1447. The Church, a Specialized Organism

The Church, a Specialized Organism

"Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost" (Mat_28:19).

The Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is an organism to whom its living Head has given a special task, and a special testimony.

The Church has its doctrine, it also has its duty.

The Church has its creed, it also has its conduct.

The Church has its message, it also has its method.

1. The Church's special task. The task of the Church is twofold. First, it has a mission to the lost, the world, the unregenerate; and secondly, it has a mission to the saved, the saints, the regenerate.

(1) Its mission to the lost.

There is but one mission given to the Church world-ward. The Church is commanded to disciple the lost, and to baptize those who believe.

There is but one message given to the Church, world-ward. The Church is commanded to preach the Gospel of Christ. We have but one mission, the salvation of the sinner; we have but one message, the Gospel of salvation.

How greatly has the Church departed from its task!

The world sent forth its S. O. S. call, asking the Church to come to its help. It was about to be overwhelmed by social, moral and economic problems. Its peoples were going down, swept under by waves of crime and shame.

The Church heard its call, and went to the help of the wily world. The churches, more and more, became entangled with twentieth century sentiments and schemes set for the solving of social unrest, and for the salvation of society.

The churches became involved with the world in an endeavor to create a civic consciousness free from contaminating vice.

In all of this, the Church turns aside from its Calvary message; it ceased to preach Christ and began to preach a social gospel.

The churches, under the ministry of the Apostles, knew nothing of joining hands with the world in an effort to civilize the nations. They knew but one message, a message of salvation; they followed but one mission–a mission of world-wide evangelization.

May we follow in their paths!

(2) Its mission to the saved. The Church has but one mission toward its own membership, toward its young and toward its old, and that mission is building up the saints unto the measure of the full-grown in Christ Jesus, unto their perfecting for ministering, unto the edifying of the Body of Christ.

Churches to-day seem to think that they are called upon to furnish amusement and social advancement for the youth. Their church buildings are often turned into playhouses; they have their pool-rooms, their bowling-alleys, their gymnasiums, their moving picture displays, and some of them have gone as far as to put in the vaudeville and the dance.

None of this is carried on under the direction of Jesus Christ; it is all human, it is all of the world, the flesh, and the devil.

The Church has but one mission toward the saved, and that is to teach them the things of God, and to train them in service for God.

2. The Church's special testimony. There is but one theme for the pulpit, and that is Christ. The Church is "separated unto the Gospel of God concerning His Son." There are a thousand themes that are elsewhere worthy of discussion, but they do not belong to the Church.

(1) The Church is not a platform for political propaganda. The Church may pray for rulers, the church-member may be subject unto these "powers that be," but the Church should not memorialize legislatures, nor seek to conduct civic affairs.

(2) The Church is not a center for social assemblies. If the Church yielded itself to every call for social uplift, and presented the pleas of every organization formed for the betterment of mankind, it would have no time and no taste for its real task of preaching Christ.

(3) The Church is not a forum for the solving of financial upheavals.

The mission of the Church is not to equalize wealth and wages; it is not to seek to stem the tide of disquiet and distress that trobs the working world.

There are patriots pleading for the poor, and there are politicians pleading for the rich; both would like to enter the Church, stand upon its platform and present their cause; the Church can have none of this.

(4) The Church is not set aside to set up or to sanction educational schemes. To be sure, the Church may teach her own sons the things of God; it may protect its youth from the false philosophies of men; but the Church must not enter the educational realm, excepting as it is seeking, definitely and specifically to preach Christ, either to the saving of the lost, or the perfecting and the training of saints.

The Church has no excuse for its vying with the world in its educational methods, and message. Its educational task is distinct from the world's.

The very fact that the Church has wandered away from its specialized message, and has yielded itself to a thousand other messages has impoverished it.

Had the Church kept the vision of the Father, followed on in preaching the Word, the whole Word, and nothing but the Word, it had made far greater progress in its God-given task.

Autor: R.E. NEIGHBOUR