I LOVE MY CHURCH
WORSHIP
DR. JIM DIXON
MATTHEW 16:13-18
MARCH 7, 2010
Matthew 16:18 is perhaps the most controversial verse in the entire Bible. This verse is so controversial that it has split the Christian world, divided the body of Christ the world over. It has separated Catholics and Protestants. It is the most controversial of verses. The first half of the verse is controversial, but the second half of the verse is also controversial. In the first half of the verse, Jesus says to Peter, “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church.” The question that has been debated for 2,000 years, “Who is the rock upon which Christ will build this church?” The Catholic Church has said, “Well, it’s Peter.” “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church.” And that may indeed be the case.
However, when you look at the words in the Greek language, the verse is a little different. Jesus says to Peter, “You are Petros, and upon this Petra I will build my church.” The word “petros” means a small, quarried stone, a small rock. On the other hand, the word “petra” means a massive block of rock. Now, occasionally the two words could be used synonymously, and if that’s the case here, Peter is indeed the rock upon which the church is founded. However, there are other possibilities. Some have said the rock is the confession that Peter made, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” “Upon this confession I will build my church.” You are petros, a small rock, but upon this larger rock of your confession, I will build my church.” And, of course, in the Bible there are a number of passages that tell us that the church is founded on the confession and the testimony of the saints.
Others have said, “Well, the rock is all of the apostles,” so Jesus is saying to Peter, “You are Petros, a small rock, and upon this petra, this large block of stone of the entire apostles, I will build my church.” And, of course, it is true that in many places in the Bible we are told that the Church is founded on the apostles. Others have said, “Well, the rock is Jesus himself.” Jesus is saying to Peter, “You are Petros, a little rock, and upon this petra, upon my life and my ministry, upon this greater stone, I will build my church.” And we don’t know. The reality is we don’t know for sure. We do know in the Bible in many places Jesus is called the rock upon which the church is founded.
We—Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox Christians, all Christians, brothers and sisters in Christ—need to learn to love each other in the midst of our differences. We need to learn to love each other. So, much is at stake and this world is so desperately in need of Christ.
The second half of the verse is no less controversial. In the second half of the verse, Jesus said to Peter and the disciples, “I will build my church and the powers of hell shall not prevail against it.” But you see, in the Greek, the words mean “the gates of Hades.” What are the gates of Hades? The word “gate” in the Greek language can reference power: the power to admit, the power to open, the power to close, the power to give access and egress. Power. But Hades does not mean hell. The gates of Hades do not refer to hell. Hades is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word Sheol and it means death. It means death and it means the keeping place of the dead, where the dead are kept until the final judgment. Hades and Sheol. So, “The powers of death will not prevail against my church.”
The church consists of those who have, through Jesus Christ and by his grace, conquered death. But Jesus also wants us to know that there are those who seek the death of his church. He wants his people in every generation to know there are those who seek the death of the church, and his promise is this: The powers of death will not prevail. So, we live in a culture and time where many seek the death of the church. This is true of some of the citadels of the power in our culture and society. There are people in the entertainment industry and there are some people of Hollywood who seek the eradication of the Christian faith and the death of the church. There are some people in the media (not all, but some) who seek the death of the Church of Jesus Christ. There are some in academia (not all, but some) who seek the death and destruction of the church of Jesus Christ.
And the devil himself, who the Bible tells us has the power of death, seeks the death of the church. He lives for the death of the church, but the promise of Jesus is the powers of death shall not prevail. As a pastor, it’s always been hard… because I love the church, it’s always been hard to hear people criticize the church. And, of course, the problem with the church is that it’s made up of sinners. We’re all sinners, desperately in need of grace, and throughout history, many times, many ways, churches have made grave mistakes. It’s an easy target. But understand that Jesus Christ loves his church and, in the Bible, it is called the Bride of Christ. He is in love with his church, and one day he will bring his church home, his bride. And, of course, we are to love the church as well. It is God’s chosen instrument in this world.
So, this morning we start this series: I Love My Church. And today we look at the first reason why we should love the church, and that is worship. This is where we experience corporate worship. For that reason alone, we should love the church. I have two teachings this morning and the first teaching is this: Corporate worship pleases God. Did you know that? Corporate worship pleases God. When the people of Christ come together and worship, it pleases God.
