Have you committed yourself to be a member of a local church? If not, why not? Why would you want to stay detached? Why would you think that being detached is something that Christ would want you to do? You’re listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith. I’m David Pick. And Colin, we’re picking up on your idea that it’s very important for us to be involved in the local church. But what is the problem? Why can’t I be a Christian and not engaged with the local church? Well, think about this. The church is the body of Christ. Now, for a Christian to be disconnected from the body, that’s a little bit like having a hand lying in the street, disconnected from the body, a severed hand or a severed leg or a severed foot. I mean, there’s something grotesque about that image. The very nature of a body is that its parts belong together. Jesus Christ is the head. The church is the body of Christ. So anyone who belongs to Christ, by definition, is and has to be part of the body. And Jesus Christ loved the church, gave himself for the church. He died on the cross in order to bring the church into being. And he does his work in the world through the body of believers. So what we want to do in this series is to help you see the church as Jesus sees it. The world doesn’t think much of the church, but Jesus loves the church. And those who become like Jesus love the church, too. I hope that as we get into the scriptures, that’s going to get into your heart. And if you’re not already connected to a local church, that you will become part of the body of Christ. Because here’s a way in which you can honour the Lord who loves you. So today we’re in Ephesians chapter 1. As we continue our message, the body. Here’s Colin. Now, Christ displays his glory through the gathering of believers. Why would you not want to be part of that? To belong to the body of Christ? To serve the body of Christ? To give to the body of Christ? To live and to die for the body of Christ? There is no greater privilege for a believer in this world. And when you grasp that we are the body of Christ, that was the whole point of the message last week, you will begin to see this in a whole new light. See, the gas station, the movie theatre, the drugstore, the big box retailer, they are all means to an end. But the church is not a means to an end. The church is an end to itself. Because God places supreme value on the gathering of local congregations of believers. In fact, as we saw last week, this has been his great purpose throughout history. What did we learn from the Heidelberg Catechism? That out of the entire human race from the beginning of the world until its end, what is God doing? He gathers, he protects, and he preserves for himself a community of people, chosen for eternal life and united in one faith. And the Father therefore has exalted Christ the Son over all things. Why? For the church. For the church. And friends, thinking this through, that is why the primary strategy for evangelism in the New Testament is to plant churches. We should think about that. The primary strategy in the New Testament for evangelism is to plant churches. The book of Acts, just read it. What does Paul do? He goes into one city after another. And he preaches the gospel, and he gathers a few converts, and he establishes a church. And then he goes back to the same places a short time later, and he establishes elders in all of these churches. Why? Because God’s great purpose is more than that people should be converted. It is to gather his church. Because the bringing together of this new community that one day will be glorified in heaven, as we thought last week about the great multitude gathered in the presence of Jesus, this is his plan of salvation. It’s not a kind of detachable extra. Because the head works through the body. And the great apostolic vision was that in every great center of population, there should be a body through whom the head will work. So Paul did more than lead people to Christ. That’s half a strategy. He planted churches, local congregations of believers, gathered by God for worship and sent out by God to serve. Now I hope this is stimulating you to think in the light of the word of God in a fresh way, and perhaps a new way, about the place of the local church in the great purpose of God. Now let’s at this point move from learning to application. And I want simply to offer to you today five applications, five ways in which we can learn particularly from this analogy of the body of Christ, the body of which Christ is the head. Here’s number one. Christ is the head of the church. I just want us to grasp that and to take hold of it. The church belongs to Jesus Christ. It’s Christ’s not because we decided to make him the head. It’s Christ’s because he is the head and he’s decided to make us the body. Christ has gathered us as his people together. We are his people, absolutely. And the body serves at the direction of the head. We draw our life from the head. We are utterly useless without the head. We can do all that the head purposes to do by the power that comes from the head. And we are called to be responsive to him. Christ is the head of the church. Second, every believer, every member of the body needs to be connected to the head. I hope you’re reading one of the books that we’ve been recommending or some book about the church in the course of this month so that we’re really learning and making some progress together. One of these books is by John Stott. And if you’re reading that one, you’ll have noticed on the very first page he says this. He talks about the grotesque anomaly of an unchurched Christian. That’s strong language, isn’t it? He says, I hope that none of my readers are that grotesque anomaly, an unchurched Christian. Now, we must be very careful not to press any analogy too far. Pictures are pictures and how we understand them and what we draw from them must be controlled by other scriptures. We must always remember that we are saved by grace through faith in Christ and the thief on the cross so often referred to arrived in heaven truly without ever having been part of a local congregation. But that is an anomaly. It really is. And that is John Stott’s point. Just last week, and