Sermon Tone Analysis

“Many signs and wonders were regularly done among the people by the hands of the apostles.

And they were all together in Solomon’s Portico.

None of the rest dared join them, but the people held them in high esteem.

And more than ever believers were added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, so that they even carried out the sick into the streets and laid them on cots and mats, that as Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on some of them.

The people also gathered from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing the sick and those afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all healed.”

[1]

A church of Jesus Christ is a body of baptised believers, associated together in one place to preach the Gospel, to keep the ordinances and to represent the interests of Christ’s kingdom in the world.

[2] This old definition of the word “church” was at one time well known to Baptists throughout North America.

Unfortunately, this definition has fallen into disuse in this day.

As it has been dropped from common usage, so the biblical concept of a church has also been forgotten.

The word “church,” as used in the New Testament, usually refers to a local assembly or congregation of the followers of Christ.

The exceptions would be when the term is used of an ideal or in perhaps one instance when speaking of the saints who shall be assembled in the presence of the Master following the rapture.

In the days of the New Testament, believers associated and covenanted together for religious worship and work.

These are the only kind of New Testament churches on earth.

Consequently, and as a significant aside, the term “universal church” is extra-biblical, as is the concept.

Though we share the Faith in common with all who are saints, we make no appeal of belonging to an amorphous, indistinct something named “universal church.”

A New Testament church is a local, independent body subject to no central human power.

Governed by the New Testament code, it is subject only to Christ, the Living Head and to His Word.

The New Testament knows nothing of a church covering a given territory, such as the Church of England or the Church of Ireland.

The Word of God knows nothing of a denomination called by the name of a religious entity, such as the United Church or the Roman Catholic Church.

Thus, there is no creature such as “the Baptist Church,” although there are Baptist churches.

The issue is sufficiently important to our understanding of Baptist theology that it bears repeating.

There is no “Baptist Church” as a denominational, national or universal entity.

One does not belong to “the Baptist Church,” though an individual may belong to “a Baptist church.”

Yet another truth must be stated for precision and accuracy.

Churches were created not in order to save people; they were organised for saved people.

A church is a congregation of baptised believers, covenanted together and observing the ordinances of Christ.

This assembly covenants to carry out the principles of the New Testament as they worship, evangelise and fellowship under the headship of Christ Jesus.

We believe that a church is responsible to the One who brought it into existence.

The corollary to this truth is that a congregation has no responsibility to any hierarchy or outside authority.

A congregation has no authority of its own, but is subject to the authority of Christ as expressed through the Word of God.

Thus, a church does not—indeed, cannot—save.

A church is the body of Christ, for He is the head of the church.

[3]

This simple ecclesiastical truth is neglected to the detriment of congregational strength and vitality.

Too many Baptists are ignorant of the most basic truth concerning their church.

The reason for this ignorance must be laid at the feet of pastors who are themselves illiterate concerning the teachings of the Word of God, or else they hold no convictions worthy of the blessed name by which they are called.

Join me in exploration of the model provided in the New Testament of the Church that Jesus loved.

TWO CONCEPTS OF CHURCH MEMBERSHIP — “They would all meet in Solomon’s Colonnade.

None of the rest dared to join them, but the people praised them highly.”

How people can read the same book and come to such radically different conclusions as they do is a mystery to me.

As an example, history has witnessed development of a concept that permits a union of state and church.

Nevertheless, Baptists are adamant in insisting that such a union is a monstrosity and an abomination before God.

A significant segment of Christendom is convinced that people are born into the church, much as they are born citizens of a nation.

Baptists, however, stand firm in insisting that only one born from above is qualified to be recognised as a member of a New Testament congregation.

The question of church membership—whether a person must be converted to be a church member is certainly the most important and controversial of all that concerns the teaching of the church.

This question divides the Christian world into two unyieldingly opposed groups.

On one hand, the churches “of the masses” or “the multitudinous churches” (all of the state churches) affirm:

“One can consider the visible or exterior church as composed of all the inhabitants of the Christian world, even the indifferent and unbelieving… One comes into the world, thus into relationship with the lights and graces it sheds, here one is brought up in the knowledge of the truth; but after having been a member in fact one must become a member by choice; one must declare he is joining it on the conviction that it is evangelical… This principle is recognised by all the great Christian communities.

They baptise infants, but they do not admit anyone to the Lord’s Table until he is older, has received more or less serious instruction and testing at which time he is required to confirm his baptismal vows.”

[4]

In contradistinction to that view, Baptists believe that a “church is a society of believers and of believers only; entrance into the church is on the basis of accepting of one’s own free will the grace of God in Christ.”

[5]

The confession of faith for one group of European Baptists states: “We believe that conforming to the practise of the apostles, it is absolutely necessary for all those who make up a local church to have accepted the Gospel message, to have manifested the new birth by faithful Christian conduct, and to have testified to their faith by being symbolically buried.”

