When I was a boy, Dad would often say “The Church is only fifty years behind the world.”
He meant that the (Anabaptist) church would accept things that the culture accepted fifty years ago. And he saw that as a bad thing. As I get older, I am inclined to agree. But what did he mean by the church?
Is it a building where people meet together? Is it an institutional bureaucracy? Is it a corporation? Is it an organization? Is it the people themselves, the Bride of Christ?
The Bible describes the church as a community of believers who worship together, share life, and serve God. The church is also referred to as the body of Christ, the people of God, and the bride of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27; Eph. 1:22; 4:16; Acts 16:31; 2 Cor. 11:2; Rev. 19:7).
Bureaucracy / Organization
Organization
An organization is a group whose activities are coordinated for the achievement of specific goals or purposes. There are formal and informal organizations. A formal organization usually has rules defining each person’s duties, organizational charts or a known hierarchy, and a system of rewards and punishments. Over time, an organization can become a complex multi-layered structure that limits efficiency and slows down decision making. We call that a bureaucracy.
Bureaucracy
A bureaucracy is the most common type of formal organization. Some other definitions for a bureaucracy are “a hierarchical arrangement between the parts of an organization in which the pyramiding order is based on division of function and authority” (defined by Vander Zanden). Or, a power-wielding organization with a hierarchy of ranks, the statuses and functions of which are planned in advance and staffed by bureaucrats fighting over the distribution of resources. They often collapse under the weight of self-preservation, preceded by a desire to control the people whom they serve. Their state flower is red tape.
A common problem in bureaucracies is the Peter Principle, found in a book called The Peter Principle: Why Things Always Go Wrong. Part of the Peter Principal is: “In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his/her level of incompetence.” Ouch.
What this means is, people are promoted up the food chain as long as they are competent in the level to which they attain. Eventually, they reach a position for which they are incompetent. And they are kept there. Since it is rare for individuals to be demoted in a hierarchy (or good old boy network), they will remain in their position, incompetence and all. They are protected pieces on a dysfunctional chess board. Try calling the IRS and asking a question, for instance. You will get five different answers from five different people.
They're entrenched freeloaders that have control over part of the bureaucracy and they've been there so long they think they own the place and they're going to defend it with all your money. That doesn’t sound like the church of the New Testament. It sounds like an obese church, feeding on entitlement.
Corporation
A corporation is an association of individuals, created by law or under authority of law, having a continuous existence independent of the existences of its members, and powers and liabilities distinct from those of its members. A 501(c)(3) is one example of a corporation, along with S corps and C corps.
A big problem that can occur in organizations, institutions and bureaucracies is mission creep (when they drift away from their original purpose), or ideological capture.
Ideological capture
Ideological capture means that you have a sector, or an institution, or some area of society that has been captured by a certain ideological worldview. They have been captured to the extent that you really have no possibility of presenting an alternative worldview. They become completely captured. To give an example, we have the ideological capture by the Left of higher education in the United States. It’s not total, but it’s approaching total. In some institutions (including Adventist institutions) it’s absolutely total. How did it happen?
Academia
Over a period of time, the left captured more and more and more of academia, institution by institution, professor by professor, department by department, and degree by degree. That’s how it works. Eventually, the only way you can explain what happened, is to admit that an entire sector of society or institution is ideologically captured. And here’s the amazing thing, you often see it only in clear terms once it’s happened. Only after it’s happened, can you really see what’s happened.
We are not surprised to find this in the world around us. In the culture, sinful as it is, there can be all kinds of ideological corruptions. But at some point these ideologies capture an entire institution, church or secular. I call it magnetic south. They control who’s in leadership, they control who gets to speak, they control what arguments are allowed and disallowed. Ideological capture, when it happens, is extremely difficult, if not impossible to dislodge.
And once it’s captured, there is no foreseeable means of correction. Because when you capture it, you control the platform, you control the microphone, you control the messaging, you control the leadership, you control the membership, you control the boundaries, you control virtually everything. Two examples of this are seen in the MISDA jeremiad against the Village church and the shutdown of John Zirkle’s motion to revisit the 2015 immunization Statement at the 2022 GC Session. While ideological capture can happen on either left or right, it happens more commonly on the left. It can happen in a church bureaucracy, but it never happens in the Body of Christ, people whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. These people are captured by Christ, their conscience is captive to the Word of God and its Author (John 10:28). I submit they are the true church.
Institutions
The values of a society (culture) change and are reflected by slow changes in the values of its institutions over a period of time, but the values of the Body of Christ never change. It is very important for churches to preserve their values, which come from the word of God, the Bible. The function of the church is to serve its constituency not only by responding to what it asks for, but by seeking to preserve the values that have been established in God’s Word (Proverbs 3:27). As an institution with eternal and absolute values, the church necessarily must lead its constituency, not follow it or the culture as does a secular organization. It should not be autocratic (3 John 9-11; Jeremiah 23:1).
