Encouragement to keep going

I don't know about you, but I often find it hard to keep sharing the gospel. Many of my friends and family reject Jesus, and it's hard to keep praying for them and keep hoping that God will save them. Well I had a huge encouragement this week that I wanted to share, to help you to keep going too.

I help to run a Christian Union in the school where I teach, and since the exam year groups have left school there have been a core of about 4 students attending. We've been doing an 'exploring the basics of Christianity' course as most of these students come from non-Christian families. A few weeks ago, I asked them how you get to heaven. One boy said that you had to be a good person. Since then we have looked at various Bible passages which show that only through Jesus you can be saved. Yesterday, at the meeting, this boy said outright that you can't be good enough, only through Jesus can you be righteous in God's sight. Hallelujah!

This was really encouraging because it shows that there will always be people who are just waiting to hear the full gospel. When they hear it, they respond in faith through God working in their hearts. I think I spend too much time telling God who to save, and not enough responding to the people in my life that He IS working in, and rejoicing in that.

'Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.' James 1:12

Why is church important? #2

'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. 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. "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.' Ephesians 5:25-32

Jesus and the church

• He loves us
• He gave himself up for us, by dying on the cross
• He cleanses us so that in God's sight we are holy
• He cares for us
• We become united with Him

It really is amazing when you think about this passage, not in the usual wedding-service way, but in the universal application is has for all Christians. We are all married to Jesus! And although we are saved as individual souls, precious in God's sight, when we are saved we become part of the corporate Body of Christ, the church.

So the church as a concept is made up of all Christians... but then there's also church in a local context, a specific body of members and a real and tangible community. This is where we see the concept lived out and made reality for us to understand and participate in.

Joshua Harris writes:
'[Jesus] calls and expects us to be part of [the church]... because we are part of it!
If Jesus loves the church, you and I should, too. We can't use the excuse that the church has messed up too many times or that we're disillusioned. Jesus is the only person who has the right to disown and give up on the church. But He never has. And He never will.' Stop Dating the Church, p40

Being a Christian who doesn't go to church is like being a brick lying on the ground (an analogy from Spurgeon which Harris quotes). It's useless and even trips people up! It's not what we're made for. We are made to be the people of God, living under His rule: that's what heaven is all about. Heaven is not going to be full of isolated individuals. No way! It's going to be people from every tribe, tongue and nation worshipping God together (Revelation 7:9).

The Christian life is hard. We find many struggles: against the world of people who have rejected God, against the devil who loves to trip us up, and against our own sinful nature which battles for supremacy within our hearts against God's Spirit. We need other Christians to keep us on the right track, to challenge us when we have compromised, to encourage us when we're down and ready to give up. To 'go solo' in the Christian life is to go against everything Jesus taught us about being humble and serving one another. It also buys into the lie that the less we give of ourselves and our time and money, the happier we will be. That's just not true! There is far more blessing in giving all of ourselves to the church, because it is an eternal investment.

Why is church important? #1

I'm reading Joshua Harris' book 'Stop Dating the Church' at the moment and it is incredibly helpful at explaining why it is so important for Christians to be committed members of a local church. These blog posts are really a collection of what Harris argues and my own thinking about it.

How is church like marriage?

This is one of the big questions Harris seeks to answer. In the Bible, Paul famously compares the relationship of a married couple to the relationship of Christ and the church (Ephesians 5). So what is the link between the church and marriage? Well, most Christians would agree that marriage is all about loving, faithful commitment. That's exactly the way Jesus treats the church... and therefore the way that we should treat it, too.

Harris says:
'The plain fact is, when we resist passion and commitment in our relationship with the church, everyone gets cheated out of God's best.

• You cheat yourself.
• You cheat a church community.
• You cheat your world.' p18

And again:
'The church is the vehicle that Jesus chose to take the message of the gospel to every generation and people.' p20

If we want to follow Jesus' command to go and make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28), we will struggle unless we are part of a church community. It's what the church is for: bringing together saved sinners to reach out to lost people. We're so much more effective together than individually. Just think about it: imagine you have one non-Christian friend called James. Now if you are the only Christian James knows, that means a lot of pressure on you to keep witnessing to him! And if you move away, he then knows no Christians in his area. But if you introduce James to some of your Christian friends from church, he can build relationships with them too, you can all witness and pray for him together, and if you move away, he still has links with a church and the people of God.

Church isn't an easy place. It is a place where sinners -saved and unsaved- gather together, and that's always going to be tough. But it is an ideal place for Christians to grow in godliness, as they hear the Bible faithfully taught... and as they are thrown into situations where they need to put into practice Jesus' teachings about loving your enemies, forgiving those who hurt you, and being humble and serving to one another. You see, every Christian could make three Christian friends and simply meet up with those friends regularly and get their spiritual 'fix' to keep them going... But in doing so, they would miss out hugely on the 'family factor' of church- being put into a room with loads of different people of all ages and backgrounds, where you don't have anything in common except Jesus, and you have to get along!

So to summarise:

• Church is like marriage- it demands commitment
• Church is a locus point for evangelism- in both training up and reaching out
• Church is tough- and so it refines us