THE GATHERING COMMUNITY

Sermon Summary (4/9/17) “The Gathering Community” (Mt 16:8; Eph 4-13 excerpts)

I just finished Pillars of the Earth for the second time.  Great read.  Set in 12th century England, the heroes are Prior Philip, Tom Builder and Tom’s stepson Jack who by the end of the 973 pages has built a soaring cathedral of a new design.

It reminded me of my college humanities teacher when teaching this era talked of a revolutionary architecture involving “Flying Buttresses,” just dropping it in there like I knew what a “flying buttress” was.  It took me 48 and reading the book to find out.  As it turns out, master masons were building churches to the heavens without appreciation of the wind loads on the churches high above the ground.  Until they employed external supports called flying buttresses, the churches would crack and sometime collapse.  The book in large part is about buildings.

I bet you thought church was about buildings.  “Church” is an unfortunate translation from centuries ago of the Greek word, ekklesia, which is better translated as assembly or gathering.  I like community, church as the gathering community.  After all, Paul didn’t go around the Mediterranean building buildings.  No, he built communities. 

Jesus never intended that we build buildings, “You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my ekklesia, and the gates of hades will not prevail against it.”  A gathering community, Christ-birthed, that will never die!  How is it that we become part of the gathering community?  Christ is the builder and we are stones (of differing size, shape, even color) all with different functions.  Not all are foundation stones or corner stones, but some must be or the building will crumble.  Some too must be flying buttresses or the building will collapse. 

Differing stones but Paul tells us we are one body all with differing gifts according to the grace of the Holy Spirit.  He emphasizes that all gifts are of equal importance and meant not for you but for others, for building up the body for ministry.  You the gathering community are the body of Christ equipped to do his ministry, to be his hands, heart and feet of Him on earth.

The most significant arena for disciple-making is the local church, the local gathering community.  Our mission is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.  Another way of saying it, is to lead others to an active faith in Jesus where an active faith is loving God, loving God, serving the world, changing lives is Jesus Christ.  How are we doing? Do we ask each day, how can we can spend an hour to strengthen our devotional lives better loving God and is there someone in the gathering who can mentor us?  Do we ask how we can we spend an hour each week loving others, if only to have a cup of coffee with them or to read to a shut-in?  Do we ask how we might spend an hour each month serving the world?  And do we ask how the community can mentor us to change lives in Jesus Christ, ourselves and others.?  Amen.