A COLLECTION OF SERMONS AND ARTICLES  

Table of     Contents

1. We’ve been talking about the 4 marks or characteristics of the Church;
1. That it is; One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic.
1. We have seen how oneness and holiness go together,
2. Today we are going to examine the Catholic aspect of the Church.

Ephesians 4:1-6

1 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit— just as you were called to one hope when you were called— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

BODY:

1. DEFINITION:

1. ekklesia
1. the assembly, or church, is all those believers in all places, through all time, who gather together in community to serve God
2. CATHOLIC
1. Universal, all embracing
1. We read in our text; that there is one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all, and in all.
1. The church includes all who God has called into relationship and fellowship with him, no matter who they are, what colour, nationality or background they come from.
2. Edwin Clowney, in the New Dictionary of Theology discusses this catholic character trait of the church as follows;

The NT church is catholic or universal: it is not limited geographically as Israel was, and it joins in one fellowship people of every sort. The church cannot exclude from its membership any who credibly confess Christ. Sectarianism that limits church membership to any race, caste, or social class denies catholicity. 1

3. Roman Catholic means the Roman church around the world, including people from everywhere, not just Rome
1. It could just as well be called the Roman Universal Church
2. ? What is another denominational name that contains a synonym for catholic or universal, in its title?
1. Worldwide Church of God
1. Catholic Church of God would mean just the same thing, in fact if you were to translate the words Worldwide Church and Catholic Church into another language you would quite likely use the same words exactly for both.
3. THE POINT
1. The fact is that the One, Holy, Apostolic church is universal, worldwide, all encompassing
1. It includes, it does not exclude, anyone based on race, culture, sex, age, social class, or language
4. Remember our theme for the year;
1. God’s grace expressed in, the Lord, his body and his work.
2. The catholicity, universality, and all encompassing nature of the church expresses God’s grace
3. The fact that God calls all types of people, from all types of places and backgrounds and places them in the body of Christ, underlines God’s grace
1. It demonstrates his unmerited love.
1. It reminds us that no matter who we were, no matter what our past, through no merit of ours, without any partiality or discrimination, God called us, redeemed us, forgave us and placed us in the body, the ekklesia, his assembly of called out ones.

Ephesians 2:13-16

13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.

14 For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, 16 and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility.

5. Plainly the church is made up of all that have been brought near to, and reconciled to God by the blood of Christ.
1. The fact that we are of different denominations or groups, or countries, or nationalities, or times, doesn’t make us the body or Church, nor exclude us from it.
2. R.L Omanson writes in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology;

To speak of the catholicity of the church is...to refer to the entire church, which is universal and which has a common identity of origin, lordship, and purpose. While the local church is an entire church, it is not the entire church. As catholic, the church includes believers of past generations and believers of all cultures and societies. It is unfortunate that the church in the Western world has for far too long formulated theology and mission strategy in isolation from the churches of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, the churches of the two-thirds world. The World Christian Encyclopedia shows that whites now represent 47.4 percent of the Christian population of the world, the first time in 1,200 years that whites are not the majority. Two hundred [and] eight million Christians speak Spanish, 196 million speak English, 128 million speak Portuguese, followed by German, French, Italian, Russian, Polish, Ukrainian, and Dutch. 3

6. The church is the assembly of all people, no matter what place, race, denomination or time— who have been brought together into one body by Jesus their one Lord
1. We are called as we read in our text to live a life worthy of our calling, our calling to be part of this catholic, all encompassing group of God’s beloved people;
7. Ephesians 4:1-6

1 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit— just as you were called to one hope when you were called— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.



