The following message, How Should Your Family Treat the Local Church, was given by Scott Brown at the Regional Uniting Church and Family Conference in Wake Forest, North Carolina in 2008. These are days of awakening in the Church today. And one of the things that I would like to try to communicate this morning is the great need for an awakened love for the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. We live in fascinating times today. We recently saw the stock market lose 40% of its value.

What an astonishing thing that that was. But how astonishing is it that in our churches today we are losing 70 to 90% of the next generation. They will not return to church after their freshman year in college. Where's the uproar? Where's the outrage about that?

And yet we live in times that are absolutely fascinating. And in the midst of all these times, here's one thing that we can absolutely know, that the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is God's eternal bride. And anyone who gives their heart to the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is investing in something of eternal value. And so I would like to try to frame our thinking this morning around the enormous importance of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. You know, there are many wonderful things happening in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ today.

I would like to give you ten signs of awakening that I'm observing in the church today. First of all, there are fruits of revival everywhere. One mark, one sign of awakening is that fathers are turning their hearts toward their children and children are turning their hearts toward their fathers. Malachi prophesied that one of the signs of the gospel would be that the hearts of fathers would turn toward their children, and the children's hearts would turn toward their parents. This is a sign of revival.

This is happening all over the nation, where for some reason, over the last, perhaps, decade, the hearts have just begun to turn supernaturally. It's absolutely amazing that it's been happening. Here's the second sign of revival. People are having many children. Many of you are here.

Twenty years ago it was very difficult to find these gigantic families roving America. But people are having many children. Thousands and thousands of people are having vasectomy reversals because they read the scripture that said, be fruitful and multiply. People have taken what The Bible has said about fruitfulness and multiplication, and they've taken it seriously, and they've said, that's what I want to do. It's a sign of revival.

It's a sign of awakening. When God's people look at a line of scripture and they say, that's for me. My heart desires that thing. A third sign of revival is this. There are many daughters, more daughters than I've ever seen in my lifetime, whose hearts have turned to the biblical vision.

They have begun to grasp the biblical vision of womanhood and they understand what God has designed womanhood to do and to be. And they have grasped that vision and they understand that God has called them to be helpers of their husbands, that God has called them to be keepers at home, that God has called them to be demonstrations of unfading beauty, that God has called them to a particular role and that they ought to take all of their energies and focus it on that role. This is a sign of an awakening. This is a sign of revival. When a daughter looks at scripture and says, I want that.

It's a marvelous thing that's happening before our eyes. Nobody can control these things happening. These things happen in the heart by a work of the Holy Spirit. Here's a fourth sign of revival. There are sons among us who are not wasting their youth like the previous generation has been wasted their youth in games and entertainments and all kinds of things like that.

I was shocked several years ago when I went to a conference and I called my wife. I said, Deborah, I have never met so many 14-year-olds with business cards in all of my life. What's happening? Here's what's happening. Fathers have begun to cast a vision of labor and productivity and economy and entrepreneurship, and they're encouraging their sons to be involved in meaningful labor from the time that they're very, very young.

This is a sign of revival. This is a sign of fathers listening, reading, and saying, I want that. It's a sign of an awakening among us. Here's a fifth sign of awakening. People are becoming more sensitive to the difference between worldly and modest dress.

For the first time in many years, there are many people in the church who are reading what Scripture says about dress. What does the Bible say about apparel? Well, the Bible has several things to say about apparel. The church seems to have cared less about what the Bible has said about apparel, and there's an awakening of understanding of what the Bible has said about it. It's a sign of an awakening when a father and a mother and a daughter particularly begin to think biblically about how they dress.

It's just it's a sign of awakening. Here's a sixth sign of revival. There are many who have left family for the Word of God. There are many fathers and mothers who began to apply what Scripture has said about family life and church life and work life. And they have been rejected by their families.

They've applied simple lines of scripture in their very everyday life, and their families have rejected them and spurned them and criticized them. The heartbreak and the tragedy is enormous, but we have to understand something, that the Gospel does divide families. If you obey Almighty God, it will divide you from your family, perhaps. There are some families that will be united by the gospel, and there are some families who will be divided by the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel is more important than the family, and so we see this sign of revival in which we find many, many, many families who have been rejected by their families because they have decided to obey the Word of God.

Here is a seventh sign of revival. In many places, the loss of the next generation is slowing down. In many places, the loss of the next generation is slowing down. In our normal churches, we've been losing, like I said earlier, 70 to 90 percent. That number seems to be reversed in many churches who have embraced the biblical doctrine of the family and the biblical doctrine of the church.

