As we’ve been studying the birth of the Lord’s Church in the first chapters of the Book of Acts, and discussing how the ideal thing for us is to capture the same essence, the same attitudes, and the same devotions as the first century Church, you may have noticed a word that is conspicuously missing from the text.
The word – church!
That’s not to say that we are wrong in our assessment of what we are seeing the Lord doing, but the word is not there.
The church was the biggest mystery of the first century followers of Jesus. We know nothing of the church, biblically speaking, until Jesus himself mentions it in Matthew 16:18 when He famously declares, …I will build my church…
He gives some further instructions to His disciples in Matthew 18 on how to deal with rebellion within the church, but then we don’t see the word again until Acts 5:11 when Luke records these words:
11 And great fear came over the whole church…
Why was the church such a mysterious thing to the Jews? Because the Old Testament told of a coming Messiah who would rule and reign forever, but what it did not explain that the Messiah would come, then go, and then come again some day in a distant future.
That was the mystery. They had no way of knowing that between the first time Messiah came and the next time Messiah would come, that there would be a very long number of years in between when the Lord would use his followers to expand His Kingdom before the end would come.
Praise the Lord for the mysterious church age! If not for it, we wouldn’t get to be a part! Praise Him today for including us in His wonderful invitation to follow Him! Praise the Lord for His church, of which we, even we, get to be a part!
Much Love!
Wes LeFlore (918) 607-8489 or huskerwes1@gmail.com