A functioning church is organized, meaning they aren’t chaotic, all over the place, or disorderly (1 Corinthians 14:40). People who don’t like organization probably wouldn’t like disorganization either (Judges 21:25). The church is the body of Christ; a family. The church should provide for their people, but not at the expense of their values and the Christian truth. Christ is the one who truly helps and saves people, so to take that away and let it be changed would be disastrous.
As a result of poor leadership, institutions often collapse under the weight of self-preservation. The primary duty of the institutional leader is not to ensure the continuance of the institution but the preservation of its scriptural values.
The Body of Christ
This is a biblical term used to describe the church as the people of God, rather than an organizational institution.
The word "church" in the New Testament is the Greek word ekklésia, which means "a called-out assembly." People. Some say that the church needs to be institutional to persist in time and be a part of history. Others say that while structure can provide stability, too much structure can stifle the spirit.
God designed the church to exist and function as a community, not as an institution or bureaucracy. Let me put it this way, the church is not an “it“, but a “they“!
The church is the body of Christ, of which He is the head. Ephesians 1:22–23 says,
“And God placed all things under His feet and appointed Him to be head over everything for the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills everything in every way.”
The body of Christ is made up of all believers in Jesus Christ from the day of Pentecost (Acts 2) until Christ’s return (Rev. 22:20; 1 Thessalonians 4:16). Biblically, we can regard the church in two ways, as the universal church or as the local church. The universal church is Spiritual Israel.
The universal church consists of everyone, everywhere, who repents and believes on Jesus Christ. Organization and leadership are in there but they are not by biblical definition ‘The church.’
“For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink” (1 Corinthians 12:13).
“And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd” (John 10:16).
These verses say that anyone who believes in Jesus Christ is part of the body of Christ and has received the Spirit of Christ as evidence. All those who have received salvation through faith in Jesus Christ comprise the universal church which will be ultimately gathered into one flock under One Shepherd (Revelation 12:17; 14:12; 7:9). This is the Remnant of Isaiah and Revelation (Isaiah 10:11-16; Revelation 12:17).
The local church is described in Galatians 1:1–2, “Paul, an apostle . . . and all the brothers with me, to the churches in Galatia.” According to this passage, in the province of Galatia there were many churches—they had a localized ministry and were scattered throughout the province. They were local churches. The universal church however is comprised of everyone who belongs to Christ. Members of the universal church should seek fellowship and accountability in a local church.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the church is not a building, an organization, an institution or a bureaucracy. According to the Bible, the church is the body of Christ—all those who have repented and placed their faith in Jesus Christ for salvation (John 3:16; 1 Corinthians 12:13). They are Spiritual Israel. Local churches are gatherings of people who claim the name of Christ. Members of a local church may or may not be members of the universal church, depending on the genuineness of their faith.
The church is not 50-years behind the world, or 10, or 3. The church is separated from the world by an ideological impasse, following the King of Kings (1 Timothy 6:16; Rev. 19:16) while the world follows the prince of this world (John 12:31; Ezekiel 28:18; Isa. 14:13-17). In it—for a purpose—but never of it (John 17:16).
There are only two kinds of people in the world, those who know Christ, and those who don’t (John 17:3; Matthew 7:23). And both kinds are in every denomination, including our own. How will they be separated? Notice this passage:
“The church may appear as about to fall, but it does not fall. It remains, while the sinners in Zion will be sifted out—the chaff separated from the precious wheat.”
In this context, church is not a structure, an institution, or a bureaucracy, but rather the precious Body of Christ who remain (Rev. 19:7). These faithful souls have been purged through the fires of purifying adversity.
The Jews of the Old Testament (Literal Israel) thought they were the only church. But Spiritual Israel is the larger long-range vision of the Old Testament prophecies regarding literal Israel, it is made up of people who individually choose to be governed by God. Spiritual Israel is the church (Galatians 3:29).
I close with this song:
Let us go to church, as some people say
The common terminology we use everyday
You can go to a building, that is something you can do
But you can't go to church 'cause the church is you
You can go to a chapel, you can sit on a pew
But you can't go to church 'cause the church is you
****
“But Jesus called to them and said “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant” (Matthew 20:25).
“God has a church. It is not the great cathedral, neither is it the national establishment, neither is it the various denominations; it is the people who love God and keep His commandments. “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20). Where Christ is even among the humble few, this is Christ's church, for the presence of the High and Holy One who inhabiteth eternity can alone constitute a church” (UL 315.5).
