Heavenly Mindedness (19)

 

Continuing with the quote from Vos’s message in our last post:

 

“In the city of the living God believers are joined to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, and mingle with the spirits of just men made perfect. And all this faith recognizes.” G. Vos. (See Hebrews 12:18 – 24).

 

What is it to be “joined to the general assembly and church of the firstborn”? Here we have an almost insurmountable challenge because of our conditioned thinking about the Church of Jesus Christ. We tend to think of the church as an organization, whether on the local or denominational level. Those congregations and pastors who are not affiliated with denominations still tend to identify with various traditions, even if the “tradition” is no tradition; or the dogmatic belief system is no dogmatic belief system. (Dorothy L. Sayers was right when she wrote, “The beauty is in the dogma.”)

 

Those who manage to get beyond the dominating idea of the church as an organization and who think of the church in some measure as people, or a body, or a family, or in other collective ways; often confine this thinking to the local congregation.

 

However we think of the Church, if our thinking is localized, if it is restricted to the local congregation, then we shall have fallen far short of the glory of the Church, the Bride of Christ, the Body of Christ, as portrayed in the Bible. The scope of Hebrews 12:22 – 24 far surpasses any notion of localization: “But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, which speaks better than the blood of Abel.”

 

This is the Church, the People of God, who were hidden in the ancient counsels of God, but who were unveiled in these last times (Ephesians 2:11 – 3:13). This is the People who were promised to Abraham. This is the Bride descending from the heavens. This is the reality beyond Eve, the Woman who was taken from the side of Christ in His death and resurrection (just as Eve was taken from Adam as he slept) and who Christ is making His glorious Church, without spot or wrinkle (Ephesians 5:25 – 32).

 

While the Bible most certainly speaks to us of local gatherings of the Church, if the local gathering cannot see beyond itself, if pastors and elders do not see beyond themselves and their congregations; beyond their traditions and denominations and communions; then we have fallen short of the vision and glory and calling of the Church of Jesus Christ.

 

Jesus is explicit in teaching that our witness to the world is contingent on our unity in the Trinity being manifested to the world. “I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one, so that the world may know that You sent me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me” (John 17:23).

 

Yet, we do not think or act or teach or preach as if what the Bible teaches us about the catholic, universal, and transcendent Church matters – we have localized, parochialized, and traduced the grand Biblical image and beauty of the Church of Jesus Christ. We justify our separateness instead of passionately seeking unity in Jesus Christ – a unity manifested in koinonia, communion, life together, service together, sharing life’s challenges and burdens together, witness together, bearing the Cross together. Those who recite the creeds may pay lip service to “the communion of the saints” and the “holy catholic church” but we really don’t want to go beyond the words.

 

There is a sense in which we are, hopefully, coming out of Babylon; both the Babylon of captivity and seduction, and the Babel of confusion within the Church. We can look forward to that day when “that which is perfect has come” – so that that “which is in part,” and that which is in partition, will be done away. There are no neighborhoods in the New Jerusalem, there are no traditions competing for glory, there is only the glory of God and of the Lamb radiating in and through the Bride. Ought we not to be seeking this glory today?

 

More on what it is to be “joined to the general assembly…” in the next post.