The Eternal Purpose of God
What is the Purpose of the Church? • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
Introduction
We have just finished a sermon series exploring the lies that some Christians believe sometimes. I called the five topics of that series “lies” because I believe them to be false and unhelpful at best or destructive at their worst. You might think you’re noticing a tactic in my preaching when I admit that I’m going to start this sermon series similarly.
The mandate given to me by the Church Council and by Presbytery, over the next two years, is to develop with you a mission plan for this congregation and the proper stewardship of its properties. It would be too easy for me to recast, clarify and articulate a vision in a dictatorial manner because I actually enjoy thinking up vision, mission and strategy. It’s my ‘bread and butter’, so to speak, whereas your eyes probably started to glaze over the moment I mentioned the word “vision”. I don’t want to dictate because, like you, I want the parish of Croydon Park-Belfield Uniting Church to last well into the future, building on the heritage that you all and others have so well laid down prayerfully and faithfully.
If we are going to build on that heritage well, and live into God’s plan for our parish, then I need to make sure that we are all ‘speaking the same language’. In order to make sure of that, this sermon series is going to explore the broad topic, “What is the Purpose of the Church?”, and we’re going to start by going back to the beginning, before the beginning actually...
Where Did the Story Go Askew?
Where Did the Story Go Askew?
How far back are we going to go? If we’re going to understand the purpose of our church, we need to understand the purpose of The Church.
Providentially, the Church Calendar today has us focusing on the day of Pentecost, which many people would argue is the birthday of the Church. They would further argue that the Church was given birth so as to fulfil The Great Commission, to “go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation” (). So, for some, God’s plan begins with Pentecost.
Of course, we wouldn’t need the Gospel if we didn’t have The Fall. What is The Fall? According to one of my favourite sermon preparation resources:
The departure by creation, including human beings, from the patterns and standards set for it by God. Creation now exists at a lower level of integrity and fulfilment than that which God originally intended for it.
Some Christians talk a lot about the plan of God
[The Fall is] the departure by creation, including human beings, from the patterns and standards set for it by God. Creation now exists at a lower level of integrity and fulfilment than that which God originally intended for it. (Martin H. Manser, Dictionary of Bible Themes, 2009)
(Martin H. Manser, Dictionary of Bible Themes, 2009)
Being the representative first humans, Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, thereby plunging all of humanity into sin and death.
For some Christians, God’s plan begins with The Fall.
The problem with this approach is that it ignores everything that happened before, as if nothing of importance happened beforehand. We have The Fall and that initiated God’s plan, and that is all that matters.
To think that The Fall is the beginning of God’s story is both false and unhelpful. It instigates the thinking that God wasn’t really interested in humankind until we disobeyed or, even worse, God specifically created us so that we would disobey, as if God’s plan was to send Jesus to the cross even before we created the sin that required this intervention.
To do that we need to go back before time so that we can distinguish between God’s purpose and God’s plan.
To correct this faulty and unhelpful thinking, we need to distinguish God’s purpose from God’s plan.
Back Before the Beginning
Back Before the Beginning
God’s story begins before Pentecost, before The Fall and, indeed, before even our creation. We need to go back before the beginning of time to remember,
Dictionary of Bible Themes 1140 God, the eternal
Ps 90:2
Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
God is eternal, He has always existed. And God has always existed with a triune nature, three-in-one. While the actual term “the Trinity” is not found in the bible, the truth of this doctrine is clearly set out.
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
Thus, God existed before time in perfect trinity and love, needing nothing at all from anything or anyone beyond Himself, self-sufficient.
The Almighty is beyond our reach and exalted in power; in his justice and great righteousness, he does not oppress.
Thus, God existed before time in perfect trinity and love
Knowing this about God, we might wonder then why He created anything and anyone at all? This simple and straightforward answer is because He could. The purpose of God was to share the love and community enjoyed by the Trinity.
Interference and Delay
Interference and Delay
Interestingly, neither the angels nor anything else in all of Creation could provide what God was looking for:
When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.
Which goes a long way to explaining why The Fall was so devastating: sin and death interferes with and delays the purpose of God. Nevertheless, The Fall does not alter the purpose of God, it merely requires a plan so as to get everything back on track.
The Purpose of God, Expanded
The Purpose of God, Expanded
That’s the simple answer to why God created, even though He had no need to. It brings to mind the image of a girl being taunted at school because she is adopted, and who responds with, "well, my parents chose me; your parents are stuck with you!"
The explanation of God’s purpose is much more complete. From the book of Ephesians, we discover that there are four images which describe the all-consuming passion and purpose of God, which caused Him to create in the first place, and compelled Him to initiate a plan of salvation. Those images are a house and a family, for God the Father, and a bride and a body for God the Son. Let’s look at these images a little more closely, as they are for us to help us understand God’s eternal purpose so much better.
