In SLBC Chapter 26 - The Church Part 1, speaker Scott Brown discusses the doctrine of the church, highlighting its importance and the consequences of misunderstanding it. The church is described in terms of its invisible and visible aspects, with the invisible church consisting of the elect gathered under Christ, and the visible church being composed of those who profess faith in Christ and obey His teachings. The church is also referred to as a bride, a body, a family, a building, and a temple, signifying its importance. The chapter also touches on the mixed nature of the church, with pure churches being subject to mixture and error, and the synagogues of Satan representing degenerated churches. The head of the church is described as Christ, who holds supreme and sovereign authority over it. The chapter emphasizes the importance of thinking rightly about the church, the need for reformation, and the consequences of thinking wrongly about it.

The National Center for Family Integrated Churches welcomes you to a series on the Second London Baptist Confession. This session is on chapter 26 of The Church, Part 1, given by Scott Brown. Oh Lord, I pray you would give us understanding for your love for your church and how you've configured her and how you've deployed her and how you have governed her and how we might relate to her members. Amen. In front of you here is a mural that was taken out of a 1684 version of Fox's Book of Martyrs.

And in Fox's Book of Martyrs, In this edition, it's a 3, 000 page version of Fox's Book of Martyrs. But in the mural are the various ways that the church was persecuted by the tyrants of Rome in the first 300 years of the church. And they're very graphic, they're very brutal, but you'll see what happens to members of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. When a person becomes a member of the church, he signs his death sentence in many ways. And this mural demonstrates that quite graphically.

I'd like to read Hebrews 11 verse 30, speaking of the saints of old. By faith, the walls of Jericho fell down after they were encircled for seven days. By faith, the harlot Rahab did not perish with those who did not believe, when she had received the spies with peace. And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah, also of David and Samuel and the prophets, who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, Obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of aliens.

Women received their dead, raised to life again. Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy.

They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth. And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise, God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us. Here is just a testimony of the sufferings and the tumult that those in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ have experienced in time past. We stand with them here. Tonight we'll be spending two hours dealing with the doctrine of the Church as it's represented in the confession of 1689.

And it's a beautiful section. It's the longest section in the confession. It teaches us so much about the Church. There are two great, complimentary institutions in the world that exert enormous leverage in society. The church and the family.

And they're the most formational institutions for all of society. And the family, on the one hand, is the cradle of the church, while the church is the pillar and ground of the truth. Now, in the previous chapter we considered the family, particularly marriage, and we considered the purposes and the operations of marriage. Now, as we come to chapter 26, we come to the church. Now, when we consider the church, it's important that we think rightly about the church.

It's one of the most important things that you can do. If a family's not thinking right about the church, it has enormous consequences. If an individual thinks rightly or wrongly about the church, there are so many effects of it and that would be worth a message on its own, which I think would be a valuable one. But we dare not nurture our own ideas about the church, lest we find ourselves thinking wrongly about it. God has used some very startling language to explain the church.

He calls it a bride, a body, a family, a building, a temple. And these terms bear witness to the absolute towering significance of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now unfortunately, people typically do not assign towering importance to the church. And this is a terrible mistake that people make. They allocate very little thought about it.

They exert very little energy for it. They devote very little time to it. They invest stintingly of their resources. They lightly embrace her people and they prioritize everything else higher than the church. They think of it wrongly and so they commit to it so defectively.

And this is an enormous mistake. It's an error that has such staggering consequences to it. It would be hard to grasp in significance. This confession, though, does state at least some measure of the significance of the church of Jesus Christ. The confession is divided into two parts.

The first part are the characteristics of the church, which are encompassed in chapters 1-7. That's what we'll devote our time to in this hour. And then the second section, the government of the church in chapters eight through fifteen. Now I want to run through all the chapters just very quickly because I've given a title to each one of them just to help us understand the basic thrust of each one of those chapters. Chapter 1 is the identity of the church, of the invisible church.

Chapter 2, the identity of the visible church. Chapter 3, the mixed nature of the church. Chapter 4, the head of the church. Chapter 5, the church called out of the world to walk together in the church. Paragraph 6, the visible manifestations of church membership.

Number 7, the authority invested in the church. And then, I guess we'll stop there. We'll talk about the rest of them in the next session. So let's begin with paragraphs 1 and 2, which really address the Church's identity both as the invisible Church in paragraph 1 and the visible Church in paragraph 2. So we begin with this statement in paragraph one about the invisible church.

