What is the Church?

What is the Church?

What is the Church?

The church is not a building or an event or an organization. In Scripture, God tells us the church is a people for His own possession. In this sermon Pastor David explains  how we, the people who have turn from our sin and trusted in Jesus, are the church.

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. (1 Peter 2:9-10)

You are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In Him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. (Ephesians 2:19-22)

I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, 15 if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God. (1 Timothy 3:14-15)

Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, 26 that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the Word, 27 so that He might present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. (Ephesians 5:25-27)

I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in Me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. (John 15:5)

I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth… 9 For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field. (1 Corinthians 3:6-7, 9)

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? (1 Corinthians 3:16)

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (1 Corinthians 12:27)

I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me… and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. (John 10:14-16)