No King But Christ (Eph. 1:22-23) (Part 2)

Executive Editor’s Note: This is the second part of the President’s Message that was preached in the opening session of the national meeting on April 16, 2024. For Part 1, see the April 24 issue or go to BaptistTrumpet.com.

No Head for the Church but the King of the World

“And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church” (Eph. 1:22 ESV).

Here we see the description, or the type of power that has come toward us who believe. It is a resurrection power and a reigning power that has no rival, now or ever. Paul wanted us to know the results of that power. What does God do with the reign of Christ, who is over all things? All things are under the feet of Jesus.

With that status as being the king over all things for all time, God placed Jesus as head over the church. We can have a tendency to misunderstand the idea of Jesus being head over the church. If you grew up playing sports, you may have heard the phrase before, “Don’t play to the level of people around you but be the type of player that raises the level of others.” That is what Paul wants us to know and believe and understand. Jesus, as head over all things, is the head of the church, and He is not limited by our limits or inabilities. That makes our churches — full of weak, unimportant, poor, unwise, foolish people — the greatest institutions on planet earth. The greatest force for good in the world, the greatest source of generosity on the planet and the greatest means for the display of truth, goodness, holiness, beauty and excellence.

Jesus, as King and Ruler over all things, all countries, all kingdoms, is our leader in our churches. It isn’t me. It isn’t a denomination. It is King Jesus. And as King over all things, He is for us, He is for our churches and He works through our churches, constraining and pushing and pulling the universe in its course for the good of the church. The whole of creation is being conformed to purposes that serve the glory of Christ’s church. What a compelling reason, not only to be a part of a local church, but to give your life to a local, biblical church; to build your life around the church.

If you were told that Michael Jordan was going to be on your basketball team, you wouldn’t be content just playing pick-up basketball, or be a weekend warrior with Jordan. If he called you up and said, “I have scheduled us a game for Tuesday,” you would absolutely be there! Your world would revolve around him and that basketball team!

In fact, something similar happened with Jordan. In 1995, Jordan was beginning production on the movie Space Jam, and he was also making his return to basketball after a brief stint playing baseball. So how was Jordan able to get back into basketball shape during that time? The stipulation was that the movie company had to build a gymnasium on the movie set so Jordan could practice, and that’s exactly what they did. After all, if Jordan tells you to do something, you do it. You know what else? Jordan called up other NBA players to come and work out and scrimmage with him. He was calling future hall of fame basketball players to come and help him get in shape, and they came, played and scrimmaged. Why would they do that? Because when the great one calls, you don’t ghost him. You show up. You become a part of the drama.

Yes, we will be smeared, slandered, belittled and minimized by the world, but our power should be absolutely undeniable. Our resolve should be undiminished, our willingness unfazed and our effect, the best at what we do.

But are we? Are we the best at what we do? Are we the best in creating culture? Are we the best at defining and defending who we are and what we do? Are we the best at being devoted to God’s Word? Are we the best at preaching? Are we the best at administrating? Are we the best at putting on a conference/business meeting? Are we the best at education? Are we the best at defending the cause of the vulnerable? Are we the best, as churches, at leading and sustaining institutions?

It seems that the Lord is testing our metal in that very area right now, is He not? Some major BMA educational institutions have either gone through leadership change or will soon go through leadership change. I, for one, believe that these institutions, which are extensions of our churches, are extremely important and deserve our very best, and should be producing the very best of pastors, missionaries, professors, Sunday School teachers, elders and deacons.

When you survey the landscape of church culture in America, and the BMA in particular, does it look like the church is the greatest institution — the strongest, most creative, most servant-minded, most sacrificial institution out there? Or do our churches come off as fragile and faded out, inconsequential and not influential even among her own members? How is it possible that the church could be worldly and weak? How is it possible that the church could be cheap imitators of the culture when we have Christ as our King?