I got to say I hadn’t thought about it in connection with today’s message, but just last week, Karin and I watched the film 127 Hours. Have you seen that one? Oh my. It is the story, the true story of Aaron Ralston from Indiana who back in 2003 got himself trapped in a canyon in Utah when a falling rock trapped his right arm. And nobody knew where Aaron was. And the reason the film is called 127 Hours is that this man was trapped and stuck there for 127 hours. Can you imagine this? With his arm trapped behind an unmovable rock. And in the end there was only one solution. My wife left the room when we got to this part of the film. He had only a dull knife with him. But you may remember this story from these years ago being so widely reported. Aaron cut off his own arm. It was the only way to survive. He’s gone on to be a motivational speaker. He’s an extraordinary adventurer, this fellow. Aaron can get along without his right arm. But he surely would be glad if there was any way for him to get that arm back. And that image is very vivid having seen the film in my mind right now because that is how it is with the church. One writer talks about amputated saints. That is Christian believers who are severed from the body of Christ. Detached. Belonging nowhere. And they have therefore neither the capacity to grow nor the opportunity to serve. How can you grow or how can you serve if you’re detached from the body? So I challenge you. I ask you today. Have you committed yourself to be a member of a local church? If not, why not? Why would you want to stay detached? Why would you think that being detached is something that Christ would want you to do? You know, thinking about this image, the Gospels tell us the story about the night that Jesus was arrested. And you remember that on that occasion as that group came with clubs and so forth to arrest our Lord Jesus Christ, do you remember how Peter drew his sword? And he cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest, a man by the name of Malchus. Now, I’m absolutely convinced that cutting off this guy’s ear wasn’t what Peter had in mind. I mean, this would have been a two-handed sword. And this man’s called Malchus. I think he was going to try and split him down the middle, you know, Mal on one side and Cus on the other. And he missed. And what he did was he cut off the man’s ear. And so this ear is lying on the ground. It was severed. And what use is an ear when it is severed from the body? The body needs the ear and the ear needs the body. And Luke tells us that Christ touched the man’s ear and healed him. Can you imagine Jesus picking up from the dust this limp piece of flesh and sealing it to the body? And I’ll tell you, folks, that is what I’m praying Christ will do for some of us here today. You’re a detached Christian. You’ve been a lone ranger for far too long. You’ve thought that all that really matters is me and my salvation. Me picking up the products that are out there in the spiritual market. And I’m praying that in his great mercy, as you understand what the body of Christ is and how central it is to his purpose, that Christ, as it were, will wonderfully and invisibly in your heart be sealing you into the body and that you will know through the scriptures that the Holy Spirit of God is saying to you, this is where you belong and I am placing you here to do my will. You’re listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and our message, The Body. It’s all about how Christ is working through the church. It’s part of our series, What is the Church and Why Does It Matter? And if you’ve missed any of the series or if you want to listen again, why not come online to our website, that’s openthebible.org.uk. You can listen to any of our previously broadcast messages. You can also find us if you go looking for a podcast. That may be a better way for you to listen to our message and that’s available on your regular podcasting site. Just search for Open the Bible UK. Back to our message now. Here’s Colin. Here’s the third application. Every member of the body not only must be connected to the head, but every member of the body must be responsive to the head. This is also an important point. You may be a member of the church but not functioning in any living way. Now, there is a story in the New Testament again about a man who had a shriveled hand. Do you remember that story? Jesus met this man and he had a withered, the Bible says, hand. There was no function in this man’s hand. Now, it was connected to the body. It was part of the body. But it wasn’t doing anything useful for the body. It had lost the capacity to function. There was some breakdown between the commands of the brain and the function of this particular limb. Do you remember the Lord Jesus Christ said to this man, Stretch out your hand. I always find that fascinating because that was the one thing in the world that this man couldn’t do. Jesus, what are you saying, stretch out your hand? That’s the one thing I can’t, I can’t stretch out my hand, it’s shriveled. You know, I don’t have any function. Jesus says, stretch out your hand. And the scripture simply says, and he stretched out his hand and he was healed. And I want to say to someone today, I don’t know who you are, but my prayer is that the Holy Spirit would apply this. You’ve come to think of yourself as someone who has nothing to contribute. You’ve come to think of yourself as someone who is unable to function. And I say to you today that connected to Jesus Christ, you draw life from him. And in as much as his spirit lives within you, in as much as you are indeed joined to the body of Christ, he says to you today, stretch out your hand. And you are able to fulfill the work that he has for you to do. That’s our calling together. Look, folks, we are gathered by Christ for worship. We are sent out by Christ for service. And he works through his body. If people are to experience the love of Christ, how are they going to do it? Yes, he can do it directly, but people are first going to experience the love of Christ as they experience it mediated through the members of his body. That’s why it is often said, we are in this sense his hands and we are in this sense his feet. What a privilege