What the Church Is Really About

This is North Way, tape number 496. This message, What the Church is Really All About, was delivered by Pastor Jay Passavant of North Way Christian Community on April 27, 1986. You know, if we've mentioned this morning specifically, I want to particularly welcome our visitors today. Week by week, the Lord sends people who've never been here before. And you're special to us. We realize that our church is a place where you're confronted with a lot of things that may be new and different. Expressive worship, people who literally talk in church, where people talk about being healed. And you know something? It is so different that people come, and it's so different than what they were told religion was all about, that they don't come back. How many of you would just raise your hand right now and say, this isn't just a passing fad, this is reality that we're walking in here? Amen? Glory to God. And so if you're visiting, those hands are raised for you as a testimony to stand on here with us, and hear the Lord, and be part of what God is doing through his son Jesus today. Last week, many of you honored me by celebrating my birthday. And I have truly buffeted my body this week. And I want you to know that after playing that same basketball game that Scott was wounded in, and Gary, I then flew out to California and back in three days. That sounds really glamorous. Let me tell you something. That's a long time to sit there. Your biological clock is goofed up. Then I get back, and it's turned the clock ahead another hour a day, you know? So I'm not sure even what day it is. I think it's Sunday. But I believe God that he has a word for us today. Tuesday morning, the Lord spoke to my heart that he wanted us to look at what the church is really all about today in the word. And I want you to turn with me to Romans 12 so that we can move from the basis of the word of God and see what the Holy Spirit says through his word that the church is really all about. Romans 12, verse 9. Follow with me as I read, would you? Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil, cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. Boy, that's so easy to read. How many of you find that so easy to do? Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord. God, I'd love it if you just said once in a while, I'll be lacking in zeal. I need a break, but he says never. Verse 12, be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with God's people who are in need. Practice hospitality. Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice. Mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath. For it is written, it is mine to avenge. I will repay, says the Lord. On the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he's thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Amen. 15 years ago, when I first started my seminary training, we needed money to eat as well as to go to school. And so I ventured off answering an ad that said, Kirby vacuum salesman needed. Why are you laughing about that? And so, how many of you sold Kirbys here? All right. And so I went and I had three days of intense training before I ever even walked out to sell my first vacuum cleaner. And this training was, this guy had been a Marine Corps drill sergeant, I know it. The way he just kept hitting all the different details of this thing. He showed you how to make what I would call contained messes on a carpet, just in case it didn't work real well. All that kind of a thing. He showed you how the machine worked from the inside out. I knew everything about the Kirby vacuum sweep. At the end of those three days, I was exhausted. I didn't know if I wanted to go on, but I remember him saying something like this. Now tomorrow, men, you're going out to make your first sale. And that'll prove the difference between what you know and who you are. I found out I was not a Kirby salesman. You know what I ended up doing instead? Cleaning carpets. I got into a carpet cleaning business and made some extra money that way. I learned something, but I wasn't a Kirby salesman. You know, beloved, the church today is much like that statement revealed. We know a lot, but there's quite a difference between what we know and who we are. In most places that I visit, there is a mentality of more and more input, more and more teaching, more and more training. The TV set is loaded. The radio waves are loaded. And all these are good things. I have no quarrel with them. But there's such a difference between what I know up here and who I am in here. Amen. There is such a mentality in this day toward meetings in the church. We just had a wonderful meeting the three days of last weekend on evangelism training. And I want you to know, you look like evangelists. Turn to someone and say, you look like an evangelist. Tell them that. Tell them you look like one. You look like one, Rob. All right? And if you were here for those nine hours of training, you know what to do. But beloved, there is a gap. How many of you found this week there's a gap between what you know and who you are? How many, anyone get a strike or two this week? A walk? A single? Who got a single? Praise the Lord. Anyone hit a home run this week? Glory to God. All