I just finished Why We Love the Church by Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck. It was good, educational, and hysterical at times but I must admit that I enjoyed their first book, Why We’re Not Emergent, By Two Guys Who Should Be, more.
I found three main points in this book particularly helpful. Unfortunately I don’t have the book with me right now, so I can’t post on all three points at once. Instead, I’ll have three posts – one for each point…which is probably better anyway.
POINT 1.
Being a Christian while rejecting the church is like decapitation and divorce – or decorpulation in the words of DeYoung and Kluck.
“More common than describing the church as God’s building is the imagery of Christ and the church as husband and wife (Eph. 5:22-33; Rev. 19:6-9). Christ loves the church, gave Himself up for her, and makes her beautiful. The church submits to Christ, grows in beauty before Him, and obeys His commands. The two are one – now in preview, and later in fullness, but they are one. They are inseparable as husband and wife. And any husband worth the paper his marriage license is printed on will be jealous to guard the good name of his wife. She may be a lying, no good, double-crossing poor excuse for a wife, but if she’s your wife, you’ll protect her honor, whatever may be left of it. And woe to the friend who comes around your house, hangs out, and expects to have a good time, all the while getting digs on your bride. Who wants a friend who rolls his eyes and signs every time your wife walks into the room” (WWLTC 12-13)?
“The Bible also tells us that the church is the body of Christ, with Jesus Himself at its head. Every body needs a head to rule over it – to give it direction and purpose, to instruct it in the way it should go, to hold things together and give life to its members. Likewise, every head needs a body. I suppose in the world of science fiction head could exsist in vats or hooked up to a car battery or something. But in the real world, most of us don’t see too many heads bobbing along apart from their bodies. If we ever did, I imagine our first instinct would not be to cuddle with the little cranium and sing it a love song. That would be a strange sight…Strange though it may be, it is not unusual, at least not for some Christians. Increasingly, we hear glowing talk of churchless Christianity…If decapitation, from the Latin word caput, means to cut off the head, then it stands to reason that decorpulation, from the Latin word corpus, should refer to cutting off the body…There is a growing movement among self-proclaimed evangelicals and in the broader culture to get spirituality without religion, to find a relationship without rules, and have God without the church. More and more, people are looking for decorpulated Christianity” (WWLTC 13-14).
Thus, the relationship between the believer and the church should really function like a marriage. Complete commitment, for better or worse, service, love, fidelity, community, organization, responsibility, etc. The church isn’t something that you can just ignore, when you’ve accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior. Not only should the relationship function like a marriage, but the body needs a head in order to function. I heard this weird story once about a farmer who cut off one of this chicken’s heads and it lived for 18 months because the farmer put food down its trachea. It ended up dying because it choked. In the interim…it had to be fed and ran into walls because it was blind. Chickens need their heads, like Christians need a Christ-centered church. They need it NOT for salvation, but for serving Christ and obeying Him while on this side of heaven. Granted, there are times when you can’t go to church or in the case of persecution – when you’re not allowed. I’m not being legalistic here, you’re still going to heaven if you believe Christ died for your sins and skip church one morning. I even think that lots and lots of church-leavers will end up in heaven. My point is that actively rejecting the church is not a righteous or obedient deed. Lastly, when I say 'for better or worse' I'm not suggesting that you should stay with your church if it turns into a cult or if you're being physically abused by those in leadership. Get it? Think in balanced terms.
Now, I can see the main counter arguments for these quotes being that, ‘church’ is everywhere. After all, the Bible says, “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them" (Matthew 18:20). However, this counter argument is flawed in that it conflates the body of Christ (organic) and the church (organization, ritual, religion). But I’ll talk about that more in my next post…
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