Building A Church That Works

How do you build a church that works—one that changes lives, families, and entire communities? In this powerful message, Pastor Travis Johnson shares his lifelong love for the local church and why loving Jesus means loving His bride. From childhood memories of parents sacrificing to keep church lights on, to anonymous believers paying his college bills after Hurricane Andrew, Pastor Travis shows how the body of Christ has carried him through every season.

Drawing straight from Ephesians 4, Pastor Travis Johnson unpacks God’s blueprint for a healthy, maturing church: Christ gives leaders to equip every believer for ministry, creating unity, growth, and real spiritual strength. You’ll discover why a working church isn’t about size, style, or being “cool”—it’s about honoring Scripture, staying humble, and letting God use ordinary people in extraordinary ways. Whether you’re new to church or have been serving for decades, this message will inspire you to step fully into your role in the church Jesus is building.

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Sermon Transcript

I have a very high view of the church. I have a very high view of the scriptures. This is the inerrant, authoritative word of God. If you will read it, it will change your life.

I don't buy into the idea that you can love Jesus and then choose not to be a part of the church, not be a part of a local assembly.

Let me tell you, we need each other.

We need Jesus—I need Jesus. Here's how I like to say it: God loved us so much that He gave us Jesus, and then He loved us a little more and gave us this family called the church.

I don't know how people would make it without the body of Christ. I don't know.

I have seen enough in the church that I've watched patterns repeat over and over. I see a lot of the same characters with new names. I've seen some awesome stuff, and I've seen some difficult stuff.

Let me tell you about some of the awesome stuff.

Let me tell you about the times where my parents sacrificed to keep the lights on in the church, and where my mom made our clothes, sacrificed for us and for the church.

And I watched as they brought churches up out of the ground, cared for each other, went through the word of God—very sacrificial. And let me tell you this, I never knew it. I didn't know it because they didn't talk drama. They didn't talk about church people in the house.

A lot of my friends, pastors' kids, have had really big problems with the church because church drama made it to a kitchen table at home. I didn't see that.

I never heard them gripe. I never heard them complain. You know why? Because they also had a high view of the church. Because the church will change families. It'll change lives.

And you know what? If we don't treat the church right, it will damage families and it will damage lives. And sometimes we just have to be a little hard-headed and learn things the hard way, right? There's a whole bunch of us that are like that.

Is there anybody that's been raised in the School of Hard Knocks? You say, "Pastor, I've had to learn some things the hard way."

So look, I'm not here to say that anybody's perfect here in the room. But what I will show you in Ephesians chapter five—I'll show you in verse three, and I'll show you in verse 13—how there's a trajectory towards being perfected and matured in the Lord into what the church is supposed to be.

We're gonna be in Ephesians five. I hope that you read this entire chapter. Open up your Bible app and let it play on repeat. And get this down in your heart.

I hope you fall in love with the church. I hope Pathway never says, "I love Jesus, but I don't love the church." I hope we always love the church.

And if you see things in the church that you don't like, let's make it better. Because here's the thing: Sometimes we don't see it, then we are it.

And the Bible also says in the same kind of journey that we should be patient with one another, and we should bear one another's burdens.

And so here's what you need to understand. Somebody in the church will disappoint you.

Pastor, why are you saying this? Because I intended that in this season, we were gonna have a sermon series on ecclesiology, and we're gonna talk about the study and the theology of the church and God's plan for the church. I'm just gonna remind us who we are, okay?

So I've seen that. I saw that in my home. I also saw in Hurricane Andrew, when I had been in college for all of one or two weeks, I saw the church rally when my father was sleeping under a picnic table because he wouldn't leave the church and there were no hotels to stay in.

I was thinking though, when I was in college and my family was really down in the margins and really struggling, and our church was, and our community was—there were people I'd never know their name. They were Christian brothers and sisters who would call into the finance office of my university and ask if I had any bills that I had to pay my freshman year. And through a whole bunch of people, without even knowing, people paid whatever was left on my bill. And to this day, I don't even know who all did that. But I know this: it was the church.

And I've seen that repeated over and over. You know, that's one of the reasons why whenever there's a storm, I always wanted to be involved in it because I was on the receiving end of the generosity and the blessing of the church.

