The vision of Christ according to Isaiah 11:1-13 was to restore a broken world by creating a peaceful, joyful, loving, harmonious and prosperous world. The platform he used was the church.
When Jesus finished his assignment, His prayer for the church was that they may remain one as the father and I are one. He said to his disciples my peace I give you not like the world give.
According to him the church was to spread this vision of his and make the earth a territory of heaven but what he prayed for is exactly the problem of the church; Oneness and peace. Therefore the church is in a fallen state just like in the state it was before he came.
The word church in Greek is ecclesia which is a group of people who were to implement the will of the emperor throughout the empire. Then Christ used this same vocabulary “church” which according to him was to implement the will of his heavenly father on earth.
And since Peter could pick up a revelation from God, he knew that he has attained oneness with the divine and He said on this truth I will build my church. We can only know God by revelation and not by sense knowledge.
The meaning of church in Greek is an assembly of called out ones. The word is used of any assembly; the word itself implies no more, as, for example, the town meeting at Ephesus (Act 19:39) and Israel, called out of Egypt and assembled in the wilderness (Act 7:38).
Israel was a true church but not in any sense in the New Testament church – the only point of similarity being that both were called out and by the same God.
A church according to scriptures is an Assembly of God’s first born sons (Heb 12:23). These are people who have genuinely been transformed into the image of God by the Holy Spirit.
The bible and the church came only after the fall of man. This means if Adam did not fall from glory, there would have been no need for the church and the bible.
Therefore the purpose of the bible and the church is to build people to their former state of knowing and doing the will of their creator.
Therefore the church in God’s view was to get to the kingdom of God through new birth and become a member of the church of Christ.
According to mat 16:13-18 Jesus told Peter that he is a rock and on that rock he will build his church and the gates of hell shall never prevail. He made this statement when Peter was able to reveal that heis the Christ.
Therefore the word rock is a metaphor for revelation knowledge. Jesus was referring to the group of the apostles, the chosen ones, and the call out ones who can now know the will of God through revelation knowledge as his church.
Christ said I will build my church and not the church. This means that there were other churches, built on human wisdom. What we must note is that Christ never created that word church. The word church existed before Christ.
Then Christ used this same vocabulary “church” which according to him was to implement the will of his father in heaven. And since Peter could pick up a revelation, he knew that he has come to the realm of knowing and doing the will of God.
We can only know God by revelation and not by sense knowledge. Therefore the church in God’s view was to get to the kingdom of God through new birth where you can be able to know and do God’s will on earth.
Christ came to communicate this message, how we can come back to our former state of knowing and doing the will of our heavenly father.
The scriptures reminded us that for a long time Israel lived without the true God, without a priest to teach them, and a law (2 Chron 15:3). The problem of Israel was that of lack of knowledge of God, they didn’t know how to relate to the true God (Hosea 4:6).
The church of today unlike Israel are so devoted to God but their devotion is not based on knowledge (Rom 10:1-3). The religious churches of today are busy preparing people to go to heaven after death while the kingdom of heaven wants to come to earth.
What a contradictory view? If you ask John the revelator about the vision of the New Jerusalem that he saw, whether it was ascending or descending from heaven?
Even the vision of the image that Nebuchadnezzar saw, Daniel explain it as a new kingdom that will come out of heaven from God and will rule the whole world (Dan 2:4).
The children of Israel used to believe that Baal was the true God until Elijah proved them wrong and made them to believe that Baal was just an Idol. The bible says Peter argue with God because he used to operate in the past knowledge, what God spoke in the past.
God showed him a vision where he lowered a platform from heaven with different kinds of animals and ask Peter to kill and eat. Peter was contenting with God based on the past knowledge.
But a new season came and God instructed him to kill and eat, He said what I made clean you called it unclean.
According to the knowledge of today, a church is just a group of people with bible knowledge. The word Catholic means universal and according Catholicism creating churches all over the world they will be establishing the great plan of God of universal oneness.
Another denomination called the church of Christ thought if they create a church that bears the name of Christ then it will be the true church of God.
These are all misconceptions concerning the church of Christ. The church of Christ is universal in nature and not bound by doctrine or place.
It is composed of the whole group of regenerated persons (I Corin 15:52) united together and to Christ by the baptism of the Holy Spirit (I Corin 12:12-13).
