Club or Army 1984

I'd like to begin by reading Matthew 16, 18. And I tell you, you are Peter the rock. And on this rock, your confession, I will build my church.

And the gates of death shall not prevail against it. Notice two things about these words of Jesus. First, absolute certainty.

Not if I can find the right people, I'm going to build my church. But I'm going to build it. It will be.

No question about it. And the second thing to notice is that this church which he's building is not something static and stationary like a structure. But it's moving like an armament.

It's in motion. It's going somewhere. It's doing something.

The gates of death try to hold it back. But they can. It breaks right through, crashes through the gates of death to set the captives free.

From Acts 1, verse 6. And when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? He said to them, it is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. And you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.

And again, we see the same two things. Absolute certainty. It's not if things work out right, you'll get some power.

But you're going to receive power. You will. The Holy Spirit is going to come and you're going to have it.

And the second thing is that when this power comes, you're going to be this army. You're going to move. You're going to be my witnesses starting where you are in Jerusalem but not stopping there.

You're going to move out into Judea, up into Samaria and on to the rest of the world. And a final illustration of these two things is found in 1 Peter 2, verse 9. But you are a royal priesthood, a chosen race, a holy nation, God's own people, that you may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. And again, absolute certainty.

You are that chosen race, that royal priesthood. Not try to be this, you know, do what you can. But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people.

And the purpose of your being this is so that you can be this army, so that you can proclaim the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. In other words, this thing is going to be. Nothing's going to stop it.

And it's going to move like a conquering army. It's not going to stand still. And yet, from the earliest days, there have been influences inside the body of Christ which have continuously tried to dull that certainty and to water down this army until it becomes nothing but a useless club.

The real danger to the body of Christ from its beginning was not outside opposition, but a spirit, an element within the body, and really within each of us, that tries to water it down, dull that certainty, and slow it down so that it loses its momentum. It's no longer an army but a club. And so while Jesus was building his church, the resurrected Jesus building his church and sending it out, while the Holy Spirit was coming with power upon these people and sending them out, while the Father was making them a chosen race of royal priesthood and a holy nation and sending them out, internal difficulties began to appear by which many believers were sidetracked into the club thing, while only others, only a few, managed to go on and be the army that they were called to be.

We see this as we read through the Book of Acts. By the time you get to Chapter 5, already we have problems. What happens to Pharaoh? Lied to the Holy Spirit in a matter concerning money.

Then when we get to Chapter 6, there's tension between the Greek widows and the Hebrew widows. In other words, the foreigners and the locals, and the foreigners aren't getting a fair deal here in the daily distribution of the food. And pretty soon, the church is so embroiled in internal church business, sticky issues between believer and believer, that it begins to lose its momentum in the thing that it was called to do.

It's already starting to slow down in its worship of God and in its witness to the world. Jesus said, you're going to be my witnesses, starting in Jerusalem, but going out into Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth, and they're still sitting in Jerusalem. They don't move.

They're so wrapped up in their own affairs and so turned in already on their own problems, that they don't get out. Until finally, when Stephen is stoned, persecution arises, and that persecution drives them out for the first time. And it's after the persecution that comes through Stephen's stoning, during that time, that for the first time, Samaritans begin to hear the gospel.

And then in Chapter 9, we read for the first time of some believers, Jewish believers, in Damascus. Paul goes to arrest them. And then finally in Chapter 10, the Spirit almost has to drag Peter by the neck and get him to speak in the house of the Gentile Cornelius and make him do this.

He has all kinds of resistance. He can't see that this makes any sense, but he does it. And then at last, in Chapter 11 of Acts, we read for the first time of some brothers preaching the gospel without being prodded to some Gentile Greeks in Antioch, getting a tremendous response, so that Antioch very quickly becomes the center of worldwide missionary outreach for the body of Christ.

But in a short time, the same pattern sets in, even in Antioch. Reading from Acts Chapter 13, verse 1. Now in the church at Antioch, there were prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon, who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Mannion, a member of the court of Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.

Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them out. Now here we have pure kingdom, glory at work. Five men of God.

They're Jew and Gentile, and they're black and white. And they're about the two bases of the kingdom of God. Worship of God, they're ministering to the Lord and fasting, they're worshiping.

And secondly, outreach. When they had fasted and prayed, they sent them out. But by the time Paul and Barnabas get back from that first relatively brief missionary journey, things are going haywire, even in Antioch.

And if we flip over to Acts 14, verse 27, we read, And when Paul and Barnabas arrived back in Antioch, they gathered the church together and declared all that God had given faith to the Gentiles. And they remained no little time with the disciples. But some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brethren, Unless you are circumcised according to the law, the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.

And when Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and the elders and they were knocking themselves out, getting the word out to the Gentile world, starting always with the Jewish synagogue. But getting it out, we got the nitpickers who come in and say, Unless you first get circumcised and become Jewish, you can't join our club. And all kinds of energy has to be wasted and time has to be wasted arguing and fighting and debating and going up to Jerusalem to get a verdict from the apostles about this matter.

Now if these nitpickers had been about the business of the kingdom, number one, if they had been engaged in burning worship of God and secondly, had been about the business of taking that word out to the world, they would have quickly seen that their issue was very minor and they would have rolled with it even if that wasn't clear to them. And so we see in Antioch and everywhere the problem, you know, the threat to the body of Christ among these wonderful people did not come from outside opposition. They could always handle outside opposition.