And it's very, very encouraging. And we're seeing a retention of the next generation in many families. But it's only happening in those families who have said, I will not follow the world, who have said, where He leads me, I will follow, who have said, though none go with me, still I will follow. It's only happening there. And so it's important that we continue to keep our minds on the will of Christ for us.

There are number eight here's another sign of awakening there are many pastors who have left everything and followed Jesus Christ I know I know many pastors who be who have become disturbed over the way that they've been conducting church life and they began to be convicted about it and they were either fired because their minds changed or they or they resigned to go plant a church or do something else. I know many men who get up at three o'clock in the morning and go go to a job at UPS or FedEx or have a paper route because they have lost their income because of their convictions. Now, this is a very sobering thing, but know this. There are hundreds of shepherds Loose in America who care nothing for their pocketbook. And they care nothing for their reputation.

What is God doing? It's a sign of revival. There is an awakening. An awakening so much that men are willing to abandon all of their economic support and all of their favor and they have said I care nothing for the respectful meetings in the marketplaces because I must obey Almighty God. To me, that's enormous.

Number nine, there's a growing awareness of the sufficiency of Scripture. That Scripture is not only inerrant as it is, but it is also sufficient. And because it is sufficient, it's all we need. And because it is all we need, God has spoken authoritatively for how we should conduct our church and our family life. And that God's authority is perfect and Scripture is sufficient to guide us for how to respond to God's authority.

And number 10, there's a resurgence of expository preaching. This is a sign of revival. When I moved here 20 years ago, you had to drive 45 minutes to find one church that was doing expository preaching. Right now you can find 20 churches within 20 minutes of where I'm standing that are doing expository preaching. This is a sign of revival.

This is a sign of awakening. This is a sign of God moving on his church to prepare people to do his work in the world. So I am I am I'm extremely encouraged by the signs of revival in the church today and And so with that I really want our minds to turn to the subject of how should your family treat the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Where is the Lord today? Does anyone know where the Lord Jesus Christ is today?

Well, he's seated at the right hand of God. But revelation also tells us that he is walking among the lampstands. He's walking among the local churches, that he has his care turned toward the local churches. He is standing in the midst of the seven lampstands, and these lampstands are the local churches, the churches that exist in towns all over the world. And these local churches are the object of God's love and God's affection.

And so I want us to ask this question. If we would treat the church properly, where would we look? And I would like to submit this. If we would treat the church properly, then we would need to put on the mind of Christ for the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'd like to give you this morning 11 ways that explain Christ's affection toward the church.

And I want to ask us together, do we have this same affection that the Lord Jesus Christ has for His church? So let's begin. Number one, He personally identifies with his church. When Saul was breathing threats against the church, when he was dragging people out of their houses to imprison them and and and to persecute them, There was Christ's appearance to him on the Damascus Road. And Christ says to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

And here we find Christ so identifying with the church that he's saying, what you're doing to my church, you're doing to me. The way you think about, act toward the church is the exact same way that we are treating the Lord Jesus Christ himself. The two are inseparable. And you can see this connection between Christ and His church in a number of texts of Scripture. In Matthew 25, Jesus says to His people at the final judgment, I was hungry and you gave me food.

I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me." And then they ask when this happened and they say, we never did that. And he says, truly I say to you as you did it to the least of these my brethren you did it unto me.

The Lord Jesus Christ says that the way that you treat his people in the church is also the way that you're treating him. In Ephesians chapter 5 verses 30 to 33 we read that we are actually members of the body of Christ. And so the apostle says, for we are all members of one body, of his flesh and of his bones. And the principle here is that we, the body of Christ, we who are in these local churches and we who are part of the universal church. You have to think about both of these at the same time.

You're not just a part of the universal church. You also must be a part of a local church. And in that local church that you are joined to Christ and you are joined to your brothers together inseparably we are members of his body of his flesh and of his bones that's how closely identified the church is with the Lord Jesus Christ so if you persecute the church you persecute Jesus if you feed someone in the church you feed Jesus if you come into the church you come into the presence of Christ. If you touch the church, you're touching Christ because the church is intimately, inseparably connected with the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is why the Church is the object of God's love, because he sees himself as inseparably connected to her.

