The Message of the Church

<p><strong style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>The Bible begins and ends with God dwelling with his people from Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden to the great multitude in the New Jerusalem in the book of Revelation. At each step God gathered his people together to speak to them hear from them and change them to be more like him. God assembling his people whom he loves is what the Bible calls 'church'.</strong></p><p></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>The church should aspire to be a group of vibrant loving risk-everything people who are passionately committed to living out the values of God's Word and looking forward to the new creation. Churches and their pastors and leaders need to hear what the Bible says about who they are and what they are to do.</span></p><p></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Chris Green takes 'the message of the church' to mean first that the church has a message which is that God has saved his people through Christ; second that the church is the created and saved result of that message; and third that the church is a message which is that he has saved broken people like us and by belonging to his people we are trying to respond to him in the ways he requires. His stimulating and insightful exposition begins with a survey of the church 'from eternity to Eden to exodus to exile to eternity' and then focuses on various dimensions of the church's life and ministry including its worship unity maturity servants gifts holiness boundaries and future.</span></p>