CHURCH-HEALTHY

They are born again of the Spirit; they all possess repentance towards God, faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ,” and holiness of life and conversion. They all hate sin, and they all love Christ… They are all led by one Spirit; they all build upon one foundation; they all draw their religion from one single book – that is the Bible. They are all joined to one great center – that is Jesus Christ. They all even now can say with one heart, “Hallelujah;” and they can all respond with one heart and voice, Amen and Amen.

J.C. Ryle

Wherever we find the Word of God surely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there, it is not to be doubted, is a church of God.

John Calvin

The marks by which the true Church is known are these: If the pure doctrine of the gospel is preached therein; if she maintains the pure administration of the sacraments as instituted by Christ; if church discipline is exercised in punishing of sin; in short, if all things are managed according to the pure Word of God, all things contrary thereto rejected, and Jesus Christ acknowledged as the only Head of the Church. Hereby the true Church may certainly be known, from which no man has a right to separate himself.

Belgic Confession

Those who have found the presence and power of the spirit of Christ breathing in their ministers, either to their conversion, or edification, will be slow to change such a ministry of faith, and holiness, for the liberty of church order.

John Cotton

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 57.

The early church was most useful when it preached the meaning of Christ through the lens of the whole of Scripture. It was most powerful when it maintained integrity with God and other human beings. It was most evangelistic when it understood that adherents of other religions, whether Jewish or Greek or Roman, faced eternal judgment without Christ.

Paul House

Committees are necessary. Even more important is vision and the ability to move the congregation toward the goals of the church. But when push comes to shove, it's the ministry of the Word that gives us our greatest impact. A church can usually put up with weak administration if it has effective preaching. But there's nothing quite as pathetic as people coming to church and returning home without any spiritual food.

Erwin Lutzer

Pastor to Pastor, Kregel, 1998, p. 104.

Because God is so concerned for the holiness of His people, they should be equally concerned. The church cannot preach and teach a message it does not live and have any integrity before God, or even before the world. Yet in many churches where there is no tolerance for sin in principle there is much tolerance for it in practice. And when preaching becomes separated from living, it becomes separated both from integrity and from spiritual and moral effectiveness. It promotes hypocrisy instead of holiness. Divorcing biblical teaching from daily living is compromise of the worst sort. It corrupts the church, grieves the Lord, and dishonors His Word and His name.

John MacArthur

Matthew 16-23, Moody, 1988, p. 123-124.

Someone has said that the marks of a strong church are wet eyes, bent knees, and a broken heart. We'll never be powerful until we let God be God and jealously guard His honor.

Erwin Lutzer

Pastor to Pastor, Kregel, 1998, p. 99.

In proportion as a church is holy, in that proportion will its testimony for Christ be powerful.

C.H. Spurgeon

1000 Devotional Thoughts, Baker, 1976, n. 408, p. 205.

The first mark of a healthy church is expositional preaching. It is not only the first mark; it is far and away the most important of them all, because if you get this one right, all of the others should follow… If you get the priority of the Word established, then you have in place the single most important aspect of the church’s life, and growing health is virtually assured, because God has decided to act by His Spirit through His Word… The congregation’s commitment to the centrality of the Word coming from the front, from the preacher, the one specially gifted by God and called to that ministry, is the most important thing you can look for in a church.

Mark Dever

Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Crossway, 2000, p. 25, 38.

A healthy church has a pervasive concern with church growth- not simply growing numbers but growing members. A church full of growing Christians is the kind of church growth I want as a pastor. Some today seem to think that one can be a “baby Christian” for a whole lifetime. Growth is seen to be an optional extra for particularly zealous disciples. But be very careful about taking that line of thought. Growth is a sign of life. Growing trees are living trees, and growing animals are living animals. When something stops growing, it dies.

Mark Dever

Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Crossway, 2000, p. 200.

Biblical church discipline is simple obedience to God and a simple confession that we need help. We cannot live the Christian life alone. Our purpose in church discipline is positive for the individual disciplined, for other Christians as they see the real danger of sin, for the health of the church as a whole, and for the corporate witness of the church to those outside. Most of all, our holiness is to reflect the holiness of God. It should mean something to be a member of the church, not for our pride’s sake but for God’s name’s sake. Biblical church discipline is a mark of a healthy church.

Mark Dever

Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Crossway, 2000, p. 178.