The Catholic or universal church which with respect to the internal work of the spirit and truth of grace may be called invisible, consists of the whole number of the elect that have been, are, or shall be gathered into one, under Christ, the head thereof." Now, first, it just should be mentioned that the authors use a word that confuses the modern brain. They call it the Catholic Church. And in using that term, they're not referring at all to the Roman Catholic Church, but they're referring to the Church Universal. They're referring to what the writer of Hebrews spoke about in Hebrews 12 23, to the General assembly of the church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven. To God the judge of all.

To the spirits of just men made perfect. This whole idea of the general assembly and the church. It's referring to what the Apostle Paul spoke of in Ephesians chapter 1 verse 10 when he said that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on the earth in him." So this consists of the whole number of the elect. So the term elect enters into the document. These are those whom God has chosen from eternity past to be part of his church.

It says that they are gathered into one under Christ. How much better, how much better could anything be than to be gathered into one under Christ? You know that song, Oh Lord, I want to be in that number. This is what the authors are speaking about. That his sheep scattered across the world from every tongue and tribe and nation, they were called out of the world by the Spirit and the truth of grace and were rescued.

And this rescued body, he is the spouse, the body, and the fullness of him that fills all and all. So there are these three terms that explain who Jesus Christ is and it implies so much about what has happened to those who are gathered under him as head. Spouse, body, and fullness. These are the things that the church are caught up in as being part of the invisible church of the Lord Jesus Christ. There's a beautiful picture of this in Revelation, chapter 21, verses 9 through 11, where the invisible church is gathered in the New Jerusalem.

Jesus says, Come and I will show you the bride, the Lamb's wife. And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and he showed me the great city, the holy Jerusalem descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone clear as crystal. Also, she had a great and high wall with 12 gates and 12 angels at the gates and names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel. Three gates on the east, three gates on the north, three gates on the south, and three gates on the west.

Now the wall of the city had 12 foundations, and on them were the names of the 12 apostles of the Lamb. Now, the significance of the gathering of the invisible church under the headship of the Lamb of God, it should take our breath away. God rescues the abused of this world, the lost, and He brings them into His church. The unlovely, the unwanted, the adopted. It's a staggering image, really.

All these from every tongue and tribe and nation. I have friends who once went to an organization that were placing babies up for adoption. And during their interview, the husband said, do you ever have any special needs babies that can come available and the woman who was listening to the question began to weep and why are you weeping? She said, well what kind of babies do you mean? I mean Down Syndrome babies or something like that and he doesn't understand why she's weeping and finally she says in over 20 years of doing this I have never had anyone ask me a question.

Everybody wants perfect babies. And so they left and ended up deciding not to pursue anything with that agency, just for some reasons it seemed right to them and then sometime later they received a phone call from this woman and she said we can't do anything about this because it's in another state but there's a Downs baby that could be rescued but could be aborted because the father wants to abort the baby. And so they came and rescued this baby. It was a mighty intervention. And this is what has happened to the church.

This is the nature of the universal church. The unlovely adopted sons and daughters of God being brought under this great headship of the Lord Jesus Christ from every tongue and tribe and nation gathered from everywhere. Every imaginable shade of people gathered into this invisible church. And instead of destruction, gathered up into the spouse, the body, and the fullness of Him who fills all and all. So that's paragraph one.

Paragraph two in the confession speaks of the visible church being composed of confessors, those who confess faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And there are two critical issues here that are raised. All persons throughout the world professing the faith of the gospel and obedience to God by Christ according to it. So the two critical issues are there is a profession of faith in the gospel, this is what they do, and second, obey. Those are the two qualities of the church.

This is our function in the world and honestly we are good for little else but for the proclamation of the faith of the gospel and obedience. I mean, do you realize that we really are very good for hardly anything else in this world? Why are we here? This defines why we are here. Everything else is secondary.

And this is our function in the world. And not destroying their own profession by any errors, averting the foundation. Now, averting means to turn inside out, to overturn, to destroy the foundation. So, our function in the world is to profess the faith of the gospel, to be in obedience, and not to destroy our own profession by any errors that would destroy the foundation. In other words, to keep ourselves from sin, to keep ourselves from bringing shame to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to not do anything that would cause his name to be blasphemed.

And there's so many things that can cause the word of God to be blasphemed. The first thing that comes to my mind even saying it is the Apostle Paul says that a woman should be a keeper at home, lest the word of God be blasphemed. So there are many things that the church can engage in that can cause their profession to be destroyed by errors or unholiness of conversation. In other words, being defiled by worldly things and then that affecting our lives, our conversation, the way that we operate in the world. These are called visible saints.

