Keep It Simple, Saints

The past couple of Sunday meetings, we’ve been talking about the centrality and simplicity of the cross. To the church in Corinth, Paul said (1 Corinthians 2:2), “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” Jesus’s death on the cross is the one and only access point into the Kingdom. We add nothing to the finished work of the cross —no rules, no actions, no tradition. Take a moment to read Romans 3:22-23, Romans 6:23, Galatians 2:20-21, and Ephesians 2:8-9.

The early churches were established on the simplicity and the centrality of Jesus Christ and His crucifixion, and then false teachers came in and started adding things. In 2 Corinthians 11, Paul is concerned that the church is being deceived by false teaching and is being led astray from a simple and pure devotion to Christ. In Galatians 3:1, Paul says to that church, “O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified.” Paul had clearly portrayed Christ’s crucifixion as the sole truth of salvation. False teaching bewitches and captivates people, luring them away from the simple, central, and all-sufficient crucifixion of Jesus and back into the bondage of dead works.

Have we added anything? Have we allowed any teaching, doctrine, movement or denomination to cloud and corrupt our simple faith? Have we been seduced into thinking some action on our part makes us more saved than other believers? Do we have some secret additional revelation that makes us superior? Are we the chosen remnant because of some action, tradition, or practice? Are we more saved because of our worship style or our meeting location and time? Have we added any “necessary doings”?

Simple Gospel Simple Church

The Greek word for “church” is ekklesia. This word means “those who have been summoned out and into”. The church is a gathering of people who have responded to the invitation to come out of the world and into the Kingdom through faith in Jesus Christ and what He did on the cross. The church is not a building. Believers first met in the Jewish Temple, synagogues, and in homes because the church was originally only Jews and those who converted to Judaism. Then the Jews persecuted the church and at the same time non-Jews (or Gentiles) started believing and following Jesus, so they met in homes. In Ephesus, Paul taught daily for two years in the Hall of Tyrannus (Acts 19:9–10). This was either a municipal space or a school for philosophy. It was just a good place for him to gather people for evangelistic teaching. Once he established churches, they met in homes.

Specific individuals and couples are explicitly mentioned in the New Testament as hosting or opening their homes for local church assemblies.

• Priscilla and Aquila in Ephesus and Rome (Romans 16:3-5, 1 Corinthians 16:19)
• Nympha (or Nymphas) in Laodicea (Colossians 4:15)
• Philemon, Apphia and Archippus in Colossae (Philemon 1:2)
• Gaius in Corinth (Romans 16:23)
• Lydia in Philippi (Acts 16:40)
• Titius Justus in Corinth (Acts 18:7)

Exactly fifty days after the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, 120 disciples were praying and worshiping together when Holy Spirit filled them and activated them as the church. A lot happened in that upper room, but it was just the second story of a house. The first official building for a church didn’t come along until around two-hundred years of church history. It was a house converted into a meeting space in Syria. Then 313AD Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity. As the church moved from a faith gathering to an established institution, we saw the development of hierarchies, processes, separation of clergy and common folk, and sacred buildings. Around 300 years after the church was first birthed in an upstairs room of a house, the paradigm of church began shifting from people being the Lord’s house to a building being the Lord’s house, and then an emphasis started forming on constructing beautiful buildings.

I say all this to emphasize that church is not a building but a people. We’ve met in various locations. Wellspring was sent out of Trinity Dallas, that met in an old dilapidated Baptist sanctuary that they bought and renovated. Since we were sent out in 2017, we have met in my house, in a backyard, in an office building, in a renovated theater, in an event space, on the roof of a building in downtown Dallas, in the capitol building in Austin, and recently in a church sanctuary near Dallas’ Fair Park. Regardless of where we gather, when we meet we are the assembly of the called out, the church. Just as we add nothing to our salvation through Jesus crucified, we add nothing to church. Yes, we do things but not as a means of salvation. What we do, including the communion, the worship, the teaching, the water baptisms, and the ministry, is all a rooted in our faith in Jesus Christ and His crucifixion. He is the head and we come together to form His body under His head.

As of October we’ll be meeting in homes. This isn’t because houses are more holy and it’s not because we’re better than churches who meet in buildings. This is the direction that we believe Holy Spirit is leading us. Does this mean we’ll never be in a sanctuary or auditorium? Nope. Jesus may lead us into different places in different times for different purposes.

This past week I had the opportunity to pray with church planters from India. They are facing very real persecution right now. Some of their churches meet in official buildings (those have been easy targets for persecution). Many of their churches are in homes and one we prayed for meets in a basement (it’s literally an underground church). Is the church in a basement any less than the church in a cathedral? Where we meet does not impact or change our identity as the children of God. And as the children of God, wherever we meet becomes the family room of God —as long as faith in Jesus Christ and His finished work on the cross remains simple and central.

Seeking His face!
Matt

Matt Neese
Wellspring.Live

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