The culture to which (the church) would conform in order to be relevant becomes so inextricably entwined with antagonism to the Gospel that to conform to it must mean a loss of the Gospel itself. In such a day, we must re-hear the Bible and re-imagine the concept of successful ministry not as necessarily immediately fruitful but as demonstrably faithful to God’s Word… Simply put, we need churches that are self-consciously distinct from the culture. We need churches in which the key indicator of success is not evident results but persevering biblical faithfulness. We need churches that help us recover those aspects of Christianity that are distinct from the world, and that unite us.

Mark Dever

Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Crossway, 2000, p. 14.

A healthy church is a Godward-looking church. We look in dependence on Him for our message, our method, and the transformation of our churches into the image of Christ.

Mark Dever and Paul Alexander

If we are coming to church only as consumers, to get our own needs met, then we have missed the point of the church. We are not merely intended to get our needs met. We are intended to be part of God’s plan for drawing other people to Himself, for encouraging and building up those who are already His children. Each member is not simply intended to be a consumer. We are all intended to be providers. We are colaborers with God Himself in the work of the Gospel (1 Cor. 3:9)! Some of us may well be introverted or less talkative. But none of us are designed merely to be ministered to, as if the whole church revolved around our own felt needs and desires. We are all called to “stimulate one another to love and good deeds” and to “bear one another’s burdens” (Heb. 10:24; Gal. 6:2).

Mark Dever and Paul Alexander

It’s easy to stand on the sidelines and find fault with the church’s weaknesses, deficiencies and ineffectiveness; it’s another thing to become involved in fixing the problem by becoming part of the solution. More dedication, more involvement, more prayer, more effort, more devotion, more service, and more humble cooperation and participation in the activities of the church are the appropriate responses to the situation.

Wayne Mack

To Be or Not To Be a Church Member, Calvary Press, www.calvarypress.com. 2004, p. 52.

The true church lives and moves and has its being in prayer.

Leonard Ravenhill

They may seem weak in the eyes of the worldly strong. They may seem foolish in the eyes of the worldly wise. But the Gospel message is the power of God unto salvation, and the Gospel means are effectual to salvation. These are the Spiritual instruments given by God with which Christian congregational Spiritual life is nurtured, the Spirit’s tools of grace and growth in grace appointed by God in the Bible.

Ligon Duncan

The Ordinary Means of Growth, Tabletalk, October 2007, p. 14. Used by Permission of Ligonier Ministries.

What will a church look like that is committed to the ordinary means of grace? It will be characterized by love for expository preaching, passion for worship, delight in truth, embrace of the Gospel, the Spirit’s work of conversion, a life of godliness; robust family religion; biblical evangelism; biblical discipleship, biblical church membership, mutual accountability in the church, biblical church leadership, and a desire to be a blessing to the nations. Along with this all, there will be an unapologetic, humble, and joyful celebration of the transcendent sovereignty of the one, true, triune God in salvation and all things.

Ligon Duncan

The Ordinary Means of Growth, Tabletalk, October 2007, p. 15. Used by Permission of Ligonier Ministries.

O love! How much want is there of you in the Church of Christ! And how much does the Church feel for this want! It groans, it languishes, it dies daily because of your absence. Return, O love, return! Repair breaches, restore paths to dwell in, edify the old ways and places, and raise up the foundations of many generations.

Nathaniel Vincent

A Discourse Concerning Love, 1684.

Our challenge is to stay up with the time, to serve our generation, yet in no way alter the truths of His Word. Styles and methods change and must be kept up to date. But truth? It is timeless. Not subject to change… We are to be willing to leave the familiar without disturbing the essentials. To minister effectively the church must wake up to what changes…and what doesn't… The church that sits around frowning at the future, doing little more than polishing yesterday's apples, will become a church lacking in relevance and excitement. At the same time, the church that softens its stand theologically and alters Scripture to fit the future's style, will lose its power.

Charles Swindoll

The Bride, Zondervan, www.zondervan.com, 1994.

The basic trouble with the church today is her unworthy concept of God... Our religion is weak because our God is weak... Christianity at any given time is strong or weak depending on her concept of God.

A.W. Tozer

The Attributes of God: a Journey into the Father’s Heart.

The neglected heart will soon be a heart overrun with worldly thoughts; the neglected life will soon become a moral chaos; the church that is not jealously protected by mighty intercession and sacrificial labors will before long become the abode of every evil bird and the hiding place for unsuspected corruption. The creeping wilderness will soon take over that church that trusts in its own strength and forgets to watch and pray.

