A God Centred Community
Three Key Takeaways
The church is far grander than we often think. The Bible describes the church with lofty language—as the people of God, the dwelling place of God, a chosen race, a royal priesthood, the body of Christ, the bride Christ gave himself for. We need to constantly refresh ourselves with this vision so we don't lower our expectations.
Everything changed at Pentecost, and we need to live like it. When the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost, the disciples went from hiding in an upper room to turning the world upside down. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, and prayer—and the Lord added to their number daily. That same power is available to us.
Prayer is the reflex of our soul when God comes near. We train ourselves through spiritual practices so that seeking God becomes the reflex of our soul and the instinct of our heart. Not as isolated individuals, but as a God-centred community.
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A God Centred Community
We're taking a few weeks to revisit a fundamental question: why are we here? The short answer is simple—we're here to start a church. We're a couple of years into that process, roughly halfway through. In a year or two, we'll be able to say the church we came to start has started and is established, with new questions about what comes next.
But "we're here to start a church" can sound a bit dull, lifeless, or even strange if you're not familiar with church or have never been involved in planting one.
So let’s first explore what the Bible says about the church and what it means to be a God-centred community together.
Refreshing Our Vision
We all carry ideas about church from our culture, upbringing, and background. Some of us think buildings. Others think meetings to attend, sermons to hear, or worship services. Maybe you think of it as a community to belong to. All of these have some truth to them, but when the Bible speaks about church, it uses much loftier language—grand, exciting, and visionary.
We need constant reminders of what God thinks about the church and what we're doing here, so we don't lower our expectations or settle for less than His vision.
What the Bible Says About the Church
Scripture describes the church as the people of God across the face of the earth. It's the dwelling place of God—where communities gather, God dwells among them in a particular and important way.
Peter writes that we are "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession" (1 Peter 2:9). We're particularly owned by God, possessed by Him in a unique way.
Isaiah paints a striking picture: the people of God are like a mountain that will be raised higher than all other mountains. The peoples of the earth will stream up towards it, hear the Word of God, and put down their weapons. In a world filled with conflict, that's an exciting way to think about being God's people.
We're also described as the body of Christ—intimately connected to one another and to Him as our living head. By the Holy Spirit, we're joined together spiritually.
Paul calls the church "the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth" (1 Timothy 3:15). The church protects, guards, and lives out the truth of who Jesus is. We've been given a treasure—the mystery that Christ became flesh, died in our place, and was resurrected. That truth is the most precious thing in the world, and we're called to guard it and protect it.
Perhaps most beautifully, Christ "loved the church and gave himself up for her" to make her holy, "so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish" (Ephesians 5:25-27). The church is the bride of Christ that He loves and gave Himself for, to be presented back to Him in perfection.
When you think about it, you realise, "That's us." Except it doesn't feel like us because it's so grand and lofty. When we look around, we might think, "Maybe not." That's why our hearts constantly need refreshing and renewing.
The Gospel Is Bigger Than We Think
The good news of Christianity isn't just that you can be forgiven and go to heaven. The gospel is that God is gathering and transforming billions of people from across the nations of the world into communities of life and love. It's much bigger, more grand, and more global than we tend to think.
When churches function badly, they're terrible places where things go wrong. Churches are a bit like nuclear power stations—in some ways they're great. They cost a lot to get going, but then you get this energy that comes out and it's brilliant. Except if it goes wrong, it's bad news for everyone. That's what sometimes happens with churches. It's toxic.
But when churches function properly, they become places where people learn the truth of the gospel that sets them free and protects them from lies. People can literally walk into freedom because of the truth contained in the church community. They can be set free from all kinds of things that were holding them back.
Churches that work properly become places where people far from God can hear the gospel and see the life of faith lived out in other people like them.
Waiting in the Upper Room
Acts 1:12-14 describes what happened after Jesus ascended to heaven and before Pentecost. The disciples returned to Jerusalem and went to the upper room where they were staying. About 120 people gathered there—the apostles, the women, Mary the mother of Jesus, and His brothers.
They're in hiding because their leader has just been crucified. They've seen Him resurrected, but they're not out proclaiming, preaching, or planting churches yet. They're in an upper room. And what are they doing? They're devoting themselves to prayer with one accord.
