A House for God
“. . .zeal for your
house consumes me,. . .” Psa. 69:9
“When it was almost time for the
Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to
“His disciples remembered that it is
written: ‘Zeal for your house will consume me.’" John 2:13-17
Have you
ever wondered what David meant when he first wrote this in the Psalms? Interestingly enough, Jesus repeats those
same words when He drove the money changers from the temple with a whip. These are the words that I want us to explore
and then adopt as our own. Our goal in
this part of the study is to become zealous for God’s house.
As I
mentioned before, the eternal purposes of God are all facets of one great
plan. Our first section dealt with the
facet of a bride for God the Son. This
section focuses on the eternal plan to find a House for God. Again, we find this emerging over and over
again from Genesis to Revelation. So,
let’s explore this by looking at the scriptures you found for all the things
that could be a dwelling place of God. Guys,
where is the scripture that indicates that the bride of Christ is a city?
“One of the seven angels who had the
seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, ‘Come, I will
show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.’ And he carried me away in the Spirit
to a mountain great and high, and showed me the
So you see
in this very verse exactly what I’ve been talking about. The bride of Christ and the House for God are
facets of the one great plan.
In the
Hebrew, house and home are synonymous.
What are some of the important things that define home for you? Here are some of the answers the men came up
with during our session:
- Place of rest
- Sanctuary
- Dwelling
- Mutuality
- Refuge
- Mise-en-scene
(Google it)
- Habitat
- Shelter
- People
- Love
This list
of places where God has or will dwell is sort of a time line of God’s eternal
plan to find a dwelling place.
Adam to Jacob
|
Garden |
Garden of
Eden – “Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in “Then the
man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the
garden in the cool of the day,…” Gen.
3:8 |
|
Rock |
“When
Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, ‘Surely the LORD is in this place, and
I was not aware of it." He was afraid and said, "How awesome is
this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of
heaven.’ “Early
the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed under his head and set it
up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. He called that place “Then
Jacob made a vow, saying, ‘If God will be with me and will watch over me on
this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear so
that I return safely to my father's house, then the LORD will be my God and
this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God's house, and of all
that you give me I will give you a tenth.’”
Gen. 28:16-22 “He said:
‘The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer;’” 2 Sam. 22:2 |
We see in
the Garden of Eden the first implementation of God’s eternal plan to have a
dwelling place. After Adam and Eve
sinned, Gen. 3:8 says that God was walking in the garden in the cool of the
day. So apparently it was God’s custom
to come to the garden and walk and talk with Adam and Eve. Now Adam and Eve were an integral part of
this whole plan. God did not come and
walk and talk with the animals or converse with the plants. Only Adam and Eve were made in His image and
as such were non-optional parts of the plan for God to have a dwelling place.
But Adam
and Eve chose to go a different path, fellowship with God was broken, and the
plan for God’s dwelling place was thwarted.
But God is never stymied by our sins or the works of Satan. He simply kicked in a plan to redeem what was
now broken.
So this new
plan begins with Abraham. God sent
Abraham on a quest to find a dwelling place for God. Look at Hebrews 11:9-10.
[Prompted] by faith he dwelt as a
temporary resident in the land which was designated in the promise [of God,
though he was like a stranger] in a strange country, living in tents with Isaac
and Jacob, fellow heirs with him of the same promise. For he was [waiting expectantly and
confidently] looking forward to the city which has fixed and firm foundations,
whose Architect and Builder is God. Heb.
11:9-10 Amplified
So Abraham
packs up everything he has and brings a lot of relatives with him and sets out
… that away! He didn’t know where he was
going! He just let God lead him as he
went. He lived in tents and grazed sheep
and livestock as he went along. So what
was He looking for? Rather, what was God
looking for? Hebrews says that he was
looking forward to a city. Perhaps we
could say that he was looking for a building site.
Abraham was
a man of the altar and the tent. Wherever
he went he lived in tents and built altars.
These are two key elements of the house of God. The tent reminds us that we are only
sojourners in this world and we do not have permanent dwellings anchored in the
world system. The altar tells of the sacrifice
of our ways and the consecration of ourselves to God’s ways.
