why covenant matters

In my previous two posts regarding the need for covenant in church membership I pointed us to the Biblical context of covenant. I argued that the strength and heart of any relationship is the covenant. After all, a relationship in which one person is allowed to constantly violate the unspoken terms upon which the relationship is based is very definitely an unhealthy and even abusive relationship. A relationship without boundaries (covenant) is called "co-dependent". God is not an enabler. He invites us into healthy relationship.

Similarly, we are to arrange our relationships within the Body of Christ in this way. The strength and vitality of our growth together will depend upon our agreed upon covenant. In this post I would like to demonstrate why this arrangement is so important. I want us to see that the purpose of the church is so incredibly important and that the mission that each of us individually and corporately are called into is of such great and transcendent importance, that to not join together in this way diminishes all that we are called to accomplish in this life.

The trajectory of the gospel is from heaven to earth, redeeming the earth and bringing it into complete fulfillment, culminating in the second coming of Christ.

Every other religion envisions an escape from earth into a heavenly realm that is purely spiritual and non-material. Only Christianity sees the work of God as healing creation and bringing the material world into reconciliation. We learn in scripture of God’s love for the city. God told Adam and Eve to develop the world. In their disobedience they were cast out. The city was given to us as a way of contending with the fall. It is a place of protection and development and advancement and spiritual challenge. A missional church is one that has the gospel at the very heart of its belief and passion.

Missions comes from the heart of God. Missional people are driven to move the gospel message wherever they are and implement The overriding knowledge for the Christian is that Christ died for us. That one truth affects and instructs every other truth. At the cross, the wrath of God was satisfied by His grace and love. Christ went to the ultimate extreme in forsaking His place in heaven, becoming human flesh and humbling Himself to the point of death on the cross. The trajectory of salvation is from heaven to earth, from the immaterial to the material. God has moved into our world and is redeeming the earth.

Sin, justice and wrath are not popular subjects in modern culture, but how else can one explain the issues of evil and suffering? The world suffers because it needs redemption. More and more intellectuals today are coming around to the idea that there is evil in the world. I recently heard the story of a minister who was asked to advise a panel of Hollywood producers who were determined to make more religiously-oriented films. He asked them, “How many of you believe in God?” Only about half of them raised their hands. He then asked, “How many of you believe in evil?” Every single one of them admitted that because of their own experiences and observations about life, they could not deny that evil was present in the world. The problem of evil in the world is undeniable.

The secularist who does not believe in God’s wrath and justice has no answer to the issues of human violence and evil. After all, when one looks around nature, he sees that violence is natural and that evil is prevalent. If it is OK for big animals to eat small animals, for instance, what is wrong with murder and violence and war in human behavior? If it is true that human beings are a part of nature and have no other meaning above their natural content, then why would we recoil at human violence?

How is it that the human heart understands the plumb-line of human immorality? It must mean that God’s perfect sense of justice is in place and therefore that justice must be satisfied. It is only in Christianity that you find such a complete answer to the problem of evil and justice. God in His perfect sense of justice cannot just “let sin go”. Sin has to be paid for in some way. God in His justice demands payment, but in His grace and love He provided a way in the death of Christ on the cross.

His redemption: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and JUST and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)

By His death on the cross, Christ paid the price once and for all in real and tangible expressions. It is interesting that this verse says if we confess our sins, “He is faithful and JUST and will forgive us.” His justice is satisfied by His death. Because He died I don’t have to die. On my behalf, He will plead not for mercy, but for justice, because God in His perfect justice will not require more than one payment for my sin. Both legalism and liberalism corrupt the meaning of grace. Religious legalism uses God - it serves God in order to get something out of Him.

