The Surprising God

The following post is excerpted from a lecture by Dr. Michael Morrison, dean of faculty and professor at Grace Communion Seminary . Church service (public domain via Wikimedia Commons) In an earlier post , we saw how the apostle Paul used several metaphors (images) in defining the nature of the church . In this post, we'll see how Paul viewed the life of the church  by looking at what he wrote concerning the church's assemblies, membership and discipline. Church assemblies Paul understood that Christ does not just call scattered individuals – he calls individuals in order that they meet together. Paul describes those meetings in 1 Corinthians 14.  Although the church in Corinth may not be typical, this is the best description we have:  When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up. (1 Cor. 14:26) Note that the primary purpose her

The following post excerpts a lecture from Dr. Michael Morrison, dean of faculty and professor at Grace Communion Seminary.  For a second post on this topic, click here . Church of the Holy Sepulcher, Jerusalem (public domain, Wikimedia Commons) Ekklesia What is the nature of the church? We learn a lot from the epistles of Paul where the apostle uses the Greek word ekklesia in referring to the church. Ekklesia comes from the Greek preposition ex (meaning out of ) and the verb kaleō (meaning to call ). In the first century,  ekklesia  was used to refer to town meetings in which citizens of a city were called together for a political purpose (e.g. Acts 19:39). By using the word  ekklesia , Paul is viewing the church as a group of people who are called together. It may be that Paul's use of ekklesia was facilitated by the Septuagint's use of this Greek word to correspond to the Hebrew word qahal , referring to the assembly of Israel. This does not mean, however, t