right, a home run by the way is, are they here today, you think? Praise the Lord. Is when you share the gospel with someone, they receive Jesus and they come to be part of the church. That's a grand slam. Sorry, Carl. All right. Carl would know, I won't quarrel with him. You see, beloved, you can look, you know, you look so spiritual in a meeting. You can look like you know everything. You can have a, you know, seven inch thick Bible. But what you know and who you are need to be woven together as one message to the people. When we were in Florida, I heard on the radio of it, an evangelist coming to one of the big central Florida churches. There's some huge churches there with all kinds of people. And the radio ad was talking about, now come early so you can find room to park to get into this meeting. Because this is going to be a meeting like no other meetings ever been. And on and on they went. But you know something, beloved? I don't see the New Testament talking a whole lot about meetings. In fact, there's not a lot of reference later on after the second chapter of Acts to that meeting at Pentecost. You know, you don't see the apostles. Well, you remember Pentecost? What a meeting. I mean, the Holy Ghost really came at that meeting, right? They don't worship meetings. What they were were men and women who were out there living what they knew to be true. Church, listen, I have absolutely no brief against meetings. We need quality meetings. In fact, it's a grief of my heart that some of us have yet just pick and choose our meetings. We have a man of God that comes to tell us about what the Holy Spirit's doing in China. And so few of us feel like that's important. I want to tell you, we don't call meetings here just to be busy. We call meetings because what we believe God is sending us in the way of apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers are people who can equip you to live the Christian life. But the meeting isn't where it happens. It's when you leave the meeting that what's important takes place. How many of you know that you can understand patience as a biblical doctrine, but until that person walks up to you 20 minutes late for a meeting that you had to go to together, maybe for your job or whatever, you don't know what patience is all about until you can look him in the eye and say, I love you, brother. It doesn't, it's fine. Bless God. You can understand what forgiveness is all about. You can know the doctrine. Now you can take me to Matthew 18 and say, well, there's three steps. But until you hear someone who said something unkind about you and you know it's in God's commandment to forgive them, then you don't know forgiveness really. You just know it up here. And so beloved, we need to see today the difference between who we are as a church and what we know about being a church. And I wanna say to you today, this is what the church is really all about. What it's really all about, beloved, is closing the gap between what we know and who we are and making them one. And do you know how that happens? One word, relationships. It happens in relationship. What the church is really all about, beloved, is relationships. Now we have, so many of us have been brought up in a religious tradition that told us that what we were with God is between he and I. It's no one else's, but how many of you were taught that religion is a private thing? That word, it's a, well, I wanna say, first of all, that the only way we can have relationship one to another is by having a relationship with God. And if you're here today and you have seen religion in your life as something that you were to do in order to gain favor with God, now be honest with yourself. You may have gone to a church for 40 years where you were told that if you did these things, God would accept you. If you prayed these prayers, if you gave this money, if you did these things, God would accept you. And if you didn't, God wouldn't, and you'd go to hell. And that's been your religion. But I'm here to say today that there is a better way. There's the way of relationship. God so loved the world that he sent, not a religion, but his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him will not perish, but have eternal life. You see, it's faith in Jesus Christ. It's not a church. It's not this church, or the Presbyterians, or the Methodists, or the Catholics, or the Baptists. It's relationship to Jesus Christ that brings us close to God. How many of you find that to be true in your life? It's relationship. And so we begin by relating to one another through our heavenly father. And I could read many scriptures about that today. I just wanna go on. The whole idea of isolation is over, beloved. The idea of being separated, cut off, is over. God wants us to be in relationship. You know one of the things that, in our culture, I just don't wanna become a spiritual fueling stop. I just don't wanna be, you know, we drive on up here to North Way, and we find a place to park over across the street or whatever, and find our way down here, and get pumped up, and then go back out again. Because you know what that ultimately comes down to? It will begin to be just isolated, impersonal, and I think ultimately, arrogant and prideful