Let Church be the Church

Acts 1:1-8

Introduction

Think Together – What is the problem with “I’m a Singer”?

Past 12 months, there was a huge trend in Korea. Almost all Korean people were watching a TV-show called “I’m a Singer” on MBC every Sunday evening.  Every week, 7 top pop singers within Korea perform to compete against each other to survive on this singing contest show.

When this show was on TV, every major portal site’s most searched key words were the names of the singers on that show and the title of the songs they sang.

At first, this show was criticized for copying off foreign TV show format “survival competition.” But it brought bigger meaning and huge impact for illuminating the worth of singers who have amazing voices and who has come a long way called music before the public.

There were even people who said to pastors to do “I’m a pastor” as a joke. Young people who were crazy about “Idol singer” who rely more on visual aspects, they began to fall into these singers who touch their hearts with songs interpreted in their own philosophy of music.

But after a year, this TV show encountered a crisis; popularity and viewing rates are continuously declining. Episode by episode, why can’t we help but feel that this is turning into “Their league: It’s about them”? Foremost, people seem to be fed up with the same way of unfolding competition and interviews that pop up every minute like heavy unnecessary seasoning in cooking.

It is almost repulsive when singers themselves take care of and complement each other.  We can also sense some singers on that show, they seem to be very nervous and be sensitive to the rankings on the outside, yet inside they show complacent side thinking, “It’s not a bad deal even if I lose since I already have several chances of appearing on TV and I got fame and popularity as well.”

Is it just this TV show? Recently, Korean President Myongbak Lee is heading toward the end of his term in office, now various problems began to appear on the surface. Every time, presidents start their term, they resolve to do “new politics,” “clear politics,” and “governing for everybody.” But when the term ends, you can see that it is completely different from the picture they drew in the beginning.

Is it the problem occurring only in the world? What about church today? And what about us?

Decline of Christianity in Europe

             According to the travelers who traveled around Europe, Christianity is declining in the Europe which is home to Christianity. A critical evidence is that many church buildings changed into bookstore or restaurants because church gone through financial crisis due to radical reduction of believers. Even churches that remain look terrible since they are not well-maintained.

USA, decline of Christian’s quality

             American Christian community is facing a critical situation. To say it in short, part-time Christians are increasing. They are enrolled in church, and go to service constantly, yet instead of studying the Word of God, they do not even read Bible, and interpret the Word in their own way of convenience. It also appears that there is tendency of being stingy in sharing and serving.

             According to George Barna, an expert on religion-related statistics in the US, in his recently published book, “Futurecast” believers taking arbitrary or convenience focused attitude is the general current in American Christianity. Compared to 10 years ago, believers who believed that Bible is entirely infallible were 46% and now it’s reduced to 30%; people who belied that God is all powerful were 74%, and now it’s reduced to 60%; and there were drastic reduction in believing good works by faith.

             The percentage of believers reading Bible at home was also reduced from 45% to 35%; percentage of attendance in Sunday school reduced from 23% to 15%; regular attendance in worship service reduced as well from 49% to 40%.

Decline of Christianity and Growth of Islam

             While Christianity is declining, Islam is growing drastically after 9/11. Today, Islam is the fastest growing religion in America. It is estimated that Muslim population has reached to 6.7 million. At this moment, there are around 1200 Islam mosques in America; more than 60% of them were built within last 20 years. After 1994, the rate of Muslim growth was 25%. In addition, there are around thousand Islam centers and schools. Constantly, every year, there are around 135,000 people converting to Islam. According to the report, while the Gulf War was going on (1991.1.17~1991.2.28) almost 3000 Americans converted to Islam.

             Where should church go? Just like that TV show, “I’m a Singer” we have encountered an overall crisis. This TV show is airing last episode of the season today so that they can reexamine overall program. They will especially strive to rethink of the purpose and direction they had first intended when the show started. In the same way, I want you and I to seriously think about how we can let church be the church it supposed to be. What was the church when God first gave us? What kind of church we have to go back to? Through Acts chapter 1 I want to share with you.

