Brothers and sisters, this evening, I am going to, last Lord's Day, Rev. Grassmuth took us through the whole of Heidelberg 21 and he did a swell job of it. But I was sitting in my office during the week and I thought, with us embarking on this journey of being a, well at least for me, a new church, most of you have been at this for a while, it might be prudent to dig into what our catechism says about the Church of God a little more. And I had a look and I had the bright idea, time will tell if it is a bright idea or not, to look at each of Lord's Day 21's questions separately. So the plan for this evening is to just take question and answer 54 and tread it through very very carefully and very diligently so that we know all that it encompasses all that it is and all that it should be. So let us confess then together Lord's Day 21 question and answer 54. What do you believe concerning the Holy Catholic Church that out of the whole human race from the beginning to the end of the world The Son of God, by His Spirit and Word, gathers, defends and preserves for Himself unto everlasting life a chosen communion in the unity of the true faith and that I am and forever shall remain a living member of this communion. Amen. Thus we believe. So we say, in short, in Lord's Day 21 question and answer 54 that the holy catholic church, remember that catholic means general, the church of all ages, I sometimes refer to it as capital C church, so that the holy catholic church, from the whole of the human race, from time eternal, through spirit and word, God has gathered a church, that communion can also just mean a church. And to help us in our understanding here, let us go to scripture and open at Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians chapter 4, it seems as if we're skipping ahead a little with only being in Ephesians. I was accosted this morning, asked when will we finish with Ephesians 1 verse 3 to 14. And now we're already at chapter 4. all in good time Ephesians 4 and we're going to take the first 16 verses for our reading if you are able please stand for the reading of the Word of God this is the Living Word of the Living God I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you to walk worthy of the calling in which you were called with all lowliness and gentleness, with long-suffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift, Therefore he says when he ascended on high he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men Now thus he ascended what does it mean? But that he also first descended into the lower parts of the earth He who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens that he might fill all things and he gave himself to some to be apostles some prophets some evangelists and some pastors and teachers and for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting but speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into Him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effect of working by which every part does its share causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love. Amen. This is the word of the Lord. Please take a seat. that God through the Word and Spirit from time eternal gathers for himself a church and then in Ephesians 4 we see how he does this by giving gifts unto his church. So a question what then is necessary for a Christian to believe and you'll recognize it from Lord's Day 7 and the answer to that question is of course all that is promised us in the Gospel. It's one of the easier ones to remember from the Catechism. And then what follows is a summary of the promise in the form of the well-known Apostolic Creed with which we are busy and have been busy in the Heidelberg Catechism for a while. And one of the things that is necessary to believe, one of these 12 main points is that we profess our faith in the holy catholic christian church now let's just make sure if we say we believe in the holy catholic church we don't mean to say that if you're part of the church then you are saved that's not what we're saying we are not saying that you need to be in the church in order to be on that bus going to heaven no all that we are saying is that there is a church. We believe in the church that Christ sets up. However, it's not so clear what exactly we need to think about when we profess our faith in the Holy Catholic Christian Church. And that's what this evening is all about. What does it mean if we say we believe in the Holy Catholic Church. We believe in the Holy General Christian Church. Now, In this day and age there is a very wide and open approach found in most churches, also the Reformed. Anything that presents itself as church can possibly fall under this umbrella. This Holy Catholic Christian Church is considered by name to be the total of all the people who are saved from time eternal until the youngest day. To put it more specifically, These are all the elect together. Christ assembles a congregation for Himself. That is what we confess. He calls people to faith through the preaching and the ministry of the sacraments, the preaching of the Word and the ministry of the sacraments. And this gathering work of Christ is not invisible but very visible indeed. And it is necessary for a Christian to profess his faith in the Holy Catholic Christian Church. Therefore Christ gathers, defends and preserves a church for himself which means that in the church we see this work of Christ and secondly we have a calling being part of this church. Now one of the finer images that we find in the New Testament describing the church is the image of a building work, a building site, a construction site. The foundation of this building was laid by Christ and His Apostles and this foundation is needed to be built upon. It is only on this foundation that we build upon. We have our brother Paul saying in 1 Corinthians 10 that the foundation was laid and now each