THE CHURCH IN FLUX
Chapter 13
Today’s Church and the New Testament.
I once went, on a Saturday of course, to a service at the Messianic Synagogue in Beverly Hills, a few doors away from the hotel where we were staying. Even though the sermon was from the New Testament, all the trappings were based on traditional Jewish practices, such as wearing a yarmulke, the carrying of the Torah throughout the premises, as well as the presence of a cantor, who sang both in Hebrew and English; all in all an impressive ceremony.
Just as in Jewish traditions the books of Moses occupy a prominent place, so in the Christian church the entire Bible – both the Old and the New Testament – is central to its teaching. This means that, while Judaic worship is founded on the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, the organization and offices of the Christian church are, supposedly, all based on the New Testament. However, there is a big difference: where, in the Mosaic laws, we can find precise descriptions on how to celebrate the Jewish religious feasts, including the Sabbath, the New Testament features very little about the church’s organizational structure. What is remarkable is that, in the church whose start was recorded in Acts 2, and which grew quite rapidly, thanks to the Apostle Paul, a radical break was made with all former religious customs, although not without considerable friction. They were so drastic that even the day of worship was changed from Saturday, the Sabbath, to Sunday, the first day of the week, celebrating Christ’s resurrection. Another fundamental changes were baptism rather than circumcision and the added new feature of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, with the specific stipulation to celebrate this as a reminder of Jesus’ death and his coming again.
The tearing of the curtain in the Jerusalem temple when Jesus died on the cross was also symbolic of the change in emphasis from temple worship to freedom of location, already foretold by Jesus when he, in his unorthodox conversation with a Samaritan woman, as recorded in John 4, told her that true worship was to take place in spirit and truth, and was not bound to a specific place or building. Jesus here already hinted at the ‘truth’ being that God’s love is evident everywhere in His world and His spirit pervades all things.
Jesus himself had no use for the regulations the church leaders at his time had instigated. In the eyes of the ecclesiastical establishment he was a great sinner because he did not keep the rules they had made about the Sabbath celebration and daily life. His flouting of the temple statutes was one factor in him being condemned to death.
The apostle Paul was the most radical of all apostles in abolishing Old Testament directives, emphasizing that ‘love’ was the only condition. In Romans 13 he writes that “Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for they who love their fellow creatures have fulfilled the law.”
When I read these words, then my attention is always drawn to environmental issues: how can we love our neighbors when we pollute the air and the water on which their health depend? One of the laws of ecology is that “everything is connected to everything else,” and that includes the love we have for each other and for ourselves. Another ecological law is that “there is no free lunch.” If we neglect to love our neighbor, if we neglect to love God’s creation, the bill for our misconduct is in the mail, and we will experience the consequences in our own life and in that of our children.
Just as we take for granted that the way we live today is ‘normal’, is in accordance to God’s will – and I believe that nothing is further from the Truth – so we assume that the specific church structures and organizations we have are God-given or prescribed in the New Testament. Here too nothing is further from the Truth. No wonder that, as we saw in the previous chapter, there are some grave misgivings about the church which we must take seriously.
We seldom question these regulations – mostly man-made I should add. My experience in the church is that, although very liberal opinions are never questioned and the word ‘heresy’ is no longer heard in the church, when the rules of the Church Order are challenged, all hell breaks loose.
One of the cardinal commandments of Christian conduct is to follow Jesus. I believe we have to also follow him in organizational life. Jesus, for some reason, did not think it wise to create an organized church structure, nor are there any written statements from him. The only record we have that he could write is, when confronted with the question whether he should condemn a woman caught in the act of adultery, he wrote something in the sand. What that was is not recorded.
Although thousands followed him to see him cure diseases, only 120 were present at his Ascension. Yet churches are impressed with numbers: mega churches where ten of thousands attend are all the rage now, even though Jesus de-emphasized numbers, saying that ‘where two or three are gathered in My name, there I will be also’. Yet, at Pentecost, as related in Acts 2, thousands were attracted to the New Way, with the result that, when the New Testament churches grew, they lacked a roof to stay under.
Being constantly open to the heavens was seen as impractical, so the pragmatic leaders of the ancient church shaped a dome over its walls, a dome of which the Saint Peter’s church in Rome is an excellent example. In reality the dome replaced the Dome of Heaven, with frescoes showing supposedly celestial scenes. Once such a structure or similar coverings were in place, the church basically retained its walled-in format.
The early church was instituted during the time of the Roman Empire. Christian people then, as they are now, were born organizers, necessary, of course, when something was growing rapidly. All around them these early Christ- followers witnessed how well run the Roman Empire was and so, guess what? They used that example to fashion the church organization, built it on the same principles: the emperor become the pope, the senators became the archbishops, the bishops took the place of generals, and the priests became the officer class. And, logically, once a hierarchy was in place, the striving for power and authority influenced the development of the Christian church as well.
There are more similarities. The Pope, when speaking Ex Cathedra, became infallible in his pronouncements, just as the Roman Emperor had divine attributes. To give the church a high degree of holiness, the church itself was equated with the Kingdom of God.
After the Reformation both the Anglican and the Lutheran churches retained a power structure in which the king or the hereditary ruler was the titular head, which, in reality, meant that these national denominations not only occupied a monopoly at the expense of other religious organizations, but also robbed them of their freedom, because the secular heads the church could manipulate them for his own political aspirations.
In the Netherlands and Scotland the ecclesiastical organizations were not nearly as closely tied to the state as was the case in Lutheran countries such as Germany and Sweden, yet in the 17th Century the State nevertheless had an enormous influence there as well. In a sense Christ’s words that in the world his followers would be persecuted, were replaced by something rather opposite: in the world you will have a monopoly, of which Russia also is a good example. Also the structure of the Reformed churches resembled the way the state itself was organized, be it not nearly as strict as the Roman Catholic Church. It’s not surprising that, where the State structure changed with the times, the way the church was fashioned remained constant.
What is equally striking is that especially the Roman Catholic and the Anglican churches resembled more and more the Old Testament structure which had a High Priest – Pope or Archbishop – and a large priestly class with elaborate robes and other religious paraphernalia so reminiscent of Old Testament prescriptions. None of these regulations have any basis in the New Testament. Actually Christ always emphasized the ‘freedom’ aspect which he so liberally showed in his own life.
So how biblical is the current church structure? Are the offices to which we attach so much importance really in accordance with New Testament writings?
More about that in the next chapter.