Christ’s body consists of all who have Jesus living within them, not just the members of the many organizations called church. Anybody can organize and run a church; but Jesus wants to build His body on the rock of supernatural revelation — His ekklesia. To institutionalize church puts it under human management. Can’t Jesus manage His own body better than we can?

A meeting of the body of Christ works better as a team than as a one man show. One person speaking can never demonstrate the presence of Christ like a group obeying the Spirit together can. When a group of Christ-followers meets, all in sync with the risen Jesus, miracles happen.

Ekklesia gets Christians off the bench and into spiritual action. Church wants people to listen to a lecture about the playbook. Prechurch church Christianity runs the plays.

Prechurch Christianity trained people to let the Holy Spirit flow from within them. Church showcases one man’s message. Prechurch ekklesia showcases Christ speaking through ordinary people.

Why should churches keep preaching if they don’t help people live out what they preach to them? Church can be like the huge rocket in Huntsville, AL, a form without power, going nowhere. Most Christians meet to hear a sermon; but we could meet to actually practice living out what the Bible says!

Prechurch preaching was to nonbelievers. Prechurch gatherings were a time for everybody to listen to and obey the risen Jesus. The Bible is God’s playbook. Prechurch Christians met as ekklesia, to run the plays.

Church fractured into 70,000+ denominations. Prechurch ekklesia always embraces the oneness of the body of Christ. The Bible says that to say “I am of Paul,” or “I am of Apollos,” is spiritually immature. A Christian doesn’t need a subset.

I’m crying out in the cyber wilderness: Prepare the way & make straight paths for Jesus’ ekklesia. The Bible says that Christians are to confess our faults to one another. Why doesn’t church allow time for that? Prechurch Christianity was informal and relational, not formal and organizational.

Since Jesus came to set us free, perhaps people in church services should be free to listen to Jesus and do what He says. To hear a sermon can be informative or inspirational, but to hear the Savior is life-transforming. Unfortunately, church spends much more time training people to listen to a pastor than training them to listen to Jesus. Jesus said, “Follow Me,” but church tends to train people to follow a pastor.