Posts Categorized: New Testament Church

Is “tithing” the duty of the Christian?  In this article we will examine every important passage on tithing in the Bible and get answers to a lot of our questions on it.  What does the Bible teach about tithing before the giving of the Mosaic Law?  What does it teach about tithing under the Mosaic Law?  What does the Bible teach about tithing in the New Testament? Further, what does the Scripture teach about giving under the New Covenant, and how is it different from tithing under the Old Covenant?  Read on and see!

If the Bible teaches that our church meetings should be open and participatory, what role should the women play? This is a good question, and one that needs answering. There are two passages in the New Testament, which seem to place restrictions on women in the meetings of the church.

As I officiated over the Lord’s Supper on that predictable Sunday morning in November of 1995, I had a nagging feeling that something was not right. This particular communion Sunday proved to be little different from others we had celebrated in the past five years of my ministry as a teaching elder at Milpitas Bible Fellowship (MBF). I had read testimonies of saints in centuries past who found deep and intimate fellowship with Christ through this holy ordinance. I had believed and taught that the observance of the Lord’s Supper was a very special and significant occasion in the life of every local church. Why then, wasn’t it more powerful in my own life? The stark reality was that my own observance of the Lord’s Supper was neither very special nor significant.

The traditional Protestant worship service today strongly resembles a show business performance. In both we find ushers, programs, music, costumes, lighting, a chorus, a stage, a script, an audience, and a master of ceremonies. (Christian Smith, Going To The Root, Herald Press, p.88.) The congregation sits passively as the audience while the pastor performs. When the congregation is permitted to participate in the meeting, they are restricted to singing in unison, antiphonal readings, dropping money into the offering plate, and taking notes during the sermon. The ordained clergy are expected to perform all significant ministry. Meanwhile, ninety-nine percent of God’s people attend worship services Sunday after Sunday for years on end, without ever contributing any true spiritual ministry to the body of gathered believers.

Is this the way God intended for His church to meet?

The modern day “sermon” lies at the very heart of most contemporary “worship services.” It comes replete with many distinguishing characteristics. It often takes the form of a lengthy gospel message, being a “preaching” rather than a “teaching.” Additionally, it is usually delivered in a monologue lecture format, with no opportunity for feedback or dialogue from the congregation. Furthermore, there is no opportunity for anyone to question the teacher, evaluate the teaching, or spontaneously contribute an insight on the subject being taught. Morever, many believers today tacitly assume that the pastor is the only one who is uniquely qualified and gifted to teach the Word of God to the congregation. Finally, we assume that the way pastors deliver their teaching to the church is virtually the same as the way Christ, His apostles, and the early church taught their congregations.

Have you ever stopped to ask yourself why the church of Jesus Christ assembles together? More importantly, have you ever searched the New Testament to seek the answer to that question? Many Christians reveal cloudy thinking when they state that the purpose of the meetings of the church is to worship, evangelize, or listen to a sermon. These may be the primary reasons for most church “services” today, but are they the purposes given in Scripture?

We have created a chart that lists differences from the New Testament Church and today’s more Traditional Church.

If the longing of your heart is to experience church-life New Testament style, then this booklet is written for you. It describes some of the exciting discoveries that the people of Milpitas Bible Fellowship made in the summer of 1996, that radically changed their whole perspective on what it means to be the church.

If it is true that tithing was part of the Old Covenant worship of Israel, and has no practical bearing upon New Covenant Christians, the question naturally surfaces, “what does the New Testament actually teach about giving?” Surely the place for New Covenant believers to begin in their quest to understand God’s revealed will regarding giving is in the New Testament Scriptures.

Who does God want to lead His church? How is the church supposed to be governed? What is an elder and how is he related to a pastor? What is an elder supposed to do? How can we know who God has called as an elder? These are all important questions that need answering if we are to govern our church according to the will of God. Thankfully, the Bible has not left us in the dark in these important matters!

“You know, Lord, how I serve you with great emotional fervor in the limelight. You know how eagerly I speak for you at a Women’s Club. You know how I effervesce when I promote a fellowship group. You know my genuine enthusiasm at a Bible study. But how would I react, I wonder, if you pointed to a basin of water and asked me to wash the calloused feet of a bent and wrinkled old woman day after day, month after month, in a room where nobody saw and nobody knew.”

What would it be like for a church to take seriously its conviction that it must derive its practices solely from the Bible? In some ways the members of Milpitas Bible Fellowship (MBF), a small, non-denominational Bible church located in Milpitas, California, have found the answer to that question.