Earlier this year, I set in motion a Vision for this church. I saw the love our church family had for our community and the desire for us to grow into a healthy church that was committed to reaching the lost for Christ. In our vision for Trinity, I set us on a path to grow into a healthy church by the means of six marks. This series, I wish to expound these six marks and show how they will help us grow into a healthy church that magnifies the Lord Jesus in all that we do.
Mark 1: A Church Founded on the Word of God
The first mark is one that looks at the Bible as the foundation for our church vision. I like to think of our vision as a roadmap. On the map, there are all kinds of destinations and places we could go. Looking through the lenses of our vision, we can see all kinds of exciting possibilities. But if we move along with our vision, recklessly doing all these exciting things, we run the danger of falling off the map. If we don’t have a compass leading us on the correct heading, we can easily get lost, and even forget where we came from. That’s where God’s Word comes in—the compass to our map.
It is intentional that God’s Word is key to the first mark in our vision. Apart from God’s Word, we are lost, roaming aimlessly in a world that is constantly trying to find its way. God foresaw our need for a proper heading and he gave us the Bible to help us keep the right direction. The Psalmist says in Psalm 119:105, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” The Church is working in a world of darkness, and the Bible is the lamp to help us not misstep, and alight to keep us on the correct path. Like a compass, the Bible keeps us going in the right direction. Whether it is a church vision, or how to raise our children, or how we treat one another—the Bible is there to instruct us along the way. In fact, it tells us the way to our destination. In order to grow into a healthy church, it takes a body of believers, day-in and day-out, building on the foundation of God’s Word.
Because it is essential that we always look to the Bible for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:16), we saturate ourselves with God’s Word each week. Sunday Mornings, we are walking together, verse by verse through the Book of Mark. Each week we look at Mark’s gospel, and the authority Jesus has as King of the Kingdom of God. By walking through books of the Bible, we allow the Bible to teach us and instruct us—we allow the Bible to direct us on the path that leads us to Christ. On top of that, we are studying Sound Doctrine. This is an intense study of God’s Word and what it teaches us about God, Scripture itself, ourselves and so much more. We study each week, in a more comprehensive way, these six marks, drawn from Scripture to help us grow into disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ.
All of this is intentional. We want to be a church that grows in numbers. We want to be a church that is respected in our community. But most of all, we want to be a church that glorifies our Savior. As we go forward with our vision, think about your commitment to God’s Word. Is it the foundation for your life, or do you use it only as a crutch when times get hard?
Hopefully, we can all come to the point where we see it as not just a crutch but the always present lamp to our feet, and a light to our path. May the Word of God always be the foundation to our Church and its vision.
Bro. Jesse