An Open Church an Open Mind 1981

We're just saying, Holy Spirit ever-binding, age to age and soul to soul. To be thinking about that for a few minutes this morning, I'd like to begin by reading from Philippians chapter 1, verse 27 and the first part of 28. Only yet let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you stand firm in one spirit, with one mind, striving side by side for the faith of the gospel, and not frightened in anything by your opponents.

Over the past almost a year, we've been talking and sharing together about the form that we feel the Spirit is directing us to take as a congregation. And we've come into fairly close agreement, it seems, that in our case, for us here, the Spirit appears to be directing us and shaping us in what we have come to call an open church. Open in a sense that our commitment to each other as members, one of another in the same body, does not require that we spend hours and hours with each other every week, doesn't demand that we agree on every single point of doctrine.

Our unity with each other as members in the body of Christ does not mean, we feel, that we have to adhere to a uniform set of disciplines for our private lives. In fact, we believe that it is not necessary and it may not even be good for us to, for example, have the same routine for private prayer, or that we all take the same percentage of our income and give it as an offering to the Lord, or that we all worship God with our hands folded, or that we all worship God with our hands up, or that we all speak in tongues, or that we all work the streets. There's room for variety.

Nor are we saying that the form the Spirit appears to be causing us to take here at the moment is what every church ought to be doing. We're not saying that at all. Believers all over the place are being gathered by the same Spirit into communities that are much more tightly knit than ours, where they do spend a lot of time with each other, and where they share their material substance entirely, where they pool their resources, where they agree to adhere to a specific and often pretty rigid discipline in their private lives, and where they submit to a clearly defined leadership structure.

But for us at this time, with a vast variety among us, and the extreme differences in our backgrounds and the distances many travel to get here every week, and perhaps no doubt for reasons that God alone knows and He will only show us when we're here in the Kingdom and Glory, we are to remain, for now, it seems, an open church, so that the most limited mind can come into full-fledged membership in the Body, so that the Mary Magdalenes and the Zacchaeuses and the Ladnices, if they want to, and sometimes they want to for a receive somehow, in the midst of all our problems, the welcome of the Kingdom of God, and so that we, all of us here, can understand clearly that our ministries only begin here in the Gathered Assembly as we worship before the Throne, that the bulk of our ministries, for every one of us, goes on outside there, as we worship the Father and praise the Lamb in our inmost hearts, in the midst of the rap race, and as we, all of us, lower the neck down to the bottom of the sea to scoop up living souls for the Kingdom. But, in stressing the importance for us to remain open, always to be an open church, there is a danger that we mislead ourselves into thinking that therefore we don't really have to have anything in common in this realm of flesh and blood, and that we really don't have to make any kind of commitment to each other. After all, we're committed to the Vine, not to the other branches.

Each branch abides in the Vine. But, if each branch is abiding in the Vine, the branches somehow have to display some kind of harmony. In fact, the proof that the branches are really abiding in the Vine is that they display the mind of Christ, all the branches, not only in their worship of the Lamb Himself, and not only in their passion to proclaim the Gospel to the world, but also in their harmony with each other.

And you can't possibly miss this as you read the New Testament. Our Lord's dealings with the disciples and also His dealings with the Apostolic Church are loaded with a continuous call for unity, not unity of organization, not necessarily unity on every point of doctrine, but unity of heart and mind that will manifest itself somehow in our life together. From John chapter 17, I do not pray for these only, but also for those who are to believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, even as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in Thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that Thou hast sent me.

The glory which Thou hast given me, I have given to them, in order that they may be one, even as we are one, I in them, and Thou in me, that they may become perfectly one. How does this work out in practical terms? For the Son to be in us, the Father in the Son, and we become perfectly one. Surely, if we are one, it's going to show itself somehow in our life together.

