Chapter II
Why And
When This Theory Started
There is no mention of a Universal Church in the Bible. The
warmest advocates of the theory will of necessity admit that nearly every
instance in which ecclesia, translated church, is found, reference is to an actual,
local, visible church. The other few times ecclesia is used, according to the
laws of language, the term is used in a generic or abstract sense, and does not
at all refer to an all-inclusive Universal, Invisible some thing. This will be
dealt with later.
Not only does the
New Testament know nothing of a Universal, Invisible Church, Christians of the
early centuries knew nothing of such. I have read rather widely in the writings
of the early church fathers - the writings of the Christian leaders who lived
in the early days of Christianity all the way from Polycarp who knew John the
apostle, on down. In their writings they don't speak of an all embracing
spiritual Universal, Invisible Church. Doubtlessly they would have been amazed
at such a doctrine. They speak of church and churches - never of a vague
Universal, Invisible monstrosity composed of all the saved everywhere. They
knew the Greek language too well to try to use the term ecclesia in such a
sense anyhow.
As time passed,
Satan managed to introduce heresies and perversions among the churches. These
eventually produced the Roman Catholic Church. Bear in mind that Roman
Catholicism did not spring full grown into the world. It is the product of
error and false doctrine accumulated over a period of several centuries. Dr. R.
K. Maiden, former editor of the Word and Way, of Missouri, has the following to
say about the rise of the Universal Church theory:
"The conception and adoption of the Universal Church
Theory, is the parent heresy in ecciesiology. How and when did this theory
originate? The change from the idea of the individual, self-governing church,
to the Universal Church had its origin in one of the most colossal blunders of
all Christian history - that of making 'ecclesia' and 'basileia' identical. So
far from being identical, the difference between 'church' and 'kingdom' is so
great as to require that they be contrasted rather than compared. Jesus and the
writers of the New Testament never confused the two terms. The taproot of the
Universal Church theory is the identification of the church and kingdom, making
the two coincident, coextensive and coterminous. The theory of the identity of
church and kingdom and of the universality of the church were twin born. New
Testament writers knew nothing of a world church. As nearly as can be
determined, the first formal, official identification of church and kingdom was
projected when the Roman Empire became nominally Christianized, about the time
of the consummation of the great ecclesiastical apostasy. It was the Ecumenical
Council of Nice, called by the Emperor Constantine, that affirmed and projected
as its creed the idea of a 'Catholic' World Church. From then down to the
Lutheran Reformation of the sixteenth century, the universal VISIBLE theory of
the church held the field, except for the scattered, comparatively obscure,
hunted and persecuted little churches known by various names at different times
- churches of the New Testament type in doctrine and polity. Following the
Reformation period and born of the Reformation movement, there emerged a new
theory of the church - the UNIVERSAL, INVISIBLE SPIRITUAL THEORY."
The Universal Visible Church theory is an utter necessity
of the Roman Catholic Church. There is not the slightest resemblance between
the simply organized, self-governing churches of New Testament times, and the
great, complex hierarchical pope dominated institution that we know as the
Roman Catholic Church today. Conditions in that church became so intolerable
that they produced the Protestant Reformation. Let it be remembered, and never
forgotten that Baptists are NOT Protestants. They existed long before the rise
of Protestantism.
When the Protestant
reformers split the Catholic world, they did not make the radical changes they
would have made had they gone back to the Bible as their standard of life, and
doctrine, and conduct. They of necessity rejected the Roman Church as the
Universal Visible Church, but they did not go back to the New Testament Church
type. What would they do? With what would they replace the doctrine of the
Universal Visible Church? They solved the problem by coining the doctrine of
the Universal INVISIBLE Church. So the Universal, Invisible, spiritual theory
of the church WAS INVENTED! Such a thing didn't exist for over fifteen hundred
years after Christ started His church! But this is now the working theory of
all Protestantism - and sad to say many Baptists have unwittingly been snared
by this theory.
THE MOTHER OF HERESIES
Down in Florida where the writer lives, we often have
severe hurricanes, and sometimes these spawn a whole bunch of violent
tornadoes. They literally spin off of the parent storm. This same thing is true
of the mother heresy, the Universal church theory. She spawns a lot of other
heresies. The Church Branch theory is a case in point. Some years ago there was
a preaching mission sponsored by the Federal (now National) Council of
Churches. Dr. E. Stanley Jones acted as a special spokesman for the Council, in
an attempt to keep it and its aims before the people. Dr. Jones advocated the
formulation of a kind of super church entitled "The Church of Christ In
America", formulated by all the denominations. He said, "The figure
that I have in mind is that of a tree, with many different branches adhering to
the central trunk - "The Church of Christ In America ..."
Dr. W. L. Poteat, a
former president of Wake Forest College, and a very loose Baptist, in his book
entitled, "Can A Man Be A Christian Today," in referring to organized
Christianity calls it, "The Christian Church." Dr. Marshall, teacher
of McMaster's University, is quoted as saying in a sermon, "Baptists do
not regard baptism as essential to membership in the 'Christian Church' - the
church universal - even though they insist on immersion as a condition of
admittance into the BAPTIST SECTION OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH." The National
and World Council of churches operates on the theory that all of the churches
of different and even conflicting faiths should be united into one big world
church, with the leaders, the "Big Boys" directing its course. Beyond
this seen conglomeration however, is the Church Universal concept, the mother
of the smaller church heresy.
SUMMARIZING: The
Universal, Invisible theory is unknown to the Bible; is unknown to the writings
of the early church Fathers who lived back near apostolic times; was unknown
during the centuries when Roman Catholicism dominated Europe, and when the
Universal Visible theory was in vogue. It is AN INVENTION of Protestantism
designed to take the place of the Catholic Universal Visible theory. No one who
seeks to follow the Bible should adopt as an item of doctrine an unscriptural
invention of men.