Power Walk Ministries

Guest (Male): This is the Power Walk Ministries broadcast with Reverend Paul Cannings, and we're so glad that you've tuned in to join us. Today we begin a new series titled Why Church? to truly consider what church is, its purpose, and why it's mandated in Scripture. Providing a close look at the New Testament church, Pastor Cannings underlines the importance of being part of a local church. The Body of Christ is his message today. Let's listen.

Dr. Paul Cannings: Many people have come to me and they've said, "Why church? Why church?" Matter of fact, now it's wonderful. I can stay at the house, relax, and do some live streaming, and there goes church. I've got a good word, good music, encouraged me, and therefore I'm good. I finally can just not have to travel in, get dressed, do all these different things. This is working out great.

So why come to church? What's the big deal about churches? I mean, I finally get a day to rest. Saturday with the kids playing soccer games, playing baseball, all these different things taking place on Saturday. I got clothes to wash. You finally get a day of rest and you're talking church. Well, let's spend some time on this whole issue. Why church? Why go to church? Why is it important? What is the point of it all? That's a good question.

To say that I am at home and I have church is not correct. That's like saying I am at the house, I'm watching television, I'm sitting on the couch. For some people who are in colder climates, I have the blanket over me, I'm watching a great game or I'm watching the news and we got family. No, that doesn't work like that. You wouldn't call that family. You wouldn't call it family to sit on your bed and spend most of the day on your bed or on your couch or walking around and just grabbing a meal here and there, hardly talking to anybody in the family and just moving around doing what you like to do, what you enjoy doing, what makes you feel relaxed, not stressed, and you had family. We wouldn't call it that.

So family is a whole lot more than that. When we come from family to church, we have a lot of similarities because the first thing that God established wasn't church in the Bible. It was family. From this family unit, he established a secondary family called the church. God had all of these backup systems. First, it was a nation from family to a nation called Israel. In the New Testament, if a man takes care of his family well, that leads to qualification attached to his leadership in the church. You've got a man and a woman representing Christ and the church. So God creates church as another nation. 1 Peter chapter 2:9-10 talks about the church being a nation unto God. It's a new structure that God has put in place.

And with doing so, then you have single moms coming and they are people in the church that can help with that support mechanism if the father is missing, if the mother is missing. It becomes a whole other family. So God has a whole process attached to this system that he has put in place called the body of Christ, the only place that he is the head of, and he calls that his church.

So let's walk through Why Church? Just a peripheral view of why it's important in the family focus of God. It's the only organism that Christ has put in place that he would use and work through to impact the world. He's not going to do it through governments. He's not going to do it through political parties. He's going to do it only through one organism: the church. So if you see things getting worse, the thing that is dying is the church.

He says if judgment, 1 Peter 4:17, begins in the household of faith, what will be the outcome of the rest of the world? So in other words, if the church fails, the rest of the world goes with it. So that's why when he comes back for the rapture and he redeems his church, you've got the tribulation period going crazy because there's no more restrainer on earth. So the church is his restraining force.

The Bible would say this in Proverbs, even though that's not where the church age is—the church is in the New Testament as we know. But in Proverbs, he says where righteousness is present, sin is restrained. So if sin is not finding anything that is restraining it, holding it back, the place that is failing is not government, it's not political parties, it's the church. It's the church. If my people who are called by my name will turn, then you will have less wickedness in the earth.

So when we come to the New Testament, even when we go to the book of Revelation, we will find the same impact. That when Christ is upset and wants to walk away, he talks about taking his lampstand from the church. This is his major commitment to the world. It is his church, the body of Christ. This is what he's committed to, as I said earlier. So we can't come to church and not examine what that means. Because today, church for us is singing, when many times singing was at the end of going into the temple and sacrificing before God.

Because if the high priest came out, that means that the people's sins were forgiven. So guess what they need to do? Rejoice. So today when we come to church in a New Testament, even when we go to Acts chapter 2:42, we will find in that passage of scripture that singing wasn't even a part of it. They were spending time in what? Prayer. They were spending time fellowshiping together. Why? We'll talk about that today because the spiritual gifts are in the church. They're not outside the church because that's where the body of Christ is.

So when people need encouragement, guess where the gifts are? In church. When people need wisdom, guess where it is? In church. It's the body of Christ. The gifts are employed to serve one another. So the people were gathering together, they were breaking bread. Why? That's the central aspect of why we as Gentiles especially can now have a relationship with God. So they celebrated his death and his resurrection. Mostly, obviously, the Lord's supper was attached to him before he died. But they celebrated that as a means to say here is a brand new covenant that took place during the Passover.

So you had these things taking place where they gathered together, they fellowshiped, they broke bread, they prayed together. The singing in Colossians chapter 3 happened in the church, but it was not the primary thing that took place. So a lot of times when people come and they even want to know about giving, and why do I have to give? What's the big deal about giving? The Bible is saying these things are because the God's family needs to move forward in progressing his agenda forward.

