I Believe in One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church

“I Believe in One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church”

Matthew 16:18-19, Preached on October 19, 2008

 

Matthew 16:15-19   ¹⁵ He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?"  ¹⁶ Simon Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."  ¹⁷ And Jesus answered him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.  ¹⁸ And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.  ¹⁹ I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

 

One of the great events in the history of television was the broadcasting of Alex Haley’s novel-turned-mini seires called “Roots”?

 

Did you ever see that? I remember as a child sitting up at night at my Nana and Hoppie’s house watching each night’s installment.

 

It was my first introduction to the black experience in America.

 

About a year ago, Roots was put on DVD and resold. I rented a few episodes and watched it back then. When One of Mindy’s favorite movies of all time is The Color Purpose, which is like Roots, in that it tells the story of the African American experience. I have an amateurish interesting in the topic of racial tensions and racial history. I read Shelby Steele’s recent book about race, and I’ve also thumbed through Taylor Branch’s majesterial trilogy of books chronicling the life of Martin Luther King Jr and the modern civil rights movement. I am by no means an expert in the subject, but I am interested in the subject.

 

One of the things I’ve picked up on is that Roots and The Color Purple were important works to the African American Community because it told them that despite their recent hardships, they had a proud, dignified and glorious history.

And it gave them a renewed sense of confidence and hope, because in learning their history, they began to discover again who they really were.

 

You see, if you want to really understand something, you have to go back to its origins. You have to go back to the beginning, especially if you want to understand the present and the future.

 

I think there are some lessons here for the church.

 

Today the church is facing the rising tide of materialism, individualism, secularism, relativism, modernity and post-modernity, greed, selfishness, the redefinition of the soul as primarily a social-psychological self rather than a God-related, spiritual self.

 

The church is facing the erosion of personal ethics and the destruction of community through suburban sprawl and the impersonalization of rising technologies. I sometimes wonder if we in the church at large feel a little bit like the African American community has felt: marginalized, powerless, helpless and even at times oppressed.

 

The health of the church of Jesus Christ is not only being assaulted from without, but also from within.

 

There is a growing trend that tells Christians that they can successfully separate their spiritual walks with Jesus from the organizational church. In fact, there is strong sentiment out there that says that church life is antithetical to spiritual life. And there is no doubt that all of us have been hurt by the church. Perhaps that hurt has come in the active form of attack or in the passive form of lack of nurture and care. If we’ve been in the church for any length of time, we’ve been hurt by other Christians in the body of Christ. And of course we’ve been, because the church is nothing but a collection of sinners. And when sinners get together there will be sin and there will be hurt.

 

It’s a like a stylist being upset that your hair has grown back – after all, she cut it very nicely a month ago. What happened? Well, hair grows, that what it does. And sin grows.

 

And grace is need over and over again. That’s what the church is here for.

But more and more people are saying that the answer is to abandon the church in favor of individual spirituality.

 

There is plenty of legitimate ways to criticize the church. The church has become too beaucratic and too much like any other organization out there in the world. There’s not enough true discipleship, true mission, not enough true care of the soul, not enough true community and not enough true, God-centered worship.

 

So the church is under assault from both the outside and the inside. The church is also under assault from within by virtue of scandal and sin, which tarnishes our joy, grace and witness to a watching world.

 

Now more than ever we need to go back to the origins of the church.

 

Like Roots, we need to look last past some of our more recent struggles and recover the original glory and dignity of who we are.

 

We need to go back to the beginning in order to understand our present and our future. Now more than ever, we need to rediscover our roots, our calling, and the glory of the body of Jesus Christ on earth.

 

The roots of the church are found right here in Matthew 16:18-19

¹⁸ And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.  ¹⁹ I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

 

Let’s begin with the last part of what Jesus says – “I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.”

 

There is a relationship between the church and the Kingdom of God. The church is a sign of the kingdom, an instrument of the Kingdom, and a foretaste of the kingdom. In fact, look at your Credo guidebooks on page 39.

 

First, the church is a sign of the Kingdom.

 

When you are driving to Estes Park, Colorado to visit Rocky Mountain National Park, and you pass Denver, what do you do when you come to the sign that says “RMNP 30 miles”? Do you get out of the car and begin to unpack your belongings? Of course not, because you have not yet arrived. But you know you are close.

 

The church is a sign that tells us that the Kingdom of God is near.

 

In fact, let’s take my analogy just a little father. You are driving to Chicago. You are going to visit the planetarium or Soldier Stadium that sits on the edge of the city, alongside Lake Michigan. So you’re are driving and you see a sign that says, “Now entering the city of Chicago”. Do you stop? No. You are in Chicago, but you’re not yet in downtown, and you’re not yet at the Planetarium.

 

The church is a sign that tells us that the Kingdom of God is hear. We’re not downtown yet. We still have a little farther to go. But it’s not far. The Kingdom of God is pressing in.