people. How many of you have been to one of these in and out kind of gas stations where the person is behind one of these booths? I mean, don't you love it when you walk up there to pay? And you know, and over these speakers that could cover half of the North Hills, they say, $2, you know? And you look around. You know, all you wanna do is just take my money, and you don't need to have an announcement here for the population. And there's something about that glass booth and that microphone, that thing coming out that's so depersonalizing. I just love that when a guy would come out and touch my car and clean it, stuff like that. And the church better not ever become that, you know? Put a little booth up here, and say, well, turn to this scripture. And you know, we just go through the motions of it. We may know a lot at the end of that, but beloved, we won't become what God wants us to be. And so I just wanna highlight for you, because time's limited this morning, I just, I think those testimonies were great. And what the Lord is doing so exemplifies what I'm saying. I want you to just jot down these four things. Get a pencil and paper out. Our relationships are, number one, based on covenant. Based on covenant. We are secure in the Lord Jesus because of his covenant love. In the Old Testament, that word, it's a beautiful word study, by the way, is the Hebrew word hesed, H-E-S-E-D. Covenant love. Covenant love is this. It's God's promise to love you no matter what. Anybody here that's glad that God doesn't qualify his love for you based on how well you're doing? You know that God doesn't say, you know, he just had a quiet time in three days. I'm just gonna cut off my love, that's all. Now, if some of you live in that, I've heard some of you say, you know, I did my quiet time, but that's why nothing happened. Now, it's true that our quiet times give us, you know, that communion with God, but it doesn't affect God's love, church. It's a covenant. A covenant means something. It's an unbreakable promise. And Jesus said, now, listen to these words. I'm gonna read them for you. In the Gospel of John, chapter 13. A new command I give you, love one another as I have loved you, so you must love one another. John 13, verse 34. The love that God loves us is a covenant love. He loves us consistently, day by day, moment by moment, not up one day and down the next, but a covenant love. And he says, that's the kind of love you're to have in your relationships. Now, who's the hardest person to have covenant love with? Don't say me. Who is it? Come on. Not grandma, it's your spouse, right? Hey, listen, I think our culture is telling us that 50%, 50% of our culture, 50% experienced divorce. Wasn't it a blessing to hear Bill and Marge confess that? Wasn't it? That God secured their relationship, not just to him, but to one another. I'll tell you, right there it is. Touching God, loving one another. Covenant love. And covenant love, I heard someone say this once, is I, listen, I give up my right to quit. When you have covenant love towards someone, you give up your right to quit. They may deserve to have you walk out on them. They may have just done the lousiest thing. They may have even violated you. They may have been unfaithful to you. But covenant love means that you give up your right to quit. People who come to me and say, well, you know, I just can't take it anymore. The lights in this church are so bad, I'm leaving. I mean, that's it. Covenant love says, no, I give up my right to have life. I have my right right over me. Covenant love does not quit, no matter what happens, no matter how deep the violation. And I'll tell you, church, it takes a great deal of love sometimes, doesn't it, to overcome an offense. Someday I wanna talk to you about how to do that, how to get past an offense when someone violates you. Now, secondly, covenant love is based on, rather, bonded in companionship. Covenant love is bonded in companionship. I love the word in Greek for companion. It's the word synegomai, which means, listen, to work side-by-side together. That's what a companion is. A companion is someone that's right there with you, side-by-side, working through things together with you. John, the apostle, says that he was a companion of Jesus Christ in the book of Revelation. Who was the great illustrative relationship of being a companion one to another of the apostles? Paul and Timothy, all right? Paul and Timothy, companions. Paul says that in Philippians chapter two, about verse 24. Jesus sent the disciples out. How? Two by two, companions, one beside the other. If you look around this church every once in a while, if you're here any length of time, you'll see people who have companions in Christ. And you know what I find? People who have a companion are very often the ones who are growing most profoundly. I just, I can think of different ones who have found a friend to work with them in the yoke of the gospel. And I just think it's great if someone hadn't done that with me and become my companion when I was a college student in the late 60s, I certainly wouldn't be here today. I remember when this fellow's name was John White, was with me all the time. I used to want to get rid of him, you know? I