This is the body of Christ for which he is the head (Eph 1:22-23). As such is holy temple for the habitation of God through the Spirit (Eph2:21-22) is one flesh with Christ (Eph5:30-31).
There is only one church of Christ, the different denomination we called churches are schools of thought with mission to influence people to take hold of their true selves created in God’s likeness through transformation and become part of the church of Christ.
Many of our churches today are engaged in suicidal transformation. This is an act that is damaging the church’s own interest. Instead of involving in societal transformation that could bring life to the people, and the church herself.
As a church, the following serious questions have been asked.
These questions are asked because; it is believed that the church should have overpowering influence on the society. According to the initial plan of God, the church was to play a central role in the world.
It has always been God’s purpose to save men and women from every nation, and to do this through the witness of his people through word and deed.
God’s purpose for Israel was not only to draw them from fruitless works to faith in Messiah, but also to draw Gentiles to faith in Him as well. According to the scriptures, the moon represents the lesser light and the lesser light is the church.
The church has one fundamental function which is to reflect the light of the sun to the darkness of the night. You are to open their eyes and turn them from the darkness to the light and from the power of Satan to God, so that through their faith in me they will have their sins forgiven and receive their place among God’s people (Act 26:18).
Israel ‘s great commission includes living as a light to the gentiles but Israel failed to be light to the gentiles, sometimes Israel refused (as in the case of Jonah) to be a light to the gentiles.
It was because of this that the Messiah came to fulfill what Israel failed to achieve. And the Old Testament prophets spoke of the coming Messiah as a light to the Gentiles. That is how Jesus is presented in the gospel.
There is a principle of life which states that you can’t give what you do not have, Israel didn’t receive the light of God and that is why they couldn’t give it.
Israel today is represented by the church, and the church according to God’s plan was to play a central role in the life of a man and in the world but darkness has taken over the church.
This is because of the inability of the church to receive the light of Christ. Christ himself said those who receives this light, they shall never walk in darkness but they will walk in the light of life.
The reason the church cannot receive this light is because of religious practices and traditions. This is the principal reason why the kingdom of God is not advancing.
Africa’s problems of Leadership, Scientific development, Technology, Creativity, Peace, Unity, Love and Respect of the Law are issues that were to be developed by the church but most of our churches are religious.
They are unable to develop and lead followers to a place of freedom where they can know and do the will of God. They spend time teaching them how they will go to heaven after death.
Africa’s problem is that of spiritual development. The church therefore was supposed to be that platform where people are taught to discover themselves and share in God’s glory.
Many of us Africans have been robbed of the opportunity and right to discover, develop and manifest our potential due to oppressive and debilitating ideologies and systems.
The greatest impact has not been the physical restrictions imposed on us, but the horrific mental damage inflicted on our self-concept, self- worth and self- esteem. The result is an attitude that struggles to believe that there is hope for our dreams.
What I wish to say to every one of us is that attitude is everything. It is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, education, money, circumstances, failures, success, and what other people think, say, or do.
It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skills. It will make or break a company, a church, or a home. The remarkable thing is that we have a choice regarding our attitude.
Attitude is a powerful tool for success. Nothing can stop a person from achieving success who has the right attitude. There is nothing as powerful as attitude. Attitude dictates your response to the present and determines the quality of your future.
You are your attitude, and your attitude is you. If you do not control your attitude, it will control you. Attitude creates your world and designs your destiny.
It determines your success or failure in any venture. More opportunities have been lost, withheld, and forfeited because of attitude.
Attitude is the most powerful distinction in life than beauty, power, title, or social status. It is more important than wealth and it can keep one poor. You can always make up in attitude what you lack in education.
Yet nothing can help the person who has the wrong attitude. It is the servant that can open the doors of life or close the gates of possibility. It can make beauty ugly and homeliness attractive.
The distinguishing factor between a winner and a loser is attitude. The difference between a leader and a follower is attitude.
Attitude is the mind – set or mental conditioning that determines our interpretation of and response to our environments. It’s our way of thinking.
It is also important to understand that attitude is a natural product of the integration of our self – worth, self – concepts, self – esteem, and sense of value or significance. In essence, your attitude is the manifestation of who you think you are.
The difference between the attitude of a Lion and a sheep determines their place in the scheme of the animal kingdom. We live our lives based on who we think we are.
If you believe in your heart that you are a sheep, then you will stay in the confines that others have placed you in or you have made for yourself.
