Great and Unsearchable Things

Things the Lord gives me, and then I write them.

Wednesday, May 23, 2007

The Church of the First-Born

This blogspot has been dormant for several months now, and I thought it was dying, soon to be layed to rest. After getting stimulated by reading the discourses from other's blogs, and from commenting on them, a revival of sorts has happened in me to "raise this thing from the dead."
The subject that has inspired me is the people of God being opened to discovering who, what, and how the church is to be built. As with all things, it seems everyone has an idea. Therein lies the problem: man's ideas built the "church system" as we know it. As that experiment is failing, now(hopefully) we will be about seeking His plan or vision for His church; His Body.
In Hebrews, it talks about "the church of the First-Born" which is Jesus Christ, who is the first born son, with many sons to follow. This church include all that are His in Heaven and on earth-"angels, souls of men made perfect, Jesus, whose blood speaks better things than that of Abel, etc." All of this is deep and only revealed by the Spirit as He wills, but it is all good stuff, and we are a part of that company. It includes forgiveness, mercy, reconciliation, which to us are only abstract ideas, but to God they are real and spiritually tangible or reality. These are the things that flow in that realm, and with the Spirit being in us, wants to flow through our vessel to present that church and it's Head to the world to bring healing, hope and salvation.
And we're still trying to build with physical things like stone and brick, whether it be in a building or a home, when the workings of His church go on anywhere and in all things throughout our day, if we let them. Maybe that's why pastors are having such a hard time deciding about should we do church "missionally" or is a "mega-church" the way to go? What about being called "emerging"? Oh, let's not use the word "church" at all, but still we have a format and there is that one person who addresses the group. If the "pastors" of the old way accepted the "new" way, which is that they are just one of many in His church, they may have to step down and just be part of the beautiful Body of Christ and learn to yield to His Spirit so that those things in Him can flow and touch the world. Maybe they couldnt' be the leader anymore-just one of the many "sons of God."
So here we are in the 21st century hashing out how we are going to build God's church, when the truth is that He has chosen a head (His son) and He would like to have Him revealed through the vessels He has chosen-that's us!!! He also wants to be in charge.
Let's pray that we would be able to hand the trowel over to Him and step aside, asking for His grace to "deny ourselves" daily, so He can shine through us. Do you think that we might have interferred with that these past 2000 yrs. and we just need to scrap our plans?
"Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build labor in vain."