just, because he was always there. And I really wasn't that open to what he was trying to do in my life. And I remember when I was being rushed for a fraternity, you know how important that was. How many of you people have been rushed for a fraternity and you really wanted to get in it and all that stuff? Okay. And this guy in the eyes of this fraternity, well, they didn't really want him. They wanted me to come in, but they didn't want him. And I said, John, you know, I'll see you two weeks from yesterday somewhere. I was so proud. I was so, you know, and yet God had sent that man as my companion and he began to work with me and he changed my life. Now I look around here and I see some of you who have a companion in Christ. Somebody that's linked with you and growing in the gospel, working together, but many of you do not. And what will make the difference in your spiritual pilgrimage is finding someone to be a companion, bonded in companionship. How many of you were here last week when Gary shared, Gary Beasley, you were here for this sermon, okay? I asked Gary at Carl Adler's home after that sermon, I said, Gary, to what do you attribute your growth in Christ and your ability to minister the word of God in such clarity and so on and power? You know what he said? Well, he said, this guy named Francis Infuso, it was his friend, asked me to start traveling with him and become a companion. He didn't use that word, but he said, just to be a friend and to learn how to minister. And so I traveled all around the country with him, 50 meetings or so I went with him and watched him. And then, you know, in the motel afterwards and over at restaurants, over meals. And then I moved out to live in the same town with him. I became yoked together. And beloved, some of you right now, listen, there's a craving in your heart. You want more than anything for someone to yoke with you. And I wanna say, you heard people today say, in my home group, I found someone that'll yoke with me. I found a Walden Doris Spiker. You say, I want something else, needs to be made clear right now. Those people, God bless them, I don't know how old Bill and Marge are, but they're not in their twenties. Well, they just look like that. She was arguing with my discernment there. And I just think it's marvelous that God doesn't stop when you're 30 years old. Why to hear a few more of those here? Okay. It's never too late is what I'm saying to yoke together with another, never too late. And God wants us to do that, to bond us together. Let's move on. Number three, relationship in the church is bound by commandment. Well, we don't like to have anyone tell us, this is what you need to do. We don't like that. We're Americans. We don't want anyone to say, you must do this. But Jesus, who is the authority above whom no one exercises authority, he said in the gospel of John, as I just read, this is my commandment. A new commandment, he called it. Love one another as I have loved you. So you must love one another. And I read in the book of Romans the same thing. Love must be sincere. One of the things that grieves me is the way that we have ordained that relationships are optional. Well, I guess, you know, there's something I can choose to do or not choose to do. And in a sense, that is right. But to not choose to be related in the body of Christ, in the church, is to violate the commandment of God. And I wanna say, here's a word that we like even less than commandment. When one chooses to withdraw and be isolated and just kind of me and my family, and we're one unit and that's all I need. You know what that is, beloved? That's sin. It grieves the heart of God. Last week, we were taught that that was the sin of omission, omitting to do something that God had ordained in his word that we were to do together. And it's not easy to love in response to a commandment. You know what the Hebrew word for enemy is? What's the opposite of a friend? Well, it's an enemy, right? You know what the Hebrew word for enemy is? It comes from the word that means to watch. An enemy is someone who watches. Ever had the feeling that when you got in trouble, some people would be there at your side and others would just kind of watch? I've had people say, well, we're not getting involved right yet. We're just kind of watching to see what happens. I never understood before. Why is that related to being an enemy? Because you're withholding what's in your power to give. You're watching, you're just... So it doesn't take a violation. It just takes indifference. And the church is all about people who understand that we are bound, bound by the commandment of God to love one another. And church is what the world needs so much. My heart, as I travel around, you know what, I see so many churches that have things going on. There's all kinds of meetings. There's all kinds of concerts. There's all kinds of satellite explosions and word of faith, this and that. And they're all wonderful. But the quality of love that God commanded is the thing that Jesus said that all the world would know that we are his disciples by seeing that love. And it does not happen. Someone says, well, what are you saying? Jade, you're saying that unless I'm in a home group that I'm not acceptable. I