CLUB OR ARMY?

And I tell you, you are Peter the rock, and
on this rock (your confession) I will build
my church, and the power of death shall not
prevail against it. Matthew 16:18

Notice two things about these words of Jesus:

-

First; absolute certainty. Not, "If I can find the right

people I'm going to build my church. But I'm going to

build it..... it will be."

The second thing to notice is that this church which he's
building is not something static and stationary like a
structure, but it's moving like an army ... it's in motion,
it's going somewhere, it's doing something. The gates of
death try to hold it back, but they can't ... it breaks
right through ...crashes through the gates of death to set
the captives free.

So when they had come together, they asked
him, "Lord, will you at this time restore
the kingdom to Israel?" He said to them,
"It is not for you to know times or seasons
which the Father has fixed, by his own
authority, but you shall receive power
when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and
you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and
in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth."

Again we see the same two things ... absolute certainty.

It's not, "If things work out right you'll get some power."
But, "You're going to receive power, you will. The Holy
Spirit's going to come and you're going to have it."

He is saying, secondly, "When this power comes you're
going to be an army ... you're going to move ... you'll be
my witnesses starting where you are in Jerusalem and
moving out into Judea, up into Samaria and onto the rest
of the world."

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood,

a holy nation, God's own people, that you
may declare the wonderful deeds of him who
called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

I Peter 2:9

And again .... absolute certainty. "You are that chosen
race, that royal priesthood." Not, "try to be a chosen race,"

but, "you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,

God's own people.” And the purpose of your being this is so that

you can be an army .... so that you can proclaim the wonderful

deeds "of him who called you out of darkness into his
marvelous light."

In other words, this thing is going to be ... nothing is going to stop it.

And it's going to move like a conquering army. It' a not going to stand

still.

And yet, from the earliest days there have been influences

inside the Body of Christ which have continuously tried to dull

that certainty and to water down this army so it becomes nothing

but a useless club.

The real danger to the Body of Christ from its beginning was not

outside opposition, but a spirit, an element within the Body ...

and really within each of us ... that tries to water it down, dull that

certainty and slow it down so that it loses its momentum until it's no
longer an army but a club.

And so,

- while Jesus was building his church and
sending it out,

- while the Holy Spirit was coming with power
upon these people and sending them out,

- while the Father was making them a chosen
race, a royal priesthood and a holy nation
and sending them out,

- internal difficulties began to appear
by which many believers were side-
tracked into the "club thing," while
only a few managed to go on and be

that army that they were called to be.

We see this as we read through the book of Acts. By the
time you get to chapter 5 already we have problems.
Ananias and Sapphire lie to the Holy Spirit in a matter
concerning money. Then when we get to chapter 6 there's
tension between the Greek widows and the Hebrew widows....
the foreigners and the locals. And the foreigners aren't
getting a fair deal in the daily distribution of the food.
And pretty soon the church is so embroiled in internal
church business... sticky issues between believer and

believer ...that it begins to lose its momentum in the thing
that it was called to do. It's already starting to slow
down in its worship of God and in its witness to the
world. Jesus said,

"You're going to be my witnesses starting in
Jerusalem but going out into Judea, Samaria,
the ends of the earth,"

...and they're still sitting in Jerusalem They don't move.

They're so wrapped up in their own affairs, and so turned
in on their own problems that they don't get out, until
finally when Stephen is stoned persecution arises. That
persecution drives them out for the first time .... and for
the first time Samaritans begin to hear the gospel.

And then in chapter 9 we read for the first time of some
believers (Jewish believers) in Damascus. And then
finally in chapter 10 the Spirit almost has to drag Peter
by the neck and get him to speak in the house of the
Gentile Cornelius.

At last chapter 11 of Acts ... we read for the first time of

some brothers preaching the gospel without being prodded,

to some Gentile Greeks in Antioch getting a tremendous response,

so that Antioch very quickly becomes the center of worldwide

missionary out reach for the Body of Christ. But in a short time

the same pattern sets in even in Antioch.

Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets
and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called
Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen a member of the
court of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. While
they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the

Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for me Barnabas
and Saul for the work to which I have called
them." Then after fasting and praying they
laid their hands on them and sent them out.

Acts 13:1-3

Here we have pure kingdom glory at work. Five man of
God, Jew and Gentile and black and white who are about
the two basics of the Kingdom of God.... (1) worship of
God and (2) outreach:

When they had fasted and prayed, they sent
them out.

But by the time Paul and Barnabas get back from that
relatively brief missionary journey, things are going
haywire even in Antioch. Reading from Acts 14 verse 27:

And when they arrived, they gathered the
church together and declared all that God
had done with them, and how he had opened
a door of faith to the Gentiles. And they
remained no little time with the disciples.

But some men came down from Judea and were
teaching the brethren, "Unless you are circumcised

according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved."

And when Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension

and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of
the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to the

apostles and the elders about this question.

So while Paul and Barnabas are out there knocking them
selves out, getting the word to the Gentile world, the nit-pickers

come in and say,

"Unless you first get circumcised and become
Jewish, you can't join our club."

And all kinds of energy has to be wasted arguing and
fighting and debating and going up to Jerusalem to get
a verdict from the apostles about this matter. Now if
these nit-pickers had been about the business of the

kingdom .... if they had been engaged in burning

worship of God ... and been about the business of

taking that word out to the world, they would have

quickly seen that this issue was very minor.

