Recently I polled a group of people and asked them one question, what is the purpose of a church? Not surprising, I got several different answers. Some said it was to encourage Christians to live a proper life. Others said that it was grow big. Yet others said it was to evangelize the world. Those were the most common answers. A couple people even said it is to make disciples. I contend however that it is none of those things. Some of those things are how we fulfill the purpose of the church, but I do not see those as the purpose of the church. In this post, we will examine two passages of Scripture that I believe demonstrate the purpose of the church.
The first Scripture is Isaiah 42:8, “I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images.” Specifically in the second section of this verse it says, “My glory will I not give to another.” Certainly in the end of that verse we are reminded of the first and second commandments as found in Exodus 20:3-4. If we look at Isaiah 42:6-7 we read, “I the LORD have called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles; To open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.” We can easily see that the calling, saving, sanctifying, and preservation of people is how God is glorified. These are all works of God, and many of them are to be done by the people of God.
The second Scripture is found in 1 Corinthians 10:31, “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.” This verse clearly shows us that whatever we do, it should be done for the glory of God. In this section Paul was talking about a Christian’s liberty and freedom in Christ. He also in that passage lays out that although we have Christian liberty and freedom, we are not to use that freedom to harm others or hinder their faith. Our freedoms should be exercised or restrained in a way that glorifies God and draws others to Him.
Therefore, I would submit to you that the purpose of the church as well as the Christian is to glorify God. We must be a people that are consumed with the glory of God and displaying it to the world. Too many times we as churches and as pastors (myself included) are concerned about the wrong things. We are concerned with are people coming to the church, do they like me, am I effective as a minister, are we playing the right music at the right decibel level, and on and on. But how many times have we ever asked our self at the end of a service, was God’s glory on display today and did we glorify God with our service? God is glorified by making disciples, God is glorified by outreach, and God is glorified when we live a proper life. But my motivation cannot be to make disciples, outreach, or live a proper life. My motivation for what I do as a Christian and what we do as a church must be to glorify God in all we do. And if I am consumed by the thought of bringing glory to God, then I am going to care about the things God cares about and I am going to do the things that God tells me I should do. I use to have a certain phrase on the pulpit at Westlake, but I moved it one day and forgot where I laid it. It is found in John 12. Jesus has rode into Jerusalem fulfilling Zechariah’s prophecy, He is teaching in the Temple are when some Gentiles come looking for Him. They came to Philip and said, “Sir, we would see Jesus.” If we want to glorify God, people must see Jesus living in us and working through us.
By His grace and through His strength may we live for Him
Thank you for this message. It helps to be reminded what our lives are about, I sometimes tend to get so full of myself and forget the real reason I am here.