Organism, to Organization, to Institution Series – Part 6
(A single cell organism is a building block of life. When multiplying, how can you prevent it from becoming an institution where the organism can easily die or become lost in its structure? The following blogs in this series will examine the Church as an organized institution or an organism built on relationships.)
Let’s look at the church through the eye’s of Katrina Scherbern’ view or Organism Organization where she defines seven characteristics. Let’s look at her second one:
2. Living things obtain and use energy
Living things have been creative for activity. The Church was never originally designed to be a passive institution with a subclass called the “laity”. This class, called the “saints” in the Bible were active. After the four gospels, the book of Acts is written to record the acts, the actions, the activities of those followers birthing the Church. The church is not dormant!
When visiting a local church, one leaves and often assesses their visit as just visiting an “active” church they call “alive” or a “passive” church they call “dead”. Cathedrals are impressive in size, architectural, and artistic value, but when empty they are just empty tombs of remembrance. Without activity among God’s people in a place, death is evident. It is like you want to yell, “The tomb is empty; the Lord is risen!” To find that risen Lord you must look with in a gathering of his people. “Where two or three have gathered together in my name; I am there in their midst.” A gathering of saints produces life when Jesus is in their midst.
We must rethink our use of the word “church”, for we attend church, by going to church, and being the church at our church buildings. Confusing? The church is a gathering of saints with Jesus in their midst, that obtain and use His energy through His Holy Spirit. Churches that have life, are centered around the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ who brings supernatural life naturally to that group.
As a proponent of the five fold, I believe that when all five are present, there is life. An evangelist birth’s spiritual life, shepherd nurtures, cares, and develops that life, the teacher instructs that life through daily living based on the Word, while the prophet brings revelatory truth to that life. An apostle networks all the different facets, or organelles, in that cell, and together they all make up the workings within the cell that brings life, multiplication, and growth individually and corporately.
We as a church, have to quit grieving the Holy Spirit that produces that life and stifling the energy He produces. We have to allow the organelles within the cell to function as they have been created, so they can continue to attribute to the health and welfare of the cell as a whole.