Covenant Theology: The Mission of the Church

(Part 1 Sermon Number Twenty-one)

by

James E. Bordwine, Th.D.

Introduction

Previously, we studied the Foundation of the Church and the Character of the Church. Under the first point, The Foundation of the Church, we learned that there is a doctrinal truth that serves as the theological ground upon which the Church rests. That doctrinal truth is represented in Peter's confession of Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of the living God” in Matt. 16. The foundation of the Church is Christological. Doctrine about Christ and doctrine from Christ serves as the organizing principle for the Church. Under the second point, The Character of the Church, I describe three chief qualities by which the Church is distinguished: sanctity or holiness, catholicity and apostolicity. Those who compose the Church are “sanctified” by virtue of their union with Jesus Christ. Moreover, the Church of Christ is “catholic” or “universal” in the sense that all true believers are found in Her. And finally, the Church is apostolic in the sense that She is the repository for the teaching of the apostles who, upon the commission of Jesus Christ, founded the Church.

We now are ready to consider the third point in our overview of the doctrine of the Church. Under this third point, we will be looking at several passages in which the mission of the Church of Jesus Christ is explained.

03. The Mission of the Church

As we come to this third and final point dealing with our overview of the doctrine of the Church, I want to restate something I mentioned earlier. I said that the character and mission of the Church are related to the foundation of the Church, which is Christological. I want to emphasize this fact as we now consider the mission of the Church. There is a principle that must be followed if we are to learn about the mission of the Church in this world. The principle is this: The mission of the Church is rightly understood only within the context of the mission of Jesus Christ. We cannot separate the mission or objective of the Church from the mission or objective of Jesus Christ. I am convinced that one of the greatest errors in contemporary evangelical thinking on the subject of the Church is this very mistake of trying to understand and define the Church apart from the work of the Head of the Church, Jesus Chrirst. Modern evangelicals are trying to explain the work of the Church as though She exists as an independent, self-determining institution.

The Bible, on the other hand, clearly teaches the dependent nature of the Church by describing Her as the Body of Jesus Christ and describing Him as the Head of the Church. The Church is not meant to function autonomously; She is meant to function only in relation to Jesus Christ. This means that the purposes of Christ and the Church are identical; the mission of the Savior and His Body are the same. When we try to understand what the Church is supposed to be doing in the world, we will be misled if we do not maintain the vital link between the Head and the Body, between the Savior and His Church.

If it is true, therefore, that the mission of the Church is rightly understood only within the context of the mission of Jesus Christ, then we must ask: What did Jesus Christ come to do? By answering this question, we can define the mission of the Church because the Church is the Body of Christ through which He carries on His post-resurrection ministry. Answering this question, of course, requires us to look back beyond the coming of Christ to the creation of the first man, Adam. The reason we must do this is because the ministry of Jesus Christ is linked to the events that unfolded in the Garden of Eden. The atoning work of the Savior comes in response to what happened in that place. The mission of the Church has its roots in the creation and subsequent fall of man.

As we know, Adam was created to be the head of the human race and was supposed to lead the human race in serving the Creator and in taking dominion of the creation. When Adam disobeyed God, however, this dominion mandate was interrupted. Adam's sin caused a break in his relationship with his Creator; as a rebel against God, he could not lead the human race in serving the Creator and in subduing the creation. The Scripture tells us that God's response to Adam's sin was severe. However, in the midst of that disturbing scene, a promise is made. God made a promise concerning the coming of a Figure who would crush the serpent's head, restore the human race and thus reinstate the mandate originally given to Adam. This Figure, this Second Adam, is, of course, Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the Son of Man. His mission, then, would be the restoration of mankind. His objective would be the creation of a renewed humanity. This renewed humanity, led by Jesus Christ as the Second Adam, would accomplish those objectives originally assigned to the first Adam.

Now, with all that said, please consider some statements found in Heb. 2:

5 For He did not subject to angels the world to come, concerning which we are speaking. 6 But one has testified somewhere, saying, “What is man, that Thou rememberest him? or the son of man, that Thou art concerned about him? 7 Thou hast made him for a little while lower than the angels; Thou hast crowned him with glory and honor, and hast appointed him over the works of Thy hands; 8 Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet.” For in subjecting all things to him, He left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we do not yet see all things subjected to him. 9 But we do see Him who has been made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.

In this passage, the writer takes Psa. 8, which describes God's intended destiny for man, and applies it to Jesus Christ as the ultimate Man. Because of Adam's sin, the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, came to rescue the human race and enable us to fulfill God's purposes in creating us. Those purposes are stipulated in Psa. 8, among other places in the Bible. This passage draws the connection between what Jesus Christ did by way of His atonement and what God originally intended for mankind. God commanded our first parents to multiply and exercise dominion over His creation. God made man to live in harmony with Himself, to care for and cultivate this world.

The author of Hebrews affirms man's destiny by using Psalm 8. Man was made to reign over God's creation. “But,” he adds, “we do not yet see all things subjected to him.” (v. 8b) Man has not yet fulfilled the command of God to subdue and rule over everything. Man cannot fulfill God's command because he is dead in his trespasses and sins. Adam's disobedience, as I stated earlier, interrupted the mandate given to him by his Creator. When Adam fell, his potential to reign over creation was negated. But remember what God said to the crafty serpent by whose treachery sin entered Paradise: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on your head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.” (Gen. 3:15)

In the mind of the writer of Hebrews, this is where a shift occurs; here is where he turns to Jesus Christ, the Last Man. All things are not subject to man, because of sin, “But we do see Him who has been made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus,” exalted to a position of glory and honor following His work of atonement. (v. 9) The writer makes a transition from what God intended for man, which was ruined by sin, to Jesus Christ, the Last Man, who came to restore God's purpose for the human race.