One of the
altars that Abraham built was on
Next we see
Abraham’s grandson, Jacob, on his way to make a new life for himself after
making his brother Esau angry enough to kill him. Weary to the bone, he lays his head on a rock
and falls asleep. He has this incredible
dream about a ladder reaching to heaven and angels ascending and descending
back and forth from Heaven to Earth.
Jacob awakes
from the dream and his first exclamation is, “God is in this place!” And he takes oil and pours on the rock that
he slept on, consecrating it and declaring that it will be God’s house. Now Jacob has caught the zeal for God’s house
that we mentioned earlier.
Moses to Solomon
|
Mountain |
“ |
|
Piece of
Furniture |
Ark of
the Covenant – “Place the cover on top of the ark and put in the ark the Testimony,
which I will give you. There, above
the cover between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the Testimony, I
will meet with you and give you all my commands for the Israelites.” Ex. 25:21-22 |
|
Tent |
Tabernacle
– Tent of Meeting – “Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the
glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.
Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had
settled upon it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. In all
the travels of the Israelites, whenever the cloud lifted from above the
tabernacle, they would set out; but if the cloud did not lift, they did not
set out—until the day it lifted. So the cloud of the LORD was over the
tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all
the house of “As Moses
went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the
entrance, while the LORD spoke with Moses.”
Ex. 33:9 Tabernacle
of David – “They brought the ark of the LORD and set it in its place inside
the tent that David had pitched for it, and David sacrificed burnt offerings
and fellowship offerings before the LORD.”
2 Sam. 6:17 1
Chronicles 15 |
|
|
“Place
the cover on top of the ark and put in the ark the Testimony, which I will
give you. There, above the cover between the two cherubim that are over the
ark of the Testimony, I will meet with you and give you all my commands for
the Israelites.” 1 Kings |
So now
Jacob passes on and his descendants end up in
It is the
first real blueprint for what God wants His house to look like. The innermost room, the most holy place, is a
perfect cube, 15 feet by 15 feet. In it
is the Ark of the Covenant. This is a
little wooden box about 2 ½ feet by 3 ½ feet and it is overlaid with gold. It has a lid that is pure gold and is called
the “mercy seat.” Perched on this lid
are two golden cherubim with their wings stretched out toward one another sort
of covering the mercy seat. The mercy
seat is where God’s presence dwells. So
this little box made of wood and gold is a foreshadowing of Christ – the wood
represents His humanity and the gold His divinity. So now, we have the first picture of what God
wants to accomplish – Himself dwelling with us.
Well, Moses
passes away and eventually the Israelites enter the
Now enters
King David. The Philistines are
suffering horrible things because of the Ark of the Covenant and David is
allowed to bring it back. Now, the
Tabernacle of Moses is set up in
David sets
up this tent on
Meanwhile,
the Tabernacle of Moses remains in
But now
watch what is going on at
“He who dwells in the shelter of the
Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.” Psa. 91:1
“I long to dwell in your tent
forever and take refuge in the shelter of your wings. Selah”
Psa. 61:4
“Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide
me in the shadow of your wings” Psa. 17:8
“Because you are my help, I sing in
the shadow of your wings.” Psa. 63:7
Wings! Why does David keep talking about wings? He’s looking at the Ark of the Covenant in
the little tent! There are the wings of
the cherubim covering the mercy seat where God’s presence dwells.
So what
might this whole thing mean? Here we see
a foreshadowing of the house God has in mind where God dwells with men
unhindered by the veil. For a little
while God gave David, a man after His own heart, a sneak preview of what God’s
house will be like in the end. And it is
David who says “zeal for your house consumes me.” Here in the Tabernacle of David, all of God’s
people are able to connect with God with unveiled faces.
So, for
forty years there were two tabernacles in Israel, the Tabernacle of Moses in Gibeon and the Tabernacle of David on Mount Zion.
As part of
David’s intense zeal for God’s house, he puts in place all the materials and
picks the site for the
Jesus to John
|
Heaven |
“This is
what the LORD says: "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool.
Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting place be?” Isa. 66:6 |
|
Earth |
“Then I
saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth
had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the |
|
Person |
“In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” John 1:1 Jesus
Christ – “Philip said, ‘Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for
us.’ Jesus
answered: ‘Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a
long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show
us the Father'? Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the
Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is
the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. Believe me when I say that I
am in the Father and the Father is in me;…’”
John 14:8-11 “No one
has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love
is made complete in us.” 1 John 4:12 |
|
House |
“When the
day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound
like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole
house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire
that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with
the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled
them.” Acts 2:1-4 |
|
Community
of People |
Church –
“As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and
precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a
spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, …”
1 Pet. 2:4-5 |
|
City |
“Then I
saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth
had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the |
The
After many
cycles of idolatry and then turning back to God, the Israelites are exiled and
their temple and the city of
So now
enters Jesus, and He is the House of God on earth. Look at some of the scriptures that we found
about God dwelling in Him. And then look
at this in John 1:14:
“The Word became flesh and made his
dwelling among us.”
In the
Greek it is “tabernacled among us.” Again, we see the picture of the tabernacle
in the wilderness with God’s presence manifested.
And what
does Jesus say about Himself?
Jesus answered them, "Destroy
this temple, and I will raise it again in three days." The Jews replied,
"It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to
raise it in three days?" But the temple he had spoken of was his body.
John 2:19-21
So here is
Jesus declaring that He is the temple in
By the time
Jesus was born, the
“Look, your house is left to you
desolate.” Matt. 23:38
So now,
Jesus is the House of God. Not only
that, but He is the chief cornerstone.
- He is the stone that the
builders rejected (Matt.
- He is a Stumbling stone (1 Cor.
- He is the Capstone (Acts
- He is the Cornerstone (Eph.
- He is the Foundation stone (Isa. 28:16; 1 Cor.
- He is the Living stone (1 Peter
2:4).
- He is the Rock (Deut. 32:4; 2
Sam. 22:2; Ps.
- He is the Rock of offense (Rom.
- He is the Rock that moved in
the wilderness (1 Cor. 10:4).
- He is the Rock of revelation
upon which the church is built (Matt.
So now, we
have the dwelling place of God on earth, but we see something different
emerging. He is the house, but he is
also the chief cornerstone, the capstone, the foundation stone. What is a foundation stone? This was a stone laid by a builder by which
the rest of the structure found its reference.
Everything was measured from and referenced to the foundation stone, the
corner stone.
And now through Christ’s death and resurrection, we
see the Holy Spirit creating many stones out of the one Stone. He carried in His body, the many stones that
come out of the grave with him. You and
I are those living stones if we put our faith and trust in his finished work.
And it is the Lord’s intention to build all those
living stones up into a house. This work
began when the Holy Spirit was “unleashed” at Pentecost. The first building together of the living
stones at that time was an incredible event that established the House of God
again in
Then these living stones became scattered by
persecution and they found themselves in other cities and once again they were
built up into a spiritual house of God wherever they went. And the apostles recognized what was going
on, that God’s house was being built in places all over the world. Look at what they say.
“For we are God's fellow workers; you are God's field, God's building. By
the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as an expert builder, and
someone else is building on it. But each one should be careful how he builds.
For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is
Jesus Christ.” 1 Cor.
3:9-11
“Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's
Spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for
God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple.” 1 Cor. 3:16-17
“Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow
citizens with God's people and members of God's household, built on the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief
cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a
holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become
a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.”
Eph. 2:19-22
“…God's household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and
foundation of the truth.” 1 Tim. 3:15
“As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God
and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a
spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For in Scripture it says: ‘See, I lay a
stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him
will never be put to shame.’" 1
Pet. 2:4-6
So you see that the fulfillment of God’s purpose to
have a house for Himself finds fulfillment in the
years after Jesus resurrection and the unleashing of the Holy Spirit.
Fast forward now to Revelation 21; here we find the
culmination of God’s house. It is a
fantastical scene that John the Apostle is attempting to describe. And it holds many of the elements that we saw
at the very beginning in the Garden of Eden.
