TEXT: EPH. 5:1-21
A. CHURCH
The word “church” is used in the New Testament to refer to
the people of God who have obeyed the gospel by immersion into the death,
burial and resurrection of Jesus. In the New Testament the word “church” is
used primarily to God’s people who have been called out (Greek : ecclesia) of
the world. The church is God’s special holy nation of redeemed people whose
citizenship is in heaven (Acts 20:28; Ph. 3:20-21; Tit.2:14; 1Pt. 1:18-19;
2:9). The church is made up of those on earth who have submitted to the reign
of Jesus from heaven. The church is composed of those in whose hearts Jesus now
reigns (Lk.17:20-21). Wherever the will of God is done on earth in the hearts
of men as it is done in heaven (Mt.6:10), then the church exists. As a body
filled with the Spirit of God (1Cor.6:19), the church is a vibrant community in
this world to accomplish the work of God to bring men into eternity through obedience
to the gospel.
B. WORLD
World in the New Testament sometimes means what it means in
the Old Testament, namely, this earth, the good natural order that God created.
Usually, however, it means mankind as a whole, now fallen into sin and moral
disorder and become radically anti-God and evil. Occasionally, the two senses
seem to blend, so that statements about the world carry the complex touch of
perverse people incurring guilt and shame by their misuse of created things.
C. THE CHURCH AND THE
WORLD
Christians are sent into the world by their Lord (John 17:18)
to witness to it about God’s Christ and his kingdom (Matt. 24:14; cf. Rom.
10:18; Col. 1:6,23) and to serve its needs. But they are to do so without
falling victim to its materialism (Matt.6:19-24,32), its unconcern about God
and the next life (Luke 12:13-21), and its prideful pursuit of pleasure,
profit, and position to the exclusion of everything else (1 John 2:15-17). The
world is at present Satan’s kingdom (John 14:30; 2Cor.4:4; 1John 5:19; cf. Luke
4:5-7), and the outlook and mind-set of human societies reflect more of the
pride seen in Satan than the humility seen in Christ.
Christians, like Christ, are to emphasize with people’s
anxieties and needs in order to serve them and communicate with them
effectively. They are to do so, however, on a basis of motivational detachment
from this world, through which they are momentarily passing as they travel home
to God and in which their single-minded purpose must be to please God (Col.
1:9-12; 1Pet. 2:11)
Discuss: 2 Corinthians 6:14-18
Also discuss
1 John 2:15-17
MEMORY VERSE:
Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the
world, you do not have the love of the Father in you (1 John 2:15 NLT).
Resource by Church of Eternal Life Jos, Plateau state.