2.   GRACE

1. The catholic, all encompassing nature of the Church not only demonstrates God’s Grace; it also calls for gracE on behalf of its members
2. It is very easy to become bound up in what makes us different
1. To become uneasy, or intolerant and Cliquish, judgmental
2. It is very easy to become FEEL uneasy when we are part of a large, all encompassing, wide ranging group
3. It is understandable that many feel uncomfortable when there aren’t clear sharp boundaries, a clear sense of identity, things that make us feel special, good, even superior and meritorious.
4. If we feel we are part of a special group, then turn around and find we are just a tiny part of a huge group, we can feel diminished, upset, cheated.
3. Pretend for a moment;
1. You have received an invitation from the Queen, or some famous or influential world figure you greatly admired
1. Personal letter, saying they have come to know of you, and would very much like to have you come and spend a week with them on such and such a resort area.
2. Date given, ticket enclosed
2. ? How do you feel?
1.  
2. Feel different to everyone else, privileged, set apart from others.
1. Gives you a sense of pride and recognition, that you are special
3. You fly in, all excited. Every night you’ve lain awake thinking of what you are going to talk about with this great person, what you might be going to do.
1. You are picked up in a limousine and driven to this great big estate
2. You’ve dressed in your very best clothes, had your hair cut, looking your very best.
3. Ushered into huge mansion, and told that the famous person, is waiting to meet you.
4. Door is opened, and you walk into a huge ballroom.
4. To your huge surprise, the room is full of people
1. People as far as the eye can see
5. HOW DO YOU FEEL NOW?
1. Not only are there several thousand people in this huge hall, but there are all sorts of people
1. Natives from Africa in tribal dress, there are aboriginals, Afghanis, Cambodians, people from many other third world countries.
2. Bedraggled unkempt street people of all ages and nationalities
3. People who reek of dirt, of smoke
4. There are diseased and disabled people
5. You spot a well known criminal who has been hiding out in Spain, and several politicians that had been forced to resign because of rorts and other scandals
2. ? HOW DO YOU FEEL?
1. No longer feel special, privileged, but let down, diminished, ripped off
2. Feel like turning straight around and leaving
3. But then from behind you, you hear a familiar and friendly voice call out you name
4. You turn around and before you know it, the famous personality has grabbed your hand, and is giving it a hearty shake, and is telling you how great it is to have you come to spend time with him.
6. I think you can see the parallel with this fictional story, and your relationship with Jesus and the Father, and the fact that we are called into the body of Christ the Church, not just on our own.
4. The church is filled with people from every place, race and background
1. It is not just made up of people like us
2. Read again the Edwin Clowney comment on the catholicity of the church;

The NT church is catholic or universal: it is not limited geographically as Israel was, and it joins in one fellowship people of every sort. The church cannot exclude from its membership any who credibly confess Christ. Sectarianism that limits church membership to any race, caste, or social class denies catholicity. 4

3. We have all received grace, and we need to give grace, to live graciously with everyone whom God has called into relationship with him
4. We are called not only to have fellowship with God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, but with one another as we have studied before in Acts 2 and I John
1. It is a joy, a privilege as well as a responsibility to accept wholeheartedly and fully the wide variety of people God has through Jesus sacrifice, placed in the church

1 John 1:3-7

3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We write this to make our joy complete.

5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

5. CS Lewis in his book The Four Loves; writes about storge, or affectionate love.

[it, storge] is not primarily an appreciative love. It is not discriminating. IT can "rub along’ with the most unpromising people. Yet oddly enough this very fact means that it can in the end make appreciations possible which, but for it might never have existed. We may say... that we have chosen our friends and the woman we love for their various excellencies—for beauty, frankness, goodness of heart, wit, intelligence, or what not. ... That is why fiends and lovers feel that they were "made for one another". The especial glory of Affection is that it can unite those who most emphatically, even comically, are not; people who, if they had not found themselves put down by fate in the same household or community, would have had nothing to do with each other. 5

6. This is plainly true in the church
1. Because of its catholicity, its inclusion of all kinds of people, we often find ourselves in the company of people who we would not naturally get along with.
2. And when we mix with people from other congregations and denominations, we can feel the same thing, and sometimes even more so. We can find it hard to accept that they are genuinely part of the family, God’s family, the body of Christ, brothers and sisters in the Lord.
7. Lewis continues;

