Seven Proofs of the True Church

As we know, Pentecost is near, just two weeks away. It's an exciting day for the Church and for the world. Pentecost focuses especially on the Church as first fruits, but it also focuses on the salvation of the world, because the first fruits play a very vital role in that. Today, I'd like for us to think about Pentecost and our high calling, what a great high calling it is.

I'd like for us to think about the Church. Jesus said He would build His Church, and He said the gates of Hades or the grave would not prevail against it. He said the Church would continue. He would be with the Church right up to the end of the age. So today, this sermon will help us to prepare for Pentecost and see its great meaning and what we need to be doing. I'd like to first of all focus on the Church and proving how to know where the Church Jesus built is.

We know that most of the churches in this world are going a way that is quite contrary to the Bible and to God's way of life as revealed in the Bible. But the Scriptures reveal that there would be a great false Church system, and Scriptures reveal that Satan has been able to deceive the whole world. He's been able to do it through religion. And people think they are doing it right the way that they are worshiping God.

They're sincere about it. They will stake their life on it. They're so deceived. But Satan has done a masterful job. He's deceived the whole world, and he's used a counterfeit Christianity to do it in the Christian world. But guess what? The first fruits to salvation do understand. They have a high calling. They understand the truth. They know that they are of God. And they know that they have the truth, and that they can prove it.

And that the world does not have the truth. The churches of this world do not have the truth. The first fruits to salvation understand where the true church is. And they also understand where the false church, or counterfeit Christianity, is as well.

Again, Jesus said he would build his church. Is his church to be found in all of these denominations with contradictory doctrines? Well, certainly not. The Bible talks about false congregations, or false ministers, and false apostles. But first of all, it just took a few minutes to consider seven absolute proofs of where the true church of God is. Number one, the true church has the true gospel. What is the gospel? Jesus came preaching it, the gospel of the kingdom of God. That gospel means that we may become a member of the family of God.

It means that God is going to, at the second coming of Christ, set up that kingdom to govern on the earth. And the saints are going to reign with him. The true gospel means that those who are saved, those who do understand today, don't go to heaven. Instead, they're going to reign right here on the earth with Jesus Christ. So yes, number one, the true church has the true gospel of the kingdom of God, the same gospel that Jesus came preaching.

Number two, and we are going to go through these quickly because I think most of us are very conversant with these proofs already, but it's good to review them quickly. Number two, the true church keeps the commandments of God. In Revelation 14 and verse 12, we read about those who keep the commandments of God and have the faith of Jesus Christ. They live the same way of life that Jesus lived. They keep the same commandments that Jesus kept. Also, Revelation 12 and verse 17 mentions those who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.

And that testimony would be the message that Jesus preached and also the way of life that he lived. Number three, the true church has the sign of the Sabbath and the Holy Days. In Exodus 31 verses 13 to 17, we read that the Sabbath is a sign between God and his people. Today, the world keeps Sunday and holidays like Christmas and Easter, but the true church of God has kept and understands and obeys the sign of the Sabbath and the Holy Days, following the teachings and the example of Jesus Christ and the early church.

Number four, the church has the right name. The church Jesus built has the biblical name Church of God. Jesus had prayed that the Father would keep in his name the church. And so the church is not named after a man like Luther, Lutheran. It's not named after a doctrine like baptism, Baptist, or the system of leadership by the presperous of the church, Presbyterian.

No, the true church of God is named after the Father. It's simply Church of God.

When Paul wrote to churches like in Corinth, 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 2, he wrote to the church of God at Corinth. We here are the church of God at Greensboro. So 12 times in the New Testament, the church is called by the name Church of God. The true church has the right name. Number five, the true church has the real Jesus. It doesn't have a long hair Jesus.

It does not have a Jesus that did away with the laws and the commandments of God, or one that is going to come back to the earth and then take people back up to heaven. All that is a false Jesus. The real Jesus is one that has had short hair. We don't know what he looked like. There's no way to know.

But he certainly did not have long hair because the Bible says it's a shame for a man to have long hair.

Jesus kept his father's commandments. He did God's will. The real Jesus, then, is one that is quite different than the false Jesus of this world. And the Bible does mention another Jesus in the book to the Galatians. Paul wrote about another Jesus. And this world does not have the true Jesus at all.

Number six, the true church has the right spirit. Brethren, there is a spirit that drives us as the church of God. And this spirit is very different than the spirit of this world. It is the spirit of God. And Paul writes about those who would come with a different spirit in 2 Corinthians 11, verses 3 and 4.

