The church is God’s answer for the world.
Within the church His heart beats. Through us His salvation reaches out to the lost. God’s heartbeat is to have church communities all across the Earth.
The church is the hope of the world. It is where the blessing of God dwells and where the devil is defeated.
Jesus says in Matthew 16:18 that ‘…I will build My church’. This happens as the church prays, serves, gives, seeks unity and agrees and believes together. When we do this the power of God comes.
Isaiah 60:1-4
Within these verses we see the heartbeat of God for the church. As we move forward God weaves new threads into our tapestry of community. He writes new pages within our storybooks. These verses show us how He wants to guide us:
Isaiah 60:1
‘Arise, shine; For your light has come! And the glory of the Lord is risen upon you.’
His resurrection and victory is our inheritance. We are a resurrection church. We are positive and focussed on life.
Isaiah 60:2
‘For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, And deep darkness the people; But the Lord will arise over you, And His glory will be seen upon you.’
Jesus came to redeem us from this deep darkness. We are not in great shape when we first accept Christ, but His glory transforms us. In Christ we are saved, and as the church fellowships, believers can grow and mature and be transformed.
Isaiah 60:3
‘The Gentiles shall come to your light, And kings to the brightness of your rising.’
When the sun shines things can grow and thrive. People are attracted to the light of Christ in us.
Isaiah 60:4
‘Lift up your eyes all around, and see: They all gather together, they come to you;…’
We need to lift up our eyes and get perspective. Get our eyes off ourselves and look over the wall of the church. Stirring up faith we need to see. See people coming to Christ, see the church thriving, see our businesses growing, and see God touching our relationships and everything we are involved in.
A new thread for our church will be the coming of peoples from overseas. God is bringing people to Australia to be touched by God. We will be a multi-national and multi-racial Church. We must be welcoming and embracing every race, age, culture and nation.
Matthew 16:18 – ‘And I tell you that you are Peter,[a] and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades[b] will not overcome it.’
God is building His church on you. In this scripture Jesus is saying to Peter that upon Peter He will build His church. He was telling Peter and everyone listening that not upon process or systems or programs or organisation will He build His church. Jesus builds His church on people. As many members together we serve and give and help and agree together and then Jesus can build and grow His church.
Isaiah 54:1-2 – ‘Sing, O barren, You who have not borne! Break forth into singing, and cry aloud, You who have not laboured with child! For more are the children of the desolate Than the children of the married woman,” says the Lord. ‘Enlarge the place of your tent, And let them stretch out the curtains of your dwellings; Do not spare; Lengthen your cords, And strengthen your stakes.’
When you do not feel like you have anything to sing about, sing. Switch on faith and believe. Sing for the future that is yet to be visible. Singing turns barrenness into birthing.
Stretch yourself and prepare to be enlarged. Push out, stretch out, and reach out. Have ‘long cords’ for people – have patience and longsuffering with one another. Have robust and strong relationships.
We are an empowering church.
We are a generous church.
This is in our genetic code.
Each and every church we plant and create carries this code. We pursue excellence of heart and spirit in all that we do.
