Eternal Church 3

The aim of this devotional study is to grow in the knowledge and appreciation of the church.

Scripture

1 Timothy 3:14-15

14  I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, 15  if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the Living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth.

Observations and reflections

Note: the word translated “church” in Greek is “ekklesia” and means a gathering of a people called out or set apart for God.  A “buttress” is a military defense structure, or a structural support to building.

A coastal defense tower, or “buttress”

A series of stuctural supports to a building, or “buttresses”

Keep in mind the meaning of the word “ekklesia” (English “church”) when answering these questions.

1. What does it mean that church is “the household of God”?
   1. What does it imply of you and your relationship with God?
   2. What are the moral consequences and responsibilities to the fellow members in church?
2. What does it mean that church is “the church of the Living God”?
   1. What does it say of you and your relationship with the local congregation?
   2. What does it imply of God’s relationship towards the church?
3. What does it mean that church is “a pillar and buttress of truth”?
   1. What does that suggest of the function of the church through the ages?
   2. What does it imply of you and your local congregation’s responsibility towards the surrounding community?
   3. What does it suggest is a main activity within the local church?

Personal reflections Application

1. Looking at these three metaphors of church, which fit your local congregation the most? Why would you say that?
2. Looking at these three metaphors of church, which fit your local congregation the least? Why would you say that?
   1. What attitudes and activities within your local church be enhanced to make this metaphor a visible reality within your local church?
3. If one would look at your relationships and activities with the members of your local church, what metaphor would do you think believers of another church would find most fitting to describe your church with? [in other words, what image do you convey of God’s church?]

Prayer

Thank God that the church is God’s family, that God is alive within her and that God’s saving and preserving truth resides in her and is proclaimed from her.  And that God for what he has done in your life through these three truths.  Freely you have received from this grace – now pray that others (whom you know) may receive this same grace through God’s church!