And we should be able to discern the spirits. I believe that we do. And see that we're coming from just the right perspective. God's spirit is a spirit for those who are called of God to understand the truth that they can relate to, they can identify with. It is actually the spirit of God. It's the spirit of humility. It's a spirit that seeks after the truth.

It's a spirit that seeks to do what is pleasing in God's sight. God's spirit is just very noticeably different. It's the spirit of love. It's the spirit of a sound mind. It is the spirit of obedience and the right attitude toward God and the right attitude toward man. We pick up on that. God's spirit has discernibly a spirit that is different and that is right.

And number seven, the true church of God has the love of God. Jesus said in John 13 and verses 34 and 35 that, by this all men will know that you are my disciples, that you love one another. As I have loved you, he said. Jesus demonstrated the way that we are to love one another. Do the churches of this world have that same love of God? They don't. The church of God has that love because it comes from the spirit of God. The love of God is so much higher than anything at the human level. Mother love, one of the highest forms of human love, is still at the human level. And that mother doesn't think the same thing of other children as her own child that she bore. You see, God's love is a love that transcends anything at the human level. It is a love for everyone. It's a love for enemies where we can truly pray for our enemies and one day wish that they will, in a day of understanding, be able to repent and that we will have a relationship with them as brothers and sisters. So the love of God transcends anything at the human level. And we see that in the church and begin to not only see it in others, but we see it in ourselves as we have God's Spirit guiding us. The true church has love for enemies. It does good to those who might mistreat us. It is kind to the evil and the wicked, just as God is. The love of God is at a far different level. And I would say that we in the church need to think about that. How far we have risen up to the love of God. Or do we still have a lot of the human type love of this world, which is very basically directed toward the self. It's very self-oriented. But the love of God is far above anything at the human level. Human love. The love of God. So, you know, let's go over these seven things again. The true church has the true gospel. The true church keeps the commandments of God. The true church has the Sabbath and Holy Day sign. The true church has the right name. The true church has the true Jesus. The true church has the right spirit. And the true church has the love of God. You know, I want to spend a few minutes now. What about the false churches? When did the false churches begin? You know, actually, you could go back to the very beginning of human civilization. We don't have a lot of information before the Flood, but we know that this world was deceived, and ultimately God destroyed that world in the Flood after roughly about 1500 or 1600 years into human existence. God destroyed that world. But guess what? Soon after the Flood in Egypt and in Babylon, false religion began to rise. Nimrod was a leader of false religion.

And so mankind developed a system of false religion, worshiping even the sun and the moon.

Did you know the roots of Sunday and Christmas and Easter?

Go back to ancient sun worship, the worship of the sun God. They worshiped the heavenly bodies, the sun and the moon.

God commanded the Israelites not to go that way, not to get involved in false religion.

Guess what? The Israelites did. The 10 northern tribes were driven into captivity because of going the way of false religion.

What about the New Testament times?

Well, Jesus said He would build His church, but He also warned that there would be false apostles and false teachers.

And there are many verses in the book of Acts and the writings of the apostles about false ministers and false teachers.

In 1 and 2 and 3 John and in the book of Jude, there's much about false ministers in the New Testament.

We can read about this false religion in secular history as well.

For example, in Eusebius' ecclesiastical history, in a letter that was written at the end of the second century around 197, Polycrates, who was a member of the Church of God, wrote in a letter to Victor, the Bishop of Rome, that the churches in Asia insisted on keeping the Passover instead of Easter.

And he wrote, this is a minister of God, Polycrates, who was like a second or third generation after the Apostle John. The Apostle John had a disciple by the name of Polycarp, and Polycarp then had a disciple by the name of Polycrates.

And so these were leaders in the Church after the latest of the early apostles died, after the time of John.

And so this minister of God said in a letter to this Bishop of Rome, we observed the genuine day referring to the Passover, neither adding thereto nor taking therefrom. And he mentions different ones like Philip, John, and Polycarp who kept the Passover.

These all observed the 14th day of the Passover according to the Gospel.

And he mentions that his relatives also always observed the day when the people threw away the leaven. Well, guess what? When Victor, the Bishop of the Church in Rome, heard this, then he endeavored to cut off the churches of Asia. By Asia, he means Western Turkey, what is today Western Turkey, around Ephesus and that area. So this Victor of Rome didn't like it one bit because he wanted Easter. Already Easter was coming on. They wanted Easter worship, which is associated with ancient sun worship. They insisted upon that instead of the Passover. And of course, we know that the Roman Church ultimately won out in the world at large, but it did not win out with the people of God. So you can read about that in Ecclesiastical History written by Eusebius.

