The True Church

Alexander LaBrecque

In the article below Alexander LaBrecque defines the church and examines sectarian claims of some denominations to be God’s only true church, to the exclusion of other Christian groups.

Introduction
Many of the confessions of faith held by various segments of the Christian community have described the true church in the language of the Nicene Creed (fourth century) as the ‘one, holy, catholic and apostolic church’. The attributes of the church presented in this formula are biblical concepts.

During the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century, controversy arose over the identity of God’s true church. One of the papacy’s major arguments against the Reformers was that the Church of Rome was the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church. Protestants, of course, denied Rome’s claim. But how could one test the claims of opposing religious bodies to be the ‘true church’?

Rome, for example, interpreted these attributes in institutional terms. ‘Unity’ meant lockstep conformity to the wishes of the hierarchical Roman structure. ‘Catholicity’ meant the propagation and maintenance of a formal, worldwide organisation. ‘Holicity’ was defined as submission to the teaching of a succession of Roman bishops who claimed to wear the mantle of Peter.

The Reformers, however, contended that the attributes of the church could not be properly understood apart from the gospel of Jesus Christ. The church’s real unity, holiness, catholicity and apostolicity, they said, were all rooted in God’s great saving act on Calvary. Therefore, the identity of the true church could be judged by whether or not the marks of the pure preaching of the gospel and the proper administration of baptism and the Lord’s supper (by which the gospel is portrayed) were present in the community. This gospel alone would produce the attributes by which the true church can be known.

The Reformers had recovered a vital truth. The New Testament teaches that the attributes of the true church are soteriological rather than institutional. The church is one because the atonement of Christ has broken down the wall that once separated human beings according to class, race and sex. The church is holy because Christ’s death has purchased and set apart those who believe the gospel, to be God’s chosen people. The church is catholic (ie. universal) because Christ’s blood has washed away the sins of the whole world and because this gospel is now preached to every nation, kindred, tongue and people. The church is apostolic because its faith and life are grounded solely on the testimony of the apostles whom Christ appointed to witness and proclaim his saving work.

The Church Is One
The unity of the church is grounded in the saving act of the One of the many. Justification unto life has been obtained for all (Rom 5:18,19). One has died for all; hence, all have died (2 Cor 5:14). The risen Lord is the exalted head of the new humanity, which God has created, by his redemptive act (Eph 1:19-23; 2:14). On the day of Pentecost those who believed the proclamation concerning Christ were added to the church and continued in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, the breaking of bread, and prayer. The community of believers was ‘of one heart and soul’ (Acts 2:41,42; 4:32).

All are sinners and share equally in the imputed righteousness of Christ. ‘The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ (is) for all who believe. For there is no distinction; since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, they are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus’ (Rom 3:21-24). God is the God of both Jews and Gentiles who believe on Christ, ’since God is one; he will justify the circumcised on the ground of their faith and the uncircumcised through their faith’ (Rom 3:30).

The oneness of God’s people transcends such potentially divisive distinctions as race, sex and class. ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus’ (3:28). ‘By one Spirit we were all baptised into one body–Jews or Greeks, slaves or free–and all were made to drink of one Spirit’ (1 Cor 12:13). Christ has reconciled all men to God ‘in one body through the cross’, creating ‘in himself one new man in place of the two’. All believers are therefore fellow-citizens, members of the household of God, built upon the one foundation laid by the apostles and prophets. In Christ the whole church is joined together securely as a temple upon its sure foundation (Eph 2:14-22). ‘No other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ’ (1 Cor 3:11). There is one flock and one shepherd, one church and one Lord–who has purchased us with his own blood (John 10:15,16; Acts 20:28).

The Unity of the Christian church is not something to be conjured up by psychological organisational means as though it could not exist without our strenuous efforts. The unity of the church is something God has already given. It is not to be manufactured, but maintained, as believers live in response to God’s call which has come to them in the gospel. God’s people are to forbear one another in love, ‘eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all, who is above all and through all and in all’ (Eph 4:3-6).

The unity of the church is not uniformity. The Spirit has imparted to believers a diversity of gifts (1 Cor 12:4-27). Believers are one body in Christ, and as members of one another they need one another. The variety of their spiritual gifts enables them to fulfil different services to the body of Christ and thereby edify one another. Such diversity strengthens the church for its mission in the world (Rom 12:4-8).

In baptism and the Lord’s supper–both rehearsals of Christ’s death and resurrection–the unity of God’s people in Christ is portrayed. ‘As many of you as were baptised into Christ…you are all one in Christ Jesus’ (Gal 3:27,28). ‘By one spirit we were all baptised into one body…and all were made to drink of one Spirit’ (1Cor 12:13). ‘We who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread’ (1 Cor 10:17).

