Introduction

What do you think of Church?

What is it?

What’s it for?

You see, ‘the Church’ gets a pretty poor reputation in modern Western society, but it gets an increasingly poor reputation amongst people who really do believe as well.

I imagine that if we were looking at one another now, I’d see a very strange look come over the faces of some of you when you heard that last bit there … the bit about the church getting an increasingly poor reputation amongst people who believe.

So … there is an increasing number of what you might call ‘Church Casualties’ out there, who many of us have in our own families.

There’s a new book out this month (22/08/2023) which gives the church in America its first deep dive (it’s a proper bit of market research … very rigorous) into the broader de-churching phenomenon.

It’s not just about church casualties, which is what our text bears most closely on today, but it does include that in some detail, and describes the origin in the 1990s and the reasons for it running up to the present day … describing how 40 million Americans left the church in the last 25 years.

It’s the largest and fastest religious shift in the history of the U.S. with more people leaving the U.S. church in the last 25 years than all the new people who became Christians from the First Great Awakening, the Second Great Awakening and all the Billy Graham crusades COMBINED.

This is not without profound effects on the world in general.

That new book by Ryan Burge and Michael Graham shows how this rapid dechurching is taking a toll in North America on

i)               Relationally (families & friendships)

ii)              Religiously (churches, denominations and networks are fading)

iii)             Culturally (the impact of dechurching really affects communities, culture and what a country is like and all about)

That book runs much wider but our great concern is with people who do DEEPLY believe but who are alienated for some reason and don’t go.

I’ve said a lot about this phenomenon in the U.S. because I don’t think any decent research has been done on this in the UK let alone in Wales, but we really are seeing in every day experience the effects described about America right here on our doorsteps.

And, again, without any proper research having been done, just on the basis of my hard pastoral experience, I have to say I see this often arising out of a misunderstanding on the part of believers about what the Church is and what it is for … BOTH those still ‘churched’ and those now believing but tragically ‘dechurched’.

So what IS Church and what is it for?

Ephesians 1:23 says that the Lord Jesus (Who obviously thought it was worth sacrificing Himself for so painfully) has been appointed by God the Father “to be head over everything for the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”

He is to be Head of the Church (He being very definitely Jesus, not the Archbishop of Canterbury, nor the pope nor anybody else) WHICH IS two things here … firstly His body then secondly His fulness.

Now WHAT on earth is THAT all about, and how might it address the growing feeling even amongst believers about (and their consequent attitude to and behaviour towards) the Church?

Two very simple statements, then, first …

1)   The Church is His body

“appointed him to be head over everything for the church, 23 which is his body …”

The Church is the body of Christ in Romans 12:4-8 and also in 1 Corinthians 12:12-31.

In both those places Paul uses the metaphor to stress the church is a coming together of diverse and interdependent members.

But when he uses the metaphor in Ephesians and Colossians he adds the idea that Christ is the leader and head of this diverse and interdependent community of Christ’s people.

a)    Independency of members

This Church has come into being as INDIVIDUALS of all sorts have been brought to Christ.

Ephesians 1:10 has been absolutely clear that there is not ‘a type’ that is in it.

Certainly there is no genetic component, in that each individual must, consistently across the face of New Testament theology, personally turn from sin to trust Christ … so for example from the very outset on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2:38 Peter addresses in these terms the crowd up at Jerusalem that had previously thought they were OK because they had Abraham as their father:

“Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”

Now the Greek there is absolutely explicit, the command to repent and be baptised for the forgiveness of their sin along with the promise of the Holy Spirit is addressed to  ἕκαστος ὑμῶν … the call to repentance and faith is to ‘every single one of you’, to each individual.

But it is a definite call into one body.

Why do I say that so confidently?

Well, because in the context of Ephesians 1 which describes the ‘back story’ behind what God was doing in bringing about this Gospel and this salvation was done with the explicit intention of creating the BODY of the Church with Christ at its head out of the brokenness and broken individualism of humanity, but to do so by uniting those individuals together UNDER Christ’s Headship in the power of the Holy Spirit that salvation brings …

So it is that Paul builds here the spiritual understanding that will motivate and empower his corrective plea to those individual believers at Ephesians in Ephesians 4:1-6:

“As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

Can you see it now?

The Church IS made up from a tremendous diversity of individual human beings but the calling that each one has received bestows not only individual salvation but the gift of the Holy Spirit Who continues in the live of God’s people the primary intention of the Almighty in Christ to (Ephesians 1:10) bring all things together again under the headship (that word again) of Christ.

