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I Am the Church 1: Worldviews

I Am the Church 1: Worldviews

One of the big challenges about getting old is eyesight. I’m not Catholic. I’m looking for my glasses… I hate to wear glasses. It’s like an act of rebellion for me. When they tell me I’ve got to have glasses to drive, I’ll just go out and get a prescription windshield.  When I first started needing glasses to read, Leanna got so tired of me stealing her glasses that she started getting these outrageous and ridiculous glasses. 

“Troy, what are you going to do when people see you wearing those glasses?” I’ll warn them to shield themselves from my awesomeness.

“You look really different when you don’t wear glasses.”

That’s funny because you look really different when I don’t wear glasses! How we see things, our perceptive and our lens matters. That is called a Christian worldview:

Biblical worldviews and Kingdom paradigms are crucial to being victorious today. 

Worldview:  “The filter through which you look at all experiences and information, and decide how you’re going to respond.” 

Because worldview consists of a person’s most fundamental assumptions and beliefs about truth, it is central to how humans experience the world and interact with one another in society. 

Your world view is developed between 18 months and 13 years old. 

Do you have a biblical worldview? Answer the following questions based on claims found in the Bible which George Barna used in his latest survey:

1. Does absolute moral truth exist?

2. Is absolute truth defined by the Bible?

3. Did Jesus Christ live a sinless life?

4. Is God the all-powerful and all-knowing Creator of the universe, and does He still rule it today?

5. Is salvation a gift from God that cannot be earned?

6. Is Satan real?

7. Does a Christian have a responsibility to share his or her faith in Christ with other people?

8. Is the Bible accurate in all of its teachings?

Did you answer yes to these? Only 9 percent of “born- again” believers did. But what’s more important than your yes to these questions is whether your life shows it. Granted, we are all sinners and fall short, but most of our gut reactions will reflect what we deep-down, honest-to-goodness believe to be real and true.

Romans 12:2 – “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

Colossians 2:8 – We then are taken “captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.”

Matthew 24:3-14 – Do not be deceived and do not be troubled  (alarmed or freaked out)

Paradigm:  A framework of how you think about something. How you make a decision and how you solve a problem. 

Your lens is not your worldview. 

It’s your framework of how one thought goes through another. 

Every single one of us has a paradigm. We all have a belief system through which we judge all aspects of life. We judge speakers, authors, and entertainers. We judge events, churches, and workplaces. We judge family, friends, and co-workers all through this framework. We may not like the word “judge” but we all do it.

That brings us to the subject of identity…..

I’m starting a whole new teaching series today called “I Am the Church” and it’s going to be on who we actually are, how God sees us and how we conform our lives to this revelation. 

You are “the apple of His eye.” 

Protected, really valued, super important and no way at all that He won’s react if something touches it. 

Psalm 17:8 – Keep me as the apple of the eye; Hide me in the shadow of Your wings

Zechariah 2:8 – For thus says the Lord of hosts, “After glory He has sent me against the nations which plunder you, for he who touches you, touches the apple of His eye.”

Deuteronomy 32:10 – “He found him in a desert land, And in the howling waste of a wilderness; He encircled him, He cared for him, He guarded him as the pupil of His eye.”

Proverbs 7:2 – Keep my commandments and live, and my teaching as the apple of your eye.

Another traditional definition of “apple of His eye” means face to face with somebody so close that you can see your reflection in the eye of the person you are looking at. That tiny reflection is the apple of his eye. 

Seeing yourself through the lens of the Father’s eyes.

Seeing yourself the way the Father sees you.  

Coming into agreement with who the Father says you are. 

Seeing eye to eye: To agree (with someone); to share the same position or opinion (as someone else).

Moses was a Hebrew castaway adopted and brought up in an Egyptian world. He didn’t “fit in” with the surrounding culture.  While his people were enslaved; he lived as royalty. He made a huge mistake when he murdered an Egyptian to help a Hebrew slave and ended up in the wilderness. When God comes to Moses and gives him a job, Moses has another identity crisis: 

Exodus 3:11 – “Who am I, that I should go…?” 

He felt unworthy and incapable.

God has the answer to our identity issues. It is all about who He is and what He can accomplish in our lives if we let Him.

God’s answer to Moses and to us is this: 

Exodus 3:12 – “I will be with you.” 

In all things, at all times, He is with us. Every problem, every feeling of inadequacy, every painful circumstance–He is there with abundant resources to offer us.

1 Corinthians 13:12 – For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.

One of the identities we have to grow and understand is our role in “being the Church.”
We are the church. I don’t just mean OpenDoor. I mean you, me, Billy Graham, Martin Luther, Paul Wilbur, TD Jakes, your grandmother who loved Jesus, Tim Tebow, Harriet Tubman,  Polycarp, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. We are all part of the same exact body where Christ is the head and the same exact building where the Spirit of the Lord dwells. 

The Church is not subject to time, space or even matter because we are connected to Jesus and Jesus is not subject to time space or matter. He created all those things and has pre-eminence over all those things. 

Genesis 1:1 – In the beginning (TIME), God created the heavens (SPACE) and the earth (MATTER).

THE CHURCH IS THE TEMPLE

1 Corinthians 3:16 – Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?

WE ARE LIVING STONES IN THE TEMPLE

1 Peter 2:5 – …you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ

THE CHURCH IS THE BODY OF JESUS

Colossians 1:18 – He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.

WE ARE MEMBERS OF THE BODY OF JESUS 

1 Corinthians 12:27 – Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it.

WE ARE MEMBERS OF THE BODY OF JESUS 

Romans 12:4-5 – For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.

If we are going to say that “I am the Church,” you are the Church and we are all the Church then we are all going to say that demographic, race and background has to be secondary 

Galatians 3:28 – There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

IF WE ARE GOING TO SAY WE ARE THE CHURCH AND EVERY SINGLE PERSON OF FAITH IS A MINISTER IN THE BODY OF CHRIST, WE HAVE TO SAY THAT EVERY JOB IS A MINISTRY AND SEE OUR JOBS AS MINISTRIES. THE LEADERSHIP OF THE CHURCH HAS TO SEE EVERY JOB AS MINISTRY. 

BUTCHERS, BAKERS AND WEBSITE MAKERS 

Your job is a ministry!!!!

IF YOU ARE GOING TO SAY “I AM THE CHURCH,” YOU HAVE TO SAY “I AM RESPONSIBLE TO BE CONNECTED WITHIN THE BODY AS A LIVING STONE TO THE TEMPLE. I AM A VALUABLE MEMBER OF THE BODY.”

Christianity was not meant to be done alone.

If you are the church then you are to be connected as a member of the body and as a living stone in the temple… 

PEOPLE SAY, “I DON’T HAVE TO GO TO CHURCH TO BE A CHRISTIAN,” BUT I SAY THIS:

IF YOU ARE NOT CONNECTED AND TAKING PART IN A LOCAL CHURCH, YOU ARE NOT ALL YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE–AND THE CHURCH IS NOT ALL IT COULD BE BECAUSE YOU’RE NOT THERE! YOU ARE NEEDED IN THE BODY OF CHRIST. YOU ARE ESSENTIAL!