All Christian existence is to be in response to the gospel. We are exhorted by Paul to live a lifestyle that is ‘worthy of the gospel of Christ,’ standing ‘firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel’ (Phil 1:27). In the light of the infinite condescension of Christ in his incarnation and death, believers are to humbly defer to one another in mutual concern (Phil 2:2-8). Believers are to forgive one another, even as the Lord has forgiven them (Col 3:12-15).

An example of the practical expression of the church’s unity in the interrelationship of New Testament congregations is the financial assistance given by predominantly Gentile churches to the poverty-stricken Jerusalem church (Rom 15:25-27; 2 Cor 8,9). The death of Christ is the foundation for such love. While there is a place for external organisation, the unity of the church does not lie in such structures, but rather in the common salvation which believers find in Jesus Christ.

Since the church’s unity is grounded in the gospel its permanence is contingent upon maintaining the purity of the gospel. False teachings, which overthrow the truth of justification by faith, destroy Christian unity by breeding pharisaic exclusiveness. The closest parallel in the New Testament to denominationalism was at Corinth (1 Cor 1:10-17). The problem at Corinth was their preoccupation with things other than the proclamation of the cross, concerning which some thought their ‘wisdom’ had brought them far in advance of the apostolic gospel (1:18ff). Paul, on the other hand, struck a blow at such factionalism by determining to ‘know nothing…except Christ and him crucified’ (2:2).

The unity of the early church was also threatened at Antioch and Colossae. The truth of the gospel was denied in Antioch by Jewish Christians who would not fellowship with uncircumcised Gentile believers (Gal 2:11ff). Paul saw that this would ‘nullify the grace of God; for if justification were through the law, then Christ died to no purpose’ (2:21). In the Colossian church a heresy arose that detracted from the all-sufficiency of the saving act of Christ and put certain works alongside Christ as necessary for full salvation. This led to a situation in which professed believers were ‘passing judgement’ on one another in questions of ‘food and drink’, ‘festivals’ and ‘Sabbath’s’ instead of unitedly ‘holding fast to the Head’ (Col 2:16-19).

Paul, who would allow pluralism in other matters (eg. 1 Cor 8,10; Rom 14), would not compromise on the purity of the gospel. He pronounced a resounding anathema upon any who would deny the completeness of Christ’s finished work and the truth of justification by faith alone (Gal 1:6-9). Such zeal is important, because the unity of the church rests upon the purity of the gospel.

The Church Is Holy
In biblical usage ‘holiness’ or ’sanctification’ refers to that which is set apart for God and his service. The community of believers in Christ is the fellowship of ‘the saints’ (1 Cor 1:2), those whom God has separated from the world to be his people. The church is holy, not by any intrinsic or infused quality, but solely on the grounds of God’s grace: by his redemptive act in Jesus Christ, he has called into being and set the church apart for himself.

The forensic nature of the holiness of the church is seen in its frequent association with God’s ‘election’ and ‘calling’. God elected believers in the person of his Son ‘before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him’ (Eph 1:4). ‘God chose you from the beginning to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth. To this he called you through our gospel, so that you may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ’ (2 Thess 2:13,14). God ’saved us and called us with a holy calling, not in virtue of our works but in virtue of his own purpose and the grace which he gave us in Christ Jesus ages ago, and how has manifested through the appearing of our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel’ (2 Tim 1:9,10). God calls believers through the Spirit in the proclamation of the gospel and sets them apart as his holy people by faith in Christ (Acts 26:18).

The completed atonement of Christ is the sole basis of the believing community’s holiness before God. ‘We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time’. ‘By a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified’ (Heb 10:10,14). In Christ himself is found the church’s righteousness, sanctification and redemption by which it is acceptable to God (1 Cor 1:30). Having been reconciled to God by Christ’s death, believers may be confident that they are ‘holy and blameless and irreproachable before him, provided that (they) continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel’ (Col 1:22,23).

The believing community is a ‘holy temple in the Lord’, ‘a royal priesthood’, ‘God’s own people’ (Eph 2:21-22; 1 Pet 2:5). Such images portray the fact that the church is set aside for service. Believers constitute a spiritual house and a holy priesthood so that ‘you may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light. Once you were no people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy’ (1 Pet 2:9,10). The church has been set apart by God in order to proclaim the Gospel to the world. The holiness of the church is thus a call to action and finds existential expression in the life and service of the believing community.