It's going to show itself in at least four ways. First of all, that we are under and really ruled by one Spirit, and that we are led by one mind, and that we, in fact, speak with one voice, and that we take one stand against Satan and his kingdom, that you stand firm in one Spirit with one mind, striving side by side for the faith of the gospel, and not frightened in anything by your opponents. One Spirit, one mind, side by side in unity, one voice as we proclaim the gospel, and one stand against the enemy.

If we don't have this, or if we are pursuing this kind of unity all the time, then we can hardly call ourselves an open church. We might be an open club, or an open agency, but to be a church certainly must mean that there is an inner unity around the person of Jesus that manifests itself in the way we function together. Perhaps everybody can agree up to this point, more or less.

Nobody ever agrees, and that's good. We don't have to agree on all these things. But the problem now is that when we move from the theoretical to the practical, we try to put the burden on each other for this kind of unity.

If those guys would only smarten up and show some kind of compassion. If these people would only be more patient. There's a vacuum, why doesn't somebody fill it? But the burden of unity in the body rests with every single one of us.

The only thing that we can do, each of us as an individual, to fulfill this is, number one, of course pray about it, and secondly, act. In order to function together as a body, we are called to stand together in one spirit. Ephesians chapter 4. I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you've been called, with all lowliness and meekness, with patience, forbearing one another in love.

Eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all, who is above all and through all and in all.

Eager to maintain the unity of the spirit. When the spirit of God draws us together around the cross of Jesus, we have unity. We don't have to go out looking for it.

It's a gift. It's ours. But we have to maintain that unity.

We have to keep it alive and fresh, functioning together, living together, working our problems together, ministering together. All the time, this remains our responsibility to endeavor to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. When a man and woman come together in marriage, they are no longer two, they are one.

And this unity is not something they have to strive for. It comes as a gift. It's theirs.

But once they've been given this unity, once they've been brought together like this, it's up to them to maintain it. And just as marriage makes them one, so the spirit makes us one, members one of another in the body. And it's up to us as individuals to maintain that unity, to continuously put ourselves under the authority of the spirit who makes us one.

And to remember that we're members one of another, and to think that way. Because just as in the case of a marriage, a husband or a wife can begin to think of themselves as single, and then they're heading for trouble. So it's possible for believers in the body to think of themselves as single, and separate, with no responsibility to any body of believers.

And then they're heading for trouble. We have to continuously put ourselves under the spirit who keeps us alive, and guides and directs us. To function as the body of Christ, we are called to put ourselves under a single mind.

Not to be brainwashed, but with our own act of will, put ourselves under the mind of Jesus, who emptied himself of his glory and came down and became a servant. And when we put ourselves under the mind of Christ, this is going to show itself in the way we function together. As we see so clearly in the book of Acts, chapter 4. Now the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul.

No one said that any of the things that he had was his own. But they had everything in common. And with great power, the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.

And great grace was upon them all. Now the power of their testimony to the resurrection of Jesus was directly connected to this unity these people had with each other. They were of one heart and soul.

They held even their possessions in common. They shared as if they were blood brothers and sisters, or as blood brothers and sisters ideally at least ought to. And we come from many backgrounds.

We're very, very different in our thoughts and our ways and all that. But in spite of these differences, and in spite of all that, it's possible for us to think with one mind, and to be of one heart and one soul, and truly to share what we have with each other. And as we do this, our testimony to the resurrection of Jesus Christ takes on power.

To function as the body of Christ, we are called into unity in our striving together for the gospel. In other words, we are called to speak with one voice. Romans 15.

May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Tomorrow morning, we'll be all over the place. Some of us won't even be in this state perhaps.

And we'll be doing many different things. But we are not out there as individuals only. We are out there together.

Miles may separate us, but we are side by side. And what a difference this makes when we begin to catch on to this and think this way, and in our prayers for each other, think this way. Our whole purpose for still being on this earth is to glorify the Father by proclaiming the Son out there in the world as one mouth, one life.