They would grow with it. But it always came about through internal strife and that internal strife was not between the good people and the bad people, you know, not even between the true Christians and the hypocrites but inside almost every believer. Inside the body of Christ at Antioch and everywhere there was a war going on between two spirits.

One spirit was trying to make it into a club and the other spirit was trying to make this church and these two spirits have continued fighting at war down through these centuries to this moment and will continue to do so all the way until the moment when burning, blazing, separation, judgment visits the church in this final way and the bride throws off her filth, makes herself ready for the bridegroom and the issue is settled. Meanwhile, among us here as among believers in every part of the world any place community has gathered there is a spirit that would try to help us to become a club. And that spirit that wants to make us into a club isn't in the other guys in each of us.

A club, you know, maybe an exclusive little Christian club right here that has nothing to do with all the other unclean institutions or a club that's tied in with all kinds of other Christian clubs all over the world but a club made up of decent, enlightened, doctrinally sound, socially aware, respectable people but a club that's concerned primarily with itself and the spirit that is trying to help us to become a club is the spirit of the Antichrist. There is also among us here as among believers everywhere a spirit that would have us become an army. An army that first of all stands before God in blazing worship, holy, wonderful, awesome worship and gets heated and then goes out into that world with a message about the truth of who Jesus is and breaks through the gates of death and invades the territory of death and sets those captives free and takes territory for the Lord and the spirit that's trying to help us to become an army is the Holy Spirit of the Living God.

Now there's no need for us to be surprised or alarmed over the fact that such a war is going on. It has been going on and will continue until the end of the age. But what we need to be conscious of is that every time we allow ourselves to get sidetracked caught up in really issues that are nitpicky petty to the neglect of true awesome genuine burning worship of God and to the neglect of getting the word of the Lord out into that world beyond these walls every time that happens the Antichrist is doing a number on us and he's trying and having some success at making us into a club.

During the past two months we've had some of the most powerful services here that we've ever had. We've had some of the most enlightening and helpful Bible studies on Wednesday nights we've ever had. And yet during this same two month period more of us and that probably includes all of us have been exercised and upset over more peripheral minor issues and really bothered by them troubled by them than in any two month period in the last twenty years.

And there's no point in even going into what these issues are they're legion. What we have to do to solve the problem it's very simple we have to decide what are we going to be? Are we going to be a club or an army? If we're going to be a club then really we can forget about the Lord and we can forget about the world out there and settle down and busy ourselves with these little issues nitpick over this and this and this and this and on and on and on. If we're going to be an army there are really only two concerns we have to worry about at all.

One are we going to get on with the business of genuine worship of God? And two are we going to get on with the business of getting that gospel about Jesus out beyond the walls of this building? And if we will do this all the minor issues all the other things will be solved and settled in time in a godly way. Reading from Acts 13 once more. Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger Lucius of Cyrene Mannion a member of the court of Herod the Tetrarch and Saul.

While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting the Holy Spirit said set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them forth. While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting the Spirit spoke.

They were about the business first of all of holy clean blazing praise of God worship of God thanksgiving to God their hearts were concentrating on Him. They were corporately functioning as a chosen race a royal priesthood a holy nation God's own people. And we are called first and foremost to do the same.

The most important thing that we will do in all our lives is gather together and worship God. That's the most important thing we ever do. We will never come any closer to the glory of heaven and that throne until we're actually there than when we gather together in the name of Jesus and worship.

And so may God help us to lay aside anything anything any fear any hang up any attitude anything that hinders our concentrating on the throne and seeing the throne and offering our bodies as living sacrifices and our minds renewed in the Spirit. Worship! That's what we first of all have to give ourselves to and let nothing interfere with it. I may have one opinion about how it should be done and you may have another that doesn't matter but worship we give each other room if we worship we'll give each other room but do it.

While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting the Holy Spirit said set apart from me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them that after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off. So they sent Paul and Barnabas out to points beyond the other three stayed in Antioch but all five of them went out. All of them went out.

You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses and if we will move in that power and be those witnesses we will be the army of the Lord on the earth. We'll be part of it. The most effective way we can cancel out the efforts of the Antichrist who all the time wants to convert us into a little religious club for nice people is to take off the bushel go out there and take a few risks and proclaim to the world the truth about who Jesus is.

We can almost make a rule for ourselves that would be extremely helpful as much as to say if I don't have the guts to go out there and tell the world that Jesus is Lord then really I don't have the right to nitpick over any minor issue putting it in a positive way if I go out there and I tell the world who Jesus is on my job in my neighborhood among my relatives wherever it is I probably won't have the time to nitpick and so today we're going to kneel at the table of the Lord and receive his body and drink his blood the blood of the one and the body of the one who laid down his life to forgive our sins we're going to partake of him and commune with him who makes us sons and daughters of God at his side today and who then sends us forth to break through the gates of death if we will draw near to him and worship him and if we'll be obedient to him obey his spirit as we go out from here we will be the army of the Lord upon this earth and not a cloud and we will break through the gates of death and we will take the land around us and the city around us for him let's just take some time in silence