Bible Study Journal

The Church

Let us understand the concept of the church. Coming to faith I often looked upon church as a group of people trying to exploit your faith. Coming from a gentile background the feeling was justified in how other religious institutions deal with believers. However after completing more than a year at my church I can say that Church is an essential part of Christian life. You cannot truly become a Christian without experiencing Christian fellowship. And today I can resound the opinion of King David.

One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple.

Psalms 27:4

What was the temple for Jerusalem is the church for New Jerusalem. The church is not the building however. If the church were a building then it would have to be one building because God is one. However God is spirit and therefore the church exists in the Spirit.

But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. John 4:23

The fact is not always evident. Not all churches remember that they are the church of God. Many fuss about differences but not all focus on the unifying factor: Jesus Christ. I was always reluctant to enter into a church knowing that I am non-denominational in my faith. However non-denominational churches are very few to begin with. So I decided to decide my church on a different factor: distance. Yes I know there are people who travel for hours to get to their desired church on a Sunday but the fact is that the church is not the building but rather the fellowship available within the building.

What is a church?

Garry Breshears gives the following definition of the Church:

"The local church is a community of regenerated believers who confess Jesus Christ as Lord. In obedience to Scripture they organize under qualified leadership, gather regularly for preaching and worship, observe the biblical sacraments of baptism and Communion, are unified by the Spirit, are disciplined for holiness, and scatter to fulfill the Great Commandment and the Great Commission as missionaries to the world for God's glory and their joy."

The first expressed in the are that the Church is One (a unified Body of Particular Churches in full Communion of doctrines and faith with each other), Holy (a sanctified and deified Body), Catholic (Universal and containing the fullness of Truth in itself), and Apostolic (its hierarchy, doctrines, and faith can be traced back to the Apostles)

Most of the generally use the word "church" as a translation of the Ancient Greek term "ἐκκλησία" (transliterated as "ecclesia") found in the original texts, which generally meant an "assembly". This term appears in two verses of the , 24 verses of the , 58 verses of the (including the earliest instances of its use in relation to a Christian body), two verses of the , one verse of the , three verses of the , and 19 verses of the . In total, ἐκκλησία appears in the New Testament text 114 times, although not every instance is a technical reference to the church.

In the , the term ἐκκλησία is used for local communities as well as in a universal sense to mean all believers. Traditionally, only believers are considered part of the true church, but convictions of what is orthodox have long varied, as many churches (not only the ones officially using the term "Orthodox" in their names) consider themselves to be orthodox and other Christians to be heterodox.

Who are the members of the church?

The Christian Church is an term generally used by to refer to the whole group of people belonging to the throughout . The Church is basically a body of believers who are willing and ready to be an instrument of spreading the gospel in some capacity. They are essentially those who have been elected for such a purpose from the beginning of time and who are sanctified by Baptism and unified with the body of Christ through the Holy Communion.