So now we're talking about visible saints in the world. And of such ought to be, in particular, congregations to be constituted. So here we find the Church doing these two things. They make a profession of faith. They obey.

They live holy lives. And they conduct themselves in a particular way. You will know them by their fruits is the whole idea here. In the Church of Corinth, this whole problem was exposed in 1 Corinthians 5, 1-9. It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles, that a man has his father's wife.

So here in the Corinthian church, these pollutions were there that were corrupting the church. And through unholiness, the conversation of the visible church was being compromised. And then we come to paragraph 3, which speaks of the mixed nature of the church. And there are, in this paragraph, two classifications of churches. There are the purest churches, and then there are the synagogues of Satan.

Those are the two kinds of churches that there are in the world. And what we learn about these purest churches is that the purest churches under heaven are subject to mixture and error. And so this is just a reality of church life. That's why people say there are no perfect churches. They just don't exist.

No one has ever been able to find one. Some churches are better than others. But all churches are a mixture of error and truth. And so in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 11, we see an example of this where the apostle says, for it has been declared to me concerning you, my brethren, that those of Chloe's household, that there are contentions among you. There are often contentions, various maladies that exist in churches, different malfunctions in government, in procedure, in relationship, in practice.

There are all kinds of errors that the church can have. In the Corinthian church, they were saying, I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos. No, I'm of Cephas. No, I'm of Christ. And Paul says, is Christ divided?

Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul? These are just expressions of various errors that find their way into the church. In the Corinthian church, they were suing one another. Brother was going to law against brother before the unbelievers and just marring their whole manner of life in the community.

And so the church is a mixture of error. The church always has problems of overemphasizing something, or underemphasizing something, or overreacting, or underreacting. This will always be with us. And that's why church leaders have to continually progress forward to examine where the church is to continue to move forward away from the various errors that are discovered over time. God is kind to slowly reveal the errors of a church.

The best church leaders are willing to make changes, the worst refuse to because they want to protect maybe their reputations, because they're the ones that started the error. But whatever it might be, this problem is always with us. We ought always to be learning more about how we ought to conduct ourselves in the household of God. This is why the New Testament was written for us, so that we might know how to conduct ourselves in the household of God. Then there's a turning from these pure churches to these synagogues of Satan, and some have so degenerated as to become no churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan.

So this is a completely different category. Maybe you've been to synagogues of Satan before. There's a normal degree of imperfection in churches, but there's also something very different. It's such an apostasy that makes an assembly a synagogue of Satan. This is the condition that we see in the book of Revelation where a lampstand is removed from the church.

These are churches without biblical preaching, without sound doctrine, without discipline, without ordinances, without love. They'll be missing on all of these areas. You have to be able to identify synagogues of Satan and get away from them. Speak to them first and leave them. The church always has to remember what the Apostle Paul said in Revelation 2 verse 5.

Remember therefore from where you have fallen, repent and do the first works or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent. So there's hope for a synagogue of Satan if they repent before their lampstand is removed. But what a tragic thing to have your lampstand removed and to be delivered over to Satan. And then this paragraph continues, Nevertheless, Christ always hath had, and ever shall have, a kingdom in this world, to the end thereof of such as believe in Him and make profession of His name." So this is an incredibly encouraging statement here, that there always have been and there always will be his kingdom in the world. In other words, the church will always be alive.

You cannot kill the church. Well, the Romans tried and it didn't work. And no government will ever be able to stamp out the church. It's an impossibility. The church is not going to die.

The church is going to live and God through the Lord Jesus Christ and the work of his spirit ensures his people that he will always have a people in the world. And typically we're not very insightful about that. And we need to hear what Elijah heard. Oh, I have 7, 000 people that have not bowed the knee to Baal. You think you're alone?

You're not alone at all. But nevertheless, Christ has always had and ever shall have a kingdom of his in this world. And he sets up his kingdom through these churches. This just brings us to the whole important question of reformation. How important it is for churches to be constantly being reformed.

That's the whole principle of semper reformanda. Be always reforming. Our churches will never be unreformable. They will always need reformation. The Lord has commanded us to continue to move forward.

In fact, He commanded us in the Great Commission to teach them to observe all things that I commanded you. All things. In other words, we're in a constant mode of pursuit of the things that Jesus Christ commanded. That is our lot in life as members of the Church of Jesus Christ. And then in the fourth paragraph we encounter a description of the head of the church, the Lord Jesus Christ.

