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 In many of the past
arguments over church organization those opposing the MISSIONARY SOCIETY inadvertently accepted a “slip” in logic
that has been a major gateway for churchhood institutionalism today. See if you can “catch” the slip.
Campbell
conceived of the local church (“community”) as a unit of the universal church. In reality, the saints are the units
of the universal church: citizens in a kingdom, children in a family, branches on a vine, etc. But with this basic
fallacy as a foundation, Campbell urged some means whereby the universal church could cooperate. (He meant “work
as one.”) The society was conceived as a media through which many churches could function as one with respect to
certain evangelistic projects. It served as trustee for a churchhood (which they called “brotherhood”) fund, and
its executive board directed such activities.
The “Anti-s”
or “non-progressives” of this earlier day had a lot to say about the abuses of the society; or, when they dealt
with the principles of organization, they said that “the local church, with its elders and deacons” was God’s plan
for “the organization of the church.” Now watch it—”the organization of the church.” The context of argument was organization in and of the universal church. Then brethren
replied that God had not authorized the missionary society (as a media for collective action of churches) but that
God had authorized the local church with its elders and deacons — (as the media ——————). Now, you supply the missing
links that logically must be understood here, in such a context, and you will see the “slip”
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that
continues to plague many saints to this good day.
God authorized elders
and deacons all right — for the local church. But He did not appoint them, for the local church, as the organizational
media for the universal church. They are not the scriptural counterpart to man’s schemes for universal church organization.
The scriptures leave a great big NOTHING in this place; clearly saying to those who respect His authority, that
he did not intend any such universal church function. God authorized elders, deacons, etc., as the means for collective
work of saints in a local church. This is the divine counter- part to any human plan for local church organization.
History is filled
with examples of religious movements which began with avowed determination to form nothing more than local churches,
and keep them strictly independent and auto- nomous. But the party spirit creeps in, and “we” “us” and “our church”
take on increasingly wide borders; until “our” work becomes the denomination’s work, with need for “better” and
more definitive organizational structure. In “our” case, the local church with its elders became the stepping stone
to area-wide, project-wide organization of churches. A segment of “middle- of-the-roaders” still contend that thousands
of churches may work as one “if it is under the elders of a local church.” Others have moved on to churchhood work,
under an executive board. Apparently, very few haw profited by the “slip” of the past.
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