This last year, having had the opportunity to go to Scotland and trace the steps of the Scottish reformers, I ended up reading some of the works of Samuel Rutherford. Samuel Rutherford understood the beauty of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's what Samuel Rutherford says about the church and her great master, the Lord Jesus Christ. The great master gardener, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in a wonderful providence with his own hand planted me here and he means in the local church where by his grace in this part of the vineyard I grow and there I will abide until the great master of the vineyard think fit to transplant me." Rutherford understood the intimate connection between Christ and his church and that Christ takes His people and He plants them in local churches for their nourishment and their care. And He would be their Master Gardener and He would send them under shepherds to teach and He would send them brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers, so that the body would be built up in love and this precious plant that was planted in the vineyard would grow.

And the truth though is that Christ personally identifies with his church and if if you would have the mind of Christ for the church then you would have to first understand how closely Christ identifies with his church and therefore our attitudes our actions our devotions ought to be consistent with that intimacy. Here is the second thing that we learn about Christ's disposition toward the church. He cries out for the church. Christ cries out for the church. He says, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her, How often I wanted to gather your children together as a hand gathers her chicks under her wings but you are not willing." Notice the tender-hearted longing that Christ has for his church.

Oh Jerusalem, he has such tender thoughts toward the church. I pray that God would pour out his Spirit upon us and give us these same tender thoughts toward his church. And then he also fills the church. In Ephesians chapter 1, we learn in 1 23 that the church is his body, the fullness of him who fills all and all. And so the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ fills his church means that if you separate yourself from the church, In a sense, there is a kind of separation of yourself from Christ himself, for He Himself fills the church.

Yes, He does. He does fill his people individually as the universal church, but there is also always the local element of the church that's prominent in the New Testament. The Apostle Paul is writing letters to individual churches, to bodies of people. And he is filling his church even in the form of its local expression. And so it's so critical for us to understand that even though we may not like everything that's going on in our local church, even though we might see her weaknesses, even though we might see that she's kind of pinched and truncated, even though she might be sort of disfigured and not exactly right on track.

We need to know this. The Bible says that Christ fills his church and if you despise his church then you've despised what the Lord Jesus Christ has filled we need to grasp what God has said about his church. And then, fourthly, he carries his church. In Deuteronomy chapter 1, Moses reminds the people of their time in the wilderness, of God's great provisions for them in sending them manna, sending them water, sending them a pillar of fire and a cloud to guide them. Moses is reminding of God's fatherly care toward his church.

And then he says this, don't you know that it was there that the Lord carried you as a father carries his son? And so we find here that the Lord Jesus Christ is carrying his church. How do you think about the church? How do you think about your own self in the church? Well, here's how God views it, that he's carrying his people in the church as a father carries his son.

Yes, Christ is carrying all of his people in his own arms. If you want to have an image to remind you of Christ's disposition toward the church, think of this image of a father carrying his precious son and that's the image that we are given for Christ's love for the church. How do you think about the church? Do you have a different view than that when you think of local church life? Do you think of a father carrying his son as an image for the way that the Lord Jesus Christ treats his church?

Samuel Rutherford said this, There are many heads lying on Christ's bosom, and there's always room for yours. And so in this same action of Christ carrying the other members of the church. He's also carrying you. And there is room for your head on his breast. There is enough room for you in his arms.

Do you see the tender qualities of Christ's disposition toward His Church. Number five, He loves His Church as a bride. He loves His Church as a bride. Now this is perhaps one of the most startling images of the church because when you, if you would walk on the street with a microphone and go to the man on the street and say give me your first thoughts about the church I'm not sure that you would find anyone in a thousand interviews who would say, it's the bride of the Lord Jesus Christ. Imagine a spotless bride dressed in all of her wedding garments, ready to be joined to her husband.

This most beautiful thing where, can you imagine the person on the street saying, well the church reminds me of how everyone's breath is taken away when the bride is standing at the top of the aisle to come down to meet her groom. Does anybody think about the church like that naturally? Not very many. But this is how Christ views the church. He views the church as his as his bride and he has desire for her, number one.

He sees her beauty, number two. He has, he views himself as having work to do and he's working out the spots and the wrinkles of his church all their life long. It's marvelous what Christ has done. He has first declared us to be his bride and then he goes to work to care for us. The church is many things.

