It’s often heard, “I’m a member of St. Francis Church” or “I’m a member of First Baptist Church” or “I’m a member of a non-denominational church.” We focus on our membership. We focus on what ‘choice’ we have carefully made of the church to which we belong. This is all well intended, I’m sure. But, I think it exposes a blind spot.
It is almost like we are on some spiritual game show. We’re standing in front of a row of doors for different churches or doctrines trying to decide which one to choose, which one is the right one. We bite our nails and make the call and the crowd gasps, “Oh no! He’s converting!?!” our grandmother says. Or a dear friend proudly says, “Good choice bro!” Our atheist and agnostic friends are standing by wondering what the big deal is. “What time is happy hour?” they might say to just change the subject.
Forgive my playful depiction of choices many hold sacred. But I bring out the humor to hopefully reframe the conversation. I think we are too fixated on the transaction of membership and not the fullness of our fellowship. And, in either case, I think we fixate on ourselves. It’s true that we are constantly confronted with choices. And the diversity of the people in the church has never spanned a wider continuum. But, I don’t believe it’s ‘our’ church to choose. It’s not about us. And I think our membership depends far less on our choices than on the Founder’s initiative. But, I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me backup and re-lay a foundation.
Let me start with the basics. I believe in Jesus Christ. He is the Savior and Redeemer of the world. He died for our sins. He rose from the dead. And before He ascended into heaven, He commissioned His followers to be the first expression of His church. He is the Founder and Head of His church. For years I have thrown around the word ‘church’ a lot and yet have had very little understanding of where it came from or what it means.
The word ‘church’ has an interesting history. Often we translate the word ‘church’ from two main Greek words. The first is kyrios which means “Lord”. The word church evolved when kyrios was used as an adjective with oikos (meaning ‘house’) to form kyriake oikos or “The Lord’s house”. That word kyrios went through translations and adaptation from Greek to German to English (kyrios -> kyriake -> cirice -> church) and we get church meaning “The Lord’s house”.
There’s another Greek word in the New Testament, ecclesia, that is often translated into ‘church’. It is used to identify a gathering. This word means “to call out”.
The Bible uses the term… of the Hebrew ‘kahal’ in both a secular and a religious sense. In the New Testament the word is used of the whole community of the believers in Christ (Matthew 16:18) and of a single community of the faithful (Romans 6:5). The Catechism of Trent defines Ecclesia as the Church, which is the “faithful of the whole world.” You can click here and here to read more on this.
So taking all this into account, how do we define the Church? I believe the ‘Church’ is the group of people who are called out of the world to be together under Christ. Christ is the head of this group or “body of Christ.” And regardless of all the “options” we may think we have, there’s only one Jesus and one Church.
Jesus set everything up from the very first day. His chosen Apostle, a man named Peter (which means rock), the rest of the 12 disciples of Christ, and about a hundred other followers assembled together in Jerusalem in about 33 AD…almost 2000 years ago. Their Master, Jesus, had risen from the dead and ascended to heaven. Before He ascended into Heaven, Jesus gave them specific instructions to wait there for something special. Without warning, a rushing wind, tongues of fire, and a spectacle emerged for many to see. Peter stood as the leader to give the sermon and 3,000 more were added that day. The official birthday of the church, the one church.
So, what point am I trying to make? The point is to reorient us a bit on what the church is and what our role is in it as well. We often think the church is a building or denomination or a morning meeting on a street corner. We evaluate theology, leadership, or other stylistic aspects. Then we ‘choose’ one ‘church’ over another. I have engaged in this exercise many times. I confess that my decisions were often driven by my consumer mindset and unconscious biases. But, a larger reality exists that is much truer than I have likely ever realized.
I think this is reality: There’s only one Church. There’s not two churches (Catholic and Protestant). There’s not thousands of churches (when we start factoring in all Protestant denominations). There’s not millions of churches (when we consider the number of local congregations worldwide). The Nicene creed states, there is ‘one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.’ One means singular. Holy means set apart for him. Catholic means universal, across time, nations, languages, etc.. And Apostolic, means under the leadership and succession of Christ’s original 12 apostles. Many mainline Protestant denominations (along with their Catholic brothers and sisters) recite this creed. And I thank God for the leaders who have protected the faith in this powerful statement for centuries. But, I’m sure, some don’t really understand what they are professing. If we profess the creed on a Sunday at the church where we hold membership, do we practice the Creed on Monday with all our brothers and sisters in fellowship?