And THAT’s why a major issue that Paul wants to put to the Ephesian church is that they must make every effort σπουδάζω (spoudazō) to be eager, to make every effort, to do one’s best to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

And that is necessary.

It is necessary BECAUSE the Church is made up of such a diverse and uncomfortable bunch of sinners in the first place!

Of very COURSE there will be people in there you find difficult!

Of very COURSE there will be people there different to you, whose innate personality, prior understanding of the world, culture, pre-existing attitudes, preferences, goals and manner of expression you can EASILY be offended by.

Ephesians 1 is telling us that the Glory of God in the Gospel is revealed in bringing such a rag, tag and bob-tail crew together by His great mercy and grace.

A huge part of what Ephesians is for is to call God’s people in Ephesus back to the memo, in spite of the fractured independency of their origins, to unite under the headship of Christ IN THE CHURCH.

So much of the church casualty kind of dechurching I’ve come across arises because the basic truths of the Gospel have been let slip and our expectations of what the Gospel makes both those who have been dechurched in this way and of those who remain have let slip of the fundamental Gospel reality that the Church consists of sinners.

That I am a sinner and that I need to address that, and that he/ she that I find it so easy to offend or be offended by is a sinner too … and that the manifestation of the Glory of God in the Gospel is what’s at stake when I (in practice) live by the Law not the Gospel, and do not live in open repentance by grace through faith alone with my brother and sister in Christ.

Don’t expect me to be anything but a sinner who is very likely at some point to fail you, or disappoint you … or at least appear to do so.

But I owe you, and you owe me by virtue of the Gospel we’re saved by to strive in the power of the Holy Spirit we’ve received to maintain the unity the Spirit brings about … in the bond of peace.

And sometimes I’ll need help with that.

And sometimes you will need help with that.

That help might come from me to you or you to me, quite possibly both, and it might have to come with the help of another brother or sister … or a whole church full of them … but the glory of Christ needs this to happen.

But too often it doesn’t and when it doesn’t there is damage and dechurching by disillusionment is too often the result.

The U.S. research seems to show that a huge proportion of this group of people would LOVE to be back in the Church.

b)    Unity of body parts

Somebody on one of my social media links recently posted a dissection image of the central nervous system of the human body.

Apparently this dissection was initially performed by Rufus Benjamin Weaver in the 1880s.

The cadaver he spent six months dissecting was that of a woman who suffered from tuberculosis who donated her body to science just before her death in 1888 at the age of 35.

The cadaver was named ‘Harriet’ after a woman whom worked in his lab, and today the dissected Harriet is displayed at the Drexel University College of Medicine campus for all students to see.

Why am I telling you this?

It’s because if you Google Rufus Benjamin Weaver you will discover a little of how the human body is very closely and intimately connected to the head.

And if you do a little more research, you will discover not only the way that the head does not only command and control the muscles, organs and tissues of the body but also hears back from them as messages from the body return to the head to be processed and managed, and to prompt further action by and amongst other parts of the body.

There is a unity, a communal and co-ordinated activity and action in the processes of the body brought about, commanded and regulated by the brain … the Head … which keeps them all going on together in critically important co-operation and collaboration.

Now, I’d love to continue to regale you with the wonders of the workings of the central and peripheral nervous systems, but the crucial point is this:

The command-and-control centre and therefore the co-ordination centre of the body is in the head.

The parts of the body only get to see a PART of the picture … so often when the parts start feuding it’s because they haven’t got the full picture … and it’s when that full picture isn’t there to command what takes place that the whole thing goes wrong.

The key to it is the acknowledgement of the authority of the Head over the partial understanding and the independency of the separate parts that the overall objectives are preserved and the memo gets followed.

c)     Authority of the Head

Now, as we’ve said, whilst Paul’s use of this imagery in Romans 12:4-8 and 1 Corinthians 12:12-31 gets us as far as we’ve come so far with the meaning of this ‘Body’ metaphor, the same metaphor in Colossians and here in Ephesians unpacks the same idea a little bit further in the direction of the authority implicit in it in the other two places.

So, in Colossians 2:10 Paul deals with the Lord being made ‘head over every power and authority’.

There is unity, co-ordination, survival TOGETHER as a unified entity in the Church as and when it acts as if it recognises the authority of the Head.

There’s a word for what happens in a body when the parts aren’t properly regulated by the head … that word is ‘dysregulation’ and it leads to ‘dysfunction’.

So what is it that we observe at this point in the Church in the U.S. and across Western society?

We see both dysregulation (whether that amounts to theological or behavioural lapses) and as a result of that we see dysfunction … the Church not working properly with parts of the Church (individual members) either hanging on while hurting, or ultimately dropping off.

