Simon, Satan
has asked to sift you as wheat.
But I have prayed for you, Simon,
that your faith may not
fail."
Number four,
Jesus
loved the church by
discipling,
by teaching. He took His
learning, He took His time with
God in prayer, and He turned
around and invested what He had
learned and received into the
lives of other people.
Fifth,
Jesus
loved by bearing other people's
burdens.
"Come to me," He said, "all you
who are weary and heavy laden,
and I will give you
rest."
And lastly, the one I've already
mentioned, the greatest evidence
of His love for church:
He
gave up his
life,
taking our place, that the
penalty of sin might not fall
upon us, but upon Him.
Becoming
like our teachera)
spend lots of time in
theological arguments
b)
read the latest "Left Behind"
novel
c)
be Christlike
d)
to be Georgia Bulldog
fans
DWJD
Second, you and I can do what
Jesus did
by
learning,
by studying the Scriptures, by
asking thoughtful questions of
teachers and leaders, by exerting
ourselves in the acquisition of
spiritual knowledge.
We
can love the church and do what
Jesus did by
praying
-- by making prayer a priority,
so much so that we're willing to
get up early or stay up late or
block out all other appointments
to spend time the Lord of
life.
DWJD.
Do
what Jesus did. He
discipled.
He spoke to the crowds, yes, but
He invested his life in 12, and
focused most closely on
three.
You
can love the church and do what
Jesus did by bearing other
people's
burdens.
Now we can't do this exactly in
the way Jesus did -- and God
didn't intend for us to. Jesus
uniquely took the sins of the
world on Himself. He took
sickness and griefs on Himself in
a way we aren't meant
to.
And we can do what Jesus did and
love
the church by giving our lives
for the
church.
We're
not volunteers
Loving
by serving
Joseph Slife served as
Gateway's lay leader from
1997-2005.
free of charge (U.S. requests
only).
Request
a tape by calling
or writing the Gateway Church
office.
Please specify tape number
011202: Who Loves the
Church?
©
2001 Joseph M.
Slife