THE CHURCH IN FLUX
Chapter 14
How biblical is the church as an institution today?
In this chapter I am continuing my analysis of today’s church organization, and will cite references to both the Old Testament and New Testament.
While I was writing this my mind went to Moses and how he, upon advice of Jethro, his father-in-law, who saw how stressed out his son-in-law was, put a decentralized governing structure in place, as recorded in Exodus 18, basically following the army model with officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens. However that situation, involving millions of people traveling in desert conditions, exposed to all sorts of pressures, cannot be compared to the church today, which is localized, and more a neighborly matter than a complete nation on the march. We may sing that “Like a mighty army moves the church of God… we are not divided, all one body we…with the cross of Jesus going on before”, but that, in this day and age does not describe the church.
Jesus never liked mass meetings, avoided the cities, and preferred the country-side, even though, at times, he addressed some large gatherings.
Jesus knew that there’s no salvation in numbers. The opposite may be true. Jesus once wondered whether he, upon his return, would find faith on earth. He also said that ‘many are called, but few are chosen,’ again pointing to the relative small group of elect. I know that sounds rather elitist, so, perhaps, I am incorrect here. Nevertheless, it’s easy to hide in a large church, where spiritual immaturity may remain undetected.
So how biblical is the church as an institute today? Is it true that only the clergy may administer the sacraments?
1 Peter 2:9 is the well-known text which gives ‘power to the people.’ There is says that they are “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God that they may proclaim the praises of him who called them out of darkness into his wonderful light.” That really means that all believers are priests, all those who follow Christ are office-bearers. Martin Luther, the leader of the Reformation, comments on this text when he writes that “all those who know themselves to be Christian, maybe assured that they are priests,” which means that they have the authority to administer the Word and the sacraments. He also writes that “Freedom is essential for the Christian character of the church.” He continues, “At the same time (in the Roman Catholic Church) all perspective in Christian grace, in its freedom, in the faith and in everything we possess in Christ, has disappeared, and instead we have acquired human institutions and human endeavors, and so we have become subservient to the most incapable people on earth.”
As you can see Luther was not a man known for understating his case. It should be remembered that this was right after his renunciation of the Roman Catholic Church and at the very infancy of the Protestant Reformation. In a sermon shortly after that he said “Most Esteemed Pope, I hereby declare that whoever has faith is a spiritual being and judges all things and is not judged by anyone else. And if there were a simple miller’s daughter, even a child of 9 years old that has faith and acted according to the Good News, then the Pope is bound to listen to her and submit himself to her if he were a true Christian. And all universities and scholars are bound to do the same.”
It is well for us to take these words to heart, because, slowly but surely, we have reached the same state of affairs against which Luther agitated so fiercely. Does that mean that a new Reformation is needed? Of course, for the simple reason that the church must always be reforming – semper reformanda – and has failed to do so.
For one thing, the present structure has impeded the formation of Christians coming to spiritual maturity, has prevented persons to acquire a well-thought-out vision on matters spiritual, and consequently have failed to foster a distinctive Christian life style. The author of the letter to the Hebrews (6:12-13) already complained then that, “In fact though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food. Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching of righteousness”. More about what ‘righteousness’ really means for today, in the concluding chapter. Paul makes the same point in 1 Corinthians 3:2.
Nothing really has changed in those 2000 years. Then it could be blamed on illiteracy and limited access to the Scriptures. Today I put the blame directly on the professional word proclaimers, who are failing to act as coaches, failed to make them selves superfluous. The actual fault lies squarely with the ecclesiastical structures that force officials to be compromisers, hemmed in as they are by organizational boundaries and out-dated confessions.
The simple reason for the baby-state of churchgoers is that church officers are ignoring the fact that all believers are members of a Royal Priesthood, a Holy nation, a chosen people, a people belonging to God. The result is that the term ‘frozen chosen’ applies especially to the Christian Reformed and Presbyterian Churches.
Another German theologian, P.Beyerhaus, in his German book – and I translate the title – “The independence of the young churches as a problem for missionaries,” writes that ‘In the book of Acts it is clearly shown that in the early Christian church baptisms were administered and local churches were established without the help of the apostles.” This sort of scriptural maturity, however, has been suppressed in the later churches of the Reformation thank to a rising clericalism. It is not a coincidence that the word ‘lay’ as an indication of a church member without an office, is so often used, in contrast with the clergy who have their own exclusive prerogatives.
What I intend to show is that the contemporary church development has been stymied by this development and has made the church often a sterile and life-less institution.
As stated earlier, Christ did not see it as important to leave behind an organizational model for the church. The result was that the churches of the New Testament were exposed to all sorts of influences, which the leaders conceived as a danger, forgetting the fact that Jesus is the head of the church, which means that He will always provide the necessary protection. Samuel comes to mind. When the people of Israel clamored for a king, God told him – 1 Samuel 8 – “it is not you they have rejected but me as their king.” I see a similar situation here: by instituting popes and archbishops and church officials who alone may explain the Bible, they, in essence, have committed the same sin as the people of Israel who, like their neighbors, wanted a king to rule over them, shifting the responsibility from their own shoulders to a higher authority.
So, in violence of the spirit of scripture, the church fathers created a formal organization, which basically remains unchanged until this day. There the professional preachers call the tune, and the flock, the sheep of their pasture, is as mute as those wooly creatures, giving a bleat occasionally, but never rising to greater influence.
Both in the Christian Reformed Church and the Presbyterian Church we have elders. In the Presbyterian Church ministers are called preaching elders, while elected (for life) lay-elders are called ruling elders, with little or no power to rule, as ministers are not members of the congregation they serve and cannot be called to account, nor are elders allowed to chair the meetings of the church councils.
Basically the same system is in force in the Christian Reformed Church. This division of labor may be in agreement with the church order, but the New Testament doesn’t recognize this distinction. In these two denominations both are called ‘elders’, but in reality it is the minister – often called ‘pastor’ or ‘shepherd’, perhaps to emphasize the sheepish character of their charge – who is the man or woman with the clout. Only he, or now more frequently she, may administer baptism and communion and have the license to marry.
You can read more about the New Testament understanding of ‘elder’ in the next chapter.