What is the church?

I suppose many people would give many answers to the question what is the church. I was impressed by an answer I heard recently in a sermon by Tullian Tchividjian which expresses the answer to this question in dynamic terms. He said that ‘we are not a self-preserving tribe we are a  self-sacrificing mission.’ It is a powerful statement about the nature of the church, that we exist not for our own sake but to demonstrate the reality of the gospel to a watching world. It is a definition that strikes at the root of the consumerist view that is a blight upon the church at this time.  In the day in which we live we need a much more missional view of church which moves us away from the idea of church as something that is there for our own convenience to a view that sees it as a community that displays the glory of God in salvation.

Tags: Church, Tullian Tchividjian