This is not a church.

The church is God’s design for completing the work He sent His Son to earth to accomplish. It is the expression of His love and compassion for the world.  It was begun by Jesus — He is its founder and foundation — and it is most clearly represented by being His body — His physical presence in the world. Christ is currently not physically present here, but the church, collectively, is His eyes, ears, voice, hands and feet in the world, and mostly … His heart. At the outset of Christ’s ministry here on earth, He announced that He had come “to proclaim good news to the poor … freedom for the prisoners … recovery of sight for the blind, [and] to set the oppressed free” (Luke 4:18). These things were both physically and spiritually fulfilled while He was here, and through the church in the world — the total body of believers — that work is continuing.

And that work is continuing through you and me because we are the church. The church has nothing to do with buildings, pulpits, pews, programs, meetings, sanctuaries, choirs, praise bands, sermons, or day care, and everything to do with people. We are the church. As you read this and I write this, you and I are the church, right here, right now. Church doesn’t happen at a particular time, on a particular day, at a particular place; church is happening right now, wherever we are.

As Paul wrote, “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God” (1 Corinthians 6:19)? Listen to this: Each one of us, individually, is a temple of God. For the Jews, the temple was where they went to worship. Paul is saying we are that. We are the place where God is worshiped. When? Where? Anywhere. All the time. That would mean that individually, not only corporately, we are the church, so that wherever we go — wherever you go — you are bringing the church to people. Remember when we had to try and get people to come to church? Not necessary … we bring church to them. And we can do this online, in a pandemic, no less, because the internet makes everybody one-on-one.

So that’s where we begin. You are the church. I am the church. What does that mean for you? What does that mean for us? Think about that and then let me know. You can comment below, publicly, or reply privately to me by replying to this email. Let’s get the discussion going. We have much to accomplish.