Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Ordination #2, Art. 8: The True Church

Believe it or not I’m still chipping away at my ordination paper. Last Friday our group that is going through this together met and covered Articles 7 & 8 of the Evangelical Free Church of America’s doctrinal statement. Article 7 was the first one I posted on the blog (check under Ordination if you’d like to see it). This is Article 8, which is the first of three articles on ecclesiology (think that’s important in the EFCA?). As usual, any input is helpful.
That the true Church is composed of all such persons who through saving faith in Jesus Christ have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit and are united together in the Body of Christ of which He is the Head.
Jesus said He will build His church (Mt. 16.18) and Paul tells us that Jesus loves His church (Eph. 5.25). The church began at Pentecost with the arrival of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2). The universal nature of the church (Eph. 1.22-23; Col. 1.18, 24) indicates that the true Church is composed of all such persons who through saving faith in Jesus Christ have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit. This faith in Jesus and baptism in the Spirit is what unifies and brings a person into the true Church (1 Cor. 12.12-13). The Holy Spirit will also be active when the true church is assembled because He empowers the church (Acts 1:8) and He dwells in the church (1 Cor. 3.16-17). While it may be difficult to determine who is in this true Church, God knows who truly belong to Him (2 Tim. 2.19; Mt. 13.24-30).
This true Church is intended to be united together regardless of any social distinctions (Col. 3.11; Gal. 3.28). Christ is the Head of the Church (Col. 1.18), which means He is the authority over it (Col. 2.9-10) and sustains and nourishes it (Col. 2.19; Jn. 15.1-11) in the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12.27).

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