to see that vision. Every member of the church connected to the head, every member of the body responsive to the head. Here’s a fourth application. Every member of the body will suffer with the head. I have to say it because it’s true and it’s all the way through the New Testament. I’m calling you today to reconsider service for Christ, engagement with the body. And I have to be honest to say to you, you cannot be a pastor, you cannot be a missionary, you cannot be a faithful member of the body of Christ without suffering wounds. The body of Christ will always have scars. Think about the incarnation, the physical body of Christ. He takes a physical body born there in the manger. And what happens to that physical body of Christ? It is lacerated, it is pierced, it is broken. It was the body in which he suffered. And it was the world, the unbelieving world that inflicted this pain on the body of Jesus. And if you read Christian history, you will see that for 2000 years the world has overwhelmingly hated the church which is the body of Christ. It always has and it always will. Jesus says if the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. Don’t expect the world to love you for serving me, Jesus is saying. So I’m saying to you that if you devote your life to serving Christ in the body, you will have wounds to show for it at the end. Paul says we always carry about in our body, I carry about in my body, the death of Jesus. And I do it so that the life of Jesus will be manifest in others. I’m giving you a challenge. We all want to be part of a healthy body. But the body of which Christ is the head is also a despised body and it is a suffering body in this world. And some of you do suffer from scars that came to you in the course of serving Christ in the body. Scars suffered in the body are evidence that you are joined to the head. Whose brow was crowned with thorns. And whose hands were pierced. And whose feet were pierced. For no other reason than that he was doing the will of the Father in heaven. The body of Christ will always be known by its scars. Many years ago a pastor by the name of Joseph Parker spoke about the occasion when Doubting Thomas came to faith in Christ after the resurrection of Jesus. And you remember that Thomas said these famous words. He said to the disciples, unless I see the prints of the nails in his hands, I will not believe. I’m not going to believe unless I see the prints of the nails in his hands. And Joseph Parker’s comment was this. What Thomas said of Christ, the world is saying of the church. Unless we see in your hands the print of the nails, we will not believe. The body, the physical body of Jesus was broken for the life of the world. Broken for the life of the world. So how then as the body of Christ, the church, can we get to the place of thinking that we should be living within cautiously safe limits. Where did we get the idea that the highest good for the body of Christ is ministry marked by comfort and convenience. How does that fit? It doesn’t. One writer says Christ still wants to say to men, this is my body broken for you. And for this to have any credence, the church which is his body must become broken bread and poured out wine for the life of the world. Ready for that? Are you a living member of the body of Christ or are you a consumer of programs? The last thing simply to say is this very briefly. That as every member of the body will share the suffering of the head, so gloriously every member of the body will be glorified with the head. One day the scarred body of the church, the body that has so often been weak and feeble. The body that has been so despised in the world and hated and persecuted. That whole body is going to be taken up together into the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that scarred body will become like his glorious body. Think of it, the head of Jesus, the head that once was crowned with thorns is crowned with glory now. And this body, the body of Christ in the world. Known by its scars will on that day be known by its glory. And you will say, I am so glad that I am part of the body of Christ. You’ve been listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and the message The Body. It’s all about how Christ is working through the church and we’ve been seeing how we can learn from the body analogy. Every member of the body will suffer with the head who is Jesus. But every member will also be glorified with the head. And if you’ve missed any of the series, don’t forget you can always go online, come to our website, that’s openthebible.org.uk And you can listen again to any of the messages that have already been broadcast. Open the Bible is supported by our listeners, that’s people just like you. And this month, if you’re able to begin supporting us with a new donation in the amount of £5 per month or more, we’d love to send you a free gift. It’s an Advent devotional and it’s called The Coming of the King by J.C.Royal. Colin, who would you say this book is written for? Well, let me give you a couple of answers. One would be anyone who wants to prepare well for Christmas. Another would be anyone who loves the Lord Jesus Christ, because that’s what this book is about. It is about the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ and about the return of the Lord Jesus Christ. These are short readings for Advent. They help us to prepare for Christmas and they focus the light and all the attention on Jesus Christ himself. I love this little book because of its focus on Christ and because of the way that it builds faith and brings hope. Just a couple of pages to read each day and very simple, very clear and wonderfully Christ-centred. Well, we’d love to send you a copy of this book if you’d like to join many other Christians in supporting the work of Open the Bible this month. If you’re able to set up a new donation in the amount of £5 per month or more, we’d love to send you this book. Full details on our website, openthebible.org.uk. For Open the Bible and Pastor Colin Smith, I’m David Pick and I very much hope you’ll join us again soon. Have you ever felt like giving up on the church? Most Christians feel this way at some point. Find out why next time on Open the Bible.