What is the Real Church of Christ?

By Khen Lim




Image source: berlinheightschurch.com

In the very near future, I will personally experience something that I have never had the chance before. I will be able to hear at least one child call me ‘Daddy’ for the very first time and it will be positively spine-tingling.

I’d wonder what would make her call me ‘Daddy.’ How would she know to call me that? What ‘clicked’ inside her to say that? Did God plant a seed inside her so that I can rejoice in what I hear?

When Jesus asked the Apostles, “Who do you say that I am?” the same sensation could also be up for grabs but before that, He posed a slightly different question:

“Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”

And the Apostles replied, saying that He could be John the Baptist or Elijah or even Jeremiah or some other prophet. As we’d come to expect, very few Jews actually had sufficient clarity about who Jesus was. But when He asked that question, the impact was unimaginable, spell-binding and truly life-changing:

“…Simon Peter answered and said, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.’”

Unlike the common Jewish response, Peter’s answer was not just different; it elevated Jesus to a completely different plane. It was the affirmation of Jesus as the Messiah. Peter revealed the truth that Jesus was the One promised, the exclusive long-awaited Christ, the Son of the Living God, so prophesied ages prior. He was indeed the One sent from God. And Jesus’ answer was phenomenal:

“Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.”

Not only did Jesus complimented Peter; He actually said that Peter’s revelation is divinely given! Peter had not known this because he heard it from someone. He didn’t guess it. He didn’t just say it because Jesus was expecting it. God gave him the truth just like He gives us the same truth today through His Word (Rom 10:17).

And then Jesus continued, saying:

“And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock, I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it” (v.18).

The rock is the truth expressed and on that rock, Jesus said He would build His church.

Nothing in this passage or anywhere in the Gospel of Matthew or the New Testament does it say that Jesus is talking about a physical church, a building or an organisation. It’s easy to impose our imagery of buildings or denominations to Jesus’ promise and believe that, that is what He said but instead, we must place greater importance to the word ‘Church’ to mean a group of people who are called out or assembled.

Rather than thinking of a physical church, Jesus would have a people who would live their lives following Him as it is clear in the Acts of the Apostles and the various Epistles. Jesus’ people are those who follow Him. They are the church that He said He would build on. And the church would be built on the foundation of who He is (1 Cor 3:11).

When an individual like you and I decides today to surrender his sins, be forgiven by Christ and then to follow Him, as that choice is carried out through the obedience of faith, we become one of Jesus’ people and thus we become a member of His church, the very church that He built. This is not about putting our name on the list with an entity housed within a physical building or making a choice to make regular visits to it. While our names may now feature on the rollcall and while we may begin to assemble as such on a regular basis, our inclusion in the body corporate of Christ as His Church will begin the moment we are baptised into Son of God (Acts 2:37-47).

So everyone who is obedience unto Christ is in fact a member of His Church and for that, we use the word ‘universal’ as in ‘the universal church.’ The body of Christ therefore comprises all of us who are obedient to Christ whenever and wherever we are. In other words we are called to be obedient not just in a nominated building but wherever we are to be found.

We find the same use of the word ‘church’ in Matthew 16:18 as well – Jesus was not promising to erect a physical building in Jerusalem and neither was He talking about establishing a group of people in a single location. What He meant when Jesus said, “I will build My Church,” was that He would assemble every person who gives to Him to obedient response directed by the Apostles.

In various specific places around the world, Christians would gather together in groups. Local churches consisted mainly of those in these places who agree to exist as a group to do the Lord’s work as the Apostles directed them to (Acts 2:42).

The universal church was then made up of Christians and by that very term ‘Christians,’ we are not alluding to the contemporary generic term but instead to the specificity of being ‘New Testament Christian.’ Local churches hence are made up of such Christians who are unified in a body purposed in being continually steadfast in the Apostles’ teachings (Acts 2:42, Mt 18:18-20).

All of these should help encourage all of us to be both true to Scripture and also semantically correct as follows:

1.     The universal church is not about grouping individual churches but individual people.

2.    There were no evidence of organised inter-connections among the local churches taught in the New Testament. 

3.    The fact that the group may have called themselves the ‘Church of Christ’ does not imply a denomination. As such any group today that calls themselves as such might just tell us that they know how to paint a sign.

The true Church of Christ isn’t about any congregation that is bound together in some ‘church-hood’ by name or practice or creed. The true Church of Christ must always be about a body of people called out by Christ to acknowledge Him as their head and then to commit to serving Him faithfully.

In our very own local community, there are a few churches. Ours, Hosanna Evangelical Free Church, is but one. And while we look at ourselves, we should ask if we are the true disciples of Christ, if we are truly enjoined to do His bidding, and if we scripturally qualify as a true ‘Church of Christ.’

Never be fooled by a name. We must, as a church, proclaim Christ and test ourselves if we preach and practise what Christ has called upon us to do.

God’s call goes beyond words and here, those of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt in 1960 ring true:

“One’s philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In stopping to think through the meaning of what I have learned, there is much that I believe intensely, much I am unsure of. In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And, the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.”