Ten Biblical reasons to be part of a local church -- hmm

Ten Biblical reasons to be part of a local church

#1-7 adapted from Blest be the Tie that Binds Don Kistler on Church Membership – from “Protestants Affirm the Church”, a Soli Deo Gloria publication

We know that the church is not a new invention. The Greek word often translated “church” referred to God’s people in the Old Testament as well. Acts 7:38 speaks of “the church in the wilderness” (KJV) during the time of Moses and the exodus. However a new way of referring to God’s people was introduced in Paul’s epistles. We are the body of Christ. According to Eph. 5:30 “we are members of His body.” Today we speak of the church in two ways: visible or invisible. The invisible church consists of all true believers throughout all of history. Membership to this is known only by God. The visible church is the covenant community that is recognized as Christians who gather together as local bodies. There is good reason and inference from Scripture that God expects professing believers to hold their membership in a local body:

1. The New Testament churches were local, visible churches. They met in specific places. – Acts 11:26 tells us that the church in Antioch, where the disciples were first called
“Christians,” assembled together for the purpose of being taught. They were gathered together as a church. – Paul wrote his epistles to specific churches in specific locations, with pastors and elders shepherding their flocks. E.g. 1 Cor. 1:2; 2 Cor. 1:1, Gal 1:2; 1 Thess. 1:1; 2 Thess. 1:1.

This says nothing about the man-fearing demand that Christians submit themselves to 'churches' (whatever they mean by that word, they surely don't know because they refuse to specify *because if they do they know they step into a morass*). The Bible defines 'church' in numerous ways giving leave for each era of the plan of redemption to see fit how best it is to see what a church is.

2. The local church is God’s tool for bringing His people to full maturity in knowledge and faith. Eph. 4:11-13: “He gave some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and to the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man” (NASB). These are actual pastors and teachers who are equipping believers. Acts 14:21-23 says that “The apostles taught, and appointed elders for every church.” See also Titus 1:5.

This is the pure demand for man-fearing and respecting of persons. We all know you won't find more ignorant jackasses (and worse) than in leadership positions in churches. Ignorant jackasses (and worse) gravitate towards those positions. Sort of like congress. The key is the Word of God. Do you have it? If I lived in a time where it was only available by word, or by copy within a physical church, I'd be the first in line sitting in the front row everyday, dealing with the human element as a practical necessity. That is not our situation, though, is it? Different needs for different eras of God's plan of redemption.

3. The Great Commission points to church membership (Matt. 28:18-20). Baptism, a sacrament of the church, is administered by one who is commissioned by a church body. Discipling and teaching to be obedient are also properly done in the context of a church with an ordained leader (elder) and a duly constituted church body.

The Bible gives no rule that baptism can only be administered by somebody 'commissioned'. This is a lie. An often told lie by clerics who are looking at their daily living expenses and not at the Bible. As for obedience... Christians are not to be obedient to man. Obedience used this way itself is from the sick vocabulary of man-fearers and those who demand man-fearing and who police their environments to maintain man-fearing.

4. Christ said that He would build His Church (Matt. 16:18). This is the only thing Jesus said He would build – not a seminary, high school, hospital, or baseball field. Yes, He is speaking about the true Church, comprised of all true members of Christ’s mystical body, but those members meet somewhere; they are taught somewhere; they worship together somewhere; and when they do so they are a local manifestation of the larger reality of Christ’s Church, His Body. True Christians want to be a part of what Christ is building. Believers want to manifest their association with Christ and His Church in any and every way possible.

You said it yourself: "Yes, He is speaking about the true Church, comprised of all true members of Christ’s mystical body..." Yet you just had to go beyond that. Because you demand what you demand whether the Word of God gives you warrant or not. Christians find other Christians in the natural course of having the Holy Spirit in them. Those who demand man-fearing and respecting of persons and 'obedience' to clerics don't have the market cornered on Christian fellowship.

5. The Church is one of two organisms divinely instituted by God for the spreading of His love and His gospel. One is the church; the other is the family. Membership is not optional in either one. By virtue of being physically alive, we are members of a particular family. We are not simply members of ‘the family of man,’ but we are also members of an individual, specific, local family. By virtue of being spiritually alive – born again or regenerated – we are members of the invisible Church, the family of God, and therefore must join ourselves with the actual reality of that concept, namely the local church. The Old Testament practice of membership certainly shows the importance of this affiliation. Being an Israelite was not simply an issue of race and nationality, but an issue of being in covenant bond with God. Romans 9:6: “For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel.” What made someone a true Israelite was his relationship with the living God. God commanded circumcision as the sign of acceptance into the covenant community (Gen. 17:7-10). In fact, God nearly killed Moses for not circumcising his male child. Abraham was not a Jew by birth, but by circumcision. Baptism is now the New Testament sign of acceptance into the covenant community (Col. 2:11). There was not only to be an inward reality, a circumcision of the heart, but an outward sign of that invisible reality. Time and time again God calls for an outward show of what has happened internally. Good works do not save, but they are visible evidence that a work of grace has taken place in the heart.

>The Church is one of two organisms divinely instituted by God for the spreading of His love and
His gospel. One is the church; the other is the family.

So why does God put so many of His elect in non-churchgoing families? Perhaps it's to protect us from the inanity and damage that can and does occur in such vain, man-fearing and shallow environments.

>Membership is not optional in either one.