The moment when one first says, really meaning it, that though he is not "my sort of man" he is a very good man "in his own way" is one of liberation. ... we have crossed a frontier. That ‘in his own way" means that we are getting beyond our own idiosyncracies, that we are learning to appreciate goodness or intelligence in themselves, not merely goodness or intelligence flavoured and served to suit our own palate. Dogs and cats should always be brought up together, said someone, "it broadens their minds so." Affection broadens ours. Affection broadens ours; of all natural loves it is the most catholic, the least finical, the broadest. The people with whom you are thrown together in the family, the college, the mess, the ship, the religious house, are from this point of view a wider circle than the friends, however numerous, whom you have made for yourself in the outer world. 

The truly wide taste in humanity will ...find something to appreciate in the cross section of humanity whom one has to meet every day. In my experience it is Affection that creates this taste, teaching us first to notice, then to endure, then to smile at, then to enjoy, and finally to appreciate, the people who "happen to be there.". Made for us" Thank God no. They are themselves, odder than you could have believed, and worth far more that we guessed.

Affection, I have said, gives itself no airs; charity, said St. Paul, is not puffed up. Affection can love the unattractive; God and his saints love the unlovable. Affection "does not expect too much", turns a blind eye to faults, revives easily after quarrels; just so charity suffers longs and is kind and forgives. Affection opens our eyes to goodness we could not have seen, or should not have appreciated without it. ⁶

5. UNCONDITIONAL LOVE:
1. Agape love, the love of God, the love he has for us is grace filled love, love that doesn’t discriminate, or give because of natural appreciation, or mutual likes and dislikes, common interests etc.
1. Agape love is the love that God extends to all those he calls, without conditions.
2. We are part of the Church, and so is everyone else, not because we are loveable, admirable, worthy, or deserving of love and privilege, but because of God’s grace, his unconditional AGAPE love.
6. Part of being One church, being one holy Church, is understanding, accepting and appreciating the catholicity of the Church
1. Understanding the love and grace that has made the church catholic or universal
2. Understanding and appreciating the love and grace of God that has placed us so undeservedly in the Church, and responding to that love by extending that same love, grace and acceptance to all others who are also placed in the Church.
3. A refusal to accept others, is an act in direct contradiction to God’s acceptance of us;
7. Jesus also told us that others would know who are his disciples by the love we have for one another

John 13:34-35

34 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵ By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

1. It is in this light that Jesus gave us the well known line in the Lord’s prayer;
1. Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us.
2. We also read about this attitude in I John 3:

I JOHN 3:16-21

16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. ¹⁷ If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? ¹⁸ Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. ¹⁹ This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence ²⁰ whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

21 Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God ²² and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him. ²³ And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.

3. DISCUSSION:

1. List of scriptures:
1. What do we learn from the following passages about the nature of the church, the type of people God calls into his church:
1. Matthew 5:3-6 poor in spirit, mourning, meek
2. Matthew 9:9-11/Luke 2:13:14 Calling of Matthew/Levi
3. Mark 2:15-17 sick need physician
4. Mark 1:16-20 calling of Peter James John Andrew
5. Luke 17:11-17 lepers
6. Luke 19:2-8 Zaccheus
7. John 4:4-29 Samaritan woman
8. John 8:3-11 woman caught in adultery

EPHESIANS 4:1-6 1 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit— just as you were called to one hope when you were called— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

Endnotes:

1 The New International Version, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House) 1984.

2 E.P. Clowney, "Church", New Dictionary of Theology, Intervarsity Press, Leicester, England, 1988, p. 144.

3 R.L Omanson, "Church, The", The Evangelical Dictionary of Theology;  ed. Walter A. Elwell, Baker Bookhouse, Grand Rapids, Michigan,  p. 232.

4  Clowney,  p. 144.

5 C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves, Collins/Fontana Books, London, 1960, p. 37.

6 C.S. Lewis, p. 37.

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