True Christianity serves God out of the knowledge of His love and the abundance of His grace. Cain’s sacrifice was not accepted because he did not have faith in the abundant mercy and grace of God, while Abel’s offering came from a joy and appreciation for what God had already done in fulfilling His covenant promise (future tense). Therefore, it was the sacrifice of Cain that was honored by God. This story from Genesis 4 is a precursor to the Gospel. Cain, the older brother, tries to coerce God into his mold, while, Abel, the younger and less impressive brother depends solely on the work and grace of God. The theme of the older brother not receiving the honor (birthright) of God is all through the Old Testament (as well as a parable of Christ) and foreshadows the coming of Christ, the second Adam, who by His new covenant brings a new and better way.

The question for all of us is, “Am I a Cain or an Abel?” The Cain’s of this world are only concerned with self, power and control. Christ is the new and better Abel, whose blood cries out from the ground not for justice, but for mercy and grace (see Hebrews 12). As followers of Christ our passion is for His redemptive work in the world.

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. (2 Corinthians 5:18-19)

To understand the gospel is to have passion for reconciliation. Christ reconciled us to Himself and then gave us the ministry of reconciliation. From the gospel we learn of God’s passion for the lost. He was the first missionary, walking in the garden in the cool of day calling out to Adam, “what is this that you have done?” Even at the moment the curse took affect, God was providing a way. “You will strike his heal and he will strike your head,” He said to the enemy, prophesying the coming of Christ on the cross. At the cross, Christ took the blow and became the covenant curse so that we could be the covenant blessing.

As we are drawn into Him and become more like Him it is natural for us to open our eyes and hearts to a lost world. As the Father seeks worshippers and calls out for covenant restoration, our passion is for reconciliation and restoration. Missions is at the heart of God and therefore is at the heart of every believer. At the very core of our being we are drawn into Him and out into a lost world.

So what does the ministry of reconciliation look like? As the Bride of Christ, we are to have the priorities of Christ. Jesus made it clear that he came to “seek and save that which was lost.” We believe every member is a missionary, and every member is a minister. All of us are called into the Cause. Our “CAUSE” is to “love people to Christ” – to “reconcile” them to Christ. It is our “Lp2C” formula. There is a profound implication in those words. We are to love them to Christ. We are not to beat them to Christ, guilt them to Christ, scare them to Christ or badger them to Him. These failed strategies are a turnoff anyway, and have done immense damage to the witness of the church. All of us are called to reach our world for Christ; there is no question of this. But how are we to do it? The answer is found in the words and example of our Lord:

You are the salt of the Earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men. You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. (Matthew 5:13-15)

Jesus makes a clear allusion here between the church’s responsibility to be an influence to the community outside it’s walls. The church is to have an outward focus. It involves getting outside the comfort zone of the “Christian bubble” and moving into the darkness. Salt has no effect if it is not out of the salt shaker. A light hidden is useless. We must be actively relating to people who don’t know Him, investing in their lives and inviting them to be part of our faith journey.

We also have a role as a church community. It is to be, as Robert Lewis puts it, “a church of irresistible Influence.” Lewis writes of the huge difference between the evangelical church at the beginning of last century—with its reputation for impacting society through humble acts of charity, effective community strategies and far-reaching acts of community ministry and sacrificial works of service—and the single-minded “proclamation by preaching” that passes for an evangelical expression of Christian faith in most evangelical churches today. He writes:

The evangelical church finds itself, not surprisingly, disconnected from the real world. We are isolated, self-assured and socially uninvolved. The Church of the 21st century must shift its focus from an institutional orientation to a community orientation if it is to survive and thrive. (Robert Lewis, Church of Irresistible Influence).

In its disconnection from the real world, the church becomes increasingly adamant in its disgust and opposition to popular culture. What the world sees is angry shouting and moralizing, with threats of boycotts and strong-armed political pressure aimed at conforming state to church and forcing people to act more like us. The problem with this, of course, is that the church loses its saltiness if it no longer has influence. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. To love people to Christ is to show love in such compelling and irresistible ways that the Gospel is brought to bear not just by what we proclaim, but by the way we live. Evangelism, in other words, is not just something you say, it is what you are. And additionally, as we covenant together in membership, it is therefore who we are.