of you need to build on it. and whatever you build with will be tested. Some build in wood, some build in gold, some build in iron, others build in straw, but the fire will come and test it all. So in a sense, we are builders building the church. We are construction, what do you call men in construction, building the church. And we are responsible for proper building materials, for using proper building materials. But actually it's a little more complicated. You see, we are not only the builders, we are not only the men doing the construction, and by men I mean women as well, you understand me. But we ourselves are also the construction materials. we must allow ourselves to be inserted as living stones into this building. That is what our brother Peter tells us. Now you can imagine that for a stone that is then also bricked into the building or for a piece of lumber that is being timbered into the building to oversee the whole of the building work becomes very very difficult, is it not? It's only the chief builder, Jesus Christ Himself, that can see the entire building. And this state of affairs makes us wary of making far-reaching statements about the Church. For what do we know about where and how Christ is building? And are we always able to judge the quality of the building materials, being building material ourselves? We need to have modesty in judging other churches and other believers and this modesty has not always been a standout feature in Reformed history. There are often rather easily far-reaching judgments and sweeping statements pronounced over other churches and believers, which let's just call it as what it is, is not right. This incitement to modesty, however, does not mean that we should call everything church that presents itself as such, or that we immediately embrace everyone who mentions the name of Jesus as a brother in the Lord. We can't just simply go about and say, oh you say you're a church, well done, welcome, come sit by the table. No, we need to test one another. After all, there's a clear norm by which we may judge ourselves and other churches as well. And the Heidelberg Catechism gives us this yardstick, this measuring tape by which we are to judge the building work upon this foundation. In saying, the Son of God gathers a congregation for Him through His Spirit and Word. That is the measuring tools that is to be used to judge the building work upon this foundation. Spirit and Word, the instruments of Christ's Church assembly And by this we can recognize both Christ and His Church. Now the Church is and has always been the Church of the Word. By the grace of the Word, the Church exists. And where this Word is ministered, there is also the Holy Spirit at work according to His promise. The Word in which the Spirit gathers is the only treasure of the Church. If the Church does not dispense this Word, then she has nothing left to give. And then the spirit also disappears and finally the church itself disappears. A church not dispensing the undiluted Word of God is a poor church indeed. It is a bankrupt church. It is an entertainment venue. About this church that works with the Word of God, the Bible says mighty things. For example, The church is to be a pillar, a foundation of truth. And it's quite an assumption to say, we have the truth, is it not? Today, people do not want to know about truth anymore. In much of today's theology, things are stated as, well, all you can say as a human being is that you are searching for the truth, that you are on your way to reach the truth. you're trying to find out the truth and you search in the knowledge that you will actually never have any final certainty because for example after all from of a life after our earthly life nobody can give proof of so it is only theories and you can only hope for that. You can only search in the hope that you will find the truth. It has become relativistic, which means the truth becomes relative. The more we talk about it, it can either become less true or more true, depending on what we do. But you can never reach pure and true truth. Yet the Bible gives the church the right to say, we do not have to look for the truth. for we have the truth. We find the truth in the Word of God. This does not mean that we have an immediate answer to all questions that might be asked. But we can say we have the truth. The truth is that Jesus Christ came to us in His Word. In His Word Jesus Christ gave Himself to the church. So that is the treasure that we have as a church. Jesus Christ as He gives Himself in His Word. It is our honor as a church that Jesus entrusted us with His Word in which He Himself comes together. It is an honorary task to be able to share that Word. It's a task of honor but at the same time a very humble task. We do not have a Word of our own. It is not our great thoughts that we have conceived ourselves and that we can boast about. We have nothing of ourselves to offer. We can only pass on words that we have received from another. And as a church we have nothing separate from Christ. Nor are we anything outside of Christ. We just live by the grace of service to our Lord Jesus Christ. He has the first and the last word in the church. He is the builder and the keeper of the church. So let us remember well, when we speak of the church, we are talking about the work of Jesus Christ through His Word and Spirit. This is also true when it comes to the congregation of which we ourselves are a member of. It makes us careful of what we have to say about it, does it not? As a congregation, it's very helpful to continue to be critical of yourself in a good way. As a congregation, we need to ask ourselves, are we still alive for the service of Christ? Are we really living by the Holy Spirit? If there is a particular weakness in our church, then we have to point it out in love. And there are plenty of those. After all, we are human beings