Why are there so many churches today with different beliefs and practices?
– Where did they all come from?
– Does God approve of such division and confusion? i.e., Does it really matter?
The church which Jesus built:
Matt. 16:16-18 Simon Peter answered, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’. And Jesus said to him, Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.
1. Jesus would build His church (in the future).
2. It would be built upon the content of Peter’s confession: “Christ, the Son of the living God”.
3. It would always exist once it was built (so where is it today??).
When did Jesus built His church?
Well, we know it was in existence by the time of Acts 5 …
– Acts 5:11 And great fear came over the whole church, and over all who heard of these things.
We also know that people were first added to it in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2) in A.D. 30:
– Acts 2:41 So then, those who had received his word were baptized; and that day there were added about three thousand souls.
- Note 1Co. 12:13a For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, …
- Col. 1:18 He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.