[6]

However, in most of the European countries, one is a member of the church unless he or she specifically asks not to be a member.

As an example of this practise, in Sweden today each Swedish child that is born in the nation is born a citizen of Sweden, and is also born a member of the Lutheran church.

In order to disassociate oneself from the state church, there must be a legal process through which one is allowed in these modern days to not become a member of that state church.

There is no such doctrine in all the Word of God.

Such teaching does not come out of revelation of the Word of God, but it comes through coercion and through an unholy union of church and state.

Professor Alfred Kuen cites several examples of this practise by state churches in his excellent book, I Will build My Church.

[7]

Article 4 of the constitution of the Evangelical Reformed Church of Neuchâtel states that, “The Church considers to be members all who do not declare themselves excluded from it.”

In other words, they believe that citizenship or even residency makes one a member of that particular congregation and imposes upon one the duties of a member of that particular religious group.

“In our canton (Vaud) all who do not declare themselves not to be a part of the national church are considered to be members of it” (Pastor André Bovon, president of the syndical council).

“The national Church of Geneva is composed of all people of Geneva who accept the organisational forms of the Church as later established” (Art.

114 of the political constitution of 1847).

“These organisational forms are purely administrative which have nothing, either remotely or closely related, to do with the Christian faith and life.

All the amendments tending to indicate that the National Church of Geneva was a Christian Church were ruled out by the Great Constituent Council” (Henri Heyer, L’Eglise de Genève, p. 155)

“The matter of belonging to the Church rests upon the residence in the district of the community” (Constitution of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Bavaria [1920], Art. 7, paragraph 2).

“The child must be incorporated in the Church, the body of Christ, from his birth” (Reformed evangelical synod of Pau).

“Our church is a multitudinist Church.

One becomes a member by birth, not by the new birth, and is considered a member as long as he has not asked to be dropped from the church” (Church of Zurich, Dienst der Kirche in Unserer Zeit).

Most Canadians are members of a church because they were born into that particular communion.

Their parents arranged for them to be christened into the church and they are members of that church—whether they have been born from above, whether they believe the tenets of that particular communion, or even whether they are agnostics or atheists.

For the majority of professing Christendom, people never had a choice of whether they would join the church of which they are a member—they only had a choice to withdraw from the particular church.

As is true for the European churches, for the most of Canadians, church membership was arranged by parents instead of being a response by the individual to the teaching of the Word of God.

For most Canadians, church membership is not a volitional act.

Throughout the Word of God, it is apparent that those who have faith in God will commit themselves openly to union with others sharing the Faith in worship of God and service to His cause.

Tragically, by this late date there has arisen an understanding that the church is a social organisation, or even a national organisation.

Consequently, many more people profess to be members of the various churches than have been born into the Kingdom of God.

Baptists have stood from the days of the New Testament on the principle that one must be born again in order to be a member of a church.

THE REQUISITES FOR MEMBERSHIP IN A NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH —“More and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to the group of believers.”

[8] The text makes clear that faith in Christ was a precursor to membership during the days of the Apostles.

Those received into membership were expected to give credible evidence that they had received Christ as Saviour and Lord.

Becoming a Christian is a voluntary matter, and only Christians should be members of a church.

Consequently, the corollary must be that all Christians should be members of a church.

The Church of Jesus Christ is to be a regenerate church—each congregation being composed of saved people.

In every closed society, one must choose to enter after having met a certain number of conditions.

According to the New Testament, what conditions had to be met by those who wished to become members of the church?

Consider a few examples.

“Those who accepted his message were baptised, and about three thousand were added to their number that day” [ACTS 2:41].

“The Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved” [ACTS 2:47].

“Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.

Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Christ there.

When the crowds heard Philip and saw the miraculous signs he did, they all paid close attention to what he said.

With shrieks, evil spirits came out of many, and many paralytics and cripples were healed.

So there was great joy in that city…

“When they believed Philip as he preached the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptised, both men and women” [ACTS 8:4-8, 12].

Peter proclaimed the Word of God in the house of Cornelius, a Roman centurion.

The Holy Spirit was poured out on all who heard the Word [see ACTS 10:34-46].

Peter commanded those who had received God’s Spirit to be “baptised in the Name of Jesus Christ” [see ACTS 10:47, 48].

“Crispus, the synagogue ruler, and his entire household believed in the Lord; and many of the Corinthians who heard him believed and were baptised” [ACTS 18:8].

When you review the evidence, you are compelled to accept that the obligatory condition for church membership as revealed through the pages of the New Testament is faith and its corollary, baptism.

Exactly the same succession of events is found for multiple individuals in the New Testament—preaching, faith, baptism, membership.

Paul relates his conversion [ACTS 9]—he is baptised and seeks to join the church in Jerusalem [ACTS 9:18, 26]; finally, he joins the church in Antioch [ACTS 11:26].