A Family
A Family
In we read,
Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household,
Our sin has resulted in our death, and God is not happy about these consequences befalling His creation. He is not satisfied to be estranged from us, as foreigners and strangers tend to be. God would rather we be fellow citizens with all of His people; even better, members of His household, His family.
Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.
We can see something of this in the story of The Garden of Eden, back before sin entered into the human condition:
Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”
In the story, God created this beautiful garden and was then looking for His children who, He thought, were playing Hide & Seek.
The apostle Paul described this idea further in
For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
The eternal purpose of God was to have a family.
A House
A House
A Family
A Family
continues the description of God’s purpose:
built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.
Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.
The testimony of the Bible, from beginning to end, describes God wanting a place to be with His people —a house, in other words.
When God met Moses on Mount Sinai, following The Exodus from slavery in Egypt, He told Moses,
“Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them. Make this tabernacle and all its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you.
In that tabernacle —in other words, a tent— God would meet with His people.
Later, when David took over the throne of Israel, God declared to Him, through the prophet Nathan,
This is what the Lord says: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting place be?
When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
Of course, this desire of God’s is not so much about a building as it is about a place to meet with His people, for as He later declared through the prophet Isaiah,
This is what the Lord says: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things, and so they came into being?” declares the Lord. “These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word.
This is what the Lord says: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting place be?
Finally, in the book of Revelations we read of a time when sin will no longer have any hold on humankind. In that time,
I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.
God’s purpose is to have a family and a place to meet with them, being you and I. This was true long before The Fall interfered with and delayed His purpose. Yet, there’s two more images that are equally important.
A Bride
A Bride
The third image that helps us to understand and appreciate God eternal purpose is that of a bride:
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.
Now, I don’t want to make any men uncomfortable, but God has always been so interested in the idea of a people after His own heart that we can best describe it as His affection and His love for that people.
Men, you would do anything to protect and provide for your wife, wouldn’t you? That feeling and commitment pales in comparison to the care and concern God has for His people, His bride. Our desire to be wed to another is but a glimpse of God’s desire for His Church.
He called Abraham and Sarah out from their home country so that they would miraculously become the ancestors of a great nation with God as its king. When that plan failed miserably, Christ commissioned the Church, again not because He had to but because God wanted to. Which leads us into the final image of...
A Body
A Body
…a body:
And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church,
God’s eternal purpose was to enter into such a close communion with a people to call His own, that they could best be described as His body, His hands and feet on the earth, His representatives.
In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
Stop for clarifying questions
While we might say that Jesus was revealed only when the time was right and humanity had matured enough to enter into such a communion with the triune God, this still did not require The Fall
While we might say that Jesus was revealed only when the time was right and humanity had matured enough to enter into such a communion with the triune God, this still did not require The Fall
Some Final Thoughts
Some Final Thoughts
Some Final Thoughts
Some Final Thoughts
These four images of a family, a house, a bride and a body are seen consistently throughout the Bible, both in the Old and the New Testaments. They reveal the eternal purpose of God but they are obscured somewhat by His plan of salvation. Nevertheless, the purpose remains. In fact, there is only a plan because of the purpose. We cannot truly understand or appreciate the plan without first understanding and appreciating the purpose.
While The Fall interfered with and delayed the purposes of God, it required a plan to make right what was broken, to deal with the sin and death we had allowed ourselves to be captured by. Indeed, Jesus was revealed into human history only when the time was right, when humanity had matured enough to enter into such a communion with the triune God as He had intended all along. Nevertheless, His purpose did not require The Fall.
God's plan to deal with The Fall, and reconcile fallen humanity to Himself, is separate to His eternal purpose. God sent Jesus to save humanity so that it could become the family, house, bride and body that God intended. This sounds very much like God is concerned only with the group, but the group becomes such when individuals respond.
What we can begin to see in all this is that our individual purpose is only realised when we join the Church in the eternal purpose of God. Knowing that God is so committed to you and us should stir each of our hearts to respond with joy and gratitude to the fact
he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;
hat God does not treat us as our sins deserve
Our individual purpose is only realised when we join the Church in the eternal purpose of God
Our individual purpose is only realised when we join the Church in the eternal purpose of God
Conclusion
Conclusion
As we begin this sermon series, I am hoping that we will together wrestle with some important concepts in the story of God. We will see our part in the big picture, the purpose of this church in the purpose of The Church. Our purpose is to fulfil God’s plan in Croydon Park-Belfield, yes, remembering that the plan of God fulfils the purpose of God which has stood since the beginning of time and will remain until its end.