Why did Jesus so often in His dealings with those who would come to Him simply tell them to go, repenting of their sins? Why, with rare exception, did He not invite people to follow Him, joining His assembly?
Why did the apostles, in their dealings with the people they encountered, not spend time inviting people to particular churches, even after they believe?
Why did Phillip, after baptizing the Ethiopian, send the man on his way? Isn’t baptism supposed to be the entry ritual to organized churches?
Why are today’s evangelistic tactics so often formulated in such a way as to not share Jesus Christ but to instead share an invitation to an organized church?
Why are we content to let evangelism completely miss the point? Why do we introduce ourselves as representing the First Baptist Missionary Church of the Lutheran Assemblies of the Church of God in America rather than introducing ourselves for what we are, ambassadors of Jesus Christ. Is it that we are more comfortable representing a brick and mortar organization that people can see, touch, and participate in rather than representing Jesus, whom most consider either “the invisible man in the clouds” or simply a long deceased Nazarene?
Why do we organize gimmicky promotions within organized churches which reward putting butts in the pews rather than encouraging true evangelism and godly living so that treasures may be heaped up in Heaven?
Why do we expend so much time, effort, and money in organizing, building, and promoting organizations (churches, falsely so called) rather than living and experiencing an organic, spontaneous faith that results in communion among saints wherever they may be? Remember that it was something like three centuries before Christians started building churches and the like; it was around that same time that the church ceased to be an organic, living organism and became an institution, not all that dissimilar from the world’s businesses or governments. The Roman Catholic Church evolved out of that shift, and while the Reformation saw the rescue of many precious teachings, our churches are still brick and mortar, and we still endow those buildings with entirely too much reverence and respect. We treat them as “holy places.”
For all the emphasis today’s Christians place upon buildings, attendance, and formal membership, not a jot of Scripture is wasted on such things. Christian community goes beyond to what it is usually constrained. It must go beyond it.
Great thinking! It has taken me a while to get to a similar point in thought myself.
I moved from thinking I wanted to be a preacher, to wanting to lead and establish house churches, to figuring out that even house churches are another form of organization that is not needed…
Like you said, we are ambassadors of Christ. We also are “the Church” – kind of interesting that the idea of “going” to church is not inherent in the scripture – but rather that “the Church” existed in different places (i.e. the Church at Ephesus, the Church at so and so’s home, etc…)
I recently read a fantastic book about some of this thinking on what the Church is and isn’t. You can read it for free thanks to the goodwill of the authors. Here’s a link to the website of
“So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore”
I’m a little confused.
What do you mean by organised? Are you saying organised churches are unscriptural?
There is a degree of organization within the church — not so much within “church buildings” — found in the Scriptures. When the church would meet, things would be done in order, and there would be elders and deacons of certain qualifications presiding over things.
But when we start having deacon boards, business meetings, church democracy governed by “Rules of Order,” trustee boards, membership rolls, lesson plans, Sunday school plans, offerings-just-to-pay-church-bills, building programs, and so on… Then yeah, I think organized churches are unscriptural — or at least superscriptural (read: beyond the Scriptures).
There’s two attitudes that can be taken:
1) The Scriptures give us the freedom to meet as we want, redefining church from the people to the premises.
2) The God of the Scriptures was wise enough to not only tell us how to be saved but also how to worship Him, and we would do wise to stick to it as closely as possible.
(Okay, I’m characterizing a bit in those attitudes, but I’m definitely stuck to number 2.)
I’m not sure if I am understanding you right so if I have misunderstood correct me.
“There is a degree of organization within the church — not so much within “church buildings” — found in the Scriptures. When the church would meet, things would be done in order, and there would be elders and deacons of certain qualifications presiding over things.
But when we start having deacon boards, business meetings, church democracy governed by “Rules of Order,” trustee boards, membership rolls, lesson plans, Sunday school plans, offerings-just-to-pay-church-bills, building programs, and so on… Then yeah, I think organized churches are unscriptural — or at least superscriptural (read: beyond the Scriptures).”
Do you believe that the church may only be organised insofar and to the same extent as it was organised in the New Testament? So to say, the New Testament is wholly descriptive and prescriptive of what a church ought to be.
You mentioned several examples, ‘Rules of Order’ was one. Do you think because the New Testament does not mention churches having Rules of Order or Books of Order, or whatever they may be called, that it is an inappropriate to have such in our churches today? We agree they are not necessary but this is not same thing as saying they should not be used. This same point applies to the other examples you gave.
Is the central issue for you one of formality and informality? The church has become a turgid organisation when it should be a fluid community. Are organisation and community contradictory?
“There’s two attitudes that can be taken:
1) The Scriptures give us the freedom to meet as we want, redefining church from the people to the premises.
2) The God of the Scriptures was wise enough to not only tell us how to be saved but also how to worship Him, and we would do wise to stick to it as closely as possible.”
I don’t understand how these two attitudes are opposing views. The first speaks of organisation and the second speaks of worship.
I also don’t understand how the clause ‘redefining church from the people to the premises.’ follows from ‘The Scriptures give us the freedom to meet as we want’. If someone believes the Bible gives freedom to meet how we want why does it follow that they are redefining church from people to premises?
–
To speak more generally, I agree that the church today is not without fault, and sometimes serious fault. But I don’t think this is reason enough to pan churches as organised institutions.
Zach, thank you for the link to that fantastic book. It was absolutely eye opening–I couldn’t put it down! The author has also written a non-fiction book called He Loves Me which explains some of the concepts in much more detail. Thank you for pointing me to these resources. They are exactly what I’ve been waiting for!