Brothers and sisters, love the church. Love the church.

Don't you just love the church today? Can we bless God for the church?

You know, I saw my dad sacrifice. I saw my grandfather build the church. Both of my grandfathers.

I've sat with countless people at their bedside in their last days, moments of life as they step from this life into the next life. It's a pretty incredible thing that God calls us to.

And for some of you, the family of God is the closest thing that you have to a family at all. God has ditched us into this family. And I'm so thankful for it.

And I just want you to hear from me: I love you for being such a wonderful church family. I love you. The church. We have a high view of the church.

Now listen to me. Let me start us out here.

A church that works is a church that honors the scripture and grows in Christ.

How do we learn how the church works and how we should function in the church? It's in the Bible. It's just very clear it's there. God tells us how all of this works. He explains the structure of the church and then the church develops and it grows.

There's some things we can do, some things that are prescribed, some things that we can develop. The church hasn't always had buildings. First building didn't show up until after a hundred years or so had gone by.

We stood right there in Philippi, one of the oldest churches. One of the oldest churches in the world is in Saudi Arabia. It's amazing. One of the oldest churches in the world is in Africa and Ethiopia after Philip had taken the gospel to the Ethiopian treasury official while he was reading the book of Isaiah.

The first church is in the Middle East. Second church really moved to Africa. It's a really special thing that God has built that has done so much good around the world—orphan care, widow care, hospitals, schools, children's homes, literacy, art. I mean, all the great art you see that has been collected up and preserved—so much of that is because of the church.

Whenever there's been a great plague or a great war, it's almost always the Christians who are the last to stay to care for people.

Why? Because the church has a vision that's not just this moment in this life. There's an eternal vision that the church has.

Listen, I've just come to say that God knew what He was doing when He built the church.

But a church that works is a church that honors the scriptures and grows in Christ. It's a blessing to be in a working church that is maturing in Christ. It's a blessing.

And I believe that if we do the church God's way, then that maturing church, that healthy church—not only will it change our families, not only will it change our lives, but it'll change our community and it'll change our world.

I haven't come in here to bad-mouth the church. I've come in here to thank the church, to affirm the work of the church, and then to call us forward into the next season of maturing and growing.

Until He calls us home, our job and our goal, our aim, is to look more and more like Christ every single day.

Now, please, please do me a favor. Let's not strive to be a traditional church, or a cool church, or a hip church, or a young church, or an old church, or a wealthy church, or a poor church.

Let's strive just to be the church of Jesus Christ. Church of Jesus Christ.

See, it isn't a certain size, or a certain demographic, or a certain style that makes us the church. In fact, there are many growing churches that have major problems, and they don't reflect what God has called us to do. And there are many small churches that are faithful to the Lord, and there's a faithful pastor, and there are faithful leaders who work.

Listen, we can never feel better than other people, nor inferior to other people, as a part of the church. We are blessed to be a part of the church of Jesus Christ, period.

I'm thankful for the church. Let's build that church. Let's steward that church. Let's defend that church. Let's encourage that church. Let's mature that church. Let's pray for that church. Let's weep in that church. Let's love that church.

We are saved by Jesus, but let me tell you something: the church that Jesus died for, and is coming back for, is a holy church, a pure church.

Listen, I want you to be happy. I want you to be encouraged. But listen, what I really want is I want you to be a holy church. I want you to be growing in God's grace, being more mature, and not tossed around so easily—not so emotionally impacted by things happening in the world, things happening in your family, things happening in your life, things happening in your city, in your church—but that we would be stable as the church of Jesus Christ, seeking Him, submitting ourselves to Him, placing our life on an altar as a living sacrifice, that it is Jesus for us, and us for the world.

We are for God, and we are for our city. But we will not be ready for our city if we are not submitted to the Lord.

And Pathway, I'm asking you: won't you please draw in a little closer to Jesus? Can't we talk to Jesus just a little bit more? Can't we spend a little more time in the Word?

Listen, for a Christian, if he reads this book one time a week, there's no difference statistically than a non-Christian in the way they live their life. Two times, no difference. Three times, no difference.

But when you read your Bible four times a week, there's a marked spiritual and physical difference in your life because what happens—it's like what David said, “Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee.”