The reality is this: If we trust in Jesus Christ we are likely in a much larger, more global body that spans millennia. It even includes billions who have died before us and will include billions who will come after us. Our initiation into this group depended on us about as much as our membership in our biological families. I believe the work of salvation is a work of God, not man. He does the saving. We do the trusting. God (the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) deserves all the credit. If we are a member of anything, God has brought us into it. A fitting verse from Scripture regarding this is found in Paul’s first letter to the early church that gathered in ancient Corinth.
“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…”
1 Corinthians 12
So what’s the point? What’s the question? If we are in one church why don’t we experience it? Why is there so much confusion? Why is there so much division? It’s not a question of membership. It’s a question of fellowship.
The question is how engaged we are in fellowship in the church? No matter how responsive we are to that question, I believe God continues to take initiative with us to invite us into fellowship. And this is not just about our relationship with Him individually. Our relation with our Head is also with His Body, His church. We are baptized into a family, a communion of saints who have the same baptism.
“There is one body and one 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 all, who is over all and through all and in all.”
Ephesians 4:4–6
I have ‘chosen’ many churches over the years. After being baptized at 9 months old I grew up as a practical atheist. I was drawn back to the Episcopal church in my teens prompted by my friends and my mother. I entered the world of evangelical ministries in college. I have a seminary degree and debated much theology. I have been in house churches in Africa. I have worshipped with people from countless countries and cultures all who would gladly recite the Creeds. I thought I was relatively aware and engaged. But honestly, I still lacked awareness and appreciation of the universal, global church. Recently, a dear friend helped me see this larger reality.
It happened quite simply really. It started with just a simple walk as two friends. I asked lots of questions. He had lots of intriguing answers. I played the curios Protestant. He played the approachable Catholic. After the conversation, he sent me a book called “The Catechism of the Catholic Church.” I read it cover-to-cover. I found in there so much of what I already believed. And I walked away with a much greater appreciation and understanding of my brothers and sisters who have protected the faith for so many centuries.
I joined a group at a local Catholic parish called Saint Francis. The meetings covered a variety of topics and exposed a larger world I had not really ever seen. That larger world often centered on my brothers and sisters in history past who had trusted Christ in amazing ways and left an enduring legacy. Examples included Augustine, Ignatius, Cyprian, Felicity, Perpetua, Agatha, Lucy, Agnes, Cecilia, Anastasia, Francis, Teresa, and so many other brothers and sisters I’d never really heard about or learned from.
I won’t try to make it all seem easy or simplistic. Issues of faith and the church are often complex and mysterious for sure. There are issues that spark debate, confusion, and misunderstanding. But my goal was not to debate my choices of membership. My goal was to engage in fellowship. I was assuming membership. These are my brothers, sisters, cousins, and uncles right? We have the same Savior right? That’s how they all treated me, like a brother. But perhaps I like a brother who missed most family reunions or never showed up to Thanksgiving or was always traveling?
As I think about it, the church is not really that different from the large, extended family I grew up in. I have a blood brother who is also like a best friend and nephews and nieces who are like my own children. I also have cousins I’ve never met, great uncles I’m not supposed to ask about, and great grandparents who have done great things unbeknownst to me. Whether I like it or not, they are all: Family. The question is this: “How engaged am I in fellowship with them? How do I honor them? How do I join with them in what we all hold in common (instead of our differences)? And we don’t just hold in common some watered down version of faith. The Creed is a jampacked anchor of great depth and theology that so many will profess in so many languages around the world this week.
The question is not membership. The question is fellowship. My answer is to engage. I hope you will engage with me. If you engage from a spirit of curiosity, I think you’ll find some amazing things in the family treasure trove. This reminds me of a story when two curious disciples met Jesus for the first time. They had no real knowledge or understanding. But something prompted them to fellowship with Jesus and they asked him where He was staying. “Come and see,” He famously said. What a great way to get started in fellowship!
But if you approach as a skeptic, protective and defensive of your own background, you might not experience much. If you are fixated on which church you are choosing as you shop around, you might be distracted. If you are worried about your membership status you might miss new opportunities all together. Don’t worry about membership. Focus on fellowship.
Come and see. Come and engage in the fellowship of the ‘one, holy, catholic, and apostolic’ church.
See you at the next family reunion. 🙂