But that does more damage even than the casualty de-churching we’ve been talking about, it also strikes at the Glory of God.

How is that?

2)   The Church is His ‘fulness’

Here’s where we get to the question of what the Church is for.

And this is so very important because all too often we have our expectations of the Church distorted by a misconception of what the Church is and is for.

You see, it has a much bigger and broader purpose than my pleasure or my fulfilment.

Hear what Paul writes here (Ephesians 1:22-23)

“God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”

The first description of the Church was that it is Christ’s body, but the second description of the Church is that it is the fulness of Him.

a)    Is being filled

There’s a lot of tricky Greek going on here but the best understanding of this is that there is an ongoing process here that as the members of the Church are what they ought to be and go on doing what they are designed to be doing they go on being filled by Him Who fills everything in every way.

In order to address the issues around casualty de-churching in our time we really do need to be aware both of the fact that His Church is a definite work in progress, but we also need to be really aware of the need to keep on with the progress … to keep on being filled by applying the Gospel, applying the means of grace, applying to ourselves and within the Church the disciplines that belong to followers of the Way, the Christian life.

b)    Who gives what fulness?

There are all sorts of rather exotic speculations around that Jesus isn’t all He needs to be without the Church.

As He managed pretty well in Heaven in eternity before there ever was such a thing as a Church … and because that understanding relies on a less than contextual understanding of what’s being said … I think there’s a better explanation for what’s being said here in this context.

You know that ‘goes on being filled’ part of the verse we’ve been talking about?

Well, that sets a context which make it far more likely that Paul is drawing on the way Old Testament writers expressed the divine presence and manifestation of God in the Tabernacle and the Temple.

It looks much more like the idea of God’s Glory filling the Temple as when the Tabernacle and the Temple were ‘commissioned’, and in 

2 Chronicles 7:1 where, “When Solomon finished praying … the Glory of the Lord filled the Temple.”

So what Paul is doing here is to urge the readers of this letter to be filled with the Spirit (a theme he returns to in Ephesians 5:18).

It’s about the Church being the place on earth where God now lives by His Holy Spirit as the going on being filled receptacle … practising the fulness of God’s awesome and attracting presence … here on earth.

c)     Filling all things in every way?

Clinton E. Arnold then summarises the situation envisaged by all of this in this way:

“The overall sense of the clause is then that the church is filled by Christ and is thus the ‘fulness’ of Christ; as head of Spirit-filled church, Christ is engaging in a mission ‘to fill all things, things on earth and things in Heaven’.”

Now, that comes about as the Gospel is proclaimed and the power of God active in the Church brings redemption and deliverance to people and the Church extends the reign of Christ … fulfilling Ephesians 1:10.

So the final clause of this section of the letter stresses that the Church is filled with power and grace from its glorified and exalted Lord, Who extends His reign throughout Heaven and earth through the Church.

That being the case, what is causing casualties that lead to de-churching doing?

Well, obviously, it is doing the very opposite.

And that can only be happening because the Church is NOT 

i)               depending on the Gospel for itself, in the way that our relationships and our interactions should be shaped by our primary understanding of what we as humans are by nature, by what we have become by grace and by what it has taken to get us to where we stand in Christ

ii)              nor proclaiming the Gospel and manifesting the Kingdom of God to all without distinction, fear or favour, in an extensive way

People don’t leave as casualties those churches that are doing that.

Conclusion

So here’s the thing.

There’s a point and a purpose to the Church.

It is to be his body and his fulness – His dwelling place, temple or tabernacle – on earth.

And the thing is that His person and therefore his presence is compelling.

Attractive, and compelling.

He is the One that humans long to be with, once they start to know him and realise what He’s like.

And you USED to be able to go up and meet with Him, as it were, in the Jerusalem temple.

But now you go and meet Him in the jumble and the tangle of His dwelling place by his Spirit in the presence as they meet and relate together as his Church … because, while being out in His creation’s very nice, in His Church is where His Glory actually fills the Temple.

What a crime it is to get so far from Him that we set up tables in the court of the Gentiles and exclude people from that place where the Lord wanted to see a house of prayer for many nations.

What a crime it is to drive brothers and sisters from the family home.

How DYSFUNCTIONAL for disrespect for the function of the Head to lead to dysregulation and dysfunction in the body.

And what an error to expect the body to be as perfect as we want it to be, to give offence and to be offended when we ourselves long and demand to be bathed in grace.

Let’s be sure we pray most committedly for the health of the Church and of ourselves in it in this land of Wales.

And may the Lord graciously halt the de-churching we see, which pains us deeply, all around.