 

In the tradition I was raised in, people didn’t pay much attention to the Kingdom of God. They thought of it only as something that will happen at the second coming of Jesus. And when they read it in the Bible, they tended to skip over that part. It just wasn’t that important. But I remember attending a theological meeting at Hothorpe Hall, about 100 miles north of London. And I remember sitting next to theologian Richard Pratt at dinner. And I asked him, “Other than of course Jesus himself, what do you think is the central theme of the Bible? Soveriengty of God? Covenant of grace? The gospel?” “Oh, that’s easy,” he said, “It’s the Kingdom of God.”

 

Starting with Genesis 1, the Bible is the story of God the King. Israel was God’s chosen people whom the King ruled over. And the King came as a suffering Messiah to redeem not just Israel but all his chosen people from every tribe, tongue, language and nation. And as the gospel saved them from sin, they are gathered into his Kingdom.

 

What is the Kingdom of God? They say it’s hard to understand, but it’s really easy. The Kingdom is the reign of the King. Where ever the King reigns, that’s where the Kingdom is. Does King Jesus rule your heart? Then the kingdom of God is within you?

 

And the church is a sign that the Kingdom of God is hear. You see, the Kingdom of God is invisible. It is a spiritual kingdom of the heart. But the invisible Kingdom is made visible in the church of Jesus Christ. When people publically confess faith in Jesus Christ and declare him as their King, they become members of the church of Jesus Christ. They gather in worship and community. They sit under and obey the preaching of the Word of God. They receive the sacraments. They care for nurture one another. They serve the world in witness. And the presence of the Church tells the world that the Kingdom of God has arrived. The church is a sign that the Kingdom of God is here.

 

The church is also an instrument of the Kingdom.

 

Notice again what Jesus said to people – “to you I will give the keys to the kingdom of heaven.” That seems difficult to understand and a bit perplexing. What do you do with a key? You open things and you close things. With a key, you lock things and you unlock things. What Jesus is saying is not hard to understand, but it is astonishing: The church holds the power to open and close the door to the Kingdom of God.

 

How so? The church opens the door to the Kingdom of God by the public proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The church also opens the door by receiving into her membership all those who profess faith in Jesus Christ, along with their children. And the church closes the door to the Kingdom of God through church discipline, excommunication.

 

The church is an instrument of the Kingdom as it serves the world in mission.

 

The main emphasis is always on the public proclamation of the gospel and the invitation to repent and believe the gospel and to receive the free grace of God in Christ and thereby to become participants in the body of Christ, the people of God and the fellowship of the Holy. (Note that I just described the church in Trinitarian terms because the church is indeed a Trinitarian community.)

 

The church is an instrument of the Kingdom as it serves the world in mission.

 

The church is a sign and an instrument of the Kingdom, and

it is also a foretaste of the Kingdom of God.

 

The church is a glimpse of heaven itself.

 

The church is not like any other human institution because every other human institution is based on merit and attainment, but the church alone is a community rooted in grace.

 

At times the church doesn’t feel like a foretaste of heaven, to be sure. When we see and feel the sin and selfishness of others in the church, it doesn’t feel like heaven. But that’s never the end of the story. Because the church isn’t just a collection of sinners. It’s more than that. It’s a collection of people who have the Holy Spirit, who are in the process of being saved by grace and mastered by grace. The church is a community where lives are redeemed and unlovely people are loved. The church is a community where forgiveness is taught and practiced. The church is a community where we studiously study and observe the glory and beauty of God Himself – and then respond to that glory and beauty in joyful worship. The church is a community where we share our possessions with one another, so that no one goes hungry, no one goes without food or shelter and no one is left to fend for himself alone. There is nothing on the earth at all like the church. It is a glimpse of heaven.

 

When the church is gathered together, we do two things and two things only – worship and community. When we are gathered into worship and community – and when we do it well – it feel heaven take its place in our heart.

 

Isaac Walton said of Richard Sibbes: “Heaven was in him before he was in heaven.” And heaven can be in you before you are in heaven if you are in the church. Because Paul says in Ephesians that we have to all be together as the church in order to graph how wide and long and high and deep is the love of God in Christ. We can’t do it alone. We can only experience together in worshipping community – as the church.

 

So I’ve just told you how the church operates in the world. It is a sign, an instrument and a foretaste of the Kingdom of heaven. But now let me tell you something about what the church is. What defines the church and describes the church.

 

When the early church met in council in the year 325, the church was under attack. And at the council of Nicea, our early church fathers clearly articulated some very basic doctrinal truths based on the teachings of the apostles. And in the Nicene creed, they said something enduring about the church. We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church. And when they summarized the teaching of Scripture about the church this way, it stuck. The great fathers of the Protestant Reformation called these the marks of the church.

