widows – Dancing In The Kingdom

Dancing in the Kingdom- Table of Contents

Dancing In the Kingdom – Part 3 – Dancing in the Kingdom– Chapter 18 – Entering the Dance

Reclaiming the institutional church

[Bible references: Matthew 5:1-16, 38-48; Luke 6:1-49; John 13:1-17, 34-35]

There are many people who claim to love Jesus but not His church (which is his body). But we need to keep in mind that every accusation we may choose to hold against the church is against us personally. The church is comprised of sinful people, and that includes us. The church has done inappropriate things in the past and so have we. As part of our, and the church’s, sinful behavior is the ease with which we focus on the things that have gone wrong while forgetting to examine the “log” in our own eye. A quote from an old cartoon strip is appropriate here, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”^[1]

The second thing we need to hold onto is that as Jesus loved the world enough to die for – and redeem – the very people who rejected him. That includes the church – which includes us. If we are commanded to love our enemies, what should our attitudes be towards the group that we are part of? It is normal for us to have higher expectations towards our own family than those who are outside the family. Because of that, it is normal for us to be disappointed by or hurt more easily by people within our family than by anyone else.

Those hurts and disappointments can lead to us overlooking all the ways in which the church has, in its broken way, still managed to fulfill at least some of the intentions God has had for the church. Within the very messiness of church history, the church had not totally neglected its ability to show love to one another and to reach in love to those outside the church. It is through the church that we have the Bible and faithful Christians through the years that created hospitals and orphanages, taken care of the widows and others who need care. It is the church that made it possible for us to hear about the gospel and respond to Christ’s invitation to follow him.

The church is the body of Christ. We serve as the hands and feet, etc. of Christ, doing together what is not possible to do by ourselves. In the apostle Paul’s articulation of the Body of Christ, he notes how we all serve as different parts of the body, helping each other grow by serving in the unique ways God has prepared for us. Furthermore, Christ has told us that we will be recognized as his disciples by how we serve one another in love. This is one of the grand themes of the Bible, God has reached out to us in love, and we can respond by loving him in return; also loving one another. It is through our reflection of his love that others will respond to God in love as well.

On this side of the second coming of Christ, we all remain broken and so our institutions will remain broken. But that does not mean that Christ is unable to use us (as individuals or as part of an institutional church) for his purposes and that does not mean that the goodness of Christ is unable to be reflected through us as individuals or groups or through the institutions we create as his co-heirs to bring mercy and justice to his image-bearers and the world he has prepared for us.

In formal or informal ways, we create the institutional church to help us more effectively serve one another within the Body of Christ and to serve others outside the Body of Christ. As we take an historical look at the expected mixed record of the Body of Christ’s broken church (and, we must remember, our personal records as well), we need to cling to Christ, His love, His sustenance, and forgiveness us for all the ways we have failed to love each other within the church and outside the church.

^[1] Kelly, Walt, From a Pogo strip, 22 Apr 1970 www.thisdayinquotes.com/2011/04/we-have-met-enemy-and-he-is-us.html

Reflect

Sometimes our church organizations can be hard to love. Nevertheless, we cannot truly love Christ without loving his church. How could you better express love for your local congregation this year?

Observe

Read John 13:1-17. How can we love and serve the church as Jesus showed us?

Dancing in the Kingdom- Table of Contents

Dancing In the Kingdom – Part 2 – The Kingdom Revealed – Chapter 12 – Launching the church

The Spirit and the Story

[Bible references: Exodus 18:13-26; Joel 2:28-32; Psalm 16; Luke 16:19-31; John 16:13; Acts 2:1-4; 6:1-7]

During Jesus’ three years of ministry, His teaching about the Kingdom of God coming to earth was accompanied by signs: miracles of healing, cleansing, and raising the dead, and by forgiveness of sins. The miracles affirmed the message. With the introduction of the church as the vehicle by which the gospel would be spread, more signs and miracles were called for.

On Pentecost, Jews from all over the Roman Empire gathered in Jerusalem. Many were in the upper room with the apostles, when the Holy Spirit visibly empowered the apostles with tongues of fire, a violent wind, and the reversal of the tower of Babel as people of many different language groups were able to hear the apostles speak in their native tongues. These signs caused much excitement and wonder as the people responded to the work of God. As was true during the time of Jesus’ ministry, there were some who were ready to hear the gospel and others who were not. Those who were ready to hear the apostles’ message were able to understand the apostles’ message while those who were not ready did not understand the signs and resorted to mocking the apostles as if they were drunkards. This was no different than the time of Jesus’ ministry, the signs of the kingdom caused some to respond with increased faith while others responded with unbelief and hardened hearts.

As Jesus had promised, the Holy Spirit gave the apostles the words to explain what was happening. Peter quoted from the book of Joel about how the Spirit would be poured out causing all kinds of people to prophecy: sons and daughters, old men, and young men. Then Peter also quoted from David’s Psalms as he wove together the story of how all these things fit into the story of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. Those who were ready to hear the gospel asked what their response should be. Peter told them to repent, be baptized and then they too could receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Since many of these people were from the Jewish diaspora, they, now filled with the Holy Spirit, would have been able to return to their homes to continue to spread the gospel, although it seems that some people from the diaspora stayed in Jerusalem.

We have sparse details of the life of the church, but there are a few things we know which are described quite succinctly in Acts 2:42-47:

And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

With the rapid increase in disciples came some logistical problems as well. The miracles of the Spirit did not end the day-to-day problems of communicating between different cultural groups within the church. In the normal practice of sharing goods within the church and within that the need to take care of widows and orphans, there came a point where the Greek-speaking widows from outside Israel were not getting the same care as the Hebrew speaking widows. Because the apostles wanted to focus on teaching and prayer, they gathered the church to address the issue. The church resolved the issue by selecting seven men to oversee the distribution of goods. However, this would not be the last time that language and culture barriers would affect life of the church.

Observe

Read Exodus 18:13-26; Acts 6:1-7. What do these passages say about effective leadership?