You can go to encyclopedias like here's Collier's Encyclopedia. And it mentions how the worship of the sun was very prevalent among ancient peoples, peoples in Egypt and Babylonia and Persia.

And that actually this led to worship in the false counterfeit Christian churches of this world.

They came to observe a holiday dedicated to the sun.

The earliest known, this is written from Collier's Encyclopedia, the earliest known Sunday law appeared in the Edict of Constantine, AD 321, enacting the magistrates, city people, and artisans were to rest on the venerable day of the sun.

And so this, as it goes on the say, actually went back to sun worship, and yet this became firmly a part of the false Christianity of this world.

You can study more into that. Just go to Encyclopedias articles.

Here's a quote from a book by Jesse Hurlubit, story of the Christian church. We named the last generation of the first century from 68 to 100 AD, the age of shadows, because of all the periods in history, it is one about which we know the least.

For 50 years after St. Paul's life, a curtain hangs over the church through which we strive vainly to look. And when it lasted arises about 120 AD with the writings of the earliest church fathers, not the true church fathers, though. We find a church in many aspects very different from that in the days of St. Peter and St. Paul. A classic quote from this book, showing that things had changed, a false counterfeit Christianity had come on the scene. In the Encyclopædia Britannica 11th edition, it brings out that Gnosticism, an ancient system that actually has its roots back in ancient pagan worship, including sun worship, the central part of what we call Gnosticism was already in existence and fully developed before the rise of Christianity. But the fundamental ideas of Gnosticism and of early Christianity had a kind of magnetic attraction for each other. What drew these two forces together was the energy exerted by the universal idea of salvation in both systems.

Christian Gnosticism actually introduced only one new figure into the already existing Gnostic theories, namely that of the historical Savior Jesus Christ. They already had everything else. They had Sunday worship. They had Easter. They had Christmas. All these celebrations that came into the counterfeit Christianity. They had all of that already, but they didn't have the figure, the historical figure, the Savior Jesus Christ. They throw that into the equation, and you have the counterfeit Christianity of this world.

You can read, then, Gnosticism about Gnosticism and just find out how all this came to be a part of the great false church system of this world. You can read also a very good chapter in our booklet, The Church Jesus Built, about the rise of a counterfeit Christianity. I want to read from the last page of that chapter a very interesting quote. A professor by the name of Charles Gunnebert, professor of history of Christianity at the University of Paris, wrote about how all the false ideas came into the counterfeit Christianity of this world. He wrote at the beginning of the fifth century, the ignorant and semi-Christians thronged into the church by numbers. They had forgotten none of their pagan customs. The bishops of that period had to content themselves with redressing as best they could, and in experimental fashion the shocking malformations of the Christian faith which they perceived around them. Properly instructing converts was out of the question. They had to decontent with teaching them no more than the symbol of baptism and then baptizing them en masse, postponing until a later date the task of eradicating their superstitions which they preserved intact. So just baptize them just as you are.

You don't have to get rid of all the false ideas and teachings of the world.

This later date never arrived, and the church adapted to herself, as well as she could, them and their customs and beliefs. On their side they were content to dress up their paganism in a Christian cloak. It just summarizes what happened in the false churches of this world. Brethren, these are things that we actually need to be familiar with, and you can do study on that, and a good place to begin would be our booklet, this chapter. And so a great false church system took control in the early centuries AD. A great false church system. You can read about it. It had different councils and they ruled on things like Easter and when that should be observed, and they didn't want anybody observing anything associated with the ignorance of the Jews. Anything like the Passover, the Sabbath, those things were anathema. Anyone that would go that way. This church went on for a number of centuries. In 1054, this false church system split in two with the Western Roman Catholic Church out of Rome and the Eastern Greek Orthodox Church out of Istanbul, Constantinople. In the West, there continued to be many disagreements with the corruption in the Catholic Church, which is very common knowledge. You can read about it.

