The church: its nature and design

"Church" is a very flexible word. People have different views of what it is. Some see the church as a building with tower and bells. Victor Hugo described it as "God between four walls." Others view the church experientially, "a shrine of worship, a place to pray." Some would consider it a prestigious social club. But what is the biblical view of the church? What is its nature and design?

The church: its nature

The word "church" appears more than 110 times in the New Testament. Not once does it describe a material building. Nor does it describe a religious organization, an ecclesiastical institution, or even a denomination. These are ways in which the church manifests its life, but they are not the church.

A called people. The word "church" is the English rendering of ekklesia, made up of two Greek words: ek (out from among) and kaleo (to call). The literal meaning of church is, therefore, "the called-out assembly." The church is "the people who belong to the Lord." Paul described them as the house of God (1 Tim. 3:15) and the flock of God (Acts 20:28). In other words, church is always people, the people of God (see 1 Peter 2:9). The church is those who worship, not where they worship. We must not let the outward form of the church disguise its true nature, for it is not a human organization, but a divinely created fellowship of sinners who trust a common Saviour and are one with each other, because they are all one with Him through the Holy Spirit.

A fellow shipping people. God's original purpose for this world was to create an eternal community with whom He could fellowship (Isa. 45:18). This purpose was disrupted by sin, but not abandoned. Sin separated human beings from their Maker and from each other. Until this sin problem was overcome, there could be no restoration. Human failure could be met only by God's faithfulness. Only Jesus could restore the broken fellowship.

A covenantal people. Upon what basis could such a relationship be realized? A covenant, of course. A covenant is a relationship of promise and commitment that binds the parties concerned to perform whatever duties their relation ship may demand. By His covenant God demands acceptance of His rule and promises enjoyment of His blessing. And so He says, "I will... be your God, and you will be my people" (Lev. 26:12; cf. Ex. 29:45; 2 Cor. 6:16; Rev. 21:3).* Likewise, when believers say "my God," they claim a relationship and make a commitment.

Two main biblical analogies for God's covenant with sinners are the royal covenant between overlord and vassal and the marriage covenant be tween husband and wife. The former speaks of God's sovereignty and lord ship, the latter of His love and Saviourhood.

Consider the covenant God established with Abraham in Genesis 17, a chapter of crucial importance for the doctrine of the church. Notice four points. First, the covenant relationship was announced as being corporate, extending to Abraham's seed "for the generations to come" (verse 7). Thus the covenant created a permanent community. Second, the relationship was one of pledged beneficence on God's part. He under took to give Abraham's seed the land of Canaan, a type for heaven (verse 8; cf. Heb. 11:8-16). Third, the purpose of the covenant was fellowship between God and His people, that they should walk before Him, knowing Him as they were known by Him (verse 1). Fourth, the covenant was confirmed by the institution of a token, the rite of circumcision (verse 11).

Later through Moses God gave His people a law to govern their conduct. He also gave them forms of worship. These forms included feasts, exhibiting His fellowship with them, and sacrifices, pointing to the Redeemer, who alone could provide forgiveness and a basis for fellowship. Also, He spoke to them repeatedly through prophets of the glorious hope to be realized when the Messiah came.

A redeemed people. Thus emerged the basic biblical concept of the church as the covenant people of God, the re deemed family, worshiping and serving Him according to His revealed will, fellow shipping with Him and with each other, walking by faith in His promises, and looking for the coming Messianic kingdom.

When Christ came, this Old Testament concept was fulfilled, not destroyed. Christ is the mediator of the covenant. Through His atoning death, believing Jews and Gentiles formed the people of God on earth. Baptism, the New Testament sign corresponding to circumcision, represents the union with Christ in His death and resurrection, which is the sole gateway into the church (see Rom. 6:3ff.; Gal. 3:27ff.; Col. 2:11 ff.).

Peter describes the Christian church in thoroughgoing Old Testament fashion as "a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God.... Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy" (1 Peter 2:9, 10). For this people Christ will return and "gather" to Himself an eternal community (see Matt. 24:31).

The church: its design

Bible writers used no less than 80 metaphors to convey God's purpose and design for His church. We will focus on four major ones that describe the formation, continuation, and consummation of Christ's church: a family, a body, a building, and a bride.

