Church is Leaving the Building

I’ve been thinking about church lately. What does it mean to have a church? Be a church? What is church?

A brief trip through the concordance brought something clearly to view: our modern concept of church as a building or a weekly event is absent from the New Testament. If you asked one of the first believers, “Where is your church?” or “Are you going to church this weekend?” they would look at you in puzzlement.

Instead, the word “church” is used in the Bible to refer to a group of people. These people, in quantities varying from those meeting in someone’s home (Romans 16:5, 1 Corinthians 16:19, Colossians 4:15, Philemon 2) to all those in a city or region (Acts 8:1, 11:22, 13:1; Romans 16:1; 1 Corinthians 1:2, Revelation 2-3 ) to the worldwide church as a whole (Acts 20:28), are distinct because they are believers in and followers of Jesus.[1]

To be sure, there are instances when the church – this group of people – gather together for a specific purpose, sometimes in a building, but the event or physical structure is not the church; the church is people.

Why does this matter? Very simply: it changes the nature of the questions we ask about what it means to be a church. The important questions are no longer centered around the architecture and location of a building, nor the content and order of the weekly “worship service.” Instead, we have to start asking questions about what it means for us to live our lives together as followers of Jesus. This means we focus our questions around two foundational issues:

1) what is important to Jesus and how can we join Him in His ongoing ministry, and
2) how can we do this better together?

We see this truth in the metaphors used to represent the church, such as the bride of Christ(Ephesians 5), or the family of God (1 Timothy 3:15; Romans 8:12-17). Even when using the metaphor of a temple, we are described as living stones and Christ is described as the cornerstone (1 Peter 2:4-7). But this truth is especially exemplified in the metaphor of the church as the body of Christ (Ephesians 1:22-23; Colossians 1:18-20; 1 Corinthians 12:12-31).

As the body of Christ, Jesus is the head. We follow wherever the head is looking or wants to go. We are made up of many parts, each important and unique. As we follow Jesus and move throughout the earth, we are His representatives, His hands and feet doing good to those around us. 

Again, the concept of the church as a group of people rather than a building or event is important here.  If church is a weekly (or even bi-weekly) event that takes place at a specific address, then the church is very small. But the truth is much bigger! When you walk out of the doors after the sermon, you’re not leaving church; church is leaving the building. The church is the all of us following Jesus every day of the week wherever we go, at home, at work, at the gym, at restaurants, etc. The church is everywhere and has the chance to impact anyone, anywhere, rather than being limited to a specific time and place.

It also means that every single person is important and crucial to the ministry of the church. The health and vitality of the church depends on each and every one of us doing our part with the gifts God has given us – whenever, wherever we are. This is exciting to me because it means that God wants each one of us to be a part of His work in this world. He wants us by His side every step of the way.

And what is it that He is doing and wants us to join Him in doing? What are the things that are important to Jesus? Well, that is something this blog is dedicated to exploring. But for right now, we will take a look at two passages which outline the primary mission of the church.

Matthew 28:16-20 – inviting others to also be baptized, born into, adopted into the family of God, to become part of the body of Christ, to follow Jesus and learn the things He taught were important.

Acts 2:41-47 – very practical here… they continued the Great Commission, learning about the things Jesus taught; they fellowshipped – koinonia “a having in common, partnership”… basically: togetherness, unity in shared experiences; eating together; praying together. Also, taking care of those in need around them.

We sell ourselves short when we limit the concept of church to being a building or event (or even a series of events, like evangelistic meetings). If the church is really people, then we cannot expect church to really happen while we sit around in pews, staring at the back of each other's heads. True church is a lifestyle. True church means being in our community and, like Jesus and the early church, helping those around us with both their immediate and eternal needs.

This is one of my favorite quotes that sums up this idea of being the people of Jesus in our community:

“Christ's method alone will give true success in reaching the people. The Saviour mingled with men as one who desired their good. He showed His sympathy for them, ministered to their needs, and won their confidence. Then He bade them, 'Follow Me.'

There is need of coming close to the people by personal effort. If less time were given to sermonizing, and more time were spent in personal ministry, greater results would be seen. The poor are to be relieved, the sick cared for, the sorrowing and the bereaved comforted, the ignorant instructed, the inexperienced counseled. We are to weep with those that weep, and rejoice with those that rejoice. Accompanied by the power of persuasion, the power of prayer, the power of the love of God, this work will not, cannot, be without fruit.” (Ministry of Healing, p. 143-144)

When we look at the life of Jesus, we see that He cared about and took care of people’s immediate, physical needs. He loved them enough to take care of their temporal troubles, but He also loved them enough to bid them, “Follow Me,” knowing that a good lifetime is not enough if it ends in death – only a life that overflows into eternity can truly satisfy the longing of our souls. Jesus showed true love by caring about and providing for both immediate and eternal needs.

I believe this is what Jesus cares about and what we should care about as His followers. Jesus is calling us to koinonia, to togetherness as we live in our communities, reaching out to those around us and dedicating our lives to meeting their immediate and eternal needs in the name of Jesus.

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[1] This concept is even found in the linguistics of the Greek word for church, ekklesia, which means “a calling out.” This signifies that the church is a group of people called out or set aside for a specific purpose.