The institutional church is comprised of individuals who gather on the Lord’s Day and then scatter into the world to live out their respective callings before God. Consequently, the institutional church’s primary ministry on Sunday is not to reform the institutions of this world, or even reach the world for Christ, but to build up the saints in their worship of God. To that end, it is primarily on Sunday that the church’s members become equipped to fulfill their respective callings in the world, which includes (a) the mission work of the institutional church as well as (b) bringing biblical precepts to bear upon the ideologies of political, economic, and social institutions.

This interview conducted by Crossway caught my attention. It has to do with the institutional church, its spirituality, and Christian nationalism. My interest is limited to how the institutional church, which is made up of many members, is to relate to temporal yet lawful institutions in the world.
I find two quotes from the interview to be a bit puzzling.
“No other institution is called to go into all the world and preach the gospel. The family? No. The state? No. The university? No. The publisher isn’t called to go into all the world and preach the gospel. That call is given to the church. And if the church becomes chiefly a political, economic, or social institution, it becomes an institution that is just one more form of kind of shouted political slogans in the cacophony and all the noise of our very polarized politicized age. If the church just becomes that, it loses that voice. It loses its proper agency. It loses its grip and its grasp on the gospel. And if the church loses the gospel, who has it? Where is the gospel? The church is called to preach the gospel to the world.”
It is one thing for the institutional church to become a political mouthpiece from the pulpit, and quite another thing for the institutional church to posses a proper political zeal in the world. It seems somewhat obvious that one size doesn’t fit all.
A Christian congressman who spends fifty hours a week embroiled in the political battle for the life of the unborn, or defending the rights of the oppressed, can be running God’s errand. Yet it’s hard to apply the same balance of work and life to the institutional church’s pulpit ministry. Consequently, phrases like “the church becomes chiefly a political…”, and “the church is called to preach the gospel” should connote different meaning, with vastly different contextual demands, depending upon the respective callings of the many members of the one institutional church.
Back to Basics:
The institutional church is comprised of individuals who gather on the Lord’s Day and then scatter into the world to live out their respective callings before God. Consequently, the institutional church’s primary ministry on Sunday is not to reform the institutions of this world, or even reach the world for Christ, but to build up the saints in their worship of God. To that end, it is primarily on Sunday that the church’s members become equipped to fulfill their respective callings in the world, which includes (a) the mission work of the institutional church as well as (b) bringing biblical precepts to bear upon the ideologies of political, economic, and social institutions.
Institutional church members hardly can avoid interacting with, if not even being members of, other institutions such as family, civil government, and education. Accordingly, the institutional church’s members must be equipped to pull down the philosophical strongholds of the age lest they become (a) fideistic (b) impotently silent in her witness and / or (c) taken captive by the elementary principles of the world. To that end, there is a Christian duty to be able and willing to disarm the enemies of God, not just with kindness but a winsome word in season that has the power to tumble the institutional gods, if not at least silence their idolatrous worshippers.
Leaving aside how a minister of the gospel might train its congregation to think biblically in all areas of life (yet without hindering the church’s spirituality), as a general rule we might hope that the minister’s Sunday sermon would be heavier and more exhaustively focused on exegesis and indicatives, and perhaps lighter and more generally focused when it comes to personal application and imperatives regarding influencing the institutions of this world. That should be a given.
Admittedly, men like Jerry Falwell and D. James Kennedy likely lapsed into seasons of spiritual amnesia regarding their gospel-calling by turning their focus toward civil and political interests. Notwithstanding, such spiritual infidelity does not so neatly apply to the church’s members who on Monday morning scatter into the world in the service of the church militant. Indeed, when all is well, we can expect the church’s message on Sundays to look vastly different from its members’ message(s) the other six days of the week. Need it be even said that the minister who is preaching to his congregation the riches of the first fourteen verses of Ephesians has a different set of providential constraints and freedoms than the Christian plumber who is changing out a hot water tank, or the Christian businessman who accepts an invitation for a beer after work with his politically minded and irreligious colleagues?
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A common reason why we cease to pray effectually or fervently is because we fall into a rut. When this happens we pray more by habit than in the Spirit. We do indeed go through a routine of words and lists but the fire is just not there in the soul. This is one reason why we must be careful not to be dictated to by our prayer-lists. They may have their place but they must never become our masters. At times–perhaps at frequent times–we must leave our prayer-lists aside and turn from our conventional patterns of prayer. There are times when the mould of our intercession is to be discarded entirely and we are to devote our whole minds and souls to the great task of calling on God for nothing less than revival. 

