Ekklesiatime III

 If you haven't read the previous posts on the ekklesia concept, now is the time. If you have, you may be wondering what is the big deal; how much difference can trading in 'church' for 'ekklesia' really make? Aren't we just talking about an issue of semantics?

Well there's still a lot to say on this subject, and hard to understand, since we have become dull of hearing.

I was first introduced to the ekklesia concept by the New Testament Restoration Foundation (NTRF), through their self published book Ekklesia (now unfortunately and ironically re-titled "House Church" but still available on their site). As a rule I do not read many Christian books (some years ago I walked into a Christian bookstore, and was immediately and profoundly struck by the Holy Spirit that we have bookstores full of books and books and all kinds of things that people have written, while we, His people, give very little attention to what He wrote). Ekklesia is one of few exceptions to that rule. When I saw the significance of what they were saying about the ekklesia, I realized that this was a large part of what we had been searching for in trying to understand the nature of the church, and why it isn't like it should be.

The basic points to understand are these:
• The word 'church' occurs nowhere in the scriptures.
• Everywhere the word 'church' is used in your English translation the actual word is always 'ekklesia' (look it up in a concordance).
• This isn't a mere translational issue of bringing words out of Greek into English
• The word 'ekklesia' is immediately germaine to what the Body actually is.

'Church' itself is actually a a transliteration of a later Greek term, so it isn't as though the Greek was translated into an equivalent English word. 'Church' comes from the Greek 'kuriakos' which means simply "the lord's." It isn't even clear what it is that is "the lord's". It could refer to "the Lord's People" or "The Lord's House" or even something else entirely. And even if we did know what it was that is "the Lord's," it is still a vague term with no immediate specified application. In other words, yes we are The Lord's People, but then what? What about it? What does that precisely mean? It could mean anything – and in point of fact it is therefore used to mean almost anything.

'Ekklesia' is very specific. The ekklesia was a political body, made up of the local citizens, who were 'called out' to hear a matter, discuss it, have input on it, and render a decision or judgment about it. That is the word that Jesus chose to describe the gatherings of His disciples.

Seriously, get a good ballpoint pen, go through your Bible, and strike through every single usage of the word 'church' or 'churches', and replace it with 'ekklesia' or 'ekklesias'. As you go through and read the scriptures from now on, remembering what an ekklesia is, you will see the scriptures and the 'churches' in a new light.

I am not saying that the early translators or someone before that developed a purposeful conspiracy to pull the wool over our eyes – although, considering Catholicism's history, I'm not saying they didn't either. What I am saying is that we were done a genuine disservice on this point somewhere in the distant past and that this disservice certainly has worked and is working in satan's favor, not ours. The usage of the word 'church' is like a fog that settled upon the house of God. As long as we are shrouded in the mists all kinds of foggy thinking and practices can and do appear acceptable because you can't see well enough to tell the difference. If you throw out the 'church' mindset, and replace it with an 'ekklesia' mindset, the fog burns away and you can see clearly. All sorts of 'church' practices stand out like a sore thumb because you can now plainly see that they do not conform to what Jesus had in mind.

It's kind of like strapping a jet engine on an elephant's back. As long as you can't really tell what's going on it might seem ok, but when you can see clearly you realize that this isn't going to turn out very well; you're not going to make a super-fast elephant, and somebody is going to get hurt.

Consider all the places in the New Testament where it says, "the Churches of Christ", "the Church of God" or something like that. Have you ever wondered, "Well what other church would it be? I mean what other church is there?" Maybe you haven't, but I have. Now that you've thought about it, this phrase makes more sense when you replace 'church' with 'ekklesia'. Now, it's "Paul, to not just the regular, local, decision-making, judgment-rendering, everybody-gets-a-voice worldly Greek ekklesia, but to the ekklesia that is all that and so much more, the Ekklesia of Ekklesias, the 'Ekklesia of God' at Corinth..."