F.D. Srygley
The word church is used in two senses in the New Testament. Sometimes it means the congregation of disciples which comes together on the first day of the week to break bread and engage in other acts of public worship (Acts 20:7; Rom. 16:5; 1 Cor. 16:19); sometimes it means the general spiritual body over which Jesus is the head and in which every Christian is a member (Matt. 16:18; Col. 1:18, 24; Eph. 1:32). In this general sense, the word is sometimes limited by a geographical term, as, “The church of God which is at Corinth” (1 Cor. 1:2), “So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace” (Acts 9: 31, ASV). In this general sense, the church is not a denominational institution composed of a sisterhood of local churches “of the same faith and order,” but a spiritual body composed of all Christians in the region defined by the geographical term of limitation, without any general denominational organization. In the sense of a congregation of disciples which comes together on the first day of the week to break bread and engage in other acts of public worship, there are several bodies of people “on earth now possessing the characteristics of churches of Christ as given in the New Testament.” No one of these bodies perhaps possesses such characteristics in perfection. It is doubtful whether there is a church on earth which measures up to the divine standard in all of its members on every question of doctrine and practice so fully and faultlessly that there is no longer any room for improvement. The inspired measure of the stature of perfection is exceedingly difficult to fill, whether applied to a congregation of disciples or an individual Christian. There are many folks on earth now possessing the characteristics of Christians as laid down in the New Testament, but no one of them perhaps possesses those characteristics so fully and faultlessly that there is no longer any room for improvement.
Christ is probably the only perfect specimen of Christianity this world has ever seen. For this reason the life of perfection which he lived in the flesh is the divine standard of individual Christian character toward which every disciple should strive, and the spiritual body of perfection over which he is the head and in which every Christian is a member is the divine model that every church should endeavor to reproduce in itself. In the one case, the sins and failures of the individual Christian do not enter into or mar the model set for us all in his life of perfection in the flesh; and in the other, the errors of congregations of fallible worshipers do not enter into or in any way affect the body of spiritual perfection set by inspiration and revelation in the New Testament for all churches to follow. Churches, like Christians, approximate the divine standard with different measures of success; but in no case, perhaps, has either a church or a Christian attained unto the absolute and faultless perfection set for us all in the divine model. In both cases the divine standard must be approached through many trials and tribulations by a tedious process of painstaking growth in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Owing to the difference in degrees of earnestness and spiritual strivings with which Christians and churches set about filling up the measure of the divine standard, the progress in spiritual attainments is by no means uniform. One star differeth from another star in glory. So also does one Christian differ from another Christian in spiritual attainments. In like manner also one congregation of worshipers differs from another in the measure of its excellences when tested by the divine standard. It is difficult to find two Christians in exactly the same grade of spiritual growth and developing at precisely the same rate of spiritual progress. It is no less difficult to find two churches equally near to the divine standard of spiritual perfection and approaching it at exactly the same measure of growth in. grace and in the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Churches and Christians are continually outstripping and passing each other in the race for heaven and immortal glory, and sometimes they meet each other going in opposite directions.
Churches have their backslidings and their fallings from grace, as well as Christians. There is even an occasional collision at the place where two churches or two Christians meet on the road to heaven. God recognized all these things in the arrangement of the Christian system, and left a wide margin for the free play of individuality in both Christians and churches. On the New Testament basis of individual activity and personal consecration in and through independent churches, the development of individual Christian character and the growth of an independent church are unhampered by the restraints of general denominational institutions or ecclesiastic organizations. But when local congregations are massed in denominational sisterhoods of churches “of the same faith and order,” the divine standard and model are lost sight of, and the energies of both churches and individual Christians are bent to the attainments of the denominational standard. In such cases the standard is erected and the model is set for both the individual Christian and the congregation of worshipers by the predominant sentiment of the denomination. The effect is the same, no matter whether that sentiment is codified in a written creed, as in “the method of the Methodists,” or left unwritten, as in the authoritative restraints of “Baptist usage” among the Baptists, and the inviolate limitations of our plea among the Disciples.
In either case individual character and conduct, as well as congregational organization and procedure, is measured by denominational standards. What it takes to constitute a Methodist is determined by one standard, and what it takes to make a Disciple is determined by an entirely different standard. In like manner, what constitutes a Methodist church is ascertained by one test, and what makes a Disciple church is determined by an entirely different standard. A man can be a Christian without belonging to either a Methodist church or a Disciple church, and a congregation of worshipers can be a church of Christ without going into the denominational organization of either the Methodists or Disciples, or connecting itself in any way with any kind of a denominational federation of a sisterhood of churches “of the same faith and order.” Moreover, denominational institutions in religion are hindrances to the spiritual growth of both the individual Christians and the congregations of worshipers which constitute them, as well as wholly unwarranted by the New Testament. This will appear from a careful examination of the practical workings of denominational institutions. When the character and conduct of an individual in such institutions measures up to the denominational standard, the person is passed as “in full fellowship and good standing.” The holder of a denominational church letter is never rated any higher or any lower than that. When a denominational church measures up to the denominational standard, it is accepted as “of the same faith and order.” A denominational church never gets a rating either higher or lower than that. The effect of this is to produce a soothing feeling of soporific religious contentment in both individuals and congregations on a plane of spiritual attainments that will pass the one as in “full fellowship and good standing,” and grade the other as “of the same faith and order.” There is no incentive for either individual Christians or congregations of worshipers to try to rise above the highest grade in the denominational institutions to which they belong. Hence, individuals under the soothing influence of denominational institutions slacken the restraints of their conduct to the lowest notch of “the rules of the church,” and congregations of denominational worshipers broaden the gauge of their orthodoxy and dilute the strength of their spirituality to the last limit of their denominational standards of faith and practice. Moreover, the denominational standard itself, for both individual character and conduct and congregational faith and practice, being nothing else than the predominant sentiment of the denomination, is continually settling down to a lower and yet lower level of orthodoxy and morality as the denomination advances in age and increases in numbers. The predominant sentiment of a denomination is the general average of the individual convictions of its constituency. This gives all the errors in doctrine and corruptions in conduct to be found in the constituency of the entire denomination their full force and effect in grading down the denominational standard of doctrine and practice. Every denomination begins in an out gush of individual consecration from some decayed institution. In the beginning, therefore, every member of the new denomination pitches his zeal on a high key of spirituality. This necessarily gives each denomination a high standard of faith and practice to begin with. The standard will never be elevated, for the reason that no future converts to the party will be lifted above the spiritual plane of those who take their lives and their reputations in their hands to lead the spiritual protest against the doctrinal errors and the moral corruptions of the old institution. A stream never rises above its fountain.
On the contrary, future converts will soon begin to fall below the high standard of the new party in both doctrine and practice, and as the general average of sentiment is graded from time to time in the denomination, it will be found on a lower plane each time than before. The predominant sentiment of the denomination each time the general average is struck will constitute a new denominational standard several degrees lower in doctrine and practice than its predecessor. This gradual lowering of the denominational standards sets the whole drift of denominational institutionalism toward the religious Dead Sea of eternal spiritual stagnation. This is the logical cause of the ever-recurring religious reformations, each of which is but a protest against man’s effort to maintain the spirit of Christianity in unscriptural institutions. There is nothing of the kind in the New Testament. On the contrary, God, by inspiration and revelation in the New Testament, has set before each Christian and each congregation of worshipers a spiritual model of faultless perfection, and left no denominational standards or institutions to some, with soothing effect, between either the individual Christian or the congregation of worshipers and the standard of absolute spiritual perfection. New Testament churches, as well as individual Christians, were measured by the divine standard and graded according to their individual merits.