It is a question worth pondering as to whether there is much serious prayer being offered up in our busy age. There is undoubtedly a welter of other things being attempted: files of paper are prepared on a host of topics; memoranda by the score are recorded; statistics are noted; committees are formed and then disbanded; agendas are drawn up and discussed; ideas are floated and debated; proposals are offered and turned this way and then that. But in the face of the massive onslaught of secular and spiritual forces hostile to the gospel of Christ there appears to be little agonising prayer. Perhaps it is time to ask ourselves if this is why nothing seems to get any better.
Behind this lack of real prayer–if the above observations are just–there would appear to lie just one basic explanation: prayer is extraordinarily difficult. At least prayer which involves wrestling is so. There is a common style of praying found in many places today which makes but little demand upon those who offer it up. We do not set ourselves up to be the judges of other men’s spirituality. But if our eyes and ears do not deceive us it would seem that a style of prayer is widespread which consists very much of saying thank you to God for a large number of things, yet never goes on to lay hold of the Almighty or to make massive demands upon his promises.
It is time to ask ourselves whether such praying is worthy of being called scriptural or evangelical. The prayers of the Bible concentrate on the great emergency and crisis of the times. Examples of this abound. The prayers of Ezra, Nehemiah,  and Daniel may be taken as notable examples. They grapple with the main issue of the day, which is that God should pardon his people and restore to them the power of his grace. No doubt these holy men were grateful to God for the mercies of life and thanked him no less than we do today. But their chief energies in prayer were spent, not in reference to the common mercies of life, but on those themes and subjects which most concerned Christ’s kingdom at that hour. So they contain the element of striving with God. They are hot and passionate. They amount to a spiritual wrestling and to a laying hold of God in downright earnest.
If anyone thinks that we go too far in so speaking of prayer in Bible times, let him recall the marvellous earnestness recorded for us concerning the prayers of our Lord in the garden. How deeply did he experience agony! There was immense conflict in his mind and soul. This was registered in his tears and in his sweat which dripped from his brow like clots of blood. Such intensity of prayer may perhaps be unique to our blessed Redeemer. But there are expressions elsewhere in the Bible to show that prayer is hard and demanding to man.
The Psalmist speaks of an experience which must be exceeding rare in our times. His knees were weak through fasting (Ps. 109:24). Intercessory prayer requires us to ‘afflict our souls’ (Lev. 16), to ‘watch’ and not to sleep (Matt. 26:38), to ‘labour fervently’ (Col. 4:12), to persevere (Eph. 6:18) and to engage in an exercise which is intensely spiritual (Rom. 8:26).
When we study the practice of Old Testament saints we find not a little to humble and inspire us. Elijah’s prayers stopped heaven and brought a drought on the land. Again, his prayers opened heaven and poured forth rain on the parched earth. What prayers these biblical men and women offered up and with what effect upon the world! They stormed Zion in their fervour to be heard. They petitioned the throne of heaven and laid siege to its walls. They would scarcely take No for an answer. In so praying they stopped the sun in its course; they called down fire from above; they opened prisons; they overturned the schemes of armies; they raised the dead; they toppled thrones; they wrought mighty deeds of victory.
It cannot escape our attention that such wrestlers with God seem to be few today. We are grateful for those who serve Christ in whatever capacity. We value highly all who walk with God and are true to his Word and sound in their faith. But it would be good for our land and for our churches if there were a larger army of wrestlers, all taking God at his Word and pleading relentlessly the promises which he has made to his people in a dark day. In a word, we need an army of men and women who are so devoted to praying for the Spirit to come down that they give God no rest (Isa. 62:7).
Too many prayers lack steam. Too many prayers are predictable. Too many prayers are marked by sameness and tameness. But prayers which are ordinary are not sufficient to turn the tide of evil in these days. What is called for in such a dark day is for men and women of exceptional dedication to God who will plead for a mighty change in the state of things. Perhaps this is the main reason why there has been a recovery of much truth but little public manifestation of it. We are all guilty in that we have not waited with sufficient seriousness on God to give the church the power of preaching and the unction of spiritual energy.
It is a fault to treat prayer as the Cinderella of our spiritual duties. To read and to preach is essential. But the oil of divine blessing must needs be poured on the means of grace if they are to be effectual. Too many of our services to Christ are performed with little water on the mill. It is the way of God that he will have us beg for our blessings. Little prayer usually means little unction. There are exceptions but we must not take advantage of God’s kindness. At times we get unusual help in our work with but little intercession beforehand. But it is presumptuous of us to take this as our rule of action.
