Signs of a Healthy Church
It is the desire of God’s heart that His church, in every nation, tribe, tongue and people, be healthy. He has given us His Holy Spirit, and Jesus prayed to the Father that He be with us forever. Therefore, the Spirit of truth has been with us through these 20 centuries and will not depart until He has brought us to the purpose that God has set, because He promised that He would pray to the Father to give us another Comforter to be with us “forever” (John 14:16).
Sadly, the church has strayed and has divorced itself from the Holy Spirit. And just as the sin of the people of Israel was against Jesus, the sin of the church has been against the Holy Spirit. In the same way the Jewish people rejected Christ as Messiah, the church has rejected the Holy Spirit as guide. The church in the general sense has wanted to take its own initiative and has set up its own government. We understand that in the church there has always been a faithful remnant, made up of godly people, who fear God and are submitted to God, but regrettably they are not the majority.
God has always wanted His church to go from glory to glory, and from victory to victory. It has by no means been God’s desire that His church fall into all that apostasy into which it has fallen throughout the centuries. It is undeniable that the enemy came into the church and sowed tares among the wheat (Matthew 13:24-43), and like those men who slept, the church has given room to that work, divorcing itself from the Spirit, and trusting in its own works, in its own intelligence and in everything that is human. The church has let itself be seduced by the spirits of the kings of the earth.
However, God left a model in the book of the Acts of the Apostles to show the characteristics of a church according to Him, submitted to the direction of His Holy Spirit. We can affirm that this account is a testimony written for us, for our instruction, of a church that pleased God, of a church that in spite of the tribulations it suffered in those days, its deeds show us a pattern: God acting and the church responding to the participation of the Holy Spirit; the devil opposing, God working and the church submitted and being consistent with the Spirit. This resulted in the triumph of the church over the evil one. And although the devil opposed and tried to stop it, he did not succeed, quite the contrary.
God is the same and never changes. If the church had kept this rhythm in the Spirit, today, 20 centuries later, we would already be in heaven. And I do not mean having gone away with the Lord, because it is necessary for Him to return, since that day has been set by the Father and His will is sovereign and perfect. But in saying that we would already be in heaven I imply that the church would never have been trampled by men as has happened, for God has said that His people will never be ashamed. The church has been called to reign, to be above and not below.
The glory of Christ was His resurrection. He overcame sin and death and rose from among the dead. The word resurrection means “rising up,” so Christ was raised from among the dead, but He was also taken up to heaven and seated at the right hand of the Father on high. There He went to present His triumphs to the Heavenly Father and to intercede for His church. That is why the church must always be in victory, because Jesus Christ is in heaven and the Holy Spirit is among us.
Considering the first church as a healthy church and a model of God’s purpose in calling the saved to form His ekklesia, or spiritual assembly, is not so that we may idealize the time in which that church lived, but so that we may emulate this example and live as it lived. Let us not see it as an unattainable ideal, because they were not superheroes, but men and women like us, with similar passions. In fact, God did not hide their errors, but we see that in the worst circumstances, even natural ones, they were consistent with God, they believed God, because they were committed to the truth of God. They did not live amphibiously, like the animals able to live in two elements at the same time, in water and on dry land. They did not live with two ways of thinking, but only one: Christ. They had only one purpose: to leave the world and follow Christ. And all of that at the cost of their own lives. These believers understood what the glory of salvation was, what it meant to be rescued from their futile way of life and what it meant to be set apart from the world to serve the living and true God. They were filled with the Spirit and with that holy conviction.
But it is the desire of the heart of our Father God and of the Lord Jesus Christ that we live in the same way as the first church. They do not want us to sit on the pews of the temples to live a contemplative life like the mystics of the church of the first centuries, who withdrew to live their faith in hiding, far from the worldly noise. This may look very sublime or spiritual, but let us prefer the holiness of Jesus Christ, of the One who was raised in Nazareth, from which it was said nothing good could come (John 1:46), and in the midst of the corruption and perversion of that city, He remained pure. Therefore, being like Him, we too are the light of the world and the salt of the earth.