Body

1.     The foundation of the Church is the Word of God. (v.3)

First, the foundation of the church is the Word of God. Let’s read verses 1~3.

1.      In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach

2.      Until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen.

3.      After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.

             One of the ministries Jesus did on earth was to teach the Word of God. He explained Old Testament scriptures and taught them. He also gave important teachings of heaven. And, as you see on today’s scripture, after the crucifixion on the cross, after resurrection, Jesus taught apostles about kingdom of God over a period of forty days. Jesus kept teaching his disciples and his followers. And on the Word of God and His teachings, Jesus built His church.

Yet, what does the Church today look like? Nowadays, the church does not strongly urge believers to read the Word of God. The church does not encourage believers to carry their own Bible. They no longer need to look up the verses anymore. When there are too many verses to be looked up, believers don’t like it. They consider it tiresome. So now the verses are read before and after the sermon. And powerpoint slides are kindly ready in front of us.

How about Christians? They don’t want to carry that big heavy Bible to church. It seems they don’t consider Bible precious as they did before. In the past, people thought they committed huge crime when they stepped on the Bible. However, it seems today’s Christians lost much of that reverence to Bible. Christians who accidently leave their Bible at Church, they don’t know whether they left it or not until next Sunday. It is because they do not read Bible at home during the week. We cannot deny the fact that church is filled with principles of the world rather than fundamentals of the Bible.

“For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”  (Hebrews 4:12)

This scripture shouldn’t only be recited through our lips, but has to be our life, has to be our faith. But sadly, many churches, many Christians in their priority, they consider other things first rather than putting Word of God first in their life. Many people tend to consider people who live according to the Word as rigid or naïve.

Example Story – Secret Church (David Platt)

Pastor David Platt in his book, “Radical” he shared what he experienced when he visited the secret churches in China. Few years ago, he had a chance to visit secret churches in China. The first day he arrived there, he was asked to lead a Bible study. “We will gather around 2pm, come and teach the Word of God to us.”

Next day, he prepared a simple Bible Study and went to a place where 20 church leaders were gathered.  Even after 8 hours of studying no one showed tiredness, they were all focused. When he taught about the gospel and the Word of God, they asked questions vigorously and continuously. Time passed and it became deep in the night. Everyone wanted to study more but they had to go home. The leader among them asked him, “how about meeting again tomorrow?”

“Of course, it’ll be great! Same time tomorrow?” then people protested and said, “no, no. It will be better to start early in the morning!” and added, “Let’s study whole day, till late at night!”

For ten days, they shared about the gospel and the Word of God. Each day, 8 hours if short, and 12 hours if long, they stayed in one place to share the Word of God. Starting from Genesis to Malachi, they studied together entire Old Testament. When the Old Testament was done, a woman from the group asked, “There is a problem. We learned of the Word in Old Testament, what shall we do about New Testament?” then, everyone nodded. There was no other choice. From that moment, they all studied the New Testament for 11 hours.

Isn’t this what real church supposed to look like? A small space filled with crowd without any empty space. From little children to 70 year old elders, women and men they are all in one place.  Low rooftop, and there is only one bulb on the ceiling lighting up this place. There is no speaker system, there is no praise team, there is no printed program, and there is no comfortable chair. There is no ac or heater. There is only Word of God and the crowd with faith of loving the Word. This is the real church.

Korean churches were revived from Bible Class. In 1907, a great crowd of people who did not know about Christianity gathered from various places in miles and miles away with their children on their backs, hand in hand to Pyongyang. Nothing was available in that place, but the Word of God was read and shared. The Word of God is still alive and it does wonders. In order for the church to be the church, we need to go back to the Word of God.

How often do you read the Word of God, and how much do you strive to live according to the Word? Do you not have time to read the Bible because of so many things going on in your life? You cannot listen to the sermon in worship service because of your serving ministry? Put your busyness down. I urge you to put reading, hearing, and doing the Word of God first in your life. In order to serve others, you first need to eat the Word of God. Without knowing the taste of the Word, how can you encourage others to read it? Only one month has passed. Do resolve to read entire Bible one time this year. How sorry will you be before God, if it is too hard to read Bible one time in a year when you say you have been Christian all your life?