 

The four marks are those: one, holy catholic and apostolic church. A brief thought on each word.

 

ONE

The church consistent of not just Presbyterians or Methodists of Baptists. The church consists of all those who have a living faith in Jesus Christ, as well as their children. There are Eastern Orthodox and Russian Orthodox Christians in the church. There are Roman Catholics in the church. There are Presbyterians in the church. There are Anglicans in the church. The church is bigger than you think. And when we are all united together in faith in Christ, then it is critical that we realize that there is far more that unites us than divides us.

 

Jesus was passionate about the oneness of the church. In his High Priestly Prayer in John 17, he prayed that his church may be one. It is not right to say that we should strive for the unity of the body of Christ. We already possess it. We are already one body in Christ. What is right to say is that we should strive not to possess it, but to express it. To show that it is true. To demonstrate its truth to the watching world.

 

One of the ways that we do this is by partnering with other churches and denominations in our outreach ministries. Our Garden Gate outreach ministry has been greatly blessed by the help and partnership of Chase Oaks Church and Hunters Glenn Baptist Church. One of our main outreach leaders is a member of a Baptist church in Dallas, Captain Ron. The first make of the church is that she is one.

 

HOLY

The second mark of the church is holiness. The original word for church is ecclesia – which means God’s called out people. The church consists of those who have been called out of this world. The church is a peculiar people, a distinct people. Ed Clowney described the church as “the colony of heaven on earth”. And because of this, we live by different values.

 

Remember the 1989 movie Wall Street by Oliver Stone starring Michael Douglass as Gordon Gekko. Watching the news every night for the past 2 weeks, I’ve been thinking about that movie. Remember Gordon Gekko’s famous speech in the movie? Greed is good. Greed for money is what drives our economy forward. Greed for life and love is what allows us to survive in the evolutionary survival of the fittest. Greed is good. What’s amazing about that speech is that if you accept a few of his presuppositions, then his logic actually makes sense!

 

But those of us in the church don’t accept the presuppositions of the world. We are not engaged in the evolutionary survival of the fittest. We are made and redeemed and blessed by a Savior. The church lives by different values. We do community based on different ideals and different aspirations. For us, moral purity is rooted in beauty and grace, not legalism and cold rigidity. When the beauty and grace of the gospel grips your heart, it changes how you do community – how you live with one another.

 

And we become, in a word, a holy community. Holy just means set apart. Like a pair of nice towels. We are set apart for the Lord.

 

Catholic

This isn’t a reference to the church in Rome. This is something much broader. It means that the church is universal. We believe in the universal church. The people of God consists of billions of people. The church isn’t small. It’s huge. And it’s everywhere. The church is in China. The church is even in North Korea. (Su Jin’s father arrested, detained, starved and then released).

 

And because the church is catholic, we have much to learn from the church in other corners of the world. We have our blind spots, such materialism and individualism. I once read in the writing of a third world pastor that his church has a completely different view of the authority of pastors and elders in the church. In American, if you boss tells you that you are relocating to another city, you accept that because you view your employer as being in a position of real authority. But in this Latin American country, the church is viewed as a greater authority than some corporation or business. So if your boss tells you to relocate, you will not do so without first going to your pastor and elders and seeking their counsel and wisdom and permission. It’s a very different way of understanding the authority of the church, and it’s something to think about.

 

Apostolic

The final mark of the church is its apostolicity. When Jesus says to Peter, “On this rock I will build my church”, he is saying that the church is built on the foundation of the apostles and their teaching. Paul says the same thing in Ephesians, “being built on the foundation of the prophets and apostles, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.” It’s not that Peter is the cornerstone of the church. Jesus alone is that. And it’s not Peter in isolation from the other apostles. But the church is built on the ministry of Jesus and the apostles. And for us to be an apostolic church means that we received the authoritative teaching of the apostles, contained in Holy Scripture. The church is biblical. We are a people under authority.

 

And let me close with this: when the church is all these things (sing, instrument, foretaste, one, holy, catholic, apostolic), then guess what? The church is glorious.

 

Oh, we need to recover a due sense of the glory of the church. The church is the most wonderful thing in the world. Where else can you get this? The church is glorious. She handles glorious things. She is beautiful. She is gracious. Nothing is more beautiful than the church being the church.

 

And the glory of the church is so great that she will prevail. Jesus says to Peter, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Trinity Prebsyterian Church will prevail. Not because I’m a great pastor. Not because we have great elders.  TPC will prevail because it is Jesus who builds the church. And it will prevail. It will prevail to change your heart. It will prevail to bring many people into His Kingdom. And it will prevail to press the Kingdom of God in to the earth. The church is beautiful. The church is glorious. Love the church. As a friend of mine once said, “Stop dating the church, and get married to her.” Love the church. She is glorious. She is the body of Christ.