was praying about this. And you know something, church? The Lord really spoke to my heart that home groups, home groups are only a necessary expression of relationship because we're not able to do it on our own. It's kind of like, if you'll forgive the expression, training wheels until you learn to ride on that bicycle of relationship. It helps us to be related. How many of you floated through churches? And if you're honest, you went through churches, but when it came down to it, you really weren't in relationship. You weren't bonded. You weren't a companion of anybody. And so our home group ministry is there to help put you into a place where you can touch someone and respond to that command. Finally, our relationships in the church are building toward completion. The one characteristic of a true relationship in Christ, beloved, is that we desire more than anything else for that other brother or sister to succeed. Are you hearing me? Are you desirous of someone else that you're related to to succeed? God wants you to know success. He wants you to know fulfillment. He said in the book of Psalms, but the one whose delight is in the law of the Lord and on this law does he meditate day and night, he is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does shall prosper. Agape love is wanting another person's good, even if it means that you'll sacrifice your own. When we were in Bakersfield, Friday morning, Fred and I met with a couple of men who were pastoring a growing church there. And I don't know what your image of Bakersfield is like, but part of the adjustment that I always go through is realizing that not everybody has the same values that we do here in cultured North Pittsburgh. The pastor of this particular church, the name was, of course, Billy Joe. And Billy Joe had recently come to the area from, of course, Tulsa, Oklahoma, faith capital of the world. And he was a dear brother that I immediately, and it's kind of just like, nice, easygoing guy, good sense of humor and all that. And he started talking about what's happening in churches there in Bakersfield and different things that had happened there in the last couple of years. And the enemy was attacking, of course, as he always does. But he said something to us that was really profound. And he gave a message to Fred that I thought was very significant. He said this, he said, I'm glad that you're considering coming here to Bakersfield to join us. He said, in fact, we'll do anything to help you get established. We'll do whatever we can, if the Lord sends you here, to make your work successful. And I rejoiced at that. I thought, well, that's love. Because he could see Fred coming as a threat. He could see this as another church that's gonna take away some of my people. He even invited him to use the building that they're meeting in, to bless them. And church, we so need to see that toward one another. We need to see that kind of attitude. I want you to be blessed, even if it costs me some attention, some recognition. You see, the relationships in the world that I see, beloved, are so often motivated by, I gotta watch out for you. I'm not sure that I like what you're doing. Criticism, complaining, and finally competing. Those three things characterize most of the relationships in the world that I see. Until, you know, everything's fine until you go over the line. Now suddenly, hey, now you're on my turf. Now we're competing for the same promotion. Now you're starting to meddle in what's really my life. Jesus came and said, I came to give you life and life abundant. He said to Matthew, come and follow me. He said to Peter, come and follow me and I'll make you a fisher of men. Beloved, right here in our church, there are many people whose lives were once broken, disillusioned from hurts in other churches. There are a number of pastors here in our church today who come as broken people. And I want you to know that as long as I can be part of this ministry, I'm committed to completing you in the gospel of Jesus Christ. I'm committed to you, each one of you, beloved, that you wanna be all that God wants you to be. And it does my heart a great, great joy. It just brings up such excitement in my spirit to talk to different ones, to see ones that were once nowhere in God, now are serving him with all their heart. When we were out there, we had a chance to meet with Bruce and Kathy Bain, whom we are supporting as they go through seminary. In fact, Kathy's here right now, this morning. Wave, Kathy. Praise the Lord, you see her afterwards. And to hear Bruce in the middle of having lots and lots of responsibility and having her third child on the way and entering into a doctoral program that's gonna take three or four more years of full-time work, not having the stuff that they need, but hearing him say, yeah, I wouldn't be anywhere else because I'm in the will of God. I'm completing what God wants me to be. Church, that's what we're all about. And so I say to you, this is the kind of church that we wanna be all about. Put up those four things again, would you, Paula, Nancy? This is the kind of church that we wanna be, beloved. Based on covenant, bonded together in companionship, bound by commitment, building toward completion. We may