If you think you are a Lion, then you will venture beyond manmade limitations and embark on the life that you were born to live.
We cannot change the past or the fact that people will act in a certain way. We also cannot change the inevitable. But one thing we can do is to change our attitudes. Remember that your attitude is your most important asset.
Invest it well and allow it to appreciate by feeding it with positive influences. Ralph waldo said “what lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny things compared to what lies within us”.
Our attitudes cannot stop our feelings, but they can prevent our feelings from stopping us. We are responsible for our attitudes. The pessimist complains about unemployment, the optimist expects it to change, the dreamer creates jobs.
We cannot control the beauty of our faces, but we can control the
expression on them.
Attitudes are habits of thought produced by your self – image, self – worth, and self–esteem; Attitudes have the potential for good or harm. John C. Maxwell said our attitudes are the eyes of our soul.
If our attitudes are negative, then we see things negatively. If our attitudes are positive, then we see things positively. The negative habits might be arrogances, Hatred, Malice, Fear, Wickedness, Poverty, Impoliteness, dishonesty, Pessimistic, Laziness, and Selfishness etc.
These habits can be acquired and can be changed by the reconditioning of the mind. Changing attitudes therefore means changing all the negative habits to positive through the reconditioning of the mind.
The future of Africa, our nations, our communities, and our families depend on our response to the need for a new breed of Africans with a new mind set or attitude. I challenge you to take responsibility to lead your generation to a better world. The children yet unborn deserve it.
The promise of God to the children of Israel was that they should go to a land where they will have rest, which in order words means freedom or fulfillment.
They got to the land of Canaan but they never obtained the promise because of unbelief (Heb 4:1-11). Egypt symbolizes suffering while Canaan symbolizes freedom. To be free is to take hold of your true self.
Therefore freedom is to overcome the soul of negative emotions, passions, false beliefs, empty desires etc. Freedom is our right and we must take it by force.
Freedom is the release of one’s personality from bondage into liberty, from dryness into rivers of living. water, from barrenness into fruitfulness. It surely describes the release of rivers of living water from within the spirit of the believer.
The scripture declares that rivers of living water shall flow from the innermost being of anyone who believes in me (John 7:38).
According to the scriptures in Act 17:24, God who made the world and everything in it is the lord of the heaven and earth. He does not live in man-made temple.
Still in the book of act 7:48-51 the lord most high God does not live in houses built by men as the prophet says, heaven is my throne says the lord and earth is my footstool.
What kind of house would you build for me? Where is the place for me to live in? Therefore Christ came as a real substance to make a demarcation between the old and the new.
He came to mark the new beginning and he declared that God is no longer in the temple and that God’s temple is in man (2corin 6:16-17). Therefore man is a habitation of God through the Spirit ( Eph 2:19-22).
God’s great plan according to Eph 1:10 state that in the dispensation of the fullness of times Christ might gather together in one all things which are in heaven, and on earth.
God’s great plan according to Eph 1:10 state that in the dispensation of the fullness of times
Christ might gather together in one all things which are in heaven, and on earth.
God had a great plan of bringing all creation together with Christ as head. The bible uses three figures of speech to demonstrate this universal oneness or consciousness.
He says the church is like a body where Christ is the head, he says the church is like a wife where Christ is husbandman and he said the church is like a house where Christ is the chief corner stone. This is the glorious, radiant, true church or the church of Christ.
The glorious or true church of God is composed of the whole number of regenerated persons from Pentecost to the first resurrection (1Cor 15:52) united together and to Christ by the baptism with the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 12:12-13) is the body of Christ of which he is the head (Eph 1:22-23).
As such, it is a holy temple for the habitation of God through the spirit (Eph 2: 21-22 ) is one flesh with Christ (Eph 5:30-31).
It is a general Assembly of God’s firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect (Heb 12:23).
Therefore according to scriptures in mat 13:46 the glorious church is one united in Christ through faith, according to Eph 5:27 it is a true church of Christ without stains or wrinkles but of holiness, righteousness and truth,
According to Rev 21 the glorious church is when the earth becomes free from the matrix of this world and live in perfect harmony with their creator, other people, and the nature.
It is only when this will happen that we talk of world peace, love, unity, progress and concern for one another.
Therefore our vision is to bring about Human Freedom so as to establish a peaceful, joyful, loving, harmonious and prosperous world.
A church where man is completely free from the matrix of this world.