Now, you’ve all heard of monastics. Did you know that in the early church and into the Middle Ages, the most famous, renowned Christians were not pastors or preachers. The most famous and renowned were not healers or miracle workers. The most famous and renowned in the Middle Ages were monastics. These were men and women who had denied everything and gone alone, sacrificially, into the wilderness to live by themselves and to devote themselves and to worship God alone. And for their sacrifice, they were reverenced and renowned. But, of course, over the course of time, monastics realized they were making a mistake. They realized that God didn’t want private worship only. God wasn’t seeking for people to worship Him only in solitude. Monastics began to understand, “Oops, we can’t only worship in this way.”
And so, what happened? Well, they built monasteries, monastic monasteries. Kind of an oxymoron. The word “monos” means alone. Monasteries are where people who want to worship God alone can come and worship God together. Monasteries. This reflected the greater will of God. You go to Revelation 4 and 5 you see that God wants corporate worship not only on earth, but also in heaven. So, in Revelation 4 and 5… and by the way, if you’ve not read Revelation 4 and 5, you really need to go home today and open your Bible to Revelation 4 and read chapter 4 and then read chapter 5. It is glorious. You see the assembled angelic hosts worshiping God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God is Jehovah Sabaoth. He is the Lord of Hosts, and you see in Revelation 4 and 5 the angelic host worshiping him, myriads of angels surrounding the throne. A myriad literally is 10,000. In the plural, it’s many ten thousand and myriads of myriads is many ten thousands times many ten thousands. It’s a number beyond calculation. The angels of God, the angelic host, millions and millions surround the throne of God and worshiping him corporately. It pleases him and he desires this on earth as well as heaven, and so he has created the church, the “ecclesia.” This is the New Testament word, the Greek word, for church: The ecclesia, the church. It literally means “the assembly,” and more literally it means “called out or summoned.” But in the Greek world ecclesia was used for those who were summoned into assembly. I hope you understand the gospel, because the gospel doesn’t just call us to salvation through Christ The gospel doesn’t simply function on the vertical. It’s horizontal and calls us into the church, into the ecclesia. It is a summons, it is a call into the assembly. And so we assemble on the Lord’s Day. We assemble on resurrection day; we assemble every week to worship. We assemble for many reasons, but one of the reasons, the greatest reason, is worship.
We are the ecclesia; we are the church, and he loves corporate worship. That is a beautiful passage in Hebrews, chapter 12. It describes the New Jerusalem, the heavenly city, and the worship of the Father and the Son by all who dwell there.
This passage in Revelation 12 describes the inhabitants of the heavenly city, and there are 3 groups. The first group is called innumerable angels in festive gathering. Again, the word is myriads of this vast multitude. Millions of angels will inhabit the heavenly city, the New Jerusalem, and worship God.
The second group is the assembly of the firstborn, and this label combines two Greek words, the word “ecclesia,” which means church or assembly, and then “prototokos,” which means firstborn. It’s the title of Christ in the Bible. He’s the firstborn from the dead, the first born of many brothers and sisters, the prototokos. So, the assembly of the firstborn is the church of Jesus. Registered in the heavens. We’ll be in the New Jerusalem. We’ll be in the Heavenly City, with the myriads of angels. And how awesome is that going to be?
Then the final group is the spirits of just men made perfect. Some have seen this as reference to those throughout the centuries and all parts of the world who have longed for justice and for righteousness. More likely, this simply refers to the Old Testament saints—Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the Jewish people. The chosen. And so, you have these three groups in the heavenly city, the New Jerusalem, worshiping. There is corporate worship. And how awesome it’s going to be. I don’t know how it’s all going to function, but my guess is, just based on the whole of Scripture, trying to look at Scripture holistically, we’re going to, by the grace of Christ and the power of Christ, inhabit the new heavens and the new earth and we will have stewardship over all the works of his hands in the new heavens and the new earth. But from time to time, we’ll come back into the heavenly city, and we’ll gather and we’ll assemble with men and angels in holy worship. How awesome that’s going to be. Of course, that all pleases God.
