Monday, September 18, 2017

Who is and where is the church?

Firstly, before answering that question ~ Who is and where is the church.  Let us remember that God did not use a mediator when He gave His promise to Abraham! Galatians 3:20. Why do you want to go back to the weak and useless spiritual principles of this world? You are trying to earn favor with God by observing certain days or months or seasons or years. Live as Paul in freedom of these things ~ Galatians 4:9-13.

Remember that a slave woman was man's attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God's promise. But only the son of the freeborn wife could be God's own fulfillment of His promise. Isaac was the child born by the power of the Spirit. We are not children of the slave woman; but children of the free woman. 

Those who want you to keep the law are as Ishmael the child born by human effort ~ Galatians 4:23-30. Yes, and so the Lord says, " These people they are not mine. They honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me as their worship of me is but man-made rules learned by rote ~ Isaiah 29:13.

We should then ask - Who/where is the Church? The church is the body of Christ which is as one - a husband and wife united as one ~ Ephesians 5:31. And, where is the church? "For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them" ~ Matthew 18:20.

"Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our beloved fellow worker, to Apphia our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church that meets at your house" ~ Philemon 1:2. "Greet also the church that meets at their house" ~ Romans 16:5.

"...a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This is a great mystery, but it is an illustration of the way Christ and the church are one ~ Ephesians 5:31-32. Christ and the church are one and the same, united like a husband to his wife - one! It is not a building built by human hands...For He is not served by man-made rules and human hands ~Isaiah 29:13; Acts 17:25.

"God has put all things under the authority of Christ and has made him head over all things for the benefit of the church. And the church is his body; it is made full and complete by Christ, who fills all things everywhere with himself" ~ Ephesians 1: 22-23.

1 comment:

  1. Therefore, Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, now that He has died to redeem them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant ~ Hebrews 9:15. Your life (as the church) should reflect that you are dead to sin and alive in Christ and that there is no mediator between you and Him - Jesus Christ is our God, our Lord and Savior.

    ReplyDelete