One simple answer is that we are listening to Christ as friend instead of Christ as King. We think of Him as Christ the advisor instead of Christ the King. We don’t have “No King But Christ,” but rather we have a host of kings, lined up like shoes in our closet, and we’re trying to figure out which pair will work best with the events of the day. We pick and choose what we want from Him and what we will obey, and we teach our people to do so as well. We may know the goal, but we don’t necessarily know the way or the discipline it takes to reach the goal. Or maybe we do, but we deem the discipline as too invasive, too… discipliney.

Since Jesus, as King of the world, is head of the church, our power is immeasurably greater than all other powers in order to fulfill all that God has called us to do. The mission of the church has been fully equipped by the power of the God through the resurrected Christ. The resurrection of Jesus is the proof we need to put all our energy into the Great Commission.

No Other Mission but Global Discipleship

The church is the “fullness of him who fills all in all” (v. 23 ESV). Understand the picture — the resurrected and reigning King over all things fills the church with His power and purpose, and the church then fills the world with His power and purpose. The church is God’s ordained means of global transformation.

“There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!” (Abraham Kuyper)

Do you not like the way the world looks around us? Invest in the church! Give your life to the church! This filling of the world with Christ’s glory through the church is a hope we alone, as churches, possess. No other agency or institution on earth has been given this promise! Our mission purpose does not end at the doors of our churches. Every part of the world is our domain. All of culture is our goal, all ambitions we should find interest in. All that is good and beautiful belongs to us to enjoy and cultivate because we know the Creator.

Our goal is not to seek and acquire more political or military power in order to impose God’s will and purpose on the world. That is not how the rest of this letter tells us to go about filling all things in all the world. Instead, we are given a blueprint for our lives and our church, that, when followed, transforms everything in our path.

As King, Jesus has commanded and commissioned us to make disciples of all nations, while at the same time promising His Spirit to be with us, in us, working through us so that the goal is accomplished. These realities should lead us to be both serious about the mission and joyful in our pursuit of it.

We must take Christ’s commission seriously. After all, He is the King. We must take it seriously, not just in parsing it out grammatically, theologically and with advance strategic plans, even though those areas are very necessary. But we must put it into effect immediately! His commission is to start with ourselves in being His disciples. That commission is to fill and shape the atmosphere of our homes, and it is leak out to our churches and communities. Our lives are to be marked by the stamp of being a disciple of King Jesus. Our homes and churches should be filled with evidence of being chiseled away at by God’s Spirit using God’s Word as His chiseling tool. We must take Christ’s commission seriously, in every facet of our lives. We need pastors to be disciple makers, executive directors to be disciple makers, presidents of seminaries to be disciple makers, in our homes, through our churches, in our workplaces, in how we conduct and run our companies and schools.

If we want the deepest desires of our hearts fulfilled, we have to be serious. If we want the clearest expression of the gospel of God’s grace to be seen in and through our church, we have to be serious. If we long to see people saved by the gospel of Jesus Christ, we have to be serious. If we want to see churches planted and nations reached, we have to be serious!

I think we are serious. We, as churches, have banded together to help one another fulfill this purpose, but we must not stop there. We have to be serious about praying for those we have asked and tasked with leading those very departments that help facilitate the goal. We have to be serious about their encouragement and engagement. Do we do that? Do you know how incredibly impossible it is to make 1,200 churches happy? But their goal is not really to make you happy. It is to be faithful to the task, and that will sometimes make some churches unhappy.

Our communities, our world should feel the impact of BMA churches’ and departments’ counter-culture presence and influence within it because we are to be counterculture, and not a shallow echo of the world.

The healthcare industry and the education industry has its genesis in the church being transformed by the power of the resurrected and reigning Christ. Why should it stop? It shouldn’t! The power is still available. The task is great, and the road is long, but the journey is worth it!

We will be planting churches that are counter cultural. We will be running schools that are counterculture. We will be raising families that are counterculture. We will be establishing and running businesses that are counterculture. We have to be serious about creating and living in a counterculture rather than trying to sprinkle Christian-fairy dust on the worldly culture around us.

Do you have no other King but Christ? My plea for you today is that you will take seriously this question — can it be said of you that you have no King but Christ?