Then at the eschaton, at the consummation, the end of days, the Antichrist will arise, and he will not worship God. He will seek worship for himself. He will seek to have people worship him. So in 2 Thessalonians, chapter 2, we’re told the Antichrist, who is the man of lawlessness and the son of perdition, will exalt himself against every so-called god or object of worship, taking the seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be god. It says in 2 Thessalonians 2 he will seek the worship of the world because he’ll have the mind of Satan. He’ll be inspirited by Satan, and the mind of Satan is to seek self-worship. So, in the beginning of the dawn of time, Satan said in his heart, “I shall ascend above the stars of God. I shall set my throne on high. I shall make myself like the Most High God.” And his mindset has influenced all the philosophies of the world and we have people all over the world engaged in self-worship and seeking worship from others and there’s a little bit of the devil in all of us. That is why, in subtle ways, we’re prone to seek a little worship here and there. God longs to see a people that would worship him, and this pleases him. This is the great call of Christ: That we would worship him.
Some of you might be thinking “Well, why? I mean, why does God want worship?” And I think for a variety of reasons. One of the words for worship is “latreuo,” which means to serve. It’s a word that’s rendered worship, but it literally means to serve. Another word for worship in the Bible is “eusebeo,” which literally means good reverence, but it also means to offer good acts of service. And so, God knows that as we worship him, offering our lives to him, it serves the cause of heaven on earth. That’s one reason why worship pleases him.
There are other words for worship in the Bible: There’s the word “proskuneo,” “to kiss towards God,” and Hebrew words like “anah,” which means to bow down. So, we bow down and we kiss towards God and you might think, “Well, why does God want us to bow down and kiss towards him? Why do we assemble to bow down and kiss towards him?” Some have thought, “Well, maybe God just has this huge ego and he’s never sated. He just can’t get enough praise.” But I don’t think so. I mean, certainly he deserves all credit. He’s omnipotent and enthroned in glory. He deserves all praise, but I think his desire is simply that he knows that as we worship (but only as we worship) we’ll be transformed. We’ll be changed as we behold him. That’s that beautiful passage in the Bible, 2 Corinthians, chapter 3, verse 18: “We all, with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of the Lord are being changed…” transformed, metamorphosis. We all behold his glory and are being changed from one degree to another—incrementally, bit by bit. As we worship we’re being changed. We’re being transformed, and this is why it pleases him when we behold him. It changes us.
This leads us to our second teaching this morning, and that is that corporate worship inspires us. It doesn’t just please God, it inspires us. And you should love your church. You should love the church because we assemble and we worship corporately and it pleases him and it inspires us. It inspires us. Some of you have traveled to Wiltshire County in the Salisbury Plain in England. And what’s there? Stonehenge is there. Now, historians and archeologists and scientists have discussed and debated over the years the primary purpose of Stonehenge. Why did ancient people erect this edifice, this megalithic monument, parts of which were built 4,000 years ago, parts of which were built 6,000 years ago? Originally scientists thought they built it as a cemetery. I mean, they weren’t thinking of the stones as headstones, but they believed that that arrangement of stones was associated with a cemetery. That was the first opinion. And then they changed their minds and decided, no, it had to do with astrology, or maybe even primitive astronomy, and the stones might be lined up in such a way as to reflect the constellations, etc.
But now, today, most scientists, archeologists, and historians know and believe it’s all about worship. These ancient people longed to worship. It’s in the heart of man. At all times and in all places, no matter how far back you go in human history, in the heart of man is this desire to know God and worship him. And even when people, ancient people, did not know him, they still longed to worship him and to find that inspiration.
Now, God has revealed himself to the world. God has now revealed himself to Moses in the burning bush and he revealed himself in the Decalogue, in the 10 Commandments. He revealed himself to the children of Israel in the pillar of fire and the glory cloud and theophanies, and he revealed himself through the prophets. Then finally, perfectly and completely, he revealed himself through his Son, who reflects the glory of God and bears the very stamp, the very impress, of his nature. So, he has revealed himself through his Son and through his Son he has founded his church that we might come together and worship him, that we might assemble and worship him corporately. This is his desire, and we come together and we worship him through singing. We worship him through corporate singing and we worship him through corporate prayer. We worship him through the proclamation of the Word given to the people assembled. We worship him through the sacraments, and this is how it has always been, by the will of God.