The church is a bride, the church is a body, the church is a building, the church is a family, the church is a pillar in support of the truth, the church is a flock, and yet do we think of the church this way? Particularly do we think of the church as a bride, a beautiful bride? How easy it is for us to lose the heart of Jesus Christ for these precious Saints that he himself is carrying and our attitudes become skewed and we think wrongly about the individuals and also the local expressions of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. We also know that his disposition toward the church is seen in his sacrifice for the church. In Luke chapter 22, verses 19 to 20, we see that Christ's disposition to the church is shown in his in his giving his body in his giving his body for the church and Luke 22 19 says and he took bread and gave thanks and broke it and gave it to them saying, this is my body which is given for you.

Do this in remembrance of me. And so he has given his body to the church. He sacrificed his body on the cross. You know, if you open your Bibles to Acts chapter 20 and you read the story of the Apostle Paul's meeting with the elders of the church in Ephesus, this very tender moment that ends with the the elders of the church falling on Paul and weeping and kissing him, saying goodbye to him, thinking they'd never see him again. While he's addressing these elders, he has very distinct directions for them for how they should shepherd the Church of God.

And he says this to them in verse 28 of Acts 20, therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God, which he purchased with his own blood." He purchased the church with his blood. His affection toward the church is so great that he would sacrifice his body and shed his blood for his church. Now, however you might think about the church or I might think about the church should take second position in the way that Christ thinks of his church. He thinks so much of it that he would sacrifice his body and shed his blood and give his body for his church. And then a seventh way that we see Christ's disposition for the church is that he provides for the church.

Again our subject here this morning is how should your family treat the church? How should your family treat your local church? And your family should have the mind of Christ for your local church and to treat her the way that Christ treats that church. In one way Christ treats the church is that he provides for the church. In Hebrews 13 5 and 6 the writer says, Let your conduct be without covetousness, be content with such things as you have.

For he himself has said, I will never leave you or forsake you. So we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear. What can man do to me? Here we find Christ's provision for the church in that he has promised never to leave or forsake his church.

And this should be a disposition that we should become infected with as families. Families ought to have the mind of Christ for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus said, He said, I will send you another helper. He has said, I will not leave you as orphans. In John chapter 14, 1 through 21, Christ expresses so much of His mind toward His church.

He says, if you love Me, you'll keep My commandments, and I will pray the Father, and he will give you another helper that he may abide with you forever." And this he spoke of as the Spirit who would come and dwell with them and be in them. And so Christ so loves his church that he provides, but what does he provide? He provides himself. He provides his own presence. Here in John 14, Christ says, I will give you another helper.

And He uses a word for another that helps us understand what He's saying. There are two ways to understand the word another. Another of a different kind or another of the same kind. Christ says, I'm providing you another Helper of the same kind as me. In other words, I'm going to be with you through my Spirit.

Christ provides His presence for His church. And then, eighth, he builds his church. One of the most encouraging statements in Scripture is this. The Lord Jesus Christ says, I will build my church. This is a statement of the perpetuity of the church.

This is a statement of the eternal nature of the church. This is a statement of the durability of the church in the world. Are you worried about the church? Worry no longer. Christ has said, I will build my church.

I am most confident in this one thing. Christ will build his church. I am not confident in this economy. I am not confident in the political rulership that expresses itself in the nations of the world. I am not confident in anything but this, that Christ has promised that he will build his church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

Don't worry about the church, brothers and sisters. Don't spend a second on it. Spend your energy building the church and coming alongside of the Lord Jesus Christ to build His church. He has given you gifts to build up His church and He has given you time and many, many different gifts that are meant to be delivered to the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. But Christ says that He will build His Church.

Now there are many ways that Christ builds His Church. Here's one way that he builds his church. He builds his church through the works of fathers and mothers in their households. As fathers and mothers bring their children up in the training and admonition of the Lord, they are building the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you want to make a dramatic impact on the church, build a holy family.

And be a wellspring of clear and beautiful water that will issue into the life of the church. Raise up disciples in your family and give them to the church that they would serve there all the days of their lives. God provides many ways in His building of the church. He provides pressures. He provides pressures from governments and culture to build his church.

He uses everything. Christ is not very discriminatory. He uses everything. All things work together for good for those who love him and are called according to his purpose. There is nothing that can take the church down.

Does anybody worry about what this new administration, you know, might might do in restricting the rights of the church? Forget that. There's nothing that the governments of the world can do to slow down the growth of the Church of Jesus Christ. And what we know for sure is this, that when governments do crack down, the church flourishes. So we should never worry for a second what might happen God will tell us he will help us know what to do if times of persecution come we need not fret about it God will give us what to say He will give us what to do.