There are things that can be compromised and things that cannot. Time spent on reading the Word should not and must not be compromised. It is because our faith is based on the foundation called the Word. Foundation needs to be firm to do well in everything. I urge you in the name of our Lord to go through this basic training thoroughly.

2.     The Power of the Church is Holy Spirit. (v.5&8)

Secondly, the power of the Church is Holy Spirit. As I do ministry as a pastor this kind of thoughts comes to my mind sometimes. “If that person comes to our church, church will be strengthened enormously.” But after convincing that person to come to church and that person start to attend, at first it seems so good; but as time goes, there are problems that arise. A very experienced pastor gave me an advice, “Pastor Song, be careful of the first person that approaches to you with a welcoming handshake. That person will be in the front line when certain crowd gives you hard time.” I accepted this advice as a warning for me to not to rely too much on a person. Brothers and sisters, when church begins to rely on a certain person, it looks like it’s doing well at first, but consequently, it will go through hard time because of it. Church is not founded by a person.

And some people say church building should be well built. Some say Sunday school facilities need to be well equipped in order for young couples to come to church. And they say church needs to be well decorated. Last year I visited Korea, I found out that many small churches in my neighborhood all built huge buildings. It gave me the impression that “the building evangelizes” was their thoughts. However, it is definitely not true. Businesses like restaurants need to be well decorated in order to attract customers, but the church of God certainly does not need this. In the end, this is how churches declare bankruptcy and church building turn into temples. How sad and how painful is this?

What makes a church to be the church is neither by a building nor by a person. It is possible only through Holy Spirit. Let’s all read Ephesians Chapter 4. In chapter 4, Paul emphasizes the unity of church. For church being the body of Christ to become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ, it needs to be united. In this passage, a very important word was used twice repeatedly, and that is the word unite. It is used in verse 3 and13 one time in each verse.

But in verse 3, make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. In original Greek, this word in verse 3 and verse 13 was written in different tense. Unity in verse 13, it is written in present progressive tense (in the process of getting united), while unity in verse 3, it is written in perfect tense (unity has been completed). In other words, Paul is saying make every effort to keep what God has already made united. While in verse 13, it emphasizes that unity must be continuously pursued to attain. In verse 3, Paul used perfect tense to emphasize that God has already united us as one. Especially, who did Paul say that made us one? It’s not me, it’s not you, it is Holy Spirit who made us united.

I will ask you this question. Then who makes the church united? As Paul is stating clearly, it’s not by us, but by the Holy Spirit; through Holy Spirit, the church becomes the true church. To exaggerate, it is like Holy Spirit doing all the work of cooking and setting entire table, and we with our labor and devotion, just put our spoon on the table to enjoy the feast.

That is why our Lord told his disciples to wait for the Holy Spirit which God the Father promised in today’s passage. Why must they wait? Let’s look at verse 6.

6. So when they met together, they asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

7. He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times of dates the Father has set by his own authority.

8. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

When Holy Spirit comes upon the church, church receives power.  This is the mystery of the church. Didn’t Jesus promise his disciples?

 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given to you.  (John 15:7)

Example Story – Grace Korean Church and its Mission work

If you go to LA, there is a church filled with Spirit called Grace Korean Church. This church goes to spread gospel in places deep in the jungle every year to the tribes that never heard of the gospel. Deep in the jungle, they go in, do VBS, and do medical mission, and dig up well for them. On the last evening, they invite all people from that region and neighboring communities to show a movie about Jesus. They all have never been to a theater before, so they are astounded by the movie that is shown on big white fabric screen. And many people weep and decide to believe in Jesus.  So on the last day, in the morning the mission team was setting up chairs and screen to prepare for the movie presentation. Suddenly the rain started to fall. If it rains, it is impossible to show movie with the projector. They went to the neighbor villages and advertised about the movie, and told them to make it to that evening no matter what, they were so discouraged. So mission team gathered together and started to pray. They gathered every hour and prayed, yet it would only rain harder as time passed. Evening was approaching, but there was no sign of rain stopping. The harder it rained, they prayed louder. When the hour arrived, and they were about to give up, at that moment, the rain suddenly stopped. What was more astounding is that the villagers from other villages came during the movie presentation, and asked them, “how come it doesn’t rain here?” those villages were drenched with rain. They found out that only place the rain actually stopped was movie presenting space while it was pouring on other neighbor villages.