And so we see in Antioch and everywhere, the problem ....

the threat to the Body of Christ among these wonderful people
did not come from outside opposition ... they could always
handle outside opposition. It always came about through
internal strife. And that internal strife was, not between
the good people and the bad people ... not even between the
true Christians and the hypocrites, but inside almost every
believer. Inside the Body of Christ at Antioch and every
where there was a war going on between two spirits. One
spirit was trying to make this church into a club...and
the other spirit was trying to make it into an axe. And
these two spirits have continued fighting a war down
through the centuries to this moment and will continue to
do so until the moment when burning, blazing judgment
visits the church in a final way and the bride throws off
her filth, makes herself ready for the bridegroom.

Meanwhile among us here and among believers in every part
of the world, there is a spirit that would try to help us
to become a club. And the spirit that wants to make us

into a club isn't in "the other guy" it's in each of us.
A club ... maybe an exclusive little Christian club right .
here that has nothing to do with all the other unclean
institutions. Or, a club that's tied in with Christian
clubs all over the world .... but a club made up of decent,
enlightened, doctrinally sound, socially aware, respectable
people .... but a club that's concerned primarily with itself.
And the spirit that's trying to help us become a club is
the spirit of the anti-Christ.

There is also among us here and among believers everywhere
a spirit that would have us become an army. An army that
first of all stands before God in blazing worship ... holy,
wonderful, awesome worship - and gets heated to white heat
and then goes out into that world with the truth of who
Jesus is. It breaks through the gates of death and invades
the territory of Satan and sets those captives free and takes
territory for the Lord. And the spirit that's trying to
help us become an army is the Holy Spirit of the living God.

Now there's no need for us to be surprised or alarmed
over the fact that such a war is going on. It has been
going on and will continue until the end of the age.
But what we need to be conscious of is that every time
we allow ourselves to get sidetracked ... caught up in
issues that are petty to the neglect of true,

awesome,
genuine,
burning
worship of God, and to the neglect of getting the word
of the Lord out into that world beyond these walls....
every time that happens, the anti-Christ is doing a
number on us. He's having some success at making us
into a club.

During the past two months we've had some of the most
powerful services here that we've ever had. We've had
some of the most enlightening and helpful Bible studies
we've ever had. And yet, during this same two month
period we have been upset over more peripheral issues....
really bothered by them, troubled by them, than in any two

month period in the last twenty years. What we have to do

to solve the problem is very simple ... we have to decide what
are we going to be? Are we going to be a club or an army?

If we're going to be a club then we can forget about the Lord,

forget about the world out there, and settle down and busy

ourselves with these issues. If we're going to be an army there

are only two concerns we have to worry about at all:

1. Are we going to get on with the business of genuine
worship of God.

2. Are we going to get on with the business of getting
that gospel about Jesus out beyond the walls of

this building.

And, if we will do this, all the other issues will be
settled in time in a godly way. Reading from Acts 13:

Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets
and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called
Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen a member of the

court of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. While they were

worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said,

"Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to

which I have called them." Then after fasting and praying

they laid their hands on them and sent them off.

... while they were worshiping the Lord and fasting the
Spirit spoke.

They were about the business, first of all, of holy, clean,
blazing praise of God ...worship of God,

thanksgiving to God. Their hearts
were concentrating on him. They were corporately functioning

as, "a chosen race, royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people.”

And we are called, first and foremost, to do the same. The most

important thing that we will do in all our lives is gather together

and Worship God. We will never come any closer to the glory of

heaven until we're actually there, than when we gather together
in the name of Jesus and worship.

And so may God help us to lay aside anything ... any fear,
any hang-up, any attitude ... anything that hinders our concentrating

on the throne ... seeing the throne. Offering our bodies as a
living sacrifice, and our minds renewed in the Spirit.... worship.

That's what we have to give ourselves to first of all, and let nothing

interfere with it. I might have one opinion about how it should be

done and you may have another; that doesn't matter .... worship.

We give each other room ... if we worship we'll give each other room.

While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting,
the Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for me Barnabas
and Saul for the work to which I have called them."
Then after fasting and praying they laid their
hands on them and sent them off.

Se they sent Saul and Barnabas out to points beyond. The
other three stayed in Antioch. But all five of them went
out ... all of them went out.

“You shall receive power when the Holy spirit is come

upon you and you will be my witnesses."

And if we will move in that power and be those witnesses,
we will be the army of the Lord on the earth, we'll be part of it.

The most effective way we can cancel out the efforts of the anti-Christ

who all the time wants to convert us into a little religious club for nice
people is to takeoff the bushel ... go out there and take a few risks ...

and proclaim to the world the truth about who Jesus is. We could make

a rule for ourselves that would be extremely helpful ... to say,

"If I don't have the guts to go out there and
tell the world that Jesus is Lord then I don't
have the right to nit-pick over any issue."

Putting it in a positive way,

"If I go out there and tell the world who Jesus
is, on my job, in any neighborhood, among my
relatives, wherever I am, I probably won't have
the time to nit-pick."

And so today we're going to kneel at the table of the
Lord and receive his body and drink his blood .... the
blood of the One and the body of the One who laid down
his life to forgive our sins. We're going to partake
of him and commune with him who makes us sons and
daughters of God, and who then sends us forth to break
through the gates of death ... if we will draw near to
him in worship. And if we'll be obedient to him,

obey his Spirit as we

go out from here, we will be the Army of the Lord upon
this earth and not a club. And we will break through
the gates of death. And we will take the land around
us and the city around us for him.