If someone did a YouTube video ripping my wife, I would be furious. If someone spent hours of their day trash talking my bride, I would be livid. I would be angry without measure, even if what they said was true. I wouldn't care if the blemish they spoke of existed, I would hate it to my core.
The Church is the bride of Christ. Do you love the bride?
I recently finished the 385 year old book "The Love of Christ" (previously "Bowels Opened") based on Song of Solomon 4:16-6:3 by the great Puritan pastor Richard Sibbes. I also finished a study on Revelation at our church. This time in these books caused me to ask, "Do I love the bride?"
YouTube is full of Christian controversies and certain content creators trying to pit "celebrity pastors" against one another. It seems most people on X or Facebook or YouTube that discusse the Bible or Christianity see themselves as the fiery prophet that must call out the Church or the American Church to repentance.
Does the Church need repentence? Yes, daily. Does the American Church miss the mark? Yes. But do you love the Church?
"We love for goodness, beauty, riches; but Christ loves to make us so, and then loves us because we are so, in all estates whatsoever." Sibbes p. 38
Jesus Christ chose the Church Universal in all her imperfections and loves her deeply. He did not wait until she was perfect to love her. He loves her as is and as she is becoming and will love her when she reaches perfection. Do you love the Church this way or do you reserve your love for her only when she's reached glory or whatever degree of glory you deem yourself to have reached?
Christ looks at His bride and loves her as she is now. It is Satan that whispers the lie that Christ loves not until she has worked herself into beauty.
"Why should we think basely of that which Christ thinks precious? Why should we think that offensive which He counts as incense? We must not give false witness of the work of grace in our hearts, but bless God that He will work anything in such polluted hearts as ours." Sibbes p. 20
Christ looks and loves. Christ sees the individuals and local churches that worship in partial spirit and truth and smells that rising worship as sweet burning incense. We look and criticize that the process is so far from complete. He looks and sees the mustard seeds of grace as lovely. Jesus sees the very gift of faith He put in us and loves us for having it, even when it is weak faith. Jesus sees us individually and corporately in progress and marvels at it.
How do you think Christ feels when He works loveliness into the Church Universal and into local churches and local churchmen and you, little you, scoff and mock? Do you think He feels similar to an earthly loving husband whose wife has been defamed?
Be a friend of the bride. It seems to me that the Bridegroom will say "I knew you not" to those who despise and mock the very bride He died to marry.
"The enemies of the church shall one day know that the church is not friendless." Sibbes p. 60
We must not be an enemy of the church but a friend and a member of the Church. No one will enter Heaven who is not in the Church Universal. Remember the Apostles Creed. There are four entities that orthodox Christians for nearly 2,000 years have professed belief in: The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit and the holy catholic (catholic means unified and universal not just Roman Catholic) Church. No one who hates the Bridegroom will enter Heaven and no one that hates the bride will be at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb (Revelation 19:6-9).
So, practically how can we love the Church today? I hope you meditate on this and discover ways, but I want to suggest a few things.
1) See her beauty.
Every beauty mark, no matter how small, visible in the Church is a gift from Christ, it is a reflection of the Bridegroom. See her beauty and thank God for it. Jesus gave Himself up for her that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so He might present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish." (Ephesians 6:25-27). See the advancements in this and love it.
2) Love other varieties of orthodox Christian churches.
Can you have solid, biblically informed, good reasons not to be part of a local church or denomination and still cheer for and pray for it? If your answer is no, I would ask you to think long and hard about whether or not you are in sin.
Next time you see another church building I encourage you to pray for that local church.
3) Gather with a local church.
"For, next to Heaven itself, our meeting together here, it is a kind of paradise. The greatest pleasure in the world is to meet with those here whom we shall ever live with in Heaven." Sibbes p. 241
How can you love the Church Universal and avoid a local church? The people in our local churches are annoying, grating, mean, uninteresting, dumb and cruel at times. That is true. But they are also our brothers and sisters who are becoming, slowly in some instances and quickly in other instances, conformed into the likeness of the One to whom we have claimed to profess deepest love. Those in the local church have the Spirit of God in them and can minister to and encourage our soul. They are the very people with whom we will spend blissful eternity ruling and reigning alongside. They are the very people that with us are part of the bride of Christ. You can't claim to love the Church and find every church near you utterly unloveable.
Do you love the bride or will the Bridegroom be against you?
Think today how you can love the bride a sliver of how Jesus loves her today.