We are one voice. To function as the body of Christ, we are called to unity in our stand together against Satan and his kingdom. Matthew 8. When he got into the boat, his disciples followed him.

Let me just say this. When we stand together in unity against Satan and his kingdom, the main characteristic of our unified stand is that we stand there without fear. It was interesting.

Yesterday, after over 10 years of working out on the streets, we were given a kind of a hard time downtown. We weren't misbehaving. We were doing what we always do.

We were working around a young man from another fellowship who was preaching the gospel with tremendous clarity at State and Woodward in front of Christ Presby's. And all of a sudden, a whole army of plainclothes men, must have been five or six of them, gathered around and said, come over here, we want to talk to you. And one of them opened up his little book and he read the ordinance, city ordinance, and forbid us to be doing this.

And it was interesting to observe our own reaction to this. My own thought was, okay, let's back off and figure out what we, the Lord show us what to do next. Marcus Rodriguez, who was with us, immediately started nailing one of the policemen, not in a nasty way, with respect, but one of the policemen was saying, there's this group down here and that group, and everybody thinks they have the right answer.

And Marcus says, on what basis do you say that? There was a boldness that was really of the Lord manifested in him. Brother Bernie, an older man who's been down there hooting and hollering, he doesn't need a PA system. You can hear him for three blocks.

He comes along and he's walking up, praise the Lord, praise the Lord. He doesn't care. But what I'm saying is that, and Bernie got us, he said, now listen, fellas, and there were women too, whatever he called us, don't be afraid.

Don't let fear get a hold of you. And it was really a minor thing, and we found out that if we stand next to a building and don't stand out in the middle of the sidewalk, we can still do it. But we're not even sure that's what we're supposed to do.

But the way fear can intimidate us so quickly, and what a change comes over us when we begin to experience unity with each other. So, in our unity against the enemy, we see this illustrated in Jesus in the disciples in the book. And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves.

But he was asleep, and they went and woke him, saying, Save us, Lord, we are perishing. And he said to them, Why are you afraid, O men of little faith? Then he arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. Now, the winds and the sea, the storm that was battering that little ship, that was symbolic, really, of the storms of the Antichrist, which are already across the earth, lambasting the body of Christ, in many, many subtle ways, and in ways that will be increasingly not so subtle.

And the Lord says to us, Don't be afraid. Why are you fearful, O men and women of little faith? Have faith. Don't be afraid.

Don't be intimidated by your adversaries in any way. And one of the reasons why we are so self-conscious and so timid when it comes to facing down the contempt and the ridicule and dealing with the contempt and ridicule of the world, is that we still don't understand what it means to stand together. We seem to think of ourselves as out there alone.

We're not out there alone. We're out there together. We're in the boat, and the Lord is in the boat with us, and he commands us, Don't be afraid.

From Psalm 133, Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. It is like the precious ointment, the Holy Spirit, upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard, that went down to the skirts of his garments. As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion, for there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life forevermore.

The life and the power of Jesus. Rests upon the body, when the body dwells together in unity. One spirit, one mind, one voice, one fearless stand against the enemy.

May the Spirit, who gives us a taste of that unity afresh, even now, help us to maintain it in the bond of peace. Let's take some time in silence now before the Lord. We're asking, Heavenly Father, that by the supernatural moving of your Spirit upon our minds and our hearts, you would help us to see the ways in which you would have us fit in to the body, in ways which we've been perhaps hesitant to do.

We're praying, Lord God, that you would deal with our attitudes toward each other and toward all people. The ways we think of ourselves, our tendency to become impatient, and to hold on to self-pity and resentments. And we just pray, Lord God, that the walls that we raise in our hearts against each other, in any way at all, may come down.

And that in this kind of unity, the threat that people so often feel out there in the world, and so often feel even more so among believers, would be removed. And should there be any that we've driven from our midst by our hardness of heart, Lord God, forgive us and draw them back to us. We ask it in Jesus' name.