God’s True Church

What is the church?  In Mathew 18:20, Jesus taught that God is anywhere where two or three saints gather in his name. In other words, the church is not the building where Christians gather for worship. The church is a community of believers. Many other scriptures reinforce this definition. For instance, Paul talks of the church of Galatia (Galatians 1:1-2). In this scripture, Mathew referred to the local churches found in the region of Galatia. A local church refers to a localized community of believers as opposed to the broader global church which comprises of all saints on the face of the earth.

The best illustration of the global church is given in the book of Corinthians where Paul says, For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink (1 Corinthians 12:13).  From this scripture, we can infer that any follower of Christ is a member of the universal church. This is irrespective of denomination, race, gender, age or any other societal stratification factors. We are all one body.

What The Church is Not

For most people, the word church means a building where Christians gather for worship. And this was the notion that the Samaritan woman in John 4 had. She believed that the only place to worship God was at the temple in Jerusalem.
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
…Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.
John 4:19, 23

To her, the church was a building. And this might have been true in the Old Covenant.  But as Jesus let her know, the definition changed in the New Testament. In the Old Testament times, the temple was regarded as the house of God. God hid His presence  in the Holy of Holies, and only a designated high priest could access it. But under the new covenant, the temple of God is no longer the building but rather the heart of man. God now lives in the heart of the believer.

This is why the scriptures say, “Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God?” 1 Cor. 6:19
In other words, you do not need to go to a church building for you to access God’s presence. You have his spirit dwelling in you and can, therefore, access him anywhere anytime.  One of the many benefits of belonging to the true church is escaping the eternal punishment of God’s wrath.

This is not to mean that congregational or church worship is not essential.  Therefore you wouldn’t be a strong Christian without being part of a congregation. As we have already seen, the church is a community of believers. So in as much as you have God’s spirit in you, you need to be connected to other believers to make up the church.