The Church as the Family of God

As we look at what the church is let me begin with the church being a family. Check out the following verse:

Ephesians 2:19, "You are a member of God's very own family and you belong in God's household with every other Christian."

Notice this verse does not say that you are like a family, but that you are a member of God's household. It is a spiritual family. In fact, your spiritual family will outlast your physical family. Just think about it, the believers you go to church with, you will also spend eternity with. So, do we treat each other like we will spend eternity with them?

So how can we say that we are building community with our brothers in Christ when we only share events with them. We go to worship, Sunday School, and other programs of the church together, but do we truly know them? Do we spend time building trust with one another so we can hold each other accountable like a family?

The sad fact is that the church acts more like a dysfunctional family than a loving, trusting, caring family unit. Church must be more than programs to keep people busy, it must provide and organic, growing atmosphere for people to grow as a family.