But this we do know, He will build His church. Now God has so marvelously ordered life on the planet that He has provided many things to care for His people. He saves us, He picks us up off the street as we are soiled by the world, and He plants us in His church, and He intends to care for us all our life long in these local churches that he has established. This is how God has established to disciple his people. There are many reasons why people do not love and care for and find themselves devoted to the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ.

They say, well the doctrine is not to my liking. You know, I've had bad church experiences. It's hard to find a good church. It's hard for me to be with people, you know, but churches aren't always friendly and welcoming. I've had abusive pastors.

I've seen many lame shepherds. Or you know, God just hasn't led me to a church. Or the churches around here just aren't all that good. Those are all of our thoughts from time to time about it. But you can…all of these different reasons for staying away from the church, they sound like a lot of different reasons, but they really can be boiled down to one reason, one single issue, and that is this, that each one of these views the church and the Christian life as sort of a bowl of options, that you can do whatever you want each one of them assumes that the Christian life is a matter of negotiation that if you don't see what you like then you can do whatever you want to do but God has God has established local churches for the benefit of his people.

And yes, they are pinched. Yes, they are truncated. Yes, they are all doctrinally weak. All see through a glass darkly. No exceptions.

And yet Christ has called us to the church that he is building. Brothers and sisters, don't be left out of the building of Christ's church in its local expression. Now, what has God done? God has done something for us that is more marvelous than we could ever conceive of. It's better than anything we could create for ourselves.

He's created a number of practices that he brings us into to shepherd us, to correct us, to heal us, to comfort us, to encourage us. He's brought practices to us through the church, and it's for us to engage in those practices and focus our lives on those practices we live in a day where people think they can create the church any way they want to do fascinating and exciting things but unfortunately those things are found in the Bible But the Bible has given us what church life should be like. And here's what God has done for your family. He has given you a perfect method to shepherd your family. And here's what he's done.

He's called you to come and participate in the preaching of the word of God in the church. And that you would bring your family in a rhythmic fashion to hear the apostles teaching, to be instructed by scripture, by a human being. And he's commanded you to come and be to come and hear the preaching of the Word of God and God has so constructed this world that he would use this preaching to transform you. Trust that. If anybody has stopped bringing their family in to hear the preaching of the word of God, they should get their family back into that practice.

Even the mistakes, even the lack of insight that those human beings who preach the Word of God can be edifying to those who hear because it helps them to study more and learn more. God hasn't given us perfect shepherds for a reason. Maybe one reason is it forces us to think ourselves and to relate with God personally and individually. So God has given preaching. He's given prayer to the church.

He's given singing to the church. He's given communion and baptism and evangelism and discipline. This is what God has given to his church and he desires that his people trust him and just for all their lives as believers focus their attention on these things. That when the church gathers to pray, they should gather too. Don't withhold yourself from a prayer meeting.

Gather with the people. Don't withhold yourself from the preaching of the word. Gather, put yourself under that preaching. The singing, don't withhold yourself from the singing of God's people. You might not like the singing.

You may say, well, I don't really like the style. Well, God has called you to come together with his people to sing. These are the practices of the church. They're very simple. He has called the church to engage in the celebration of communion.

And so these are the ways that God provides for his people. Unfortunately his people want something more interesting. They want a golden calf. They want some entertainment. But God has said, no, forget that.

Go and hear preaching through a human being. Gather yourselves together and pray. Sing. Have fellowship with one another. Break bread from house to house.

Be involved in the life of a church. That's what God has done. And it just it disturbs me when people say, well, I really only like two or three things that the church is doing. In fact, I like the preaching and I also like the fellowship, but I don't like the prayer and I don't like the singing. I think I'll just – I think I'll – you know, those aren't my thing.

No, that's – God has called His people to engage in His practices, His way. He's called us to abandon our own mind about life and acquire His wisdom, to think His way about the church. So many people think of the church like a salad bar. I like this, I don't like that. And they pick and choose.

But God has presented a way of healing His people, instructing them, comforting them, and it includes his gathering them together for preaching, for prayer, for singing, for fellowship, for communion, for baptism, for evangelism, and for discipline. And it's not for us to treat the church like a salad bar because it's not. Because we need all of those things. And what we should do in the church is to just trust Christ and to say those things will do all that's necessary in my life. And I don't need to run all over the world trying to find some newfangled practice to fix me.

