‘THE CALLED OUT ONES’ Dangerous Question # 39

We know what church leaders think ‘Church’ means, but what does God think it means?

I was talking the other day to one of this generation’s most respected bible teachers, he’s recognised throughout the western world for his books and exposes and his positive influence on the western church over the last 50 years.

He’s a grand old man of the book, God. Well at least I think he is, one of my boyhood heroes. A Christian with a brain.

Yes indeed. I have a lot of respect for him, he has opened the truth to the enquirer and that has been so rare – too much religion and not enough truth. 

Well, I’m not sure why he wanted to talk to me, but it was fantastic to be able to ask the questions that we are normally too scared to ask.

You need to ask more of those sorts of questions.

Me? 

Everyone, but right now we’re talking about you.

True, well I certainly have questions. I had them for him and now I have them for you.

Fire away.

I wanted to ask you about what he said about Church.

Tell me what he said.

You know exactly what he said.

I do — I knew it before he was born.

But you want me to explain it?

No, I’m going to explain it, but first, tell me what he told you.

Why?

So your questions will make sense to your readers.

Alright, well he seemed to say…

Seemed?

I’m being careful here, it’s easy enough to misunderstand what a person says.

You understood most of what he said.

Ok, well, he said that we have completely the wrong idea about what you and Paul meant when you talked about Church. He said that the original bible Greek for the word church, the word ‘Ecclesia’, doesn’t mean what we think it does. 

He’s right. Christians have misunderstood what ‘Ecclesia’, the word for Church, means for centuries. You’ve all got this idea that it means ‘Christians Gathered Together’, but it doesn’t.

That’s what he said, which really surprised me. He reckons it means ‘The Market Place’. I’ve heard people saying the Church needs to go out to the market place, but he wasn’t saying that, he was saying that we actually are the market place.

Not quite, not that the church is the marketplace, but that the marketplace is the church. Paul and I were saying forget religious groupings, the marketplace is my church, people in general, everyone. The worldly, messed up, marketplace, with all its warts, is my church.

That’s what I demonstrated and that’s what the religious leaders hated about me, my complete disregard for their institutions and my insistence that people were more important than their rules. 

Christians gathered together is not the church.  I have nothing against Christians gathering together, I like people gathering together, but the word Paul used for Church, does not, and never did mean ‘Christians gathered together’.

The Church has simply misunderstood that, and misused the word, which is a pity because it has led to the unfortunate and decidedly un-Christlike feeling that you are better in some way than those who are not Christians.

So, the word for church doesn’t mean Christians gathered together??

To you Christians it does, but that is not what Paul or I were talking about. We were talking about all people.

‘All People’, not just ‘Christian People’? That can’t be right!

Yes, all people. The word is ‘Ecclesia’, and it doesn’t mean Christians gathered together. The word was in use centuries before Christianity even started, Paul didn’t borrow the word and bend it to mean what you think of as ‘Church’, he used it in the original, pre-Christian era context that it had always been used. 

What was the pre-Christian era context of the word?

The Greek word, Ecclesia, means ‘The People’. Actually, more accurately, it means ‘The Called Out Ones’.

See, so there you go! That is what we’ve been taught, it’s exactly what the preachers tell us, they say that the church, are the ‘Called Out Ones’.

They are right about the word meaning ‘The Called Out Ones’, but wrong about those ‘Called Out Ones’ being the Christian Church.

Which Church is it then?

Not any Church in the sense that you understand the word Church. 

Ok, you’re going to need to explain.

The verse in Ephesians where it talks of me using the ‘Ecclesia’, the word you have turned into Church, doesn’t mean Christians gathered together. 

Yes, you already said that. So, what does it mean then?

The verse talks of me using the ‘Ecclesia’ to teach the invisible powers of my wisdom.

So, if you’re not going to use Christians gathered together, to do that, who are you going to use??

The people.

Which people?

All people. 

So, all people are your church? 

Yes, we’re not referring here to what you mean by church, IE ‘Christians gathering together’, we’re talking about the gathering of all of humanity in all the ways humans gather together, some good, some bad… in other words the marketplace, or ‘The Called Out Ones’. All humans are called out by me.

I don’t get it. And anyway, how can you use everyday people for a spiritual task, surely that’s not possible? How can you use them to teach those invisible powers, aren’t they all in the same boat?

