The Washing Machine of Real Church Life

The flesh and the Spirit see the world around us differently.

It is easy to take something God gives and turn it into something God never intended at all. Jesus wrote the letters to the church in Revelation 2 and 3 so we could know how to give the church back to God in the pressure of the last days.

Local church, or a local assembly of believers, can easily become something flesh-led instead of Spirit-led.

Humans naturally try to maintain results in organizations. We like to keep things looking right, feeling right, and functioning. This is how good organizations are run. Real church is different than human organizations.

The church isn't like any other organization. The church is actually intended to be a training camp for heaven. If you don't keep signing up to learn to love God with everything in a way that overflows into loving others trying to do the same, you are not ready for heaven. God designed the church as a place to practice loving God with others. Training can be messy. The messy is a necessary part of the training.

Very few find this purpose in church. Most of the people to have ever attended church attended with their logic, their emotions, and their own will. This isn't real church. It isn't about Jesus, it's about self comfort and self assurance that God is ok with you. That is a satanic counterfeit designed to keep you stuck.

Going to, or even leading, church self-focused, self-centered, and self-led is the norm. Spirit-led is the exception.

Most people that continue to go to church buildings to meet quit doing "real church" in their hearts long ago. They don't go to be open and vulnerable with others as they zealously pursue God... They go to comfort their conscience because they believe people should "be part of church." Or, just as bad, they go full of selfish ambition and little intention of being corrected and changed into the likeness of Jesus.

You are only part of the body of Messiah if you are part of the blood flowing, the muscles moving, the brain thinking and nervous system speaking, the air breathing, the wounding and bleeding, the sweating, the laughing, waste eliminating, and the crying... AND all of this functioning NOT based on what you want, but on what Jesus wants!.... A body is the analogy Jesus picked for a reason! It is alive!

Church is where you learn to:

1. Hear God corporately - this is the main function of church and the most divisive activity in church. Without hearing God corporately, and all the conflict that comes with that, a church is dead. When this purpose is missed, church can really only function as any other business, where a product/vision/activity is created, packaged, and sold. This church "product" is designed to appeal to the flesh by tickling a need to be part of something important that also feels important and is fun/meaningful.

Revelation 3:1-6 NKJV — “And to the angel of the church in Sardis write, ‘These things says He who has the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars: “I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead. “Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die, for I have not found your works perfect before God. “Remember therefore how you have received and heard; hold fast and repent. Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you. “You have a few names even in Sardis who have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy. “He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” ’

2. Worship God corporately in Spirit and Truth. This is the key of David. This requires hearing God and preaching the complete word of God, which requires all followers of Yeshua to learn love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, goodness, and self control, while experiencing the move of God in their midst.

This makes all churches that agree with 1 and 2 go through the "1 Corinthians Training Program" or what I have learned to call the "Washing Machine."

The hot water of the Spirit, the strong soap of the Word, and the agitation of a group of immature people learning Spiritual maturity makes everyone who stays through the cycles clean. This is what Paul lays out in 1 Corinthians 12 through 1 Corinthians 15.

This is very difficult, and actually impossible without a miracle. Most people get offended somewhere in this process and begin withdrawing, if not fully quitting. This is why most church has become a spectator sport... And most churches have been reduced to hour and a half shows that promise limited and safe interactions called "serving" available through the week. You can find real church at almost any church if you are willing to be Spirit-led and you can miss real church, even during the "spin cycle" of an alive church, if you close your heart to the people around you, which is actually closing your heart to God (Matthew 25).

You can read about real church in the book of Acts. People getting pure and spotless is what the book of Acts is describing. That road is very narrow and few will find it:

These 22 verses, written at the end of Paul's church planting and serving ministry, describe most real church life:

2 Timothy 4:1-22 NKJV — I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to me only but also to all who have loved His appearing. Be diligent to come to me quickly; for Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world, and has departed for Thessalonica—Crescens for Galatia, Titus for Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for ministry. And Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus. Bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas when you come—and the books, especially the parchments. Alexander the coppersmith did me much harm. May the Lord repay him according to his works. You also must beware of him, for he has greatly resisted our words. At my first defense no one stood with me, but all forsook me. May it not be charged against them. But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, so that the message might be preached fully through me, and that all the Gentiles might hear. Also I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory forever and ever. Amen! Greet Prisca and Aquila, and the household of Onesiphorus. Erastus stayed in Corinth, but Trophimus I have left in Miletus sick. Do your utmost to come before winter. Eubulus greets you, as well as Pudens, Linus, Claudia, and all the brethren. The Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Grace be with you. Amen.

^This real church life Got Paul a crown. It made him ready for heaven. When he was a Pharisee, he was very active, very learned, very present, but he wasn't changing into a man like Jesus that loved enemies, prayed for those that used him, and stayed vulnerable to people by learning to be more and more secure in God.

The washing machine of real church was what God used to make Paul pure and spotless.

My point is: if you find a handful of people to actually hear and worship and interact with God with, and you are willing to stay open, vulnerable, communicative, and growing with through thick or thin, good or bad, hearing God the same or hearing God differently... And you decide that through the grace of God and the power of His Holy Spirit you are going to stick with them, then you found REAL church.

You can find real church in a thousand person mega church, or in a house church... But if you don't find real church, you will never go to actual heaven.

Hebrews 10:22-29 NKJV — let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching. For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries. Anyone who has rejected Moses’ law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?

Right now, most people are growing offended and distant with others. This is a scheme of the enemy to get people to quit without calling it quitting. Get back into the center of love. Now is the time to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God. Listen for His still small voice, and find others willing to do the same.

Maintaining an organization has nothing to do with serving the Body of Jesus. Staying connected to the heart and head of God, even when it gets you a cross... That is the point of the church!

Revelation 3:7-13 NKJV — “And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write, ‘These things says He who is holy, He who is true, “He who has the key of David, He who opens and no one shuts, and shuts and no one opens”: “I know your works. See, I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it; for you have a little strength, have kept My word, and have not denied My name. “Indeed I will make those of the synagogue of Satan, who say they are Jews and are not, but lie—indeed I will make them come and worship before your feet, and to know that I have loved you. “Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth. “Behold, I am coming quickly! Hold fast what you have, that no one may take your crown. “He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” ’

Philadelphia means "brotherly love."

1 John 4:16-21 NKJV — And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him. Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. We love Him because He first loved us. If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.

At just the wrong moment for most of the church, love is growing cold. This is the setup for quitting altogether when the pressure of the birth pains increases. Almost everyone who quits will lie to themselves and believe they are still "in it" even though they have closed off their hearts. Because of free will, Jesus will let you trick yourself until it is too late! Jesus will say "I never knew you. You lawlessly did the same thing my body lawfully did."

Matthew 7:22-23 NKJV — “Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ “And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’

(Do you see this is describing people very active in "church" life, and even leadership, but not open and vulnerable to be known for real and changed?)

It is certainly going to get much darker before the dawn. Open your heart, and be willing to be real. If you are playing church, you aren't pretending to be something around people, you are pretending to God. Repent.

Let the Spirit be poured out on you again and again so you can endure the day of testing.