Here's what I'm saying, Pathway Church: if we love Jesus and we're built on the chief cornerstone, and we are a temple of the Holy Spirit, and we're a temple for God, then we ought to be having something going on inside of us that transcends carnality, that transcends momentary issues, and then we draw close to the Lord. And God does a really powerful work in the church.

Let's go to Ephesians chapter four, verse three.

Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future.

However, He has given each one of us a special gift through the generosity of Christ... Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.

Their responsibility is to equip God's people to do His work and build up the church, the body of Christ.

This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God's Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.

I just wanna pause there for a second and just mention something. In verse three, the Bible says, "Maintain unity of the Spirit, be unified."

But if you only read three, you might feel worried, but if you read 13, it's encouraging. Because 13 says, "Keep doing things as you mature in faith and in unity."

So here's what I've understood about myself—and you probably understand this with you. Have you ever been making good progress and you say, "God, you're doing a lot of good things," and then you do something without even thinking about it?

Have any of you ever said something, and as the words were coming out of your mouth, you're wishing you could pull them back in?

Okay, what about typing out on Facebook? How many of you have deleted a post you wrote this week? Raise your hand. I did it, I did it.

Sometimes we say and do things. And we say and do things in the church, and as Christians, as members of the church, in front of people who are not Christians.

Come on, real talk. How many of you have ever done things that, because of what you did, it was an embarrassment to the church if anybody knew about it?

Right? Because really, look, we're people. Jesus is perfect, but we're being called to perfect our faith and to come into unity with the scripture.

The Bible tells us we have to crucify the flesh. Why? Because when we're placed up on the altar, and we are living sacrifices, and the flames come up, we wanna get off the altar.

But what we're seeing is no—we will crucify the flesh, and we will submit ourselves to the Lord.

And you know, as we do, Lord, if your Holy Spirit will convict me, if you will allow me every day of my life, I will get a little closer to you, and you will help me conquer this flesh that is warring against me.

The most spiritually powerful, wise, strong people in this house are people that are submitted to the Lord. They're people that humble themselves to the Lord.

They're the first people that would apologize if they did something wrong; they're the first person that would feel convicted over things that are going on in their life.

Listen to me: the stronger you get, the more humility you should have.

There is nobody that is too small for God to use, but there are a lot of people that are too big for God to use.

And if you will stay humbled to the Lord, God will exalt you. But if you're proud, the Bible says God will oppose you.

Our strength is not in anything that we have—it's not in our air conditioning, it's not in any of the things that we do. Our strength is in our submission to Jesus Christ. That's where our power is.

Humble yourselves, brothers and sisters, under the fear and the admonition of the Lord.

Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won't be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth.

Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of His body.

Amen. Can somebody give God a hand for the reading of His word today?

Now, the good news is it's not just vague concepts, but there is a blueprint for how the church is generally structured.

How a Working Church Flows

1. Christ gives the church leaders. Say that with me: Christ gives the church leaders.

2. Those leaders equip every believer—every single one.

3. Every believer does the work of the ministry.

4. The whole body is built up—healthy, connected, and growing.

Pathway, the future of our church isn't something flashy. It's not something new. It's not the latest fad or the newest innovation.

It's us doing the most ancient thing—and that's just becoming a working church, equipped, called, and useful for God.

Pastor, you don't know what I've been through—even better. Because if God can use you, the people that you talk to will believe that God could even use them.

And in our weakness, the Lord will be made strong.

I want you to stand with me today.

We are the church of Jesus Christ.

We don't just go to a church. We don't just interchange it. It's not just an address.

But we are a local body of believers that is called by God to do great things—through some of the smallest things. Tiny things, insignificant things.

Changed people's lives. Changed my life when Bobby Baker, when I was in the fourth or fifth grade, asked me to go knock on doors with him to bring kids to church on Sunday.

You will never go out to eat with me and not hear me talk to my server about Jesus. It's just become so much what I want to do.

It is a sacred thing that we're a part of—the church of Jesus Christ.

You are the church of Jesus Christ. I esteem you. I honor you. I thank God that we're a part of it and God wants to use you.

I've just come by here to remind you of that today—that God has a mighty plan for your life.

Will you just take one second and thank God for doing that in our lives. Amen.