Why do we have weekly worship services at FBC Richardson? Why do we take mission trips to Latvia and England and Africa? Why don’t we do more for the needy in our own town? Why do we still have Sunday School on Sunday mornings? Why do we go to church on Wednesday nights? Why do we have all those Children's progams? Why do we have Church Business Meetings and what do we do at these meetings? Why, why, why ...
The answers to these questions (and others) are important and key to the direction of any church. Change for the sake of change is not healthy. We want to be purposeful and strategic in all we do. Most of all, we want to follow God. I am convinced that the heart of the answer to these questions (and any others that might be swimming around in your brain) is found in an understanding of the nature and purpose of the church. Until we have a fixed and common image in our minds of what the church is (nature) and what the church does (purpose) we will always be in confusion as to why we do the things we do, the way we do them. And we will never have a clear and unified understanding of any changes that need to be made in order to accomplish God's will. Everything depends on our understanding of who we are as God's Church.
So, in order to answer all these "whys" I feel that we need to spend a considerable amount of time discussing the nature and work of the church. Once we have a solid and common understanding of that, all the other questions will be answered rather naturally and, hopefully, with one voice.
There are four major motifs that the Biblical writers use when describing the church. In no particular order they are: Agriculture, Organics/Familial, Military, and Athletics. The theme of construction (or a building) is used to a lesser degree. In order to understand the nature and role of the church we must examine each of these motifs in their context and then attempt to synthesize them into one overarching concept of the church. This may take a while, but be patient and stay with me. Anything worthwhile takes time and work.
In my next BLOG I will begin with the biblical motif of "agriculture." Stay tuned ...
Ask God to give you a bigger vision of what the Church can be. You have your favorite image of the church (probably the family image), and there's nothing wrong with that ... as long as you understand that the church is much bigger and its work much larger than just YOUR image of what it is to be. Ask God to increase you peripheal vision, and to soften your heart to EVERYTHING He wants HIS Church to be.
Blessings,
Pastor Ellis
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