In 1517, so that moves on ahead almost 500 years after the church had split, Martin Luther began what is called the Protestant Reformation. But all the Protestant churches, guess what? They continued with Sunday, they continued with Easter, they continued with Christmas, ideas of the immortal soul, the Trinity, concepts of heaven and hell. So they really didn't change the basic doctrines and teachings at all. You know, I've just gone over very briefly a few things about the history of the counterfeit Christianity that arose. And I think it's important that we understand this here at this time of the year around Pentecost because it helps us to appreciate the true church all the more. We've been able to trace the true church over the last 1900 years. It began in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost. We've been able to trace it as it made its journey on into parts of Europe and eventually England and the New World, especially here in the United States. People that kept the Sabbath, people that kept the Holy Days, believed in the resurrection and looked for God's kingdom to be set up on the earth. Yes, we trace our roots today back to the book of Acts chapter 2, the church that Jesus built. We have the same teachings and we follow the examples, the same examples of Jesus Christ and the early church. You know, it's very easy if we know what the early church taught and practiced, it's very easy to see that, hey, we're their descendants. They're our ancestors spiritually. We do the same thing and we have the same beliefs they had. Of course, we encourage everyone to read more about that in our booklet, The Church Jesus Built.

There's a chapter, the very first chapter is on a people special to God, a people special to God. You know, that's what Pentecost is all about, a people that God has chosen to be different in this age, people that God has called out of the world to be the first fruits of the Spirit, to go through the transformation process first. The second chapter is a spiritually transformed people. I'll tell you, these would be good chapters to read between Noah and Pentecost. We have two weeks before Pentecost, but truly God's people are a spiritually transformed people. They're just different.

They have the Spirit of God. They have the attitude of God, the love of God.

They look at things through God's mind and God's nature.

Well, let me read the last paragraph or two of the first chapter.

In that first chapter, then, a people special to God.

The special and holy people of God, like Abraham, are obedient people, selected from all nations, who have chosen not to live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Their trust in God comes from the heart and is demonstrated by their obedient actions. God's Spirit works in them to produce faith and obedience, making them special to God. You know, we are a people that are special to God. The second chapter, a spiritually transformed people, shows how God's Spirit then helps this people, us, to understand His truth and His way. And God's Spirit provides great power, and God's Spirit leads to obedience.

The last paragraph or two of this chapter, those who do not have God's Spirit, find it easy and convenient to disregard the biblical instructions they dislike. They devise their own traditions, giving the appearance of obeying and honoring God while sidestepping the intent of His instructions.

God's Spirit, however, dramatically changes the attitude, outlook, and spirit of His people.

They earnestly desire to obey God, and He gives them a humble, obedient attitude and approach toward Him and His Word. They can willingly and faithfully obey His commandments. They have received from Him the power of the Holy Spirit to combat Satan and their own nature. In short, they are the transformed, special people of God. Then you could also, if you would like, go ahead and read the third chapter, the responsibility and the mission of the church. And then the next chapter is the rise of a counterfeit Christianity. And then the Church of God today is the final chapter at the end. This booklet, then, if you've not read it or reviewed it lately, has things that will be beneficial to you here before, as you prepare for Pentecost. In conclusion, which will be about the last 10 minutes of this sermon, I would like to give us very quickly seven reasons that we need to appreciate very deeply the Church of God. Seven reasons why we need to appreciate the Church that God has called us to be a member of. Number one, number one, the Church of God that we are a part of is the pillar and ground of the truth. Let's go to... we'll read some scriptures now very quickly. First Timothy chapter 3 and verse 15. First Timothy chapter 3 and verse 15.

But if I am delayed, I write, so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the Church of the Living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.

You know, the truth is important. Jesus said, you shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free. The truth of God is not a mixture of truth and error. It is solid, like a pillar.

It is something we can build our life on, like a... like the ground or the foundation.

It is solid, rock solid. Brethren, we should appreciate that we are a part of a Church that seeks after the truth. We're not seeking after what might please people. What we teach may displease people. They may not like it. In fact, that is many times the reaction. God's Church just keeps on preaching the truth. And so we should appreciate that. We should not want a Church that preaches what pleases men or makes people feel better, but one that teaches the truth. Number two reason we should appreciate the Church God has called us to be a part of is that the Church is a beacon of light. The Church of God shines a light in a world that is dark. And isn't it wonderful? Who likes to walk around in the darkness? You know, you stumble around and bump into things. Don't know where you're going. But the Church provides a light. It lightens up our path so that we don't stumble around.

That's true in our lives. It's true in our families. It's true in our marriages. It's true with our children. It's true in our jobs. It's true in every aspect of our lives. God has turned on the light. In John chapter 1, we read that Jesus is the light of the world. And as head of the Church, then Jesus then turns on the light for us if we follow His lead. And we should appreciate that that we have the light so that we can have sure steps as we go forward and not stumble and fall.