There is gold, pearl and precious stones. There is the
It is an open Heaven like the Tabernacle of David and
Heaven and Earth are connected as one.
Notice also that the New Jerusalem, the bride of Christ, the completed
house of God is descending out of Heaven to the Earth. We are always talking about going to heaven,
but God wants to come to earth. Our
final destination will not be Heaven, it will be the
new earth. And what is the final
declaration at the completion of this?
“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Now the dwelling of
God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God
himself will be with them and be their God.’”
Rev. 21:3
At last, God is no longer homeless.
A House for God -- Part 2
- Pick a Site
- What are some of the building sites found in Scripture for God’s house?
- 1 Kings 5 & 6; 1 Chronicles 22; Gen. 3:8; Hebrews 12:22; Romans 9:33; 1 Peter 2:6
- Plan what you are going to build
- From scripture find some examples of planning for building God’s house. List references.
- 1 Chron 22; Matt. 4:18; 1 Kings 5; Luke 6:13
- Gather materials
- What are some of the materials found in Scripture for building God’s house? List references.
- 1 Chron. 29:2; 1 Kings 5; 2 Chron. 2
- Build it
- From scripture find the names of some people that were builders of God’s house. List references.
- Nehemiah; 1 Kings 6
Again, when we talked about a House for God, we are focusing on what God wants, not what we want or need. This is yet another purpose that transcends the Fall of man. In other words, this purpose existed before Adam and Eve sinned and the plan of redemption kicked. Hence, any activities we engage in with respect to salvation and winning the lost are subtasks to allow us to achieve this greater purpose – finding a house for God.
I would like to digress at this point, although it is not really a detour, and talk about the natural habitat of a Christian.
So, we talked about how a house is a habitat, right? Let’s expand on that a little.
- What does the word “habitat” mean?
- Now, what do we mean when we say “natural habitat”?
- What are some examples of an unnatural habitat?
- What happens to an animal that finds itself out of its natural habitat?
- Often finds it difficult or impossible to reproduce.
- May become overweight? Why?
- Loses its fear of natural predators.
- Uses its instinctual behaviors in inappropriate ways. May suddenly become aggressive and injure or kill its owner.
- Finds it difficult or impossible to live in its natural habitat. Doesn’t know how to live life in the wild.
Now, one of the things that we want to determine is what the natural habitat of a Christian looks like. The more natural the habitat, the fewer of these symptoms will be evident. So lets take a look at some of these symptoms among Christians and see if their habitat is a natural one or not.
- Ability to reproduce.
- Spiritual obesity.
- Isn’t aware of spiritual dangers and spiritual predators.
- Uses spiritual instincts in inappropriate ways.
- Knows that things aren’t right, but doesn’t know what to do about it. Can’t figure out what the church ought to look like, but knows that the current model is wrong, that it isn’t working.
Any of these look familiar? In my assessment it is a bell-ringer for what is going on among most American Christians today. So what does that tell us? Obviously, most Christians today are existing in an unnatural habitat.
There are several different types of habitat that are illustrated in Scripture. Let’s look at some of them.
Egypt
Jacob’s descendants found themselves in Egypt and in slavery. They had been brought there by Joseph during a severe famine and were able to survive the event. But instead of returning to the land God had promised to Abraham, they took up residence in Egypt and outlived their welcome.
So, instead of being in the land of Canaan, building a house for God, they find themselves making “bricks for a foreign master. Instead of building the Lord’s house, they assemble a home for God’s enemy.”[1]
What is this Egyptian habitat? It is living our lives in the world system. Egypt represented the materialistic glitter of the world. And Christians who wind up in the Egyptian habitat will be in bondage to the pleasures, the power, the consumerism of the world system. They will be slaves to their on desires and will be building someone else’s kingdom instead of Christ’s.
The way out is often difficult, but God is calling his children to exit Egypt and calling out to their oppressors to “Let my people go!”
Babylon
Another unnatural habitat pictured in the Old Testament is that of Babylon. This comes from the word “Babel” from which the Tower of Babel gets its name. What happened at the Tower of Babel? Man tried, in his own efforts, to reach up to the heavens. In addition, man was trying to make a name for himself. What happened resulted in confusion and dispersion. This is another result of developing an unnatural habitat for Christians.