A common reason why we cease to pray effectually or fervently is because we fall into a rut. When this happens we pray more by habit than in the Spirit. We do indeed go through a routine of words and lists but the fire is just not there in the soul. This is one reason why we must be careful not to be dictated to by our prayer-lists. They may have their place but they must never become our masters. At times–perhaps at frequent times–we must leave our prayer-lists aside and turn from our conventional patterns of prayer. There are times when the mould of our intercession is to be discarded entirely and we are to devote our whole minds and souls to the great task of calling on God for nothing less than revival. Let the soul pour itself out to its Maker in anguished groans. Let the heart within us feel free to roam up and down the land in its search for a way to give vent to our burden and to our grief that Christ’s cause is so low.
We shall probably seldom if ever pray in the manner of the saints of the Bible if we are not full of the knowledge of the Scriptures. This is clear from a perusal of the great prayers of the Bible itself. The Bible-characters whom we referred to as great in prayer were themselves men who were full of Scripture. Their prayers are often a tissue of biblical language. They quote not only the ideas of the Bible but also its very text. Of course there is a danger even in this. It is possible to use the Bible as mere padding in our prayers. It is sometimes the case that men who have little to say in prayer fill out their prayers by reciting texts of Scripture which may be only partially what they are trying to say. We have all been guilty, no doubt. This is an abuse. Real prayer shoots upwards, being impelled by the inward fire and animation of the soul. No one needs to be told when we have offered up a real prayer. It is something which all feel who have any spiritual life in them.
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The centurion was a student of death. Taking life was his craft. He knew the signs. He ordered the spear plunged into Jesus’ side. He watched the blood and water gush from the wound. He looked on as Jesus breathed his last and lowered his head in death. He saw his chest stop rising. He saw Jesus wounds stop bleeding as his heart stopped beating. And when the centurion saw how Christ died, he concluded, “Truly this man was the Son of God” (Mark 15:39)! The centurion knew that Jesus truly died and that he truly died for him! 

On May 4th, 1865, Abraham Lincoln’s body was laid to rest at the Oakridge Cemetery in Springfield, IL. But his initial interment was anything but restful. In the years that followed, the crypt was disturbed 17 times for various maintenance and security reasons. So, in 1901, Robert Lincoln ordered his father’s coffin be encased in a block of concrete, permanently sealing the crypt. But before the concrete was poured it was decided that the body needed to be identified. As the casket cracked open, a foul cloud wafted over those gathered. They crept forward to behold the familiar face of the 16th President. The beard on his chin was as black as the day he died. He was wearing the same suit he wore at his 2nd inauguration, now finely frosted with yellow mold. One of the spectators, J.C. Thompson later told reporters:
As I came up, I saw that top-knot of Mr. Lincoln’s. His hair was course and thick, like a horse’s, and it stood up high in front. When I saw that, I knew that it was Mr. Lincoln… His features had not decayed. He looked just like a statue of himself lying there.
Suppose I knew the exact location of the tomb in which Jesus was laid to rest 2,000 years ago. Suppose we went, like Indiana Jones on a torchlit quest, into the Jerusalem countryside or a secret underground chamber. Suppose we rolled the great stone away and entered the crypt. Do you know what you would smell?
Nothing.
There would be no shriveled corpse. No bones. No ashes. Nothing is there, because Jesus is not there. He is risen! He has conquered the grave.
But did you know that more than 1 in 4 people on earth don’t believe that Jesus actually died on the cross? Central to the Islamic teaching on Jesus is their denial of his crucifixion and death. With some Jewish and liberal protestant theologians, they insist the man who died on the cross was a body-double, a stunt savior. Others believe that Jesus merely swooned on the cross, only to be revived later.
Three That Testify
To prove that Jesus truly died, Mark calls upon three witnesses. He begins with Joseph of Arimathea, “a respected member of the council, who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, [who] took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus” (Mark 15:43). It was Friday evening, the Day of Preparation before the Sabbath which would begin at sundown. But there was a problem: three bodies were on crosses on a hill outside Jerusalem. To a people whose religion revolved around ritual purity, blood and death were ceremonially defiling contaminants which had to be removed before Sabbath. 
Knowing this, Joseph asked Pilate for permission to bury Christ’s body. Like Nicodemus, Joseph was a leader of the Jews who trusted in Christ as his Savior and was “looking for the kingdom of God.” As Mark says, Joseph’s request “took courage,” because it aligned him with Christ, an enemy of the state. But Joseph found freedom from his fear. By fixing his heart on Jesus’ death for him, Joseph was able to live courageously for Jesus. Considering Christ’s valiant love for you on the cross will make you bold for him, too.
Next, Mark offers the testimony of the centurion. When Pilate heard that Jesus had already died, he was surprised (Mark 15:44). The Greek literally rendered means “awestruck.” Why? Because death by crucifixion was designed to be slow. Even the word “excruciating” is taken from the Latin, ex cruciatus, or, “out of the cross.” Victims were left tied or nailed to their cross, exposed to the elements and wild beast, until they were overcome with exhaustion and expired.
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