Community life in Peckham (Wikimedia)
ad hoc post – 4
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Paul’s letter to the Ephesians has sometimes been described as the constitution of the church, but that’s not strictly correct. Paul didn’t write Ephesians to define what church is and is not, so it contains much more than the bare bones of a definition. Constitutions are (relatively) brief but very clearly lay out the essence and limits of something, be it an organisation like a business, a charity, or indeed a nation. They also spell out definitions of terms as well as the concept being defined, as clearly as possible. So if we want a constitution for the church, we must think in terms of something succinct, crystal clear, and complete but not providing unnecessary additional detail.
Why have a constitution?
The church has never truly had a constitution, some might argue it doesn’t need one. But recently I’ve begun to feel it does. Almost every denomination imposes customs and requirements on their adherents, over and above anything that Jesus taught. There are paid leaders and managers, forms of infant baptism, doctrine, so much encrusted over the basics. So much that can be seen as unnecessary when we compare it to the earliest forms of church or to what we learn from the New Testament. Some form of declarative constitution might bring much needed clarity to the confusion.
Over the centuries there have been repeated reforms and corrections, but generally these have resulted in yet more varieties of belief and practice. A constitution might help, we should at least make an attempt to form one.
So first of all, why would we even want a church constitution? There are probably as many definitions as there are denominations, and that’s quite a large number; a constitution provides clarity and a reference point. The Bible, and even just the New Testament is far too detailed to be a definition; yet it contains everything we need to know and does not support the additions and concretions of the last two millenia.
The essentials, but no more
What else can we say about constitutions in general? The key point, I think, is that a constitution should contain everything essential but nothing beyond that. A definition brings clarity and focus. Constitutions are usually amendable both for corrections and for additions or deletions. There is normally an agreed process for amending a constitution.
So where would we begin for the church? As always, we must begin with our source – Jesus himself.
A good start would be to state that church is defined by everything that Jesus is and does and teaches and by nothing beyond that. Having leaders of a particular flavour or style and how we name those leaders are not fundamental. Whether you have a priest, a vicar, a pastor, elders or deacons, those are all secondary features of church life and practice. They cannot form part of the definition.
Let’s begin by saying church is a group of people striving to follow Jesus. I don’t think we can start in any better way.
We’ll make that our primary clause.
Making a start
1 – Church is a group of people striving to follow Jesus as fully as possible.
Let’s check this statement. It’s a group so we’re defining the minimum size to be two. One person alone following Jesus therefore falls outside our definition. And another point in that first statement is that complete success in following Jesus is not an essential of church either, so two or more people doing their best to follow Jesus becomes our initial attempt at defining what church is. We can adjust our primary clause to make this explicit.
1 – Church is a group of two or more people striving to follow Jesus.
Perhaps we need to clarify the relationship between the people that make up church. They are a community, interacting with one another, and cooperating in following Jesus. Let’s add that in as well. And we need to include the idea of making progress, so…
1 – Church is a community of two or more people striving together to follow Jesus ever more closely.
Let’s add some support from the New Testament. Matthew 4:18-21 shows that people are chosen, called, and follow. Also, I now begin to see that there needs to be some statement before this one, declaring that Jesus is our source and foundation. So let’s renumber our clause as 2 to leave room for a new number 1 to be written later. So now we have…
2 – Church is a community of two or more people striving together to follow Jesus ever more closely. (Matthew 4:18-21)
I’ve linked to Bible Gateway for convenience. The link is not part of the constitution, but the Bible verses themselves are.
For now I’d like to adopt that as the first stab at a constitution for the church. We’ll need to expand it by adding further clauses later. Some of these additions will extend the definition while others will limit it. I plan to revisit this topic repeatedly. But for now I’d love to hear suggestions for improvement as well as objections to this initial statement. How should we extend it? What else do you think we should include? What should we leave out? What might future clauses cover?
See also:
- Christian church – Wikipedia
- Constitution – Wikipedia
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