Because Christ has already given me the way that I would be healed, the way that I would be sanctified. But people are not satisfied with this. They want a better program. They want some silver bullet, but God has not done that. He has given him, he has given his people an ekklesia, an assembly of people.

And when they assemble, they do certain things. And that is the force that God uses to sanctify his people and he sends his Holy Spirit to work in every one of those areas and so Christ builds his church through a set of practices and a set of circumstances that He places His church in. Number nine, He heals His church. In Matthew 9, verses 9 through 13, when Jesus heard conversation, he said, those who are well have no need of a physician but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means.

I desire mercy, not sacrifice, for I did not come to call the righteous but the sinners. And so Christ heals his church, and he brings his people into his church. He brings us all together with all kinds of disagreements and disconnects regarding our heritage and our background. We're all in different places, different ages, different doctrinal backgrounds, different levels of maturity, different roadmaps for life we've walked into the church with. And we all disagree.

There is no way in the world the individuals in the church will be in perfect agreement. It will never happen. The Apostle Paul assumes that when he when he is speaking to the Roman Church recorded in Romans chapter 14 and 15. He's assuming that people are not going to agree and he speaks to them about being like-minded. But like-mindedness, we learn, is not thinking the same thing on doctrinal issues.

Like-mindedness is that we think the way that Christ thinks toward one another. That's like-mindedness. Like-mindedness is not having the same opinion on meet sacrifice to idols. Like-mindedness is treating your brother like Christ treats him in the midst of your disagreement about meat sacrificed to idols. The New Testament assumes that we won't agree on everything in the church.

But here's what we must agree on. That there is a way that we treat one another in the church, and we treat one another according to Christ. We are like-minded according to Christ. And so Christ brings us into His church with all these different opinions and He spends all our life long until He takes us to heaven, knocking off the rough edges, filing us down here, sending us some person offensive to us who would challenge our love so that we would grow in love. Do you think that Christ brought you into the church so that everybody would be so perfect for you?

No. He has brought you into the church to allow you the privilege of rubbing up against other sinners so that your sin would also be exposed, that others would cause you to sin and that you would repent of your sins. And this is how Christ heals His church. And then Christ brings His church together. Notice the one anothers in the New Testament.

Love one another. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Do not speak against one another. Do not complain against one another. Do not judge one another.

Accept one another. Give preference to one another in honor. Clothe yourselves with humility toward one another. Well Christ brings His church together and the over 50 one anothers really help us understand how he desires us to be together as a church and he he eagerly designs to dine with his church. Number 11 in Luke 22 14 through 20 we read and when the hour had come he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him.

And he said to them, With fervent desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I say to you, I will no longer eat of it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God." And then he took the cup and gave thanks and said, Take this and divide it among yourselves. For I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes. And he took the bread and gave thanks and broke it and gave it to them saying, This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me." And likewise, he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is shed for you.

And here in this passage Christ says I have fervently desired to eat this Passover with you. Christ fervently desires to die with his people, to eat with them, to be with them. And this is His heart of the Lord Jesus Christ for His church. You know, this is Christ's church. It's not our own.

And we don't have the authority to make her in our own image. His image, his attitude, his disposition is superior. And what we've just seen here is that Christ's disposition toward the church is such that when he looks at his church he sees that she is lovely like a bride and there's no local church and there is no believer. There is no situation in which Christ does not cry out for the church. There is no true church that He does not fill.

There is no individual that He does not carry. And there is no church that does not have His love as a bride would have. And there is no believer for whom he has not sacrificed and there is no church that he is not provided for and there is no church that he is not healing and there is no church that he is not building and there is no church with whom he is not eating of the true church. And so Christ is walking among the lampstands of his local churches in these various cities throughout the world. And Christ has something to say to his church and he's present among his people and he desires that his children have the same mind that he has for his church and I pray that you that your family and my family would have the mind of Christ for the church and that you would personally identify with the church that you would cry out for the church that you would that you would like Christ find how you might fill the church with the love of Christ, that you would look at Christ carrying the church and say, I would do the same, that you would love the church as a bride, that you would sacrifice, and that you would eagerly desire to dine with the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Would you pray with me? Oh Lord, I thank you for your son Jesus with all of his tender-hearted mercies toward the church that he has established, this marvelous place. It's the most beautiful place in the world where you are, Lord, and I pray that you would so fill us and your churches that the beauty of Christ and the intimate connection would be so clearly seen and I pray that in this time of awakening that you would raise up an army of families who would love the church as Christ loves the church. In Jesus' name, amen.