of numerous shortcomings. It's not all that difficult to point to short-sightedness and small-mindedness to self-wisdom and arrogance. And all of this must be discovered and combated by the light of the Word. Yet no matter how many weaknesses there are in a congregation, let us not forget that for these people is what Christ gave His life. These are the people for whom Christ laid down the ultimate sacrifice. All the beautiful words with which the Bible describes the love of Christ for His church are not about His ultimate love for an ideal church. The saying goes that if you are searching for an ideal and perfect church, the moment you join it will cease to be so. But it speaks of His love for the communion of people as we see them together Lord's day after Lord's day around the Word. Whoever because of shortcomings of the church does not have a good word left for the bride of Christ cannot expect the bridegroom to speak a good word for him. People who want to share in the gifts of Christ such as forgiveness of sins and eternal life must be there where Christ Jesus dispenses them. You cannot continue saying you are hungry yet you do not accept the invitation to the table to come and eat. It is the Church, in the Church, the very concrete community of people who, despite all their differences and despite all of their problems, let themselves be taught from the Word and led by the Spirit. Whoever seeks Christ must be there where Christ lets Himself be found. And it is in the Church that He has committed Himself to this by His promise through His Word and Spirit. But we have a calling regarding the church as well. Because we've seen that the Bible says beautiful things about the church. The church has received the truth in God's Word. Whoever seeks Christ must be in the church, must hear the Word and it's all excellent. But however, there's a problem. Because where do we find this church of which is being spoken here? After all, we live in a situation where there are many churches and groups that all claim to be Church of Jesus Christ. What do we do in this case? Should everyone just join where they feel most at home? Should everyone just go where they feel they can worship in the style that they want to worship? Do we need to go with peer groups or friends and family? then it matters where you seek affiliation because every church has its faults and weaknesses. And there is no such thing as a perfect church on earth. So what then? Before we get to the question, let us first establish that the multiplicity of churches, denominations and associations is a very sad matter indeed. It is not the way God intended it to be. Apart from all sorts of explanations we can give for it, it is in any case a source of great confusion and it cannot be otherwise for the testimony of the church in the world has been greatly weakened by it. The church could have been of much greater significance in the world if there had been unity among the Christ confessors. If the opposition between one church and another was the opposition of truth to error, then we could at least be at peace with that. Then we could say, and it is easier in that sense, if there's a difference between one church and another, and the error is clear, you can say, well, we can choose between these two based on the error not being followed in this church. You could say there's a real and there's a false church. The difference between the two are obvious for everyone. But the reality is much more complicated. We meet believers in totally different churches. It's a situation that makes someone who loves Jesus and his church very sad. Some people find in the division reason to say, the question of which church is not important. Well, I happen to be a member of the RCUS now, but it doesn't really matter to me where I go to church at all. Everywhere where there are believers, I can find myself a home. Everywhere there is prayer and singing of songs, I can go and worship. Now brother and sister, if you do speak in this way, you do not take seriously the call to unity of the believers about which the Bible is clear. Then you have solved the problem by simply ignoring the problem, hoping it goes away. Other people only think from their own church. Our church is the real one and all other churches are wrong. Now the solution to this, this solution has the advantage of clarity. It's very easy if you were to say, well our church is the only right church and all other churches are wrong. You haven't discussed the differences, but it's at least clear what's going on. And the whole problem of ecclesiastical divisions is solved by simply laying the fault with the others. then you're done yourself and you don't have to think or pray about it any further. You need not do any introspection or anything else. Are we really finished with our calling on the ecclesiastical question when we say, well we've explained our position on XYZ doctrine and we're not going to explain it anymore. You can either accept it and join us or you can not accept it and go and worship somewhere else. Is that right? In Ephesians 4 verse 1 we read, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord, Paul identifying himself, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called. As believers we have a calling to fulfill. a calling regarding the church and he who has a calling is never finished he continues in verse 2 with all lowliness and gentleness with long-suffering bearing with one another in love endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace humility gentleness long-suffering and now the question is Has that attitude always been used in the church to preserve or seek the unity in spirit? And sadly we must say no it has not. Has much of the struggle in the church not been waged in a fleshly rather than a spiritual way? Because it happens so easy. I think about our own situation for example. We