Covenant Theology
The Doctrine of the Church
An Overview
The Mission of the Church
Sermon Number Twenty-four
Jude 4-18
By Jim Bordwine, Th.D.
Introduction
This sermon covers the third point in our Overview of the Doctrine of the Church, which is the Mission of the Church. Under the first point, which was The Foundation of the Church, we learned that the doctrinal truth represented in Peter’s confession of Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of the living God” in Matt. 16 is the theological ground for the Church of Jesus Christ; the Church is built upon a Christological base.
Under the second point, which was The Character of the Church, I describe three chief qualities by which the Church is distinguished: sanctity or holiness, catholicity and apostolicity. Those who compose the Church are “sanctified” by virtue of their union with Jesus Christ; the Church is ethically pure and righteous. The Church of Christ is “catholic” or “universal” in the sense that all true believers are found in Her. And the Church is apostolic in the sense that, doctrinally speaking, She is the repository for the teaching of the apostles who, upon the commission of Jesus Christ, founded the Church.
Now, as just stated, we come to the topic of the mission of the Church.
03. The Mission of the Church
Previously, I said that the character and mission of the Church are related to the foundation of the Church, which is Christological. I want to emphasize this fact as we now consider the mission of the Church. There is a principle that must be followed if we are to learn about the mission of the Church in this world. The principle is this: The mission of the Church is rightly understood only within the context of the mission of Jesus Christ. We cannot separate the mission or objective of the Church from the mission or objective of Jesus Christ.
I am convinced that one of the greatest errors in contemporary evangelical thinking on the subject of the Church is this very mistake of trying to understand and define the Church apart from the work of the Head of the Church, Jesus Christ. Modern evangelicals sometimes try to explain the work of the Church as though She exists as an independent, self-determining institution.
The Bible, on the other hand, clearly teaches the dependent nature of the Church by describing Her as the Body of Jesus Christ and describing Him as the Head of the Church. There are several passage in the New Testament where the Church is described as the Body of Christ. For example, speaking of the position occupied by the resurrected Savior, Paul says: “And [God] put all things in subjection under [Christ’s] feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fulness of Him who fills all in all.” (Eph. 1:22, 23)
And in another place, speaking of the Savior, the apostle writes: “For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-- all things have been created by Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the first-born from the dead; so that He Himself might come to have first place in everything.” (Col. 1:16-18)
There is much that could be said about these two passages, but what I want to emphasize is that the Scripture plainly portrays an organic connection between the Church and the Savior. The description that Paul uses, that of a body and a head, necessarily implies the dependent nature of the Church. Most obviously, She depends on Christ, Her Head, for direction.
The Church is not, according to Paul’s analogy, meant to function autonomously; She is meant to function only in relation to Jesus Christ. This means that the purposes of Christ and the Church are identical; the mission of the Savior and His Body are the same; it means that the Church is bound to follow the lead of Christ and bound to fulfill His commands.
When we try to understand what the Church is supposed to be doing in the world, when we try to predict what the Church is going to face in the future, we will be misled if we do not maintain the vital link between the Head and the Body, between the Savior and His Church.
Let’s return to our principle: The mission of the Church is rightly understood only within the context of the mission of Jesus Christ. What did Jesus Christ come to do? What was His objective in coming into this world? By answering such questions, we can define the mission of the Church because the Church is the Body of Christ through which He carries on His post-resurrection ministry. To determine what Jesus came to do, we must look back beyond the coming of Christ to the creation of the first man, Adam. The reason we must do this is because the ministry of Jesus Christ is, of course, linked to the events that unfolded in the Garden of Eden.
Adam was created to be the head of the human race and was supposed to lead the human race in serving the Creator and in taking dominion of the creation. In Gen. 1:28, we read these words: “And God blessed them; and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’” Adam, the first man, was created to lead his descendants in exercising dominion over the world that God created; he was designed to rule as a representative of God. Psalm 8 gives a more detailed description of God’s intention for man when it says:
Thou hast made [man] a little lower than God, And dost crown him with glory and majesty! Thou dost make him to rule over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet, All sheep and oxen, And also the beasts of the field, The birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, Whatever passes through the paths of the seas. (vv. 5-8)
Clearly, God created man to have dominion over all aspects of the creation. The privileges and authority of man were to be surpassed by no other creature. However, when Adam disobeyed God, when he asserted his independence from his Creator, this dominion mandate was interrupted. Adam’s sin caused a break in his relationship with his Creator; as a rebel against God, he could not lead the human race in serving the Creator and in subduing the creation.
As we know, God’s response to Adam’s sin was severe. However, in the midst of that disturbing scene where God is pronouncing curses upon the serpent, the woman and the man, a promise is made. God made a promise and that promise concerned the coming of a Second Adam, One who would crush the serpent, restore the human race and thus reinstate the mandate originally given to Adam. The offended Creator graciously promised to supply a Deliverer so that His creatures might be rescued from death.
The Second Adam, the Head of a new humanity, is, of course, Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the Son of Man. His mission would be the restoration of mankind; His objective would be the creation of a renewed humanity.