And we encounter this language here. The Lord Jesus Christ is the head of the church in whom by the appointment of the Father all power for the calling, institution, order, or government of the Church is invested in a supreme and sovereign manner. So here is a declaration of how the Church of Jesus Christ is to be led. And leadership in the Church is vested, you see that word there, vested or invested in the Son of God. The Son of God is the head of the church.

He is the regulator and the governor. Not only is he the savior, but he washes and waters. And he keeps the church from going astray. And he keeps the church alive in the world regardless of what governments might ever plan to do. So there's this very clear and beautiful language that he is the head in a Supreme and sovereign manner.

Isn't that a great statement? A supreme and sovereign manner. So only Christ has authority in His church. He's the only one qualified to assume authority. And it's only for Him to regulate the worship of the church, the structure of the church, the relationships of the church, and how the Great Commission is fulfilled.

He has regulated it all for His people. He has already stated what that ought to look like. And so we need to look no further than to the Bible because we have been given there all things that are necessary for life and godliness. And this states what is perhaps one of the most pivotal principles for all of church life. And I would just like to suggest, it is in my mind at least, without question, the most compelling need of the church today is to acknowledge that only Jesus Christ has authority over the church.

We've, we're just, I hope we're exiting a season of church history where the church has become just such a house of inventions, that it has been thought to be the creative palette of man, that man thinks that he can do whatever he wants with the church to make her look however she ought to be attractive to the world. This is an enormous sin against the authority of Jesus Christ over His church. So much of the calamity that we're experiencing in our culture today can be traced right back to this fundamental principle of the authority of Jesus Christ in the church. This is the whole matter of the sufficiency of scripture. We're talking about the foundation of everything that the church rests upon, or at least ought to rest upon.

In our day, we need an entire new generation of leaders and church members who will proclaim that Scripture is sufficient for church life. To proclaim that Scripture is sufficient is nothing less than saying that Jesus Christ is sufficient in the church. Jesus Christ is the author of all Scripture. And it is His Word and His word alone that is able to lead the church in the right direction. And so what we need are a generation of people in the church who are willing to humble themselves under the mighty hand of God, meaning that they will put themselves under His authority and to set aside their own thoughts for the church and to think his thoughts after him.

That's what this first part of this paragraph is about. It is to identify Christ's supreme and sovereign authority over the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then, after saying this, the authors turn to what in their day had become, or at least hope to become in the church, the supreme authority, and that is the Pope of Rome. And so the authors of the Confession say, neither can the Pope of Rome in any sense behead thereof. But is that antichrist, that man of sin and son of perdition, that exalts himself in the church against Christ, and all that is called God, whom the Lord shall destroy with the brightness of His coming." Now this phrase, as clear as it is, has caused some to contend that the confession should be modified and this phrase be removed because the Pope of Rome doesn't hold that position in the same way that he does today.

That's true in one way and it's untrue in another way. The Roman Catholic Pope today actually does stand in the place of Christ over the Church. He absolves sin, he holds keys to heaven and hell, he speaks ex cathedra, meaning that he speaks infallibly, and he claims to be able to promote prayers. Prayers can be offered to him and be effectual. This is taking the place of Jesus Christ.

So, In one way, you would have to admit that the Roman Pope of today absolutely does apply to this category of someone who is usurping headship over the Church. The authors call him that man of sin, the son of perdition. While the Pope has extra good works to super-arrogate to others, he can sell indulgences and things like that, he has absolutely taken the place of Christ in his church anyway. At the same time, you could argue that there are many Antichrists in the world today, and that is true. And so, my view is that anything that does take the place of Christ is an Antichrist.

You could go to a number of places to read about the Antichrist, or it's also called the Spirit of Antichrist in 1 John. Thankfully, the authors of the confession make it clear that the Lord will destroy him with the brightness of his coming. And so this is his end. In contrast, the Lord Jesus Christ makes himself to be the shepherd of the church. He says in John 10, 14-16, I am the good shepherd.

I know my sheep and am known by my own. And they will hear my voice. And there will be one flock and one shepherd. So there's one head, one shepherd, one supreme authority in the church, Christ alone. And so that brings us to paragraph 5, where we encounter the whole matter of those who are called out of the world and into churches.

There's this transfer of households from the household of the world into the household of God, which is the Church of God. So this chapter is actually focused on the local church. And what we read here in this chapter is that in the execution of his power, wherewith he is so entrusted, The Lord Jesus calls out of the world unto himself. I love that language. Out of the world and unto himself.