believe that we as a church are Church of Jesus Christ put here in the Gallatin Valley, that He has taken us into His church gathering work through His Spirit and Word spoken of in Lord's Day 21. But at the same time, we're also a group of people with almost all the same background, more or less. Most of us come from a Dutch Reformed or German Reformed background. Some of us come from different Reformed backgrounds. Some of us are recent converts, others are converts from birth. We all have roughly the same middle class in the economy. We're not poor but we're not exactly rich either. We speak the same language and we have largely the same experiences at our different ages. The consequence is that it's easy to communicate with people you have things in common with. We communicate with each other very easily as a social group. We should be able to easily socialize with each other, drink coffee and enjoy one another's company, which in fact we do. Do we not? There's nothing wrong with that. Lord's Day 21 also speaks of the communion of the saints and it also has to do with social interaction. And yet there is a bit of a danger involved. And I might be chasing a ghost here, but allow me some leeway. The danger is that we identify the social group with the church. And then things start to get mixed up. When we start to see the church as a club. Because then we as a congregation form a close social group. We lose one of the most distinctive characteristics of the church. Because the church is not a club, but church. A club decides for itself who is admitted as a member and who is not. But in a church however, admittance is determined by the Holy Spirit. and therefore everyone must be able to fit into the church. Now the proof in the near past is that this has been the case. But take for example this, if an American of European descent becomes a member of our congregation or starts visiting, things should probably be fine, should it not? It's easy to get along with them. How would it be for a Native American person or perhaps a Spanish-speaking Mexican who is only a second language English speaker. Socially we are further apart from one another than if an American from European descent were to join. Building up intensive social contact with such a person would be a lot of work, that's obvious. But it does not take away the calling to make an effort to get to know one another as brothers and sisters. And for that you must deny yourself. You need to practice a piece of practical humility. The greatest danger is that we as a congregation adopt an attitude of self-sufficiency. That we are satisfied with the existing situation. And here I am overjoyed that this is not the case. It's not that we are unsatisfied. It's just we feel we're going places. and we have a future here in the valley. We need to continue to strive to fulfill our calling. I believe in the Holy Catholic Christian Church where Christ wants to gather all who have been cleansed by His blood and sanctified by His Spirit. We need to ask the Lord to come to our aid. Teach us to pray from faith for the unity of all true believers in Christ. to teach us to fulfill our calling from prayer in today's ecclesial world with so many churches. For the church is never our church but always has been the church of Jesus Christ. It's therefore not about how I feel about it but about what the bridegroom expects of his bride, the congregation. Where he gathers he wants to see all his children together. If that doesn't work We should never make peace with the situation but always keep realizing that here we are stumbling upon the limitations of being our own human beings and we need to look to Him to gather us in His Word and Spirit. So full of faith we are to continue to pray that Christ will come to gather all His children. Where we don't get that far because of our lack of faith and love, lo behold it ever happens, One day He will show everyone how great His love is and how far His church gathering work has extended. And may we pray that the Lord will use us mightily as instruments in gathering His church in this influence sphere that He has placed us in. Amen. Come, let us pray. Lord we admit to you that sometimes we think so small of your church. It's not intentional Lord that we are being without respect but we tend to think of your church only as the group to which you have added us and maybe a few other churches and we miss the fact that Your church is gathered throughout all ages, throughout all time, over boundaries of nationality and language and culture. You bring your church together. We thank you Lord that we can be a living example of you bringing different cultures, different backgrounds together in one church. May it be that we continue on on this path that you have placed us that we might grow in our love that we might welcome all those that we so desperately pray you to send to us that we might not only sit back and wait for them to come and join but that we will directed by your spirit go and seek them out that we might search the lost and bring back the straight We ask Lord that You would bless and keep our congregation, that You would give us the gifts that we need to be effectual to the calling that You have called us to hear. Would You grant that we would always have a very, very, the uttermost high view of Your Word, that we might never think lowly of it, that we might never dismiss Your Word, that we might always see it as the words of Jesus Christ our Lord which he uses to gather his church. We thank you for your Holy Spirit's work in us as individuals but in us as a church. We ask that you would continue to bless us with faith, to bless us with repentance that we might be quick to notice where things are wrong and that we will put our shoulder to the wheel to fix it. so that we might worship You in spirit and truth. All of this we pray in Christ Jesus' name, Amen.