Why were they praying? Maybe because Jesus told them to wait for the promise of the Father, to wait for the Holy Spirit. So they're obeying.
But maybe it's more than obedience. Maybe being with Jesus had kindled in their hearts a hunger. They had tasted and sensed the divine, and then realised everything else is second best. They've been with the Son of God. What are they going to do now—go on holiday? Go bowling? Whatever you did in first-century Jerusalem (probably not bowling). The point is, what do you do after you've been with Jesus? Everything else pales in comparison.
The only way they have to be with Jesus now is through prayer. So they came together and with one accord devoted themselves to prayer.
Why Were They Praying?
Why were they praying? Maybe because Jesus told them to wait. He'd said, "Wait for the promise of the Father, wait for the Holy Spirit to come." So they're obeying. They're waiting. But maybe it's more than just obedience.
Maybe for them, being with Jesus had kindled in their hearts a hunger. They had tasted and sensed the divine, and then they realised everything else is second best. They've been with this Son of God. What are they going to do now, go on holiday? Go bowling? Whatever you did in first century Jerusalem. Probably not bowling. Probably something different. Whatever the option, it's like, "What are you going to do now if you've been with Jesus? What do you do instead?" Everything else is second best.
The only way they've got to be with Jesus is through prayer. So they came together and with one accord devoted themselves to prayer.
Prayer as the Truest Marker
Prayer is probably the truest marker of a work of God in our lives. That's a scary statement. Most of us feel intimidated when we think about our prayer lives. If prayer is the truest marker of where God is working, that might be concerning. But it really is the truest marker of God's work.
Look through the Bible. Pretty much every biblical hero is marked by prayer. David wrote most of the Psalms—prayers of passion, worship, and supplication. Daniel prayed three times a day. Abraham bargained with God over Sodom. Jacob wrestled with God. Moses interceded for Israel. Joshua prayed and the sun stopped still. Every one of them has a prayer story woven into their narrative.
Prayer is the reflex, the response to God's coming. When God comes, we pray. If we're not praying, that might be a sign we're not experiencing God coming near to us. We're missing it.
The Instinct of the Heart
Charles Spurgeon, the famous preacher who ministered near here 150 years ago, was described as having prayer as "the instinct of his heart and the reflex of his soul." When something happened, the reflex—like a physical reflex in your body that bypasses the brain—was prayer.
God's coming? I'm going to pray. I've got a problem? I'm going to pray. I'm feeling scared? I should pray. I don't know what to do? I should pray. It became the instinct, the reflex of his soul.
LEARNING Spiritual Reflexes
There's a famous scene in The Karate Kid that illustrates this perfectly. Daniel is being trained in karate by Mr Miyagi, who gets him to wash his car—wax on, wax off—all day. The next day, he paints the fence—up and down, up and down. Eventually Daniel gets annoyed. "Is this a wind-up? You're just getting me to do all your DIY jobs."
Then Mr Miyagi shows him what he's learned. He starts punching and kicking Daniel. When Mr Miyagi punches, Daniel blocks it—wax off, wax on. When Mr Miyagi kicks, Daniel blocks with the fence-painting motion. Daniel realises these reflexes have been trained into him, built into him. When he's in a fighting situation, suddenly all the things he's been taught become important.
We do the same thing in church. We sing songs, pray, read the Bible. But these practices don't always have the full rationale behind them until we need them. Daniel learned movements so he could fight. When the fight came, what he'd been taught suddenly made sense.
Sometimes Christian lives can be like that. We get into routines. We turn up to church, or maybe we don't because we're busy. We think about praying, but maybe we don't because we're on Instagram instead. These things lose their significance until we're put in a situation where we're forced to fight. Suddenly we don't know what to do—"Oh, I've got these things"—and they make sense.
We need to train ourselves so that the reflex of our soul and the instinct of our heart becomes to seek God, to pray, to put Him first, and to live our lives as if everything has changed. Because it has.
That's the invitation those 120 had. And that's the invitation we have as well.
A God-Centred Community
Here's the striking thing: they prayed with one accord. It wasn't just that they went off for contemplative quiet times and then came back together for a meal. Their prayer was together as a community. It wasn't just a bunch of God-centred individuals. It was a God-centred community, which is what a church is designed to be.
Let's train ourselves so that the reflex of our soul and the instinct of our heart together is to seek the God of the Bible.
