Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them.
(Acts 20:28-30 ESV)
But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Now as he went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. And falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.”
(Acts 9:1–5 ESV)
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. For the body does not consist of one member but of many. … If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” … If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.
(1 Corinthians 12:12-14, 19-21, 26-27 ESV)
Someone could ask you that question as you are walking outside the church, “Whose Church is this? Is it yours?” You could easily answer that question, “Yes, it is my church. I go here.” Or maybe you would be inclined to answer a different way, “This is God’s Church.” Both answers would be true. After all, the body of believers belongs to the Lord—but, as a member of that body, the body of believers is also your body. It is important, then, that we remember both of these. Many problems have arisen in churches where one of these has been forgotten or neglected.
But before we cover these, we must first recall that the Church is not a building, although we do meet in a building and we generally call that building a church. The word for church in Scripture comes from the Greek word meaning “assembly”; it is used in Scripture to designate the assembly or gathering that is around Christ Jesus, the Word of God, who comes to us in His Word and Sacraments. These mark the presence of the church. (Isaiah 55:11; Romans 10:10-17; Matthew 28:19-20; See also AC V, VI, VII)
Once we remember that the Church is properly Christians—believers in the Triune God, who have been called, gathered, and forgiven in Christ Jesus, and who assemble around hearing God’s Word and receiving His promises in the Sacraments—then we can really and truly deal with the question, “To whom does this church belong?”
Clearly, we see in Scripture that the church is properly God’s Church—Christ’s bride. He created the church out of the rebellious people who had turned against Him—the people He had created perfect and holy in the beginning. The Church is His creation—redeemed, formed, and birthed out of Christ’s sacrificial death for all humanity. The Lord paid the price. It’s not the pastor’s church; he is just a steward of God’s gifts, appointed to care for the church (1 Corinthians 4:1). It’s not the apostles’ church, even though most of them gave their lives for the sake of the gospel; as Paul clearly pointed out, “Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?” (1 Corinthians 1:13 ESV) No, of course not!
Only Jesus died for the Church and He alone can lay claim to her. And He is her protector. Remember how He handled Saul? When Saul was killing Christians, Jesus confronted him and said, “‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’” (Acts 9:4 ESV). Notice how He takes Paul’s actions personally, as against Him. The Church is His Body, after all. So, He calls Saul to account for how he is treating His Body, His Church. He says clearly that Paul is persecuting Him!
Jesus ties the Church’s existence to Himself; He so strongly is tied to the Church that He considered it personal what Saul was doing. Paul was attacking Jesus Himself by attacking Christians, the members of His body. We should not be surprised then that God both cares for us and that He uses us as He wishes and desires. The Psalmist rightly declares, “Yet for your sake we are killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered” (Psalm 44:22 ESV). Paul echoes this in Romans in the midst of reminding us that nothing can separate God’s people from the love that was enacted for us at the cross of Christ.
We live here in this world at God’s leisure, to be salt and light in this world, to be His representatives, who suffer for His sake and for the sake of fellow believers whom He is adding, whom He will add, or whom He will support. This means if God wants to move His people elsewhere, that is His prerogative and His decision. If the Lord thinks it is best to plant a new congregation, close an old one, merge a congregation together, or renew an existing congregation, that is His choice. We might ask questions about why.
No doubt, the disciples asked questions when Saul began to persecute the church in Jerusalem. However, it brought about a salutary effect. The church in Jerusalem had become fairly large and was doing extremely well; it was working through many issues such as having so many widows for which to care. But all that was upended by persecution; such persecution, though, resulted in growing the church. With Stephen’s death and martyrdom:
[A] great persecution [arose] against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. … Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ. … Now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except Jews. But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellenists also, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number who believed turned to the Lord. (Acts 8:1, 4–5; 11:19–21 ESV)
God used a tragedy and a terrible event to grow His Kingdom, just as we pray in the Lord’s prayer. We should know and remember that the Lord can and does use the “bad” and “negative” and “terrible” events that strike His churches to bring about His good purposes.
We may not like those events; we may personally think this cannot be God’s Will. We may even pray that God would take another action but the Lord will do what He knows is best for all His people—for His whole church. Sometimes, that means we may need to suffer for the sake of the rest of the church, not unlike a mother who suffers for the sake of her child or a father who gets injured protecting his wife and children. This, of course, calls for a great amount of trust, but it is trust that God has certainly earned by willingly sacrificing Himself for us.
Does this mean we have no say in this? Paul wanted to travel to Spain to preach the gospel there (Romans 15:24), but we do not know if he actually made it there. We know that he didn’t get to go when he wanted, as he was arrested in Jerusalem and eventually ended up in house arrest in Rome. Paul’s plans didn’t always work out like he wanted or desired. Sometimes, God had different plans for Paul.
And yet, other times, Paul makes it clear that it was his decision. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “For I made up my mind not to make another painful visit to you” (2 Corinthians 2:1 ESV). Paul used his discretion. You see this when Paul wants to go back and visit the churches he already visited earlier and see how they are doing. He seems to initiate this action (Acts 15:35-41).