What a blessed hope for anyone through the ministry of his word, by his spirit, those that are given unto him by his father. So it says, in the execution of his power. So it's a work of divine power that enables anyone to come out of the world and into the church. There are people who think that they can come out of the world and into nothing. Well, they have a wrong view of the way that God has wired the world.

Someone who says that they have come out of the world and they do not go into a local church have to question whether they actually have come out of the world. I don't believe that you can come out of the world and not actually be in a local church. It's probably a very, very rare situation. I don't know how anyone could come out of the world and not love the bride of Christ. If anyone loves Christ, how could they not love the members of the body of Christ?

It just makes no sense to me. When I find someone who says they're a Christian and they're not in a church, I always confront them that they're not a Christian. And they always say you don't have to go to church to be a Christian. And they're just speaking falsehood. They're speaking such a gigantic contradiction in terms.

They have absolutely no conception of what the Church of Jesus Christ is. If they had any idea they could never say anything like that. And if they don't have the love for the Saints, how can they love the one who gave himself for the Saints? So this whole idea of coming out of the world and into the church is the focus of this paragraph here. And we're told how this happens, and this is very beautiful.

It happens through the ministry of the Word, by His Spirit, and a gifting by the Father, where the Father gives these to His Son. Those are three distinct things that happen when someone has come out of the world. It happens because the Word of God was preached. All you need, all you need in the world is to preach the Word of God and the power of the Holy Spirit and a Savior who will take someone out of the world and give him to Jesus Christ. And so this is the picture that is being painted here.

For a purpose, and that purpose is stated, that they may walk before Him in all the ways of obedience, which He prescribeth to them in his word. So it's the preaching of the word of God and the work of the Spirit and the Father snatching them. And then the result of that is that they walk before him in obedience. So there's a walk, there's obedience, and then there are prescriptions in the word that this person called out of the world is faced with. These are the three things that are part of their lives.

And these prescriptions have to do with the way things ought to be done. And then the authors say that those thus called, he commandeth to walk together in particular societies. Now, these particular societies, these are local churches or churches for their mutual edification and the due performance of that public worship, which he requireth of them in the world. So he commands his saints who have been born again to walk together in churches. Walk together.

It's interesting, you know, Most churches just sit together, but they don't walk together. And here, the normal way of living together in a church is to walk together. It's a mirror of the way that the family is supposed to operate as well. With fathers, with their children, they bring them up in the training and the admonition of the Lord when they sit in their house, when they walk by the way, when they lie down, and when they rise up. It's a walk-along, talk-along, discipleship community.

The home is that way and so is the church and it's not enough for the church to sit with one another. They must walk together. They must know one another to bear one another's burdens, to speak the truth in love, to care for one another, to forgive one another, all the one anothers that over 50 of them in the Bible. But we are to walk together, not just sit together. That means that the church is not just a Sunday morning affair.

We are the people of the way. We are walking along the narrow path together. Jesus says, I am the way. And there we are together walking along with our Savior together in life so that we can look one another in the eye, so that we can know how one another are doing. This church culture is a particular society, as the authors say.

This particular society is a subculture. It's a new community. It's a society that lives together and works together and maybe dies together, as so many of the saints have in time past. And So there's this new community that is created and we are commanded to walk together in these particular societies. One of the difficulties of modern church life is proximity.

When people live a long way away from each other, it makes it so hard for them to walk together. When someone says they want to come to this community, I'll tell you what I do. I say, don't come to this church unless you're willing to live within this circle. I mean you can move out of the circle and you can still come to this church but there's no way you can be as much a part of the community as everyone else. I think 95% of the people in our church live within a 15-minute circle of where we are right now, or a number of places that are close by.

And what that does is it drives community. It enhances community. If everybody lives an hour away, it makes community very, very hard. And I mean, my counsel to church leaders and church members is try to figure out how to get closer together. Maybe people need to move and be closer together.

That's often very difficult and only the Lord can engineer circumstances where that's really possible. And is it necessarily sinful to have a church where many of the people live far away? I don't believe it is sinful necessarily. But it does create consequences that you have to grapple with and you have to try to overcome. For many years, Dan Horan lived about an hour away from this church.

