The meeting of Grace Christian Church. We meet in person and stream services every Sunday at 10:30 AM EST in Manalapan, New Jersey.
Summary of Chapter One: There Are Two Kinds of Churches
- Key Verse Breakdown (Matthew 16:18): "I will build My church" emphasizes Christ as the sole source ("I"), unstoppable builder ("will"), and owner ("My") of the church; ministers are not the source but participants.
- Man-Made Church Characteristics:
- Built by human intellect, ability, and independence from Christ.
- Focuses on numerical growth over spiritual growth.
- Uses man-made success markers, imitates other churches, and conforms to secular culture.
- Results in vain labor (Psalm 127:1), lacking Holy Spirit power, leading to spiritual deadness, lack of Christ-centeredness, pride, futility, and imitation of worldly traditions.
- Christ-Built Church Characteristics:
- Made of believers transformed into Christ's likeness (Romans 8:29), thinking, believing, choosing, behaving, and living like Him.
- Totally dependent on Christ as source (John 15:5).
- Experiences supernatural transformation (Romans 12:2), spiritual attractiveness (2 Corinthians 2:14; John 12:32), overflow of Christ's life (2 Corinthians 4:7; John 7:38), unconditional love (2 Corinthians 8:24), and glorifies God (Romans 11:36).
- Conclusion: A successful church is Christ-built, not man-made; the next chapters explore Christ building His church in and through individuals.
Summary of Chapter Two: Christ Building His Church In You - Part One
- Spiritual Growth Imperative ("Grow Up"): Believers must mature spiritually (Ephesians 4:11-16) to build the body of Christ; failure leads to remaining "spiritual babies" who are self-absorbed, manipulative, and conflict-prone.
- Characteristics of Spiritual Babies: Self-focused on personal expectations, frustrations, control, and discord; results in a self-absorbed rather than Christ-centered church.
- Spiritual Maturity Defined: Transformation into Christ's likeness (2 Corinthians 3:18), leading to selflessness, unconditional love, harmony, humility, and faithfulness.
- Two Ways to Live the Christian Life:
- "A" Christian Life: Self as source (with God's help) to produce promises, keep commands, and transform; inevitably fails, leading to disconnection from God's promises (supported by statistics like only 13% living victoriously).
- "THE" Christian Life: Christ Himself as the life (John 14:6; Philippians 1:21), source (1 Corinthians 1:30), supply (Philippians 4:19), and transformer (2 Corinthians 3:18; Philippians 1:6); supplies needs like love, strength, hope, and transforms into Christ-like qualities.
- Human Limitation: Apart from Christ, nothing can be produced (John 15:5); self-effort fails because the Christian life is divine and only livable by Christ in us (Colossians 1:27; Galatians 2:20).
- Believer's Role: Receive from Christ (Colossians 2:6), abide/depend on Him (John 15:5), live by faith in Christ as object (Hebrews 11:6; Galatians 2:20); faith is moment-by-moment dependence believing only God produces the promised life.
- Summary Diagram: Choice between self as source (lifeless, unchanged) vs. Christ as source (life, power, transformation).
- Note: For deeper study, refer to "Living Life From A New Source" on the ministry website.