We should remember that our Lord has spoken to us about these kinds of things. “‘If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples'” (John 15:7-8 ESV). And, “’Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened'” ( Matthew 7:7–8 ESV).
Jesus invites us to pray to Him—and this applies to what we do or will do as His Church. Like Jacob wrestling with God in prayer, or Hezekiah laying before the Lord his petition, or Isaiah offering his lips to the Lord, or even Jesus’ own examples of prayer, which included His request not to suffer—we too have been given the chance to come before God and offer our ideas and our counsel of what we think and what we are willing to do. The Church belongs to Christ, but we are valued members of His body and He listens to us. Now, of course, He will make the ultimate decision, but He does not disregard our pleas or ignore our thoughts. He listens and considers them and sometimes implements them! That is why some people say, be careful what you pray! God might give you what you ask!
This is very important for us to remember. The Church is Christ’s Church, but it is also ours. We cannot sit back and act like we have no part to play or that it depends only on a few, or that we cannot do anything without a specific word from Jesus. We already know what Jesus wants us to do.
Here, though, is where we must be very careful because this is where many churches have gone astray. For we surely know that Jesus wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of Him (1 Timothy 2:4), but at what cost? It could cost us money, possessions, our reputation, even our lives. But losing any of these for the sake of the gospel would be God-pleasing. The problem comes when people compromise God’s Word to “grow” the church.
When a church develops tactics out of psychology or human reason rather than based on God’s Word, the foundation is rotten and will surely fail. When a church focuses on numbers rather than quality discipling or centers things on the charisma of the pastor rather than the power of God’s Word, the shift will harm any faith that is born amongst the people. When a church dismisses a sin as unimportant or breaks the commandments to increase their reach to more and more people, then the hypocrisy chokes the faith of the next generation.
Thus, God’s people must take care how they proceed—not according to human wisdom or the ways of man—but according to God’s prescribed ways, through the teaching and preaching of His Word, even as weak as that seems. There is certainly a lot of room here, though. Shall I spend my time talking to the neighbors on my left or right or across the street? How shall I pray for them? Shall I pray for faith? For hardships such that they might be open to hearing and I might have a chance to witness? Shall we pray for healing and help so that they might know God’s compassion?
Shall we personally invite people or open our gym up and see if we have opportunities to converse? Shall we join our efforts together with other Christians around us or move our efforts elsewhere? How shall we proceed in our place and neighborhood? There are many possibilities and we should be praying about them—not only what God would want us to do but what we would want to do and about what we think would be good.
After all, we are part of Christ’s body and He loves us such that He hears our prayers and listens to us. He has entrusted us as His people with caring for His Church and made us priests and witnesses of Him in this world.
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. (1 Peter 2:9–10 ESV)
We are here to represent Him to the world and to pray for the sake of those in this world that they would not be lost. We stand praying for the sake of our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, seeking what is for their benefit and blessing as well. We are a body and so we care for them. How many are the prayers that others have prayed on your behalf already, and to which the Lord has heard and answered for your benefit? I know that it is more than I can count for myself. We cannot forget this.
For those who have forgotten that the Church is ours and that she is Christ’s, have wandered into a number of errors. Those that forget Christ is in charge, hang the church’s existence on human efforts—they act and behave like the church will not exist or survive without them. They put a heavy emphasis on the future of the church based on something we humans can quantify—the church depends on the youth, on new converts, on foreigners, on money, on programs, on the building, on our evangelism efforts, and so forth. When you fall into this error, the church’s life is centered on human activity. In fact, some of the most “successful” churches fall into this trap—they say, “Look how alive we are! Look at all we are doing!”
Those who forget that we are the church and body of Christ, refuse to take ownership of their church. They expect others to act. They wait for signs from God. They do not realize that God has allowed them some discretion in carrying out His mission and purpose. They sit around and expect God to provide without them doing anything. In other words, they act like the man who sits at home saying, “I prayed to God for food. Now I wait for it to appear at my table.” Such a man has forgotten that God has given him hands and arms and feet and the ability to work, to buy food, and to prepare it. He waits for God and yet God has already provided him!
We should take time to examine our own hearts and lives—have we fallen into any of these errors? Perhaps fears have played a part for our inaction, or perhaps arrogance and pride is driving our actions. Whatever the case, the Lord would have us repent and return to our callings, to our vocations. We remain His Church in the place He has put us and we remain about His work as long as we are here, whether we remain in this place or He moves us to another. So, fold your hands and get on your knees and pray; then get up and do what the Lord has put before you, living according to the way He has taught and instructed you.
Lord Jesus, You called us out of this world to be Your body, sacrificing of Your life blood to make us Your own. Grant us humility to live under Your direction, ready to suffer for the gospel, but also give us courage to act boldly and decisively in speaking Your Word before the world that more might hear, believe, and be saved; for You live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.