When your son is big and strong, and yet gets bullied in school, you would say to him, “Come on, where are you going to use your power?” I think God will have the same thoughts. Brothers and sisters, where are you going to use your power? When Holy Spirit comes upon us, we receive power. Shouldn’t we strive to attain this?

The power of the church is being filled with the Spirit. I urge and bless you to be filled with the Spirit so that this church can receive power to shake up families, regions, nations, and tribes.

3.     The purpose of the church is to witness.

Thirdly, the purpose of the church is to witness. Church needs to be built on firm foundation called the Word, and needs to receive power from Holy Spirit. What is the ultimate purpose of these? Let’s look at verse 8.

8. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

The ultimate reason and purpose for receiving the power of the Word and Holy Spirit is to be a witness. These are very deeply connected and related, they cannot be separated. Have you seen a church that had firm foundation in the Word, and was filled with the Spirit, yet was not diligent in being witness of the gospel? Have you seen any mission-oriented church that was cold as ice? The Christian company Life Way did research on the characteristics of healthy churches that are growing.  Among very important characteristics, being mission-oriented was one of them. In the church that does missions you can feel the liveliness. They give feelings of being alive. We feel that the congregation of that church is joyful. In Romans chapter 10, Paul says

13. For, Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

14. How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?

15. And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

(Romans 10:13~15)

Look at your feet. Well, are they beautiful? Before this passage, Paul talks about faith. “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”(v9) One who believes that Jesus has solved the problem of his sin and believe that he is saved, this person will witness to others for sure. Because that joy and gratitude is so great, he will tell it to his family, his friends, and his neighbor again and again. You should seriously think about it if you have believed in Jesus for long time, yet you are not interested in witnessing or are ashamed of the gospel. You ought to ask yourself, “do I have the true faith?”

Example Story – If you found the cure to the cancer…

Let’s just think that I was in serious condition because I have cancer. I had no possibility of living, yet one day, I took this medicine and the cancer was completely gone. I got to experience this groundbreaking work of the medicine, and it saved me from this deadly disease. Then, wouldn’t you tell them about this medicine to your family, friends, or your neighbors?

Example Story – George Whitefield, “I had rather wear out than rust out.”

In the 18^th Century, among great preachers who led the Great Awakening in America was George Whitefield. He led Revival movement in England when he was 22 years old, and led Great Awakening in the new world when he was 25 years old; 80% of Americans have heard of his sermon at least once, and more than 10 million people have accepted Jesus Christ by his sermon. He went around New England in America (6 states in East coast) on horses to preach. He would often fall from horses, and accepting sermon requests from many places his health was deteriorating fast. He would often say this to his friends.

“Let my name be forgotten, let me be trodden under the feet of all men, if Jesus may thereby be glorified… Let my name die everywhere, let even my friends forget me, if by that means the cause of the blessed Jesus may be promoted…”

Whitefield went back and forth all around England and New England to preach the gospel of Christ with his life. In 1970, he was resting in a inn in Boston because he was feeling sick, people came in the middle of the night and begged him to preach the Word of God.  He preached for the last time, and He went to the Lord. Before he preached, he said this to his friend who was trying to stop him. “I had rather wear out than rust out.”

Please do remember that the purpose of church’s existence and purpose our existence is to witness the gospel. We were only interested in our health, body, and money, and had no interest in witnessing the gospel; let’s change so that we can wear out for the gospel.

Conclusion

In order for a church to be the church, we need to go back to the church God first made. The foundation of the church is the Word of God which is still alive and works within our lives. The power of the church is not “me” but Holy Spirit. The purpose of Church’s existence is witnessing the gospel. I urge and bless in the name of our Lord so that we can make this our hope and vision for the church.