re-think church

A friend commented in a previous post ( compost, garbage, scraps...kingdom planting future faith ) I had put in my status on FB. Only on facebook I had it under the heading of " future church." He is a leader of a church, and his comment to the post was, " sounds convincing, but unscriptual."

I think the problem is in the tension between the " church ", and the " kingdom." I suggest reading the Gospels and see how many times " church " is mentioned, as compared to " kingdom."

The terms "Kingdom of Heaven" and "Kingdom of God" are New Testament terms and they do not appear in the Old Testament. Jesus said "The Law and The Prophets (i.e. Old Testament Scriptures) were until John (the Baptist); since that time the kingdom of God is preached ---" (Luke 16:16). The word "KINGDOM" appears in the New Testament 158 times in 150 verses, including the times it appears in the terms "kingdom of heaven" and "kingdom of God". The Term "KINGDOM OF HEAVEN" appears 33 times in 32 verses - all in the Gospel of Matthew. The term "KINGDOM OF GOD" appears 70 times in 69 verses; 5 times in 5 verses in the Gospel of Matthew; 15 times in 15 verses in the Gospel of Mark; 33 times in 32 verses in the Gospel of Luke (the same as does the Kingdom of Heaven appear in Matthew); 2 times in 2 verses in John...church is mentioned twice, once in Matthew 16:18 and twice in Matthew 18:17.

Even in the the original Greek language the word "ekklesia " has been substituted for " church ", In classical Greek the word "ekklesia " meant an assembly of citizens summoned by the crier, the legislative assembly. The word as used in the New Testament is taken from the root of this word, which simply means to "call out." In New Testament times the word was exclusively used to represent a group of people assembled together for a particular cause or purpose. It was never used exclusively to refer to a religious meeting or group.

Now I'm not church bashing, I'm just pointing out that perhaps our present day understanding may have morphed from an " ekklesia " whose sole purpose was re-imagining, and rebuilding the present day world into the Kingdom that consumed Jesus passion and life...to our understanding as a religious meeting, or church as the building.

Yes, I know you can haul me into Paul's letters and find lots and lots of reference to church, structure, doctrine and business practice. But, I think if we want to understand Jesus, and understand what he was so passionate about...the we have to keep going back, and back, and back to the gospels. Jesus dreamt, imagined and lived in the reality of the Kingdom.

So back to my original post, so maybe it doesn't look like our understanding of church today because you say it is unscriptual...but does it matter? Can we agree that it embraces the meaning of " ekklesia ", and that it is passionate about what Jesus was passionate about...proclaiming, revealing, building the Kingdom, here, now. Jesus said this at the start of his road trip in to the surrounding neighborhoods...

God's Spirit is on me; 
he's chosen me to preach the Message of good news to the poor, 
Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, 
To set the burdened and battered free, to announce, "This is God's year to act!"
He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the assistant, and sat down. Every eye in the place was on him, intent. Then he started in, "You've just heard Scripture make history. It came true just now in this place."

and...

The blind see, 
The lame walk, 
Lepers are cleansed, 
The deaf hear, 
The dead are raised, 
The wretched of the earth have God's salvation hospitality extended to them.
"Is this what you were expecting? Then count yourselves fortunate!"

Now, I really have to ask everyone, does it matter what kind of box I put that in? If I can find an " ekklesia " a small band of followers of Jesus to live out the proclamation, the redemptive imagination of Jesus Kingdom...is this any less than your scriptural interpretation of the church?

I guess that's the difference when you can formulate a church, some how where it can come down to ( A + B + C + D +Y = CHURCH )...you have something you can contain and control. When it comes to the Kingdom it is un-containable, and un-controllable. It is the passion, the imagination, the power, the profound mysterious reality of the Kingdom as small as a mustard seed that we plant in the world.

Maybe it's time to really re-think church...and think, imagine with the mind of Jesus the mysterious reality of the Kingdom now, on earth as in heaven...and not be so wrapped up that everyone has to do it with the one size fits all formula.

Comments

[Patrick O]

Sounds very Scriptural to me, though it's not Traditional. Trouble comes in that we view Scripture through the lens of tradition, then assume that how tradition has interpreted words or approaches or callings is actually what Scripture itself inherently declares.

I very much would push back against such concepts being supposedly unScriptural. It's very Scriptural, especially if we are willing to let the meanings of words and concepts and activities be viewed in light of their original context, not as later cultural accretions imbued them with different meanings altogether.

[Al]

Well said, Ron and Patrick.

I draw your attention to a simple cartoon by nakedpastor: http://www.nakedpastor.com/2012/01/19/interpretation-is-everything/

No matter how we view scripture, it is still our choice as to how we are viewing it. Even literalists choose either to take everything literally (no matter what the style of writing is), or choose which parts to take literally.

So claiming that an idea is 'scriptural' or 'unscriptural' is really saying: "It doesn't agree with my interpretation of scripture."

That is not to say that we shouldn't have a good understanding of what scripture is, because we need to. But we also need to recognize that not everyone sees everything the same way.

And as a parting thought--even the Bible itself proclaims that Jesus is the Word of God.

[ron cole]

Patrick, and Al...I wonder if in the end it might be as simple as allegiance...is it the tradition, and church doctrine. Or is more sole allegiance as being a citizen of the KINGDOM, living in that reality now. I think to of the idea of incarnational truth, is profound fleshy mystery that is discovered living it. It's interesting in our thinking how fast we filter Jesus out...when in reality he should be the filter that we strain everything through. Thanks guys, for helping me think this out.