Church is a family. Jesus told His followers, "Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother" (Matt. 12:49-50; see also Mark 3:34, 35; Luke 8:19-21). In this statement Jesus created a definition of family. The book of Acts sometimes uses the word "brethren" simply to indicate a new spiritual filial status among Christians, a family in which brothers and sisters share a common heritage. Peter also talked of that kind of a spiritual family relationship (1 Peter 2:17). Paul repeatedly referred to this new status in addressing believers in Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Philippi, Colossae, and Thessalonica. To talk of brothers and sisters among believers was to transcend physical relationships and affirm a common family bond, even when people were of different nationalities and ethnic backgrounds, either Jew or Gentile.

How does one become part of this family? By being born into it. The New Testament word for "brethren" is also the root for the word "womb." So "brethren" connotes birth. Those who belong to Christ's church have been "born of the Spirit" (John 3:6,7). We cannot join Christ's church! We must be born into it! Only in this relationship can we experience the fatherhood of God. Just as those in natural birth who come from the same womb are brothers and sisters, so those born of the Spirit are brothers and sisters in the Spirit, members of God's family. "For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters" (Heb. 2:11, NRSV).

The apostle Peter speaks of "those who through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ have received a faith as precious as ours" (2 Peter 1:1). Only these can unite in saying, "Our Father." We are one in faith, one in inward life, one in Christ Jesus. We worship the same Father, and we trust in the same Saviour. We are drawn to our Lord and to one another. In Christ, and in Him alone, is true familyhood realized. John defines it as a dual fellowship: horizontal and vertical "fellowship with us" and fellowship "with the Father and with his Son" (1 John 1:3).

The governing principle of this fellowship is love (see 1 John 3:14). Attitudes and actions of brothers and sisters are not dictated by the prejudices of society or the instincts of fallen nature, but by divinely implanted love that views every other believer in Christ as a brother or a sister in the family of God.

Francis Schaeffer said it perceptively: "There is no such thing as a Christian community unless it is made up of individuals who are already Christians who have come through the work of Christ. One can talk about Christian community till one is green, but there will be no Christian community except on the basis of a personal relationship with the personal God through Christ." ¹

Church is a body. Paul describes the church as Christ's body (see Rom. 12:5; 1 Cor. 12:27;Eph. 1:23; 4:12; Col. 1:24; 2:19). The metaphor conveys a close and vital relationship that binds the church to Christ. Two primary figures used by Paul bring out this close relationship: "head" and "members" of the body. By using these figures, Paul underscores three significant points.

First, Christ is the authority over the church. The church is not autonomous, but subject to Christ as Lord (see Eph. 5:24). The church must obey the voice of the Lord above all other voices; His will must reign. In this sense, the head ship of Christ is equivalent to His Lordship over the church. Christ ex presses Himself through the church as His instrument. As Johnston writes, "Christians were the limbs of the Messiah, and therefore his servants, expressing his mind and will (Col. 1:24). It is as if the risen Lord actually lived in the churches to direct, teach, and bless them." ²

Second, the church finds its goal in Christ. Christ, in whom are all the purposes of God for the world, is the ideal toward which the church directs its efforts. That means the church "in all things [will] grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ" (Eph. 4:15). The character of Christ is the goal for the church to reach, and it will eventually achieve this goal eschatologically. Meanwhile, Christ the head is working in and with the church to fulfill His goals. Hence, He "feeds and cares" for her (Eph. 5:29). He gives Himself "to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless" (verses 26, 27).

Third, the church experiences unity in Christ. Paul emphasizes the unity of the church by pointing to the interrelationship existing between the members of the body. In the human body, severance of a limb means crippling for the body, and death for the limb! Unity within the church is so essential that Paul equates any division in the church as equivalent to dividing the body of Christ. "Is Christ divided?" he asks the Corinthian church (1 Cor. 1:13). Because we are members of Christ, we are members of one another (see Rom. 12:5). To be in Christ is to be in the church. To be in the church is to be united in Christ and united with each other. As in the words of the song: "We are not divided, all one body we, one in hope and doctrine, one in charity."

The church of Jesus Christ always has been, is now, and always will be one and undivided. In Christ's church there is unity because there is union (see 1 Cor. 12:12). It cannot be classed along with clubs, associations, denominations, or lodges. These are only organizations, but His church is an organism, made up of those who are "members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones" (Eph. 5:30, KJV). We are one in Christ and one with Christ. This immediately rules out an amalgamation of denominations or churches in order to effect a human-made unity. Those who belong to Christ possess a sevenfold unity one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God the Father of all (see Eph. 4:4-6).