There is one New Testament passage, in particular, that is relevant here. In Heb. 2, we read:
5 For He did not subject to angels the world to come, concerning which we are speaking. 6 But one has testified somewhere, saying, “What is man, that Thou rememberest him? or the son of man, that Thou art concerned about him? 7 Thou hast made him for a little while lower than the angels; Thou hast crowned him with glory and honor, and hast appointed him over the works of Thy hands; 8 Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet.” For in subjecting all things to him, He left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we do not yet see all things subjected to him. 9 But we do see Him who has been made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.
In this passage, the writer takes Psa. 8, which describes God’s intended destiny for man, and applies it to Jesus Christ as the ultimate Man. Because of Adam’s sin, the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, came to rescue the human race and enable us to fulfill God’s purposes in creating us. Those purposes are stipulated in Psa. 8, among other places in the Bible. When the writer speaks of “the world to come,” he is speaking about existence interpreted in light of Christ's glorious atonement, he is speaking about how things are seen now and how things will be seen in the future through regenerated eyes. He is talking about how this world is going to be affected by the atonement.
The author affirms man’s destiny by using Psalm 8. Man was made to reign over God's creation. “But,” he adds, “we do not yet see all things subjected to him.” (v. 8b) Man has not yet fulfilled the command of God to subdue and rule over everything. Man cannot fulfill God's command because he is dead in his trespasses and sins. Adam’s disobedience, as I stated earlier, interrupted the mandate given to him by his Creator.
In the mind of the writer of Hebrews, this is where a shift occurs; here is where he turns to Jesus Christ, the Last Man. All things are not subject to man, because of sin, “But we do see Him who has been made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus,” exalted to a position of glory and honor following His work of atonement. (v. 9) The writer makes a transition from what God intended for man, which was ruined by sin, to Jesus Christ, the Last Man, who came to restore God's purpose for the human race.
By becoming a man and making atonement for sin, Jesus Christ was able to restore man so that the effects of the fall can be reversed. The New Testament makes it clear that we are no longer talking about man subduing the physical world only. In His atonement, Jesus Christ “disarmed the rulers and authorities” and “made a public display of them.” (Col. 2:15) Through the Church, the redeemed humanity, the purposes of God are being made known “to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.” (Eph. 3:10)
The target of redeemed man's rule has been translated to a different realm: “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Eph. 6:12) The Church, the new humanity, is asserting Her God-given right to rule against the evil forces that have infested God's creation by taking the message of man's redemption in Christ to the whole world. Christ's purpose as the Last Man was to restore harmony between God and man and to enable man to subdue all things for God's glory.
To know what the Church is supposed to be doing in this world, we must know what Christ came into this world to accomplish. The Church is His body and He works through the Church even now as He resides in heaven with His Father. When the Bible describes the coming of the Savior into the world and what would occur as a result of that advent, it is describing the mission of the Church. Christ works in and through His Body exclusively; this is why we must understand that all those passages that tell us what would happen in the world as a result of Christ’s coming are telling us what the Church would be doing between the advents of the Savior.
As Christians understand this connection between the Savior and His Body, they are able to discern and labor for that which Christ intends to accomplish. On the other hand, as long as Christians are ignorant of this connection between the Savior and His Body, they remain confused about the mission of the Church and the Church, therefore, remains ineffective. This is what has happened in modern evangelicalism. Many churches in our land are little more than laboratories for the latest psychological or marketing fad. Many churches today are trying to be everything from baby-sitters to career counselors because there is a void in their philosophies of ministry. That void is created by the absence of a Biblical understanding of their ministry.
I want to stress that since there exists this unbreakable connection between the mission of Christ and the mission of the Church, we can confidently study passages that describe the result of Christ’s coming into this world and know that we are reading about the mission of the Church. The Church is going to be the means whereby the many things said about the ministry of Jesus Christ are going to be realized in history.
The Bible, of course, contains many passages that give us a picture of what impact the coming of Christ is going to have as time marches on. One such passage that is typical of others in the Old Testament is found in Isa. 2:
1 The word which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. 2 Now it will come about that In the last days, The mountain of the house of the LORD Will be established as the chief of the mountains, And will be raised above the hills; And all the nations will stream to it. 3 And many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the house of the God of Jacob; That He may teach us concerning His ways, And that we may walk in His paths.” For the law will go forth from Zion, And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. 4 And He will judge between the nations, And will render decisions for many peoples; And they will hammer their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, And never again will they learn war.
I want to begin by explaining the context of this passage. The first chapter of Isaiah’s prophecy serves as an introduction to the whole book. The writer begins by bringing charges of rebellion against the people. They have broken the covenant with God and he warns them of an inevitable judgment. Isaiah’s words are sharp as he accuses Judah of abandoning the Lord and despising the Holy One of Israel (cf. 1:4). The people are sick, declares the prophet, and they have been badly wounded by the Lord’s chastisement, but they refuse to repent (cf. 1:5, 6). The land is desolate, the cities have been burned with fire, strangers are devouring the crops; only the mercy of the Lord had prevented the people from being obliterated, writes Isaiah (cf. 1:7).