I always marvel when people say to me, “I’m a Christian but I don’t need church.” They don’t know what they’re talking about. They have no clue. People say, “Well, I can worship in a solitary walk in the woods,” and yes, they can, but it’s not corporate worship. It’s not the ecclesia. They say, “Well, I can worship in Starbucks. I don’t need a church. And I suppose you can. People say, “Well, I can get together with a couple of Christian friends at Starbucks and that’s my church,” but I bet you don’t do group singing there. I bet you don’t share the sacraments. I bet you don’t hear the Word of God proclaimed or engage even in group prayer. You do some of these things and you’re going to be kicked out of Starbucks.
So, he established the church. And you can look in the book of Acts and you can go through the Epistles of Paul and you see these four things always in the life of the early church: The assembly for singing, for corporate prayer, for proclamation of the Word by those called and gifted, and this partaking of the sacraments.
I want to take a few moments before we close to look at these four things. I want to begin with singing. I mean, does it inspire you? One reason I love the church, one of the reasons I love this church, is the singing. I love our praise teams. I love to sing together. You know, there’re some people who you always hear from time to time that have negative comments about the megachurch, the so called megachurch, large churches. I’ve heard lots of people through the years say, “You know, the problem with Cherry Hills Community Church is it’s too large. We want to find a smaller venue and find a smaller, more intimate church where we can worship.” And I understand that. I do understand that and there’s something special about intimacy and Christ loves all churches whether they’re small or whether they’re large, as long as they’re faithful. Christ loves his church. But for me, there’s something incredibly awesome about large church gatherings. I just love to see the Body of Christ assembled. I mean, it’s going to happen in heaven. It’s happening now around the throne of God as myriads and myriads of angels assemble and it will happen in the New Jerusalem and it’s wonderful here on earth to be gathered with so many brothers and sisters and sing in worship to our God and it inspires me. Does it inspire you? For that alone, I love the church. I love our choir and they inspire me. I love singing.
There are many different sub-cultures within the church of Jesus Christ. There are so many different sub-cultures of worship and singing in the church of Jesus Christ around the world. When we get to heaven, I don’t how Christ is going to get us all together and on the same page, but somehow by the Holy Spirit he’s going to do it and it’s going to be awesome. So awesome. And even here on earth, it inspires us. I love the church to worship, and it inspires.
Then there is prayer. We come together for prayer. I know many of you think, well, prayer is something I do on my own. And Jesus does mention closet prayer in the Sermon on the Mount, but by the will of God, we should all come together for prayer, too. Did you ever notice that the Lord’s Prayer is corporate? I mean, I say the Lord’s Prayer every day in my devotional time, and I individualize it. “My Father, who art in heaven.” But you notice that Jesus gave it to us as a corporate prayer. “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed by thy name. Give us this day, our daily bread.” That’s a corporate prayer meant for Christians to pray together.
We do pray together. I mean we come together every Sunday and Mark led us in prayer this morning, but hopefully you were praying too. He’s leading the assembly in prayer but we’re all praying with him. We’re all praying together with him. Even when I begin my sermon and I begin always by quoting Psalms 19:14. “May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in thy site.” In Psalms 19:14 it says, “Oh Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.” But hopefully you’re praying that prayer with me and we’re praying for each other and we’re praying that our hearts will be right and his Word will be anointed because we are the assembly. We’ve been called to pray for each other and during the week there are many prayer groups that assemble for corporate prayer. You might consider being part of one of those.
Then there’s proclamation. When we gather together, there’s proclamation of the Word. For me, it’s a scary privilege to preach the Word of God and I approach it with reverence and holy fear. Holy fear. I don’t sleep on Saturday nights—not very well, not very often—and I’m always so nervous. It’s a holy privilege that I approach with deep reverence and inadequacy. Sometimes I get e-mails where people point out that one of my stories or one of my antidotes wasn’t quite right. They tell me they’ve researched it on a web site, on a watchdog site. Just this last week, I got an e-mail saying that the story that I had shared a few weeks ago on Art Linkletter and Ida Fuller, according to a watchdog website, was wrong. I don’t know. I mean, I got the Art Linkletter story out of one of Paul Harvey’s books and then I researched Art Linkletter’s life. Barb downloaded the bio section on the internet. And then the other story on Ida Fuller I got from a book by Robert Schuller. I don’t make these things up.