Because the church is holy, it must be holy. It is a community which lives in the world but must be distinct in its lifestyle, for God has called believers from sin to himself (1 Cor 6:9-11). ‘As He who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in all conduct’ (1 Pet 1:15). Purity of life is commanded ‘as is fitting among saints’ (Eph 5:3). God’s people are to be sanctified wholly unto him (1 Thess 5:23; 4:1 ff). It is true that the community of saints makes many mistakes, commits sin (James 3:2, 1 John 1:8), and must ever repent and be reformed; but as believers await Christ’s return, they are to zealously pursue godliness (Tit 2:11-14; 2 Pet 3:11).

This is not a sterile morality. Christian ethics are Christian because the meaning of all existence has been determined by God’s grace revealed at the cross. Therefore, ‘as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, ‘believers are to exercise love and forgiveness toward one another, as God has toward them (Col 3:12). The church’s existential holiness, the distinctiveness of its life from that of the world, is that it is a community full of the forgiveness of sins, a fellowship of forgiven and forgiving sinners responding to God’s mercy and the lordship of Christ.

The Church Is Catholic
The term ‘catholic’ (from Greek kata holou, ‘according to the whole’) was first applied to the church in the second century. This expression refers to the whole Christian church in contradistinction to the local congregations of believers of which the whole church consists. The catholicity of God’s church is related to the unity of the church, for all the communities of believers throughout the world constitute a worldwide church. Thus, while the New Testament speaks of ‘churches’ in a particular locality, Paul can also speak of ‘the church of God which is at Corinth…called to be saints together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours’ (1 Cor 1:2). Local congregations are the manifestations of the one church of God which consists of believers everywhere. Furthermore, the whole church of God consists of all believers, that is, all who have received forgiveness of sins through faith in Christ’s name (Acts 10:43) Neither the church’s catholicity nor its unity rest upon an external organisational structure, but solely upon the Christ proclaimed in the gospel.

The universal extent of Christ’s redemptive act is the ground of catholicity of the church, and both are related to the universality of the fall in Adam. ‘Sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men had sinned’. ‘One man’s trespass led to condemnation for all men…by one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners’ (Rom 5:12,18,19). Just as the whole world was included in Adam’s fall, so has God’s gracious action Jesus Christ encompassed the entire human family.

God’s desire for the salvation of all mankind has been manifested in the death of Christ as a substitutionary ransom for all (1 Tim 2:4-6). By his death Christ made propitiation for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2). God’s wondrous deed in Christ accomplished the reconciliation of the world to himself, by the imputation of their sins to his own Son, the righteous One who knew no sin (2 Cor 5:19,21). At Calvary the whole world was judged in the person of Jesus Christ. As the risen Lord at God’s right hand who has received all authority in heaven and earth, the Son of Man draws the whole human family to himself through the proclamation of the Gospel (John 12:31,32; Matt 28:18,19).

The church is the universal fellowship of God’s redeemed people, in which it matters not whether one be ‘Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, or free man’ – such distinctions are ultimately irrelevant (Col 3:11). Believers form one universal people whom Christ has ransomed by his blood ‘a great multitude which no man could number’, ‘from every tribe and tongue and people and nation’ (Rev 7:9, 14; 5:9). Although organisation is needed for the church to efficiently implement its mission, the church’s catholicity resides not in any ecclesiastical structure, but solely in the doing and dying of Jesus Christ on behalf of the world.

The Church Is Apostolic
The church is apostolic in that it is founded upon the teaching of the apostles. The New Testament has preserved for the church the content of the apostles’ teaching concerning Christ, his redemptive work, and its implications for the life of the believing community. Thus, the church is apostolic, for it is built upon the knowledge of Christ and the gospel of his salvation proclaimed by the Lord’s chosen messengers.

The word ‘apostle’ – while sometimes used in a general sense in reference to Paul’s colaborers and other missionaries – is predominantly a technical term, referring to Paul and ‘the twelve’. These individuals were the primary witnesses of the crucified Lord to whom he revealed himself after his resurrection and whom He authorised as representatives to proclaim His saving act and to establish the believing community.

The unique authority of the apostles rests upon the ultimateness and finality of God’s revelation in the Christ event. God’s eternal purpose of salvation was accomplished in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus; in the fulfilment and completion of the redemptive history of the Old Testament. Jesus is the Word of God made flesh, in whom God’s eschatological revelation has been fully disclosed (John 1:14, 18; Heb 1:2). From among his disciples Jesus chose twelve to be apostles (Luke 6:13; Acts 1:2). These were to be eyewitnesses of his earthly ministry, death and resurrection (Acts 1:21,22). That which the church knows of Jesus has come through them (John 14:26; 15:26f; 17:20). To them the risen Lord explained how the Scriptures had been fulfilled in the events concerning him; that the Messiah was to suffer and die, but rise the third day, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations (Luke 24:44-48). Paul, who had also been a witness to Christ’s ministry and resurrection life, was later added to this group (Acts 26:12-18; 1 Cor 15: 4-9; 9:1).

