Your church is precious

Baptists emerged from those who continued what Martin Luther started in the Reformation. Our forefathers worked to obliterate hierarchy and political entanglement from our churches. The autonomy of our congregations protects them from the loss of vision that typifies large bureaucracies (denominations). At the same time, our congregational polity allows us to change the direction of the work and institutions we hold in common with other churches.

Let me back up a step from the importance of how we do church. My generation, and certainly the one behind me looks askance at the whole idea of institutions, including the church. The more basic question is the importance of the church in the first place. During the Jesus People movement of the early 70s, large numbers of young people made professions for Christ. Our iconoclastic tendencies kept that enthusiasm for Jesus from transitioning into a commitment to his church. We did not understand the heart of God at this point and many of us have fallen by the wayside because of this.

The church is important to God. We are told in the Bible that Christ loved the church and died for her. The personal aspect of our redemption is real and relevant but we tend to overemphasize the “Jesus died for me” aspect to the detriment of our understanding of his love for the redeemed as a corporate body. The church is also described as his body and his bride. We are not individually the bodies of Christ or his brides. We are only that in relationship with other believers. These metaphors exalt the relationship that together we have with God. As Paul points out in Ephesians 5, we tend to value our own bodies highly. Similarly, a bride is the dutiful groom’s object of love and sacrifice. Exalted images show us how important the church is to our God. We discount this at our own peril.

Believers are also gifted for community. The redeemed are universally promised spiritual gifts at the point of our salvation. These gifts are given for the building up of those around us and not for our own glory. In fact, there is no use for these gifts if we are merely individuals.

In the same way, we are described as priests in 1 Peter 2:5. The primary things a priest does, exhortation, intercession, and teaching, are done only in relationship with one another. In fact this verse compares us with stones being built into a house. One stone does not make the house but the several do. Sometimes, “priest” is misunderstood to simply mean that we have access to God through Christ without human mediation. We do have this access and need no earthly high priest for the atonement of our sins; but priesthood is a transitive idea?it has a subject and an object. Priests worked to intercede between men and God. Our prayers for one another are a form of this intercession. Encouraging one another to godly living is another priestly work. Teaching our brothers the things God has taught us first is still another. All these presuppose a community of the redeemed. Apart from this community, priesthood is hard to apply.

The church is one of three foundational institutions ordained by God. The family is the first, chronologically, and government second. Few who discount the importance of the church would also say families and governments have also outlived their meaning. If we assign any significance to God’s ordination, we must include the church in that list of necessary institutions. In addition to importance, God’s choice of these three should add timelessness. The forms of the church and its methods might develop and even become obsolete but the institution is as vital for the community of the redeemed as the family is for mankind.

When we say “the church,” we often refer to all the redeemed in every tribe and land. We all make up the body and bride of Christ. At the same time, we rarely exercise our gifts or practice accountability on such a grand scale. I am also part of a vast human race made up of billions who are dead, living, and yet to live. That is true but not often applicable. We live as redeemed humans in relationship with those we know well and see regularly. A local church is the place where we practically live out our faith. Paul’s letters describing spiritual gifts and how they work to build up the body of Christ were written to local churches. We are a part of all God’s people but we are in daily relationship with a specific body of believers, a church. Otherwise our giftedness and priesthood are only academic.

Significance and timelessness require that we test our beliefs and practice related to churches. Maintaining biblical clarity in our ecclesiology will help us avoid the slide into a merely human agenda we see in some churches and groups of churches. If the Bible is our mission statement, all we are and do should be constantly judged by biblical precepts. Who we are and what we do will be ageless if we do this.

As tempting (and easy) as they may be, arguments about how we do things will be less productive. Methodology, music style, worship style, and other preference-based issues are not foundational to the existence and mission of a church. That’s why we have less to go on biblically when we seek a “thus saith the Lord” statement on the subjects. That’s also why we’ll never settle disagreements on methodology.

The empowerment we receive as believers in community is a great stewardship. While we will never find perfection in a church, this does not mean that the institution God calls the body and bride of Christ is unimportant. We will miss most of what God is calling us to do individually if we do not commit to fellowship with other believers. Neither does imperfection mean that it is futile to seek better ways to serve God corporately. The significance, permanence, and crucial function of the church warrants full commitment as well as our faithful service.