never have the greatest music ministry the world's ever seen. We may never have the biggest Sunday school or the most buses. Many may not even have the greatest preaching ministry. But I pray to God that we will know and be known as a people who love one another, whose relationships reflect the love of God. I wanna ask you today, are you part of that? Have you found yourself knit together in the bond of Christ with another? Jesus prayed, Father, that they might be one even as we are one. And you know why I believe he prayed that? And I wanna conclude with this. When a people learn to build relationship in unity together, the Bible teaches, I believe, that nothing is impossible to that people. You wanna know why marriages endure the greatest suffering and disappointment and hurt? It's because a husband and a wife become one together. You wanna know why a church can go through struggles and all kinds of diversions and distractions and disappointments? Because a people have bonded themselves together as one people. And we can not only survive, but beloved, we can overcome. And I believe that's what God wants. And so I say to you today, that's what the church is really all about, relationships. And God the Father through the Son Jesus is empowered by the Holy Spirit, loving one another. Let's pray together. Lord, I know that you yearn to see a church where love abounds, God, where people are built one to another. God, where there is a bonding and companionship. Lord God, where people have determined that they would complete one another in Christ. Jesus, where there is a response to the commandment to love, based on the love that you've given us Lord. And I just pray today, Father, if there's any here who know that this is where you've brought them, that they would take a step today of uniting, uniting God, their heart and their energy and themselves with what you're doing here. Dear God, I know that that's your desire. That's your spirit. I bless you, Father. I bless you, Lord. Praise God. I wanna ask a question as we conclude this morning. As I was describing earlier, a relationship with God through his son, Jesus. I sensed in my heart that there were a number of you who were saying, you know, I don't have assurance of that. Listen now, it's almost time to go, but this could be the most important five minutes of your life. Your relationship with God will determine your destiny. That's as simple as that. And some of you today aren't really sure. There's no assurance in your heart that God is there. And if you were to die tonight, you would not know for sure that you'd be with him in heaven. I wanna ask today, do you want that assurance? Do you want to know that you have forgiveness of sins and a relationship with God's son that will endure through eternity? You see, in the end, beloved, it's not the good works that you do that gets you to be with God. It's not how much you gave or not how many people you were nice to. God doesn't have eternal scales where he drops in all of your good things and all of your bad. And if it tips this way, you make it. That's not God. God said the gulf is so wide between your sin and his holiness that no man could ever jump it. No man could ever walk across it on good works. But his son, Jesus came and laid down his life on a cross and it became a bridge. Over which those who have faith may walk today. If you're here today and you've never come to assurance of eternal life with God's son, you can do that right now. Would you pray with me please? If you're here today and you say, I want to know God in my heart. I want to be related to him. Pray for me. I'm gonna pray right now and I want you to pray this prayer with me wherever you are, pray it with me. Heavenly father, I give up my own ways God. I ask you to forgive my sin now, my separation Lord. And I want to know today father, that you receive me, come into my life. Let me know your presence Jesus. I give you my heart and who I am, I now give to you. I trust not in my works, not in my church, not in my family, but I now trust in you Jesus. With every head bowed now, please, for the sake of those who are just dealing with God right now. If you prayed that prayer, I want to have the privilege of agreeing with you that today is a day of beginning a relationship with God's son. About a major answer to prayer here. And it's also appropriate because we're talking about relationship and bonding. And I just want you to celebrate a major commitment and step of faith. Amy Sappold is gonna get married. Isn't that great? Come on up here. Thank you. Thank you. How do you say? This is Amy Sappold for those of you who don't know and her new fiance, Tom Sherry. Let's praise the Lord for that, okay? Thank you. Now, unfortunately, I see a lot of disappointment out there too. But I praise the Lord that God supplies, right? And so you want to just congratulate these two and believe the Lord to put all the details together. It's what, three days from tomorrow? No, it's a few months down the road and I'm sure you'll all be invited. But we rejoice in the Lord's provision. God bless you. Okay, Tom. Okay. Hallelujah. Let's sing this chorus together. We shall be as one. You come forward to talk to these coordinators. Let's sing.