I say get thee behind me, Satan. Police fools. Christians are strangers in this world. In this world, not of this world. They are not defined by 'family.' Or what building they attend. (I'm starting to look for my horse whip...)

As for the rest of this point #5, the invisible church of which Christ is King is not your local church. (And let's state it here: which local church, pilgrim? Yours? But of course! So what about all those Christians in wrong local churches? Can they all fit into your building? No? But then they must recognize you are their leader they must be 'obedient' to and thus make clones of your little church building all over the world? Maybe they better just learn from and conform themselves to the Word and the Spirit like real Christians. As for the correlation of ritual water baptism and circumcision... You infant-baptists lose that debate every time you attempt it. And you lose it on the ground of and before the tribunal of something called the Word of God. I'll be obedient to the Word of God, not to the word and demands of man.

6. God’s people are repeatedly called to a visible place throughout Scripture. Nehemiah 1:8-9: “I will gather them from there and will bring them to the place where I have chosen to cause My name to dwell.” The people He is gathering are His servants and the people whom He redeemed by His great power and His strong hand (Neh. 1:10). This was not a rote, empty religious practice, but it was a joy for those involved.
– Psalm 26:8 “O LORD, I love the habitation of Your house and the place where Your
glory dwells.”
– Psalm 27:4 “One thing I have asked from the LORD, that I shall seek: That I may dwell
in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD and
to meditate in His temple.”
– Psalm 84:1 “How lovely are Your dwelling places, O LORD of hosts!”

This has to do with providence. Now notice how the person who wrote this would no doubt mock endlessly if you told him that God bringing Christians to the New World and America is God providentially gathering His people together. Mock away. There will be mockers in the end times. And very ignorant and ungrateful self-identified Christians.

7. Much of the Bible cannot be obeyed without belonging to a church as a member. Appreciating those who have charge over you (1 Thess. 5:13) is not possible if you are not in some official way under someone. Hebrews 13:17: “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they keep watch over your souls.”

And here we have the key verse used by Romanists to demand Christians come under the power of the Beast. Good work, Protestant cleric. To counter the devil here always go back to Hebrews 13:7 for the context of Hebrews 13:17. "Remember them which have the rule over you, *who have spoken unto you the word of God.* I.e. they have the Word of God. In that era it was rare to have the actual Word of God. We have it now. (And notice the churchians will do anything and everything in their churches *other than proclaim the actual Word of God, word-for-word.*) The churchians who demand in you to fear man rather than God don't want you to know that context. Again, in that era the Word of God was not as available to all in printed editions as it has been in subsequent eras and certainly our own era. Remember, the Bible gives warrant to see church as it practically needs to be seen in any given era of the history of redemption. House churches? Perhaps, if that is what is needed. Cathedrals? Perhaps if that is what is called for. Elijah in a cave (with the internet) because in that time there were only 7000 who had not bowed their knee to false idols? Perhaps if that is what is called for. Either way God's elect have the Spirit and value the actual Word of God which is the foundation of the invisible church of which Christ is King.

8. When I asked my students if they had any input into this topic Matt Fields replied, “chicks.” It is true that the directive “Don’t be unequally yoked” (2 Cor. 6:14) becomes a lot more feasible if you spend time with like-minded believers. You are much more likely to find a godly, churchgoing companion, who has learned the pattern for marriage from the ideal of Christ and the church (see Eph. 5:22-33), by getting to know those who actually see it as a priority to belong to a church.

Yes, and when you exalt ritual and man above the Word and the Spirit there is the necessity to grow your church by means other than calling and regeneration. Marriage within the church and children and hence...infant baptism! And we're all still making money. Not a lot, but it beats teaching junior high school. You get to feel so much more powerful, with all those 'obedient' people 'under' you and what not.

9. Belong to a church because it is commanded by God. Heb. 10:24-25 “Don’t give up meeting together.” How did they meet together? As mentioned above they met together with pastors and elders who faithfully guarded knowledge and instruct people (see also Malachi 2:7-9; 2 Tim.
1:11,14)

Wow, God says to his own, don't give up meeting together with other of my children, and the churchian twists it as God saying fear man more than God and know that man has the truth 'faithfully guarded' and not the Holy Spirit and the Bible (a King James Version at that!) you are holding in your hands.

10. We should generally have the same view of things as Jesus. Eph. 5:25 says that “Christ loves the church.” So should we. How can we demonstrate this without being part of a local
congregation? Love the church because Christ does. He bought the church with His own blood (Acts 20:28). He gave up his life for the church (Eph. 5:25). We ought not speak derogatorily of something God has so highly esteemed.

I love the church so much that I refuse to take part in any kind of counterfeit of it. We live in times when the devil has his tail up all the churches you know what, and his tongue down their throats. In this era of the history of redemption I stand with the Word and the Spirit and not with ritual and man. Today's leaders of churches can't even recognize the pure and whole - received - Word of God, let alone value it. They mock it. They mock it while at the same time they are demanding their 'laypeople' fear them more than God. I say, get thee behind me, Satan.

Now if a person feels a local church is something they need, then so be it. Each Christian is different and in different stages of development and understanding of the faith. For one a local congregation might be just what they need, yet for another that same congregation might be death to their development. Fallen man, on this subject, demands the same kind of uniformity and policing of human beings that collectivists in the secular political world demand. No, it's not under your control, fallen man. It is, though, in God's control.