'Kay... the next venture into asking God to reveal what HIS view of Church is vs. what has become the world view - or even more so - the "Christian" view...

Scriptural reference concerning the Church, best I can tell, begins in Matthew 16:18. Here it is in context:

"13When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say the Son of Man is?" 14They replied, "Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets." 15"But what about you?" he asked. "Who do you say I am?" 16Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." 17 Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. 18And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. 19I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." 20Then he warned his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ."

Now this might take awhile. I've heard SO many interpretations of this passage and I'm asking HS to show me HIS view. All I can do is put out what I believe at this point and time and let Him change my mind as needed. So, here it goes... Obviously Jesus was asking if the disciples knew who He really was and Peter had the "right" response in indicating He was "Christ, Son of the Living God". I think most people agree on that point. And I believe that is the "rock" Jesus was referring to when He said "...on this rock I will build my church..." He was making the point that Peter's verbalization of the truth of who He was is the foundation - the starting point - the commonality - on which the Church (those who believe in that foundation, called out by God to action) would be built. What that tells me is everything we do, say, believe, act upon must ALWAYS come back to the truth of what God the Father did for us at the cross through Jesus. Without Him there would be no Church.

AND there's the added bonus that "the Gates of Hades will not overcome it." WOW! To me that says when we build upon the truth of what God did through Christ, it's all good! And that can be such an encouragement when we see all the flaws that we, the Church exemplify. Another point I read recently is how interesting it is that the mention of "enemy territory" in the phrase "Gates of Hades" indicates a passive stance rather than an aggressive or offensive one. In other words, gates are stationary objects - think about that!

Now the next area is even tougher for me and I honestly don't have a completed "set in stone" (pun intended) opinion on this yet - but I'm asking... The keys to the kingdom of heaven... hmmmm... and binding and loosing on earth and in heaven... hmmmm... The first thing I think of is the previous mention to "gate" and then the mention of keys. Don't ask me what that means - I dunno! But... since there is reference to the gates of hades AND to the kingdom AND to the Church AND to the foundation of Jesus, maybe the binding and losing has something to do with what (whom) recognizes the rock of Jesus and what (whom) does not?? Again, nothing set in stone, just thinking in typed font here...

And then the clencher - "Btw, don't tell anyone the truth I've just asked you to verbalize - the one about Me being the Christ and all..." Ummmm, wha???? I've heard lots of explainations for why Jesus said stuff like that, but I STILL don't get it... So if you're out there and have a good answer, I'd LOVE to hear!

But to summarize about how this all relates to the Church, I believe the one and only thing we can stand on is the foundation that is the truth of what God did through Jesus and as we stand upon that truth, we have the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven and as such we have access to that "gate". And all those who follow do as well (the loosed and the bound?). AND the enemy will not prevail! Those are celebratin' words!

IC Ponderings II

Alrighty. As disorganized as this may be, here it is. First, I did a word search on terminology regarding church in the bible.

The most commonly used greek word that translates to "church" is Ekklesia, which means a calling out; a poplular meeting, especially a religeous congregation (Jewish synagogue, or Christian community of members on earth or saints in heaven or both) - assembly, church. It is also a compounded word created from one word meaning a primary prep. denoting origin (point from where action or motion proceed) and a derivitive of kaleo which means to call out.

So what does that mean to me? It means that the biblically referred to "church" is a calling out of a group of believers to a motion or action. Interestingly enough, if you research "temple" and "synagogue" you find definitions that indicate sacred buildings or structures. There is an obvious difference that would seem to be very intentional in differentiating between what was the previous form of religion compared to the "new worship" Christ brought! It was no longer to be about going to a place to worship but worship was to become a people called out into action! WOW!

From John 4 - "21Jesus declared, "Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and and truth."


And this is only the beginning!!!!

Yeah, it's been awhile since I last posted which means this may never end once I get going. My latest topic is going to be surrounding Church. I'd like to use blogging as a place to explore what we've learned "church" to be through "IC" or institutional church and tradition verses what the bible says about the Church. Last night at our house church meeting we began a discussion. Each of us shared a bit about what we don't like regarding the IC. Some of the dislikes mentioned included fear of not being "good enough", frustration over the "office of pastor", distaste for the concept and structure of Sunday School, frustration over the willingness of many to ignore parts of scripture according to "doctrine" or denomination, the overwhelming assumption that conformity is necessary for unity... to name a few. There were others but I can't lay my hands on that silly napkin at the moment...

What I want to do (and knowing me, probably will not be orderly enough to accomplish) is take any number of "churcy" concepts and methodically begin comparing them to scripture, asking Holy Spirit to re-teach me what God intended when He introduced the concept of the Church.

Here's my disclaimer. I am in no way desiring to show disrespect for the body of Christ and recognize that we are all fumbling around in this together. My goal is to learn more about God's heart as I seek to better understand His plan for us as believers as we come together.