Joy Community Fellowship: Pitman, NJ

In defining the Church, we must distinguish between what the Church does, and what it is. As Christians, we aren't defined by what we do, but by what God has done for us through the person and work of Christ. This is a consistent pattern in the New Testament letters: Who God is and what God has done in Christ --> Who we are because of Jesus --> What He has saved us and created us to do.

While it's important to include what the church does in our definition of church, we want to avoid defining it primarily by what we do, which could cause us to think of the church with a man-centered, works-based mentality (the church is our doing, not God's). This is contrary to the gospel, which says that we are who we are because of what God has done, not because of what we do. So as we seek to understand the church's identity, we believe that, at the most basic level, the church is:

God's people (who we are), saved by God's power (what God has done and is doing) for God's purposes(how we live/what we do).

These three elements are evident in Jesus’ final words to His disciples, which we refer to as the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20):

16 "Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." "

If making disciples involves teaching them to obey everything that Jesus has commanded, then we can conclude that being a disciple means learning to obey everything Jesus has commanded. Fundamentally, to be a disciple is to be a learner. Those of us who are disciples take responsibility for our own growth in the gospel, and the growth of others (since we are called to go and make more disciples, by teaching them to obey Jesus' commands).

More specifically, the core of a disciple's identity is described in verse 19: to be a disciple is to be baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. To baptize means to immerse in, or to saturate with. Jesus is saying that disciples are immersed into the name of God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Throughout the Bible, naming someone has to do with a person's identity. Names reveal truth about who we are. To get a new name is to say something profound about who that person is.

So when Jesus says baptize disciples in the name of the Father, Son, Spirit, He is saying that we're to establish people in their new, Trinitarian identity. Jesus wants His disciples to know who they are. As disciples, our identity isn't found in what we do, but in who God is (Father, Son and Spirit) and what He has done for us in the gospel.

"In the name of the Father..." (Sons/Family)

We are God’s Children, His sons, who are adopted and fully accepted and loved by Him, apart from any good behavior, with all the rights and privileges of being an heir of God, co-heirs with Christ! To be baptized into the name of the Father means that I have a perfect Father who loves me and accepts me not because of what I've done but because of what Christ has 275534110_640 done.

And to think of this identity corporately, we are brothers and sisters. So to be baptized into the name of the Father means to be adopted into God's family, to worship Him as our heavenly Father, to be His dearly loved child, knit together as family with one another. That is who we are (not something we have done), in the name of God the Father. As we grasp more and more who we are as God's children, it produces a familial love towards others in the church.

"In the name of the Son..." (Servants)

When Jesus says we are to baptize disciples into the name of the Son, He is referring to Himself. He is the Son of God, and we also learn from this passage that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Him (v.18). That makes Jesus the Lord, or King, of all. And if Jesus is Lord, to be baptized into His name means that we are His servants.

As children, we worship God as Father and love one another like brothers and sisters, and now as servants, we worship Jesus as Lord and King, and we submit to Him by serving those around us (see Matthew 20:25-28, 25:31-46, Luke 17:7-10, John 13:1-17, Philippians 2:3-11, Galatians 5:13, Ephesians 6:6). We do whatever He leads us to do, whenever He tells us, and wherever He wants us to do it.

Living as servants of King Jesus, who serve others as He served us, presents a tangible witness to Jesus and His coming Kingdom, and to the power of the gospel to change us from self-appointed mini-kings, into humble servants of the true and reigning King (2 Corinthians 5:15). We serve others in such a way that it demands a Gospel explanation – lives that cannot be explained in any other way than by the good news of Jesus (1 Peter 3:15). Our humility points to His ultimate humility. Our servanthood points to Him, the Servant of all. Our sacrifice points to the One who gave up His life for us.

"In the name of the Holy Spirit..." (Missionary)

Finally, not only are we baptized into the name of the Father and the Son, but also into the name of the Holy Spirit.

If we're baptized into the name of the Holy Spirit, who are we?

One likely answer is that we are saints -- holy ones -- set apart by the Spirit, for God's glory, to live for His purposes. But if we think specifically about the call to make disciples, and if we think of the way Luke/Acts and John record Jesus' commissioning of His followers, the immersion of our identity in the Spirit means that we are, through the Spirit, Jesus' witnesses, His missionary people (cf. Luke 24:46-49, Acts 1:8, John 20:21)/

To be immersed in the Spirit -- to be baptized in His name -- makes us His witnesses, His missionary people, sent with the Spirit's power into the world to share the good news of Jesus with our lips and to show His glory with our lives, bearing witness to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus and calling on others to repent and believe the good news (2 Corinthians 5:17-21, Colossians 4:5-6, Acts 4:23-31, 8:1ff, Mathew 5:16, Philippians 2:14-15). As missionaries, we worship the Spirit as our Helper, empowering us to bear witness to Jesus with boldness and compassion.

Towards a Definition of the Church

We began with a desire to understand who, or what, the church is, and we wanted to be careful not to define the church by what she does, but by who she is. We have seen that within the Great Commission itself, the call to make disciples is a call to form people into a new identity: as disciples, our identity is that we are God's children, loving one another like family, Christ's servants, serving one another and others in His name, and the Spirit's missionaries, sent out to share and show Jesus everywhere we go.

So in light of all this (remembering the church is God's people, saved by God's power, for God's purposes), here's how we define the church:

The church is a family of missionary servants, saved by God's grace and sent as disciples to make disciples, for the praise of God's glory.

This is the way we understand the identity and mission of Joy Community Fellowship: we are a family of missionary servants, saved by God’s grace through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus on our behalf, and sent as disciples to make disciples, all for the praise of God's glory (While the phrase, "for the praise of God's glory", does not appear in the Great Commission, we include it because we are commanded to do all things for God's glory, and as we conceive of the church, we want to be reminded of this all-encompassing goal for everything).