Did you know that they’re talking about creating watchdog sites for watchdog sites? For me, what I’m mostly concerned with and have this holy fear about is that I rightly divide the Word of God—that I do proper exegesis of the Bible and the text, that I’m presenting to you, accurately, what God has given once and for all to his people and that I am orthodox and biblical in my theology. And it’s a scary, scary privilege, and it’s audacious. It’s audacious. It’s an audacity to preach the Word. I’m a sinner talking to sinners. You’re sinners looking at a sinner so it feels kind of like an audacity to stand up here and preach to you.
But I hope you understand that the Bible tells that Christ has appointed in his church first apostles, then prophets, then evangelists, pastors, and teachers. His gifts were that some should be apostle, prophets, evangelist, pastor, and teachers. And preaching is kind of a combination of the prophetic gift and the teaching gift and it exists in the assembly by the will of Christ. When you say, “I don’t need to go to church, I can just study the Bible on my own,” I understand what you’re saying, but you’re missing the assembly and the gifts of Christ that he’s called us to. So, I want you to know that as I approach preaching with holy fear, there’s a sense of which you should too as you come here and as we assemble together.
And then there’s the sacraments. We worship through singing and prayer and proclamation and the sacraments. And for Protestants, there are two: Holy Communion and Baptism. In the Catholic Church there are seven, but the Catholic Church also has the Protestant two amongst their seven, baptism and communion. Through these sacraments, for these sacraments, we gather. Next Sunday is Communion Sunday. Next Sunday we assemble here and we have communion and, in the sacraments, we focus on Jesus. We worship God, but we know the Father through the Son. We know him through Jesus and we receive the spirit through Jesus. So we focus on Jesus in the sacraments and in communion we focus on his body broken and his blood shed for us and the forgiveness for sins that he provides and he alone.
And it is meant to be corporate. The word communion has the same root as community. The Greek word for communion in the Bible is “koinonia,” which means fellowship. It’s the fellowship in his blood. So, we assemble on the Lord’s Day, the church, the ecclesia, and we partake of the sacraments, Holy Communion, and we do it together.
Now, it’s true that sometimes we’ll take communion to an individual who is shut in who cannot get out, or to someone in the hospital, to somebody who, again, cannot come to the assembly. We’ll do that. It’s also true that, upon occasion, I’ve been asked (I mean, I rarely do weddings anymore, because I have not the time, but over the course of my ministry I’ve done over 600 weddings) by couples if I would serve them communion during the wedding ceremony. And I hesitate to do that. I’ve done it because I really seek to please the couple, but I also want to please God and I always feel somewhat uncomfortable because communion is meant to be for the body of Christ assembled. And you can have a bride and groom take communion together as believers and that’s great, but you have other Christians in the room and communion was never meant to be a spectator deal. All of those who believe in Jesus are meant to take it together as we worship through the sacraments, and it pleases God and inspires us and I love the church.
And the sacrament of baptism focuses on Jesus. We go under the water and we die to self. We come out of the water, we live to him and for him. We experience through baptism, in a sense, the death and resurrection of Christ as we die to self and live to him and we celebrate the washing of regeneration and the washing and cleansing of sin and we consecrate ourselves in the sacramentum. We take the sacred oath to trust him and serve him all the days of our lives in baptism. And we do that corporately. We have baptisms in here in our worship service at special times. We also have other venues where we assemble segments of the body of Christ and have baptisms. It’s meant to be something we do together, and it’s part of worship in the assembly of the church, and it pleases God and inspires us.
So, I would ask this as we conclude and as you head out, that you would maybe today commit yourself to greater faithfulness with regard to the church—greater faithfulness with regard to the assembly, greater faithfulness with regard to Sundays. You can worship him individually during the week wherever you are, but as you are able, commit yourself to come to church—to ecclesia, to the assembly—that we might experience corporate worship. It pleases it him and it’s going to inspire and transform us. This is the will of God for his people. Let’s close with a word of prayer.