We should appreciate that. I'm giving seven reasons why we should appreciate the Church that Jesus built and that we are a part of. Number one is the pillar and ground of the truth. Number two, it is a beacon of light. Number three, this Church has a message of good news. It's called the gospel. The gospel means simply good news. In Matthew chapter 1 and verses 14 and 15, the message is about the kingdom of God. And God uses the Church to bring this message of good news to us. How did you come to understand the truth? Well, whether even if it was through your parents, your parents, you know, at one time heard a message and the message was a message about the kingdom of God. It was a message of good news. It's good sometimes to go back and remember where we got the message from. It did not come from within us. It came from without. It came from the Church that God uses to preach a message of good news, the gospel, the gospel of the kingdom of God. That is the message by which God called us to be a part of His Church. Number four, we should appreciate the Church. I'm bringing out these things because I think sometimes we take the Church for granted. We did not appreciate the Church we are a part of as much as we should.

Number four, the Church provides a place of worship for the Sabbath and the Holy Days, which are holy convocations, a place where we can come to worship God and learn more about Him and learn more about His purpose for us.

It's a place to honor God and thank Him. And certainly we do not want to neglect the assembling of ourselves together, Hebrews 10 verse 25, but instead we want to come as often as we are able physically and financially to do so. We do not want to miss Church. Church is important. This is a place of worship, and the Church provides that, and we should be thankful for it.

Number five, we should appreciate the Church because it affords fellowship with others who also believe, those who God also is called to be firstfruits. We need fellowship with one another.

We need support. There's a lot of fellowship and support that we provide each other every time that we are together, and that fellowship is joyful. We develop close friendships, closer than even our physical family, because these relationships are eternal.

And that which has brought us together as a family is actually God's Spirit. We are children of our Heavenly Father. Everyone belongs. Everyone is a part of this family. Do we appreciate the fellowship that the Church affords to us? I hope that we do. It's very important. Number six, the Church provides spiritual nourishment. Jesus Christ said that He was divine, and He said that we are the branches. And we need, then, as branches to have nourishment that flows into us from Jesus Christ, who is the vine. And of course, our Heavenly Father, who is the husband man, the owner of the vine we receive of His Spirit, and that from Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ and God our Father use a chosen ministry to help us to grow. Let's turn to Ephesians chapter 4.

We're not turning to many of the verses, but I think we all understand what I'm saying here. Let's read these verses as far as spiritual nourishment. God provides a chosen and trained ministry to help nourish us spiritually and to help us to grow. In Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 11, He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying or the building up of the body of Christ. And so we are to grow, and this means we need spiritual nourishment to help us to grow. And we appreciate the Church provides that. Brethren, look at all of these ways that the Church is such a benefit to us. By the way, the word Church means ekklesia or ecclesia, ones that are called out. The age of the Church will be over at the Second Coming of Christ. Then everybody will be a part of the Church. But this is an age that God is calling out a firstfruits that is pictured by Pentecost. We need to appreciate our calling more, and we need to appreciate what the Church does for us. The seventh reason we should appreciate the Church God has called us to be a part of, His Church, is that the Church then leads us to word full spiritual maturity. It teaches us. The Church inspires us to go on forward. The Church encourages us. We need encouragement. We all have trials and problems that we face. The Church protects us. It protects us from the world and from those that would do us harm. And the Church helps us to go on forward, enduring and not quitting, not giving up toward full spiritual maturity. Well, look at here, verse 13. Ephesians 4 and verse 13. Till, and it's a process, we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So there we go on to full spiritual maturity. No longer children, verse 14, but verse 15, midway through, growing up in all things to Him who is the Head of Christ. And last part of verse 16, with growth taking place then in the body for the edifying of itself in love. Brethren, let's never take the Church for granted. Let's always appreciate the Church. Let's go over these seven again. It's the pillar and the ground of the truth. It is the beacon of light and a dark world. It is the Church with a message of good news. Number four, it is a place that God has provided for worship. It's a place, number five, He's provided for fellowship and developing eternal relationships with others who believe. And number six, it's a place for spiritual nourishment so we can grow. And number seven, so we can grow to full spiritual maturity.

Yeah, let's never, ever take God's Church in vain. So I'd like to conclude by saying what a high calling God has offered to us to be a part of His Church at this time. It is an honor and a privilege to be called today to be a part of the Church of God. It is a better resurrection, Hebrews 11 and verse 35.

It is a resurrection where we will become spirit beings and we will become a part of the bride of Christ. Just imagine that some of these things are going to be covered in more detail in the sermons just ahead and on the day of Pentecost. Remember that the Church Jesus built is composed of a special and holy people whose trust in God comes from the heart and is demonstrated by their obedient actions and that God's Spirit works in them to produce faith and obedience, making them the special people of God.