That guy burned so much rubber going back and forth, it was like he lived here. I've never seen anything like it, actually. He lived as close as my next door neighbor to the church, but he had to work, let me tell you, really, really hard to offset the cumbersome nature of living an hour away. Some people can do it, but they're going to spend a lot of money and fuel and tires and time going back and forth, and that can be very difficult. But the church is to live together in particular societies called local churches.

And then in the sixth paragraph is an explanation of the visible manifestations of membership in the Church. And here we read that the members of these churches are saints by calling, visibly manifesting and evidencing in and by their profession and walking, their obedience unto that call of Christ. So, the requirement of being part of the Church is a profession of faith, having a visible manifestation of salvation. It's not just what you say, but how you live, the evidences of your salvation, the things that we do. And one of the critical calls of the church is to make sure that we judge those who are received into the church membership according to this criteria that's here.

That those who are in a local church should look like they are Christians. And they should be around long enough so that you'll know whether they really are or not, as much as you can know, because we can't know with any level of perfection. But often the bar for church membership is so low that you do end up with a mixed company of unbelievers. And these do willingly consent to walk together according to the appointment of Christ. Now, this willingly consenting to walk together is the whole matter of church membership.

They covenant together and they are bound together in love, giving up themselves to the Lord and to one another and by the will of God in professed subjection to the ordinances of the Gospel. So this is a voluntary association willingly walking together. By the way, this is not the same thing as a parish. Maybe you've been a part of a parish ministry before in your life where people are divided into geographical units. Well, this really came from the Roman Church, which divided churches into economic units and established money collectors in these parishes, these economic units, and they appointed people to collect funds.

This is the distinction between a parish system and a free system. And this Baptist Confession is declaring the counterpoint to the parish system, which does not foster a willing walking together, but rather a forced walking together in an economic unit. So the authors understand the differences here. And then in paragraph 7, the last paragraph that we'll be dealing in this section, the power and authority invested in a church. And this chapter speaks of the reality that real authority is invested in churches.

And so we read here that, to each of these churches thus gathered according to his mind, declared in His Word, He has given all that power and authority, which is in any way needful for their carrying on that order in worship and discipline. So Here is the authority of the church. This is why in 1 Corinthians 5 verses 4 and 5, the church delivered one over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, that his spirit might be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. They were doing church discipline in order to exercise the proper authority that was given to the church. Often today churches are completely unwilling to exercise any kind of authority, to declare any kind of moral authority in people's lives, to give any kind of direction and instruction, and this is completely contrary to the very nature of the Church who has authority invested in her by her supreme authority, the Lord Jesus Christ.

That's why in the Corinthian church they quote, put away from themselves the evil person. And in the next statement here, which he has instituted for them to observe with commands and rules for the do and right exerting and executing of that power. So there's a right execution of that power. Of course, Matthew 18, verse 17 speaks of this, of the unrepentant person who has been spoken to about their sin, and if He refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if He refuses even to hear the church, let Him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.

Assuredly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. And this is the authority that is invested in the Church of Jesus Christ. So there you have it, a picture of the nature of the Church of Jesus Christ. Now, how is this doctrine being attacked? I'd like to give you a few.

First of all, this doctrine is being attacked by those churches who exist without any real authority. They have no moral authority. They do not exercise church discipline. They don't care about their people enough to observe sin and speak the truth in love about it. And it's a tragic situation.

It really comes from the fruit of a relativistic society that doesn't think that there's anything wrong with anything. And then there are churches who expressly do not practice church discipline. And then I'm just going to call this next attack The talking head church, where the shepherds do not know any of the sheep. They're just talking heads. They're media personalities, primarily.

They're on a screen, they're behind a microphone, but they're not real shepherds who know real sheep. And this too is a tragedy. And it completely contradicts the whole nature of the church that's been described here. And then we could talk about it in terms of nomadic saints. Those who go from one church to another, they never settle down into particular societies.

They're never satisfied. They really are looking for the perfect church. They haven't understood that every single church is a mixture. And that no matter where they go, they're going to find error in doctrine or practice, either in orthodoxy or orthopraxy. They'll never be able to get away from it.

And then finally, another tragedy that results from the attacks against these principles is hatred for the Church for her flaws. And I think this is a real tragedy where people are content to stay home and not invest themselves in the church of Jesus Christ nor care for her saints nor pour their lives out for her or give their resources to her or allocate their time for her or determine to spend and be spent for their sakes. So there you have it, the first half of this great chapter on the church. Let's pray. Lord, this picture that you've given us, you would help us to understand your word and to find ourselves faithful to your church for which you shed your blood.

Word of God. Thank you for watching!