Missionaries need to be supported. People need to find benevolence. People need to be able to sustain the house of God. There's lights, there's water, there's all these different things. Well, the house of God helps his people to gather. So that has to be sustained. It's not just about the preacher or about this or about that. We're looking at the wrong things. It's about sustaining the only powerful organism that will exist for the world to be impacted, and that's the church.

Here is what we find first about why church when we are broken. Some people are just desperate, single parents or struggling. And that's why within the church, he designed it this way that we will start looking at in 1 Corinthians chapter 12:4-7. Understand this is not any different than what they're going through as they go out into the world in a polytheistic system, when they're going out and there are gods everywhere that people are worshipping, their marketplaces that have different gods being sold in it.

There is all kinds of different festivals taking place in Corinth. I mean, it is the mega city. And the people are coming to church, but they're coming to church with a secular mindset. And they're wondering. They're bringing in all these different things because they had poetry festivals, they had all of these speech festivals and people were doing exceptionally well. So when they came in church, they were thinking that we could just use these things within the church to make it great.

Then they had all kinds of things taking place in some of the temples they came out of. They had prostitution in the back of the temple. They had food where they go and eat and then they would drink and then they would babble in the temple. So they were just jumping around babbling and babbling and going into a frenzy. So when they came to the New Testament church, what did they find? The Lord's supper. What did they find? People speaking in tongues.

So they sought to adopt what they had in their pagan temples in the New Testament. That's why he had issues about morality in the New Testament church, because these things were affecting how they came into the church and were therefore functioning and operating. So after Paul walks through the importance of just having order and structure within the church in chapter 11 and trying to maintain unity in the midst of diversity, Paul wants to explain the importance of making this church productive.

That's why he talks about the Lord's supper before he comes to talk about spiritual gifts. Because spiritual gifts are viable in making the church useful. This is huge. Spiritual gifts are viable in making the church useful. To go into a church and do nothing and make all kinds of reasons why we shouldn't because these people, if you start getting involved you really learn about the church and then you don't really want to be there. Well, that is not an appropriate way to look at church.

You go to work and there's all kinds of people there, but for the sake of money, you stay there. You go to work, you apply yourself, you deal with all the different dynamics, you jump in your car, you deal with the traffic, you do all of this over a paycheck. What about God? So we come into the church. Yes, there're imperfect people there. That's why there is a gift of helps. That's why there is a gift of service. That's why there is a gift of wisdom. People don't know how to make decisions. That's why it's there. It's not there for perfect people. It's there for broken people.

That's why he says in Ephesians chapter 4, equip the saints. Help them to find what is necessary. Equip came to getting a ship totally resourceful in making a journey across the ocean. Because once it's out there, there's no satellites in the sky in their day saying where the ship is or coast guards. When a ship is out there, it's at its own mercy. So they equipped the ship to deal with all that it needs to deal with so when it's out there it can make the journey and achieve the purpose for which the journey was established.

That's also attached to broken bones and mending them. So he's talking about broken people needing to be fully equipped to make a journey where Satan is going to the heavens day and night seeking to destroy us like a roaring lion, he would say in 1 Peter chapter 5. So when we look at those things, the Bible is saying, yes, we need a place for healing, to be equipped, to be strengthened, so that we could be productive, as salt and light to a world that is getting worse by the minute. So we need to be equipped to be productive for the glory of God. So we'll pick this up in 1 Corinthians chapter 12:4 and walk all the way through why church. Stay focused.

Guest (Male): Thank you Dr. Cannings. A place where we as individuals and families can go to be equipped, healed, strengthened, and to serve other people. Let's see it as an extension of our own families. Now if this message has been a blessing to you and you'd like to obtain a copy, then please call us at 281-260-7402. Again, that's 281-260-7402. You're also welcome to visit us online at powerwalkministries.org for this series or other ministry resources.

Dr. Paul Cannings: I had someone walk up to me and say, "Hey, you so blessed me when I listen to the station and feed off the word that God has placed through you." That means so much. I had a person say to me, "Hey, you saved my marriage. I was really going to walk out on my wife. You saved my marriage." Oh man, that moved me to keep pressing on.

I pray, folks, that you would support our ministry and become a part of it and share with us in the resources that we have because that goes to the support of this ministry. Pray for us, please, sincerely mean that. Pray for us. You share the word with other people and that you'll become a partner, a regular partner with us. All you have to do is go to our website, powerwalkministries.org, and press the donate button, and it would explain in there how you could become a Power Walk partner. God bless you. It's been a blessing serving you.

Guest (Male): To become a partner, please call us at 281-260-7402 or visit us online at powerwalkministries.org. And as we leave you, remember Christ is the head of the church and it's the only organism God will use and work through for his eternal purposes. So let's be faithful in fulfilling our role in it.