It is interesting to note that the city of Babylon is mentioned in Revelation. Here, Babylon is a counterfeit for the New Jerusalem, the real city of God, the real house of God. The harlot of Revelation is from Babylon and is a counterfeit bride. She tries to steal the hearts of the men using her outward attire.
The children of Israel found themselves in Babylon after God judged Israel. Here are some of the things that happened at that time:
- The Babylonians took the holy vessels of God from the Temple in Jerusalem and packed them off the Babylon, undoubtedly using them for idol worship. So you see the holy things of God being mixed with the unholy things of the world. This is a sure sign that the habitat is not natural.
- The people of God were scattered throughout Babylon and were not able to gather together as they so often did in their homeland. This is another sign that the habitat is not natural. Like a zoo where the animals are artificially segregated from each other, Christians will be segmented, pigeon-holed, and separated when their habitat is unnatural.
- They created synagogues. Without the temple, the Israelites felt the need to develop an artificial habitat, a human invention to replace what they were missing. “Man builds synagogues; God is building a holy temple.”[2]
- They got comfortable in Babylon, and when it came time to return, the vast majority of them, 97.5%, stayed in Babylon. They had developed businesses, built homes, married locals, and had families. It would be a major disruption in their lives to leave this comfortable, familiar environment to return to the wilds of Canaan.
There were a lot of good things in Babylon. The vessels from the house of God were there, although profaned. There were some great men of God there as well. Read the book of Daniel. And God did some really amazing things in Babylon. Think of the story of Nebuchadnezzar, and the other kings who witnessed the might power of the God of Israel.
But you must understand that God was homeless. And his people were living in an unnatural habitat. Many of the Israelites who stayed in Babylon lost their identities within a few generations. Their offspring were no longer identifiable as the chosen people of God. Does this look anything like what’s going on in Christianity today?
There are great men and women of God in the church today that are in this unnatural habitat of Babylon. And many of God’s holy vessels are there as well. But the telltale signs of Babylon are everywhere. It is filled with people and organizations that are attempting to make names for themselves. Confusion is everywhere and God’s people are scattered or segregated in unnatural ways.
Despite decades of evangelizing, Christianity is declining in America – we cannot for the life of us figure out why we can’t reproduce ourselves. Worst of all, our children cannot seem to survive spiritually and are losing their identities as the chosen people of God.
In a recent survey, the Barna Group said that “a majority of twentysomethings – 61% of today’s young adults – had been churched at one point during their teen years but they are now spiritually disengaged (i.e., not actively attending church, reading the Bible, or praying). Only one-fifth of twentysomethings (20%) have maintained a level of spiritual activity consistent with their high school experiences.”[3] So you see, the same thing that happened to the children of Israel who stayed in Babylon is happening to our children today. This is another sign that this is not our natural habitat – our offspring cannot survive and are being scattered to the winds and are being assimilated into the world system.
Please don’t get me wrong. God attempts to bless anything we offer him. But He will never build His house in a foreign land. We try to build community in this land of Babylon, but it is an attempt to do it in the flesh. It is an attempt to build it in our own power and ability – with us functioning as the head instead of Christ. The Tower of Babel was man’s attempt to build community without God as the center. The Jewish synagogue emerged during the Babylonian captivity as a way to develop community in this unnatural habitat. But God wanted them to return to Jerusalem and build His house there.
In the same way, God is calling us to leave the land of Babylon and build a house for Him. That is our natural habitat as Christians.
The Wilderness
There is one more unnatural habitat to talk about today – the desert of waste – the wilderness. When the children of Israel left Egypt they had to pass through the wilderness. Likewise, when the children of Israel returned from Babylon, they had to pass through the wilderness.
The wilderness is a necessary part of finding our natural habitat. It is a place and time for us to detox, if you will. For the Israelites leaving Egypt, the detox time was extremely painful and they pined for the security of slavery under the oppression of the enemies of God. Likewise, when we exit the world system we often find it difficult to let the ways of the world drain from our systems. It is so familiar and we’ve been under its power for so long, that we are afraid of anything else.