The Christian’s faith must be a confronted faith, a faith that overcomes the world. A faith that does not let itself be cornered or intimidated or boxed in by anything in life. That is the faith of Jesus and it is the faith that was once given to the saints (Jude 1:3). Therefore, that is our inheritance, that is our portion, our treasure, something we possess today, because God does not change nor is there shadow of variation. If we wanted to, we could all live filled with the Holy Spirit, so that we would form a healthy church which:
Encourages the brethren in the midst of persecutions and tribulations. Christ was crowned so that He might crown you with the crown of life; after having been made perfect through suffering, He became the author of eternal salvation.
- Receives encouragement from God in order to encourage its brothers and sisters, so that when one is stoned and fallen, agonizing, it covers him and surrounds him; when one falls it lifts him up; when one is discouraged it strengthens him.
- Testifies and gives an account of the wonders that God does in its midst, and they submit to one another.
- Has a very different spirit, a superior spirit with which it recognizes the gifts of its brothers and sisters and the authority they have received from heaven.
- Is a church that is subject to its authorities, and seeks counsel among them.
- In the midst of a crisis and great discussion or difference, it first seeks what the Holy Spirit has said and how God has worked in the same circumstances, before making a decision, thus saving the church from a possible schism or division.
- The Word of God prevails over human arguments, and submission to the Holy Spirit is above self.
- The unity of the church is sacred, so that nothing justifies a division, for it represents the Body of Christ, which cannot be divided or corrupted.
- Understands that the church is one and indivisible.
- Is willing to give up its freedom in Christ so as not to be a stumbling block to its brothers and sisters. Freedom has a price, and it is the death of self in order to glorify the life of the One who lived and gave His life for him.
- Recognizes that the testimony of Christ before the world is love.
- Knows that no church is independent of the Body of Christ or of the authorities He has placed, so that God has the last word, and the last one as well.
No matter how many centuries have passed, we are that church. The law of life in Christ Jesus is with us. We have been born again, we have been born into a living hope through the Gospel. Christ is at the right hand of the Father, but He also lives in us and His Holy Spirit came down to guide us into all truth. The angels are all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation, and all things pertaining to life and godliness have been given to us by His divine power, through the knowledge of Him who called us by His glory and excellence (Hebrews 1:14; 2 Peter 1:3).
We are rich and have been enriched; there is no reason to live in poverty, in weakness, in decay, in weakness or in shame. We are called to live in the resurrection of Christ. Let us live raised up, as Christ was raised from this world and seated in the majesty on high at the right hand of God. That is God’s desire for the church and it must be our longing. Let us pray without ceasing that the Father heal His church and restore the church of this century, because it is necessary that we have a healthy church.
Let us not be discouraged, but press on. Let us not give place to discouragement or despondency. Let us lift up our heads because our redemption is near and is kept in Christ. The God who cannot lie swore by His name that He will be with us. He made a covenant for up to a thousand generations; therefore He will come and will not delay, He will come for His own, for He has engraved our names in the book of life. He cannot forget His Word. God swore by His holiness, by His truth and also by His name. And if He was faithful in the past, He will be so always, by the merits of Christ.
Let us not set our eyes on what is seen, for our faith goes beyond what our eyes perceive. What is seen was made from what was not seen, and what was not seen was the spiritual world to which we have been transferred. We live in a physical, natural world, a world of matter and of the tangible, but our God is Spirit, and He has made us one spirit with Him. Let us live in the Spirit and overcome the world. Our Lord Jesus Christ wants, before grace is closed in this world and judgment and the end of all things come, to show a testimony through His church. He wants to use us in these days to give a courageous testimony of faith. The Lord wants to raise us up in this time to shut the mouth of the devil and the boasting of the ungodly men who have risen up against the Anointed One, blaspheming His name. Let us prepare our hearts and offer our lives to God, so that He may accomplish it.
Taken from the study series “Signs of a Healthy Church” by Pastor Juan Radhamés Fernández.