If Christ is the head of the body, we are the members of that body. By describing us as members of that body (Eph. 5:30), Paul emphasizes certain important points. First, membership in the body of Christ requires mutual responsibility one for another. Members ought to "have equal concern for each other" (1 Cor. 12:25), not just in spiritual affairs but also in material necessities. We should care for the poor, the needy, the hungry, and the naked (see James 2:14-17; Rom. 12:20; Matt. 25:34-36). In fact, we should be ready to lay down our lives for the sake of a fellow member (1 John 3:16).

Second, being members of His body gives us the assurance that Jesus is ever present with us as the church. When we meet in worship, when we assemble at the Communion table, when we carry out His witness, Christ is with us (see Matt. 18:20). He is our head, we are His body, and we work with Him and for Him.

Third, being a member also suggests that we want to add "members" to the church; we want to extend Christ's body. "Whoever is brought under the influences of the truth, and through faith is made partaker of Christ's love, is by that very fact appointed of God to save others." ³

Members do what Jesus would be doing if He were present in the flesh. Where the members go, the church goes. The more members there are, the more outlets there are for God's love. In this way, the great objective of the church is fulfilled: to make Jesus omnipresent, to make Him as much present in as many places, through the members of His body.

Thus witness, service, and ministry are not optional to members of the body.

They are inevitable! The body has no observers. In fact, witness is so para mount in the life of the church that Jesus included it in His last commission to the church (see Matt. 28:19; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:47; Acts 1:8). Obedience to that commandment is the supreme test of loyalty to Him. Peter describes the church as "a people belonging to God" in order that they "may declare praises of him who called you. . . into his wonderful light" (1 Peter 2:9). The church is placed on earth to let people know of the blessings God offers through His Son. "It is dreadful," says George Sweazey, "to think of anyone missing for even a single day the wonders of the life in Christ." ⁴

Church is a building. Israel had "the tabernacle of the Testimony" (Acts 7:44) as the house of God. Solomon built the Temple. But "the God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands" (Acts 17:24). Rather, He has us as His dwelling place (see 1 Cor. 3:9). Paul states, "We are the temple of the living God" (2 Cor. 6:16).

What is Paul saying? Not that a building is unnecessary, but that God does not require a building to dwell in or to make His presence known. He lives in human hearts: "And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit" (Eph. 2:22). Peter calls us the "living stones" that comprise a "spiritual house" (1 Peter 2:5). God by His grace has gone into the quarries of humanity and taken those who are "dead in [their] trespasses and sins" (Eph. 2:1) and has made them alive together in Christ. This is how God fashions and erects the church. Believers are redeemed and fitted by grace to become stones in this habitation of God.

They are, says Paul, "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets" (verse 20). The genitive "of" does not mean "consisting of," but means "laid by." The apostles and prophets are the progenitors of our faith. Through their eyes we see Jesus. In their words we read the mind of God. Their lives and deeds have given the church its great historical foundation. But Jesus is the real foundation. As Paul states, "For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ" (1 Cor. 3:11).

Paul's reference to apostles in no sense means a historical continuity of bishops. It refers only to the faith and ministry of the first apostles. Like them, we too are commissioned to carry Christ's message to the world. "The church is the depositary of the wealth of the riches of the grace of Christ, and through the church eventually will be made manifest the final and full display of the love of God to the world that is to be lightened with its glory."⁵

When Solomon's Temple was built, it "was built of stone made ready before it was brought thither: so that there was neither hammer nor ax nor any tool of iron heard in the house, while it was in building" (1 Kings 6:7, KJV). So also in the building of the spiritual house. God has predetermined the size, shape, and placing of the stones. "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight" (Eph. 1:4; see also 1 Peter 1:2).

The building that the Holy Spirit has built is not a static one. As Paul says: "In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord" (Eph. 2:21). These words anticipate growth toward full maturity, "attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ" (Eph. 4:13).

The goal for the church is clear: in its conduct, individually and corporately, the church must exhibit the life of God. We are called to be a holy people (see 1 Peter 2:9). The adjective "holy" designates a new relationship between believers and their God. It implies an exclusive relationship demanding absolute consecration and conformity to the nature of God. God is a jealous lover who allows no rivals. We are exclusively His people (see verse 10).