The wilderness is necessary, but it is also supposed to be temporary. To a great extent, the amount of time we spend there is up to us. But there are some really important things that we are to learn while in the desert, even though it is an unnatural habitat.
So, what are some of the things that the children of Israel learned while in the desert?
- Christ is adequate to meet all your spiritual needs.
- If you remain in the wilderness, you will eventually die. The purpose of bringing us out of the unnatural habitat is to bring us into the natural one. It is not to live in spiritual and physical deprivation the rest of our lives.
- The desert is designed to refine us. Remember Abraham was a man of the tent and the altar. His sojourn was meant to be a temporary thing, and he learned to sacrifice all that he was to God. Like I said, it is a place of religious detox. This is what Jesus was talking about when He spoke about old wineskins. We must abandon the old wineskins and obtain new ones before God can pour new wine into them.
- It is a symbol of new beginnings. Have you ever wondered what that verse was all about that talks about John the Baptist being a voice crying in the wilderness? He was in the wilderness declaring that something new is coming.
- Any extra time spent in the wilderness than is necessary becomes a waste. The same is true of any unnatural habitat. Settling in Egypt causes you to waste your life on pleasure and power and fame. Settling in Babylon causes you to waste your efforts on institutions that can never allow God to build His house. Staying in the desert causes you to waste your life in a period of transition with no resolution.
Our Natural Habitat
So, you may be now asking, what is our natural habitat as Christians? In a word, it is ekklesia. “It is instinctive to your species as a Christian to freely share Christ with your fellow brothers and sisters and to hear about Christ from them. It is instinctive to your species as a Christian to live in community with other believers who are seeking to put themselves under no other Head but Jesus. It is native to your species to church together with other believers in an atmosphere of freedom, spontaneity, joy, and love. All of these things are written in the church’s genetic code.”[4]
So what does this look like? Let me give you four tenets that characterize this local community of believers.
- Christ is the Functional Head of the Group – Essentially this means that no one person’s agenda drives the group. There is no one who usurps the roll of headship that belongs only to Jesus. “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi,’ for you have one Teacher, and you are all brothers. And do not call anyone on earth ‘father,’ for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one Instructor, the Messiah. The greatest among you will be your servant. For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” Matt. 23:8-12
"What then shall we say, brothers and sisters? When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up.” 1 Cor. 14:26 - God’s House is Made of Living Stones – A physical building is completely irrelevant in the natural habitat of the Christian. We are literally the house of God everywhere we go. “As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” 1 Pet. 2:4-5
- Natural Community, Not Forced – The ekklesia will be a close-knit community of believers that forms around the situations and circumstances in which we find ourselves. These may arise out of neighborhoods, work circumstances, common interests, etc. Note one of the groups that Paul addressed in one of his letters. “All God’s people here send you greetings, especially those who belong to Caesar’s household.” Philippians. 4:22 Here we see that one of the groups in Rome developed out of a work environment – people who served in the household of Caesar.
- All Members Functioning as Ministers – It is impossible for us to come to full maturity as Christians, either individually or as a group, unless every member functions as a minister. “Yes, the body has many different parts, not just one part. If the foot says, ‘I am not a part of the body because I am not a hand,’ that does not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear says, ‘I am not part of the body because I am not an eye,’ would that make it any less a part of the body? If the whole body were an eye, how would you hear? Or if your whole body were an ear, how would you smell anything? “But our bodies have many parts, and God has put each part just where he wants it. How strange a body would be if it had only one part! Yes, there are many parts, but only one body. The eye can never say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you.’ The head can’t say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you.’” 1 Cor. 12:14-20
[1] Viola, Frank. “From Eternity to Here”. David C. Cook. 2009, pp. 175.
[2] Viola, Frank. “From Eternity to Here”. David C. Cook. 2009, pp. 183.
[3] http://www.barna.org/teens-next-gen-articles/147-most-twentysomethings-put-christianity-on-the-shelf-following-spiritually-active-teen-years
[4] Viola, Frank. “From Eternity to Here”. David C. Cook. 2009, pp. 194.