As Christ’s designated representative, the apostles’ teaching bears divine authority. Their word is to be received as the Word of Christ himself (Matt 10:40; John 13:20). What they proclaimed was not of human origin, but the revealed Word of God, to be received and accepted as such (Gal 1:12; Thess 2:13). The apostles’ office was to ‘make the Word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations, but now made manifest to the saints’ – the revelation of Christ, the hope of glory (Col 1:25-28; Eph 3:3-6; Rom 16: 25,26). They declared ‘the whole counsel of God’ and ‘fully proclaimed the gospel of Christ’ (Acts 20:27; Rom 15:19). Upon their witness to Christ the church was built (Eph 2:20).

As the church was founded upon the apostles’ witness, so it is nourished and grows by continuing in the apostles’ teaching (Acts 2:42). Congregations are to maintain the traditions delivered to them by the apostles (1Cor 11:2; 15:1ff; 2 Thess 2:15). The strongest condemnation rests upon anyone who would corrupt the purity of the apostolic gospel (Gal 1:6-9). The apostles’ interpretation of the gospel is the final standard of sound teaching (2 Tim 1:13-14; Tit 1:3,9). This is ‘the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints’, the purity of which the church must preserve at all costs (Jude 3).

The church is apostolic in that the apostles testimony to Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the Living God, is the rock on which the church is built (Matt 16:18). Upon the foundations of the New Jerusalem are the names of these apostles of the Lamb (Rev 21:14). In so far as the Christian church upholds the apostolic gospel it is ‘the pillar and bulwark of the truth’ (1 Tim 3:15). This is the apostolic church.

Sectarian Claims
God’s true church is thus the community of all who believe in Jesus Christ, and its attributes may be described as ‘one, holy, catholic and apostolic’. The marks by which we may know the true church are that it believes and proclaims the pure gospel through the Scriptures, baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Its unity, holiness, catholicity and apostolicity are all grounded upon this gospel.

Unfortunately, certain religious institutions have claimed to be God’s only true church to the exclusion of other Christian groups, which are regarded as being apostate. In attempts to find scriptural support for such self-commending claims, appeal is made to certain proof-texts upon which dubious interpretations are imposed. The Roman papacy, for instance, appeals to Matthew 16:18 (’You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church’) in an effort to establish its supremacy. Some religious groups make the name of their denomination the mark of the true church (eg., Church of God’, etc.). Others contend that tongues-speaking is the evidence that they alone have God’s full approval.

Some Seventh-Day Adventists, citing Revelation 12:17, have claimed that our own church organisation is the ‘remnant church’ in contradistinction to all other denominations, which are regarded as ‘Babylon’. While it is true that Adventism has certain distinctives such as the Sabbath, conditional immortality, and an eschatological emphasis that can and should make a contribution to other Christian groups, the exclusivistic claim to be the only true church is misguided.

Sectarianism is contrary to the gospel and denies the unity, holiness, catholicity and apostolicity of the church. It denies the unity of all who believe in Christ for the forgiveness of sins, and thereby brings division into God’s church (1 Cor 3:16-17). It denies the holiness of the church because it ignores the fact that the imperfections in belief and practice seen in different segments of the Christian community have been covered by the blood of Christ. The catholicity of the church is denied by sectarian exclusiveness, for such communities cut themselves off from open fellowship with the rest of Christ’s worldwide body. And the apostolicity of God’s church is denied, since the non-sectarian and evangelical nature of the church rests upon the apostles’ interpretation of the Christ event.

Conclusion
One observer has noted:
“To identify a particular organisation, a particular denominational structure (however much it may be used by God as an instrument of God to do a work in the earth) with the biblical church of the body of Christ, is the mark of a cult.”

Fortunately, God’s grace is greater than our sinful pride, and if we trust in the atonement of Christ we will be forgiven our former sins of ignorance. The one essential mark of the true church is the gospel proclaimed by the apostles, the ‘testimony of Jesus’ which they bore and by which they established the Christian community. Upon this solid rock stands God’s one, holy catholic and apostolic church. At times this church may appear as about to fall, but it will not fall. It will go through to the end, for ‘the powers of death shall not prevail against it’ (Matt 16:18).”