A.W. Tozer

Most human organizations that fall short of their goals do so not because of stupidity or faulty doctrines, but because of internal decay and rigidification. They grow stiff in the joints. They get in a rut. They go to seed.

James Gardner

How desperately sad is the fact that the church is known by schism, not unity; ignorance, not knowledge; and indecisiveness rather than maturity. How it must break God’s heart to see us continue in such a poverty stricken condition in light of what He has done, stands ready to do, has the resources to accomplish, and has defined as our calling in Christ.

R.C. Sproul

The Purpose of God, An Exposition of Ephesians, Christian Focus Publications, 1994, p. 104

The best remedy for a sick Church is to put it on a missionary diet.

Author Unknown

The great, God-blessed churches in the world today have one common characteristic: an insistence upon an exposition of God’s infallible Word.

O.S. Hawkins

There should be some non-negotiables on which you must never compromise. In particular, make certain that the church is committed to:

1. The Bible as the fully inspired, inerrant, infallible and authoritative Word of God.

2. That God is exalted as holy, sovereign and all-wise.

3. That salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

4. That there is solid, biblical, expository preaching and teaching.

5. That the church recognizes its duty to evangelize its own community and those around the world through missionary efforts.

6. That it teaches and insists upon holiness among its membership.

7. That it is characterized by a love toward both the saved and the lost.

8. That it both feeds and protects the flock.

9. That it encourages genuine fellowship among its members.

10. That it is a church that prays, recognizing its absolute dependence upon the grace of God.

11. That it is a vibrant, joyful Christian fellowship.

Curtis C. Thomas

Life in the Body of Christ, Founders Press, 2006, p. 79, www.founders.org. Used by Permission.

Few things are sapping the strength of the church of Jesus Christ more than the unreconciled state of so many believers. So many have matters deeply imbedded in their craws, like iron wedges forced between themselves and other Christians. They can’t walk together because they do not agree. When they should be marching side by side through this world taking men captive for Jesus Christ, they are acting instead like an army that has been routed and scattered and whose troops in their confusion have begun fighting among themselves. Nothing is sapping the church of Christ of her strength so much as these unresolved problems, these loose ends among believing Christians that have never been tied up. There is no excuse for this sad condition, for the Bible does not allow for loose ends. God wants no loose ends.

Jay E. Adams

Christian Living in the Home, P&R Publishing, 1972, p. 35-36, Used by Permission.

The church which is not a missionary church will be a missing church when Jesus comes.

F.B. Meyer

The temple of truth has never suffered so much from woodpeckers on the outside as from termites within.

Vance Havner

In God’s divine design, every “biological family” when converted to Christ becomes the “church in miniature”… And as these families mature and reflect the fullness of Christ, they become the strong building blocks of the church. In this sense, mature families automatically create mature churches.

Gene Getz

Elders and Leaders, Moody, 2003, p. 126.

The way to preserve the peace of the church is to preserve the purity of it.

Matthew Henry

Don’t go where it is all fine music and grand talk and beautiful architecture; those things will neither fill anybody’s stomach, nor feed his soul. Go where the gospel is preached, the gospel that really feeds your soul, and go often.

C.H. Spurgeon

It is no secret that Christ’s Church is not in good health in many places of the world. She has been languishing because she has been fed, as the current line has it, ‘junk food’: All kinds of artificial preservatives and all sorts of unnatural substitutes have been served up to her. As a result, theological and biblical malnutrition has afflicted the very generation that has taken such giant steps to make sure its physical health is not damaged by using foods or products that are harmful to their bodies. Simultaneously a worldwide spiritual famine resulting from the absence of any genuine publication of the Word of God (Amos 8:11) continues to run wild and almost unabated in most quarters of the Church.

Walter Kaiser

Toward an Exegetical Theology, Baker, 1981, p. 7-8.

Whenever the true message of the cross is abolished, the anger of hypocrites and heretics eases…and all things are in peace. This is a sure token that the devil is guarding the entry of that house, and that the pure doctrine of God's Word has been taken away. The church, then, is in the BEST state when Satan assaileth it on every side…both with subtle sleights, and outright violence. And (likewise) it is in the WORST state, when it is most at peace!

Martin Luther