Not at all. The invisible powers are vehemently and systematically opposed to me, whereas the people, all people, are just going about their lives… Remember ‘Father forgive them for they know not what they do’? I’m still that Jesus and they’re still the people who don’t realise what they do. 

This is all a bit overwhelming and confusing, God.

Yes, of course, that’s because it doesn’t sound like what you’ve been taught. 

No! It’s nothing at all like what we’ve been taught.

That’s because where it says I will lead you into all truth, it doesn’t mean I’ll repeat everything you already think you know. It means what it says, I’ll lead you into truth, the emphasis being that you’re not already ‘in’that truth.

Ok, fine, but how can you possibly use normal everyday people, and not the Christian Church to teach the invisible powers?

As I said, simple. I created the entire universe for people, all people, did you realise that? Not for Christians, but for all people.

So, you’re saying Church, the way Paul meant it, not the way we mean it, means all people. I know I keep asking that, but…

Yes, ‘The Called Out Ones’, which is everyone, all people are my church. 

How can that be?

Paul understood, that contrary to his harsh and judgemental religious training, that people, all people, no matter what their lives are like, are my favourite things in the universe. People, even in their misery and mess are the pinnacle of creation.

Hard to believe.

Not if you look at people’s hearts. What Paul was saying in that verse about me using the church to show my wisdom to the invisible powers was that I will show my wisdom through my relationship with all people.

Which part of your wisdom are we talking about here?

The simple part, the most important part, the part where I came to live among you and prove, once and for all, that I ‘highly esteem’ you. Not just love, but actually esteem you, like you, even when your lives are messy – so much so in fact that I am happy to become a man just like you.

I came to show those invisible powers that although they would like me to judge humanity for their faults, and demand all sorts of religious behaviour – prayer, quiet times, church attendance, bible reading etc – none of that is important to me.

What’s important is you just the way you are. I don’t think of people as worldly. I don’t think any more highly of Christians gathered together, than I do of those whom you think of as ‘the lost’. 

So where does your wisdom come into that?

Come on, Mark, get with the programme, you know the answer to that! My wisdom is demonstrated by my relationship with all people, my forgiving the worst crimes even when the perpetrator is not even aware of their crime, that my son, is wisdom, and it can only be demonstrated through all people, not one special group.

Ok, so what about what you said about ‘The Called Out Ones’, that still seems like a contradiction.

You’ve been led to believe that means Christians ‘called out from the world’, but it doesn’t. All humans are called out by me, and no, they don’t have to say the Christian prayer to be chosen by and powerful for me in teaching invisible powers of my wisdom.

Sounds dangerous theology, God.

Yes, it is, very dangerous. If understood this will set millions free from centuries of domination, control and abuse by religious institutions. 

How can that be dangerous?

Dangerous for the institutions. This is important, I have nothing against Christians gathering together, but I am vehemently opposed to mind control, to the organised and systemised control of what a person is supposed to think about me. 

I will tell you what to think about me, and what I think about you. Remember the ancient scripture, ‘You do not need any man to teach you, but the Spirit will teach you’. 



As the theologian you are talking about made clear, ‘Church’ in the bible, the Greek word, ‘Ecclesia’, is not referring to Christians gathered together. All people are ‘set apart for me’, ‘called out for me’ and made especially as my gift to myself, my favourite part of all creation.



Originally, centuries before the Christian Church, the word Ecclesia referred to those who represent the rest, those with authority, those who make decisions, ‘the socio-political gathering of citizens ‘called out’ to attend to the concerns of the city’. In other words, those with huge influence in society, those looked up to and voted in by the rest of the people. That isn’t a good description of what you Christians call church. 

Paul used that particular word, which had no religious connotations when he used it, because he knew something that others had missed and he was making his point with a play on words.

What had others missed?

That I do not favour a representative group, that I came to relate to all men, that all humanity are ‘called out’ to relate to me in a way that will teach the invisible powers in high places the wisdom of God. Me and humanity, that’s my church. The gathering, the calling out of all humanity. I have chosen everyday men and women, that is my ‘church’, all of humanity. 

Christians gathered together is fine, and you can call that church if you want, but it isn’t what Paul or I meant when we used the word.