In the last days this exclusiveness is seen, on the one hand, in God calling out a remnant people; and on the other, in the remnant obeying His commands, preserving His "faith," and reflecting His character (see Rev. 12:17; 14:12).

Church is a bride. When the New Testament uses the image of a bride to describe the church, the connotation is one of a love relationship between Christ and His church. This metaphor has its roots in the Creation story. Paul describes Adam as a figure of Christ, the Second Adam (see Rom. 5:14). The woman God gave to Adam typifies the church. The church's relationship to Christ is like that of Eve to the first Adam.

Consider the Genesis story. God put Adam into a "deep sleep" and made a woman from his rib. On Calvary the Second Adam was plunged into the sleep of death. Adam's side was opened by the divine surgeon, and his blood was spilled in order to obtain his bride. As far as Adam was concerned, the procedure was painless. But at the cross the Second Adam enjoyed no protection from agony and pain (see Ps. 22:14, 15). In order to obtain His church He "gave himself up for her" (Eph. 5:25). He bought the church "with his own blood" (Acts 20:28).

What a thrilling moment when the companion ordained of God and provided by Him was presented to Adam, to share his love, to enjoy his fellow ship, and to partake of the blessings freely given him by God. Likewise, the Holy Spirit brings us to Christ that we may receive His blessings, enjoy His fellowship, and be workers together with Him. Adam acknowledged the gift of Eve with wonder and awe: "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" (Gen. 2:23). She was a part of him! He was a part of her! Adam never thought of refusing her, for she was one with him.

Those who belong to the church, the bride of Christ, may say with assurance that they are "members of his body" (Eph. 5:30), His flesh and His bones. Jesus assures us, "All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away" (John 6:37). So completely identified with Christ is His bride, so close is that union, that they two are one flesh.

As a "man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife" (Eph. 5:31), so Christ left all for the sake of His bride. The church too is joined to Christ, as a woman to her husband. This means a separation of the bride from the old family ties that were under condemnation to exist exclusively for the heavenly Bridegroom. Why? So that His bride "may be complete in Him, a continual representation of another, even the eternal world, of laws that are higher than earthly laws."⁶

The union between Christ and the church, existing from the moment of the believer's acceptance of Christ, will be fully consummated when the entire church is "caught up" (1 Thess. 4:17) and the marriage itself is celebrated in heaven. Someday all who are arrayed in the robes of Christ's righteousness shall go on the arm of our Beloved into the bridal halls of glory (see Rev. 19:7-9). Joined in eternal marriage to her heavenly Bridegroom, the church will be united with Christ. The dominion forfeited by our first parents because of sin will be restored fully by the second Adam, the Lord Jesus, and given to His bride, the church. She shall reign and rule with Him over a restored earth, sharing His throne and the glories of His kingdom (see Rev. 3:21; cf. John 17:22).

The Genesis story informs us that God "closed up the place with flesh" (Gen. 2:21). Did it leave a scar? As Adam looked at that mark on his side, he might have reasoned, If it were not for that, I would not have Eve; I would be alone. And when Eve saw that scar, she might have thought, I would not exist except for that. In eternity the church triumphant will have an ever lasting reminder of the One who will forever bear the scars of Calvary in His hands, His feet, and His side. Were it not for that "shed blood," He would have no bride to share His glory (see Rev. 5:9). Were it not for those wounds, the church would not be in heaven. What holy aspirations and godly motives should possess the life of one redeemed at so great a price!

Awaiting the Bridegroom

So, then, what is the church? Not some stately building on a street corner, or some expertly run religious organization, or a conglomerate of denominations. It is a "called-out" people, united in life to Jesus Christ, composed of those who have been born of the Spirit and whose faith is based in the Word of God. When persons by faith receive the Lord Jesus, they are placed by the Spirit of God into the body of Christ, the church.

The church is a distinct fellowship of those redeemed by Christ and called by Him to represent God in the world and continue the Messianic ministry. It is also an institution fulfilling its proper function to glorify God, to render the service of love, and to proclaim Christ and His ministry.

The church is a family comprised of children of the same Father. We are sons and daughters, heirs and joint-heirs.

The church is a living temple in which God takes up His residence and in whom He exhibits His life. The church is a bride awaiting her eternal union with her Bridegroom.

Do you await with joy the coming of the Bridegroom? Can you say today, "Yes, I have His life dwelling in me; I have been made a partaker of His nature; I am a member of His body and bride"?