What is the Church? 

     I WILL build my church," He said to the disciples. That is future tense, because at the time it did not exist. Church is a New Testament work. The Old Testament spoke nothing about the church. I’m sure the disciples wondered, What's the church? Did Jeremiah mention it? Did Isaiah? What does the word Church mean? It comes the Greek compound word ekklesia. Ek means " out" and klesia means, " to call." Therefore, ekklesia means "those who are called out." Aren't you glad there was a day when you were called out; when Jesus said the same thing to you that He did to Peter? "Come and follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men." He didn't go after Peter in the ship and drag him out and say, "Follow Me whether you like it or not . "Jesus never does that. He operates in grace. He makes provision; he makes the call. But thank God, one day we accepted the call. We dropped everything like Peter; we followed Jesus, and he made us fishers of men. 

     Now the New Testament mentions the Church in two different ways, the universal Church and local Church. Although there are many places "the Church meaning universal church is used, we'll look specifically at the book of Ephesians. 

The whole theme of the book is the Church: how it was known in eternity past 

"For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church; and he is the savior of the body." -Eph. 5:23 Two terms are used-Church and Body. Notice they are both singular. We are members of THE Church. THE Body of Christ One thing we need to understand about the universal Church is that it is invisible. You can't see it with your visible eyes; you can't feel it with your hands. It's a spiritual- thing; it’s invisible and hence it is called a mystery "(5:32). The Church is a mystery. First because it was unknown in the Old Testament. The prophets didn't know about the Church. The disciples didn't know about it either.

The other mysterious thing about the church in the New Testament is that those on the outside don’t understand it. If you ask sinners today about what goes on in the Church of Jesus Christ, in the body of Christ, they don't understand it. The Bible says, "for the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God" (1 Cor 1:18). The church is compared to a brotherhood. You have to first join to find out what is going on. This is the spiritual organization encompassing the world. God said to Abraham, "out of thee shall all the nations of the earth be blessed". The Church is universal brotherhood. Are you familiar with fraternities and sororities? They are very secretive. Only the men and women who find them understand what they're doing. To get into a fraternity, you have to go through initiation rights. You have a secret handshake and secret phrases that you say. 

How do you get into the secret society called the church? 

You have to say the secret phrase: " I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. He arose from the dead, and I now accept Him as my lord and savior." You are now a member of the brotherhood. We even have our own language! 

Other people just don't understand. It's foolishness to them. In Colossians 1:18 both "body and church" are used again in the singular. "And he is head of the body, the church; who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence." This is the invisible church. 

Ephesians 4:4 tells us "there is one body." referring to the body of Christ, those who are born again, members of the church. Now look at Galatians 1:2 "And all the brethren which are with me, unto the churches of Galatia. " Notice that "churches" is plural and they were in one particular location Galatia. This tells us that there many local churches. There are a lot of people saying that we need to get the churches back in the homes today like it was in Paul's time (Rom.16: 3-5) 

My friend, that is where they started. We have come a long way. I don't want to go back into the homes. Home Bible studies are all right; but we need a central place where we can meet and be together to fellowship, worship and rightly divide the word of truth. God established the local church to help us better understand the invisible church of the lord Jesus Christ. The local church is something in the visible tangible world that we can see, come to, join with and handle. He put the local church in the natural world to help us understand the universal church that is in the spiritual world. Isn't He good? He did the same thing for you when you were born again. You became a member of the body of Christ and God said." In order to help you understand that. I'm going to institute marriage." In marriage you can understand how the wife submits to the husband and how the husband is the authority in the home. Just as it is the duty of the wife to submit to the husband, it is our duty of love to submit to the Lord Jesus Christ. And the husband rules the household in the way that Jesus rules over the body of Christ in love. 

God does these things in the natural so we can understand spiritual truths. Whatever Jesus does for his church, we should be doing in our marriages. Listen husbands, the Bible says that he is the savior to the body. Did you know that you are the savior of marriage? You ought to willing to lay down your life for your wife and kids and for the protection of your family. Jesus did it and that is how much commitment and dedication you ought to have to your marriage. See to it that your marriage survives. He goes the extra mile over and over again. He says "I won't lose that one; I'll leave the 99 and go search for it, " He puts himself into it. The same thing is true of the local church; whatever we read about the universal church should be going on within the local church. One is the pattern for the other. In the 1950's God began to raise up supernatural miracle ministries- Kathryn Kuhlman, William Branham, Oral Roberts, Kenneth Hagin. You would go to their tent meetings and watch the miracles. God was something. But then you would go back to the church and say "Boy, I wish another evangelist would come." 

Then during the 1960's came the Charismatic movement. Denominational walls started to fall, and God began to raise up full gospel businessmen. Businessmen began to find out that God wanted to work in their businesses. Movements and organizations come and go, but Jesus said, " I will build my church and gates of hell will not prevail against it." You are seeing a full circle of what God instituted on the day of Pentecost. Those ministries and organizations were raised up and are continuing to be raised up and used, but today God is drawing emphasis back to the local church. You are going to start seeing supernatural things in the local church. Pastors will be operating in the supernatural. The crowds who flocked to the tents and auditoriums will beat a path to go to church. God established the local church. Special moves of God have come and gone, but the local church is still here and more powerful than ever. I believe before Jesus Christ returns, you will be able to take the local church and lay the book of Acts right over it and they will mesh one with the other. People will walk out of the local church, and their shadow will heal people on the street. I believe you will see the five fold ministries coming out of the local church. God did not ordain that people had to go to special seminaries to be an evangelist, or learn to be an Apostle. He intended that all those gifts operate, function, come out of and return to the local church. That is the pattern of the book of Acts.