I want to pause for just a moment and observe that the implications of this one passage are so clear that I have to wonder how there can be so much confusion regarding the mission and destiny of the Church. If my principle is valid, if the mission of the Church cannot be understood apart from the mission of Jesus Christ, then some questions are in order. How can we read this passage, which declares that through His ministry Jesus Christ is restoring mankind, and be in doubt regarding what God is doing in the world through the Church as Christ uses Her to apply His atonement? How can we not see that Christ is redeeming humanity so that we can realize those purposes for which we were created? How can we be pessimistic about the ministry of the Church in this world? How can we plead ignorance concerning the inevitable restoration of the human race when it is so evidently taught in this passage? Has Christ been defeated? Has Christ been stopped? Is the atonement an accomplished event or not? I hope you see that by recognizing the connection between the ministry of Christ and the ministry of the Church, the mission of the Church comes into focus. And not only does the mission of the Church come into focus, but the glorious future of the Church becomes undeniable.

By becoming a man and making atonement for sin, Jesus Christ was able to restore man so that the effects of the fall can be reversed. The New Testament makes it clear that we are no longer talking about man subduing the physical world only. In His atonement, Jesus Christ “disarmed the rulers and authorities” and “made a public display of them.” (Col. 2:15) Through the Church, the redeemed humanity, the purposes of God are being made known “to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.” (Eph. 3:10) The target of redeemed man's rule has been translated to a different realm: “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Eph. 6:12) The Church, the new humanity, is asserting Her God-given right to rule against the evil forces that have infested God's creation by taking the message of man's redemption in Christ to the whole world. Christ's purpose as the Last Man was to restore harmony between God and man and to enable man to subdue all things for God's glory. In union with Christ, man can be what God made him to be; God's design is restored and brought to completion in Christ.

All of this means something important for our purposes in this sermon: It is useless to attempt to define the mission of that Body apart from the mission of Her Head. The Church, as the Body of Christ, does not go off on Her own, but is directed by Her Head; and the Head, which is Christ, does not carry out His post-resurrection ministry apart from the Church, which is His Body. If we want to understand the mission of the Church, then we must understand the mission of Jesus Christ, the Second Adam. The mission of Christ and the mission of the Church are one and the same. To know what the Church is supposed to be doing in this world, we must know what Christ came into this world to accomplish.

To be precise, let me say that the function of the Church is to take what Christ has done for Her and what Christ has given Her and use those resources to call and train a renewed humanity. The Church serves only to further the mission of the Savior and His mission is the restoration of mankind. That is what God promised at the point of the fall and that is what the Bible is about and, in fact, that is what history is about.

As Christians understand this connection between the Savior and His Body, they are able to discern and labor for that which Christ intends to accomplish. On the other hand, as long as Christians are ignorant of this connection between the Savior and His Body, they remain confused about the mission of the Church and the Church, therefore, remains ineffective. When believers miss the Biblical definition of the Church's mission, they will invent objectives for the Church. This is what has happened in modern evangelicalism. Many churches in our land are little more than laboratories for the latest psychological or marketing fad. Many churches today are trying to be everything from baby-sitters to career counselors because there is a void in their philosophies of ministry. That void is created by the absence of a Biblical understanding of their ministry. Churches know that they are supposed to have a purpose, they know that they are to be engaged in ministry of some kind; therefore, not having a proper view of the relation between Christ and the Church, they are forced to create programs and institute services that justify their existence. This necessity, in turn, leaves churches at the mercy of an unstable, morally deficient culture. The importance of the connection between the ministry of the Savior and the ministry of His Church cannot be overstated.

The Church is going to be the means whereby the many things said about the ministry of Jesus Christ are going to be realized in history. Christ has accomplished His atonement and is now overseeing the application of that atonement to the human race. The Bible, of course, contains many passages that give us a picture of what impact the coming of Christ is going to have as time marches on. In this sermon, I've laid the groundwork to consider a few passages that describe the ministry of Christ through His Church. We will begin looking at these passages in the next sermon.

Application

There is one application in particular that demands to be made at the conclusion of this sermon. The application is this: the perspective that we have on the atoning work of Jesus Christ is the perspective that we must have on the ministry of the Church. This follows, I believe, from the principle that I have explained, which is: The mission of the Church is rightly understood only within the context of the mission of Jesus Christ. Let me put this as simply as I can: We cannot declare victory for Christ, but defeat for His Church; we cannot rejoice in the Savior's triumph on the cross, but weep for the Church's failure in the world; we cannot place confidence in Christ's ministry, but have no confidence in the Chruch's ministry. The Church is the Body of Christ and Christ is the Head of the Church; His ministry is the ministry of the Church and His triumph is the triumph of the Church and His victory is the victory of the Church.

The Church will do no more than Her Head and the Church will do no less than Her Head. According to the Savior, He has overcome the world (cf. John 16:33); according to the apostle Paul, Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead, has been seated at the right hand of God far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and every name that is named in this age and in the age to come and has had all things put in subjection under His feet (cf. Eph. 1:20-22). I say again, we cannot declare victory for Christ, but defeat for His Church; we cannot rejoice in the Savior's triumph on the cross, but weep for the Church's failure in the world; we cannot place confidence in Christ's ministry, but have no confidence in the Church's ministry.

There is one perspective on the ministry of the Church that the Bible allows and that one perspective can be described by words like “optimism,” “hope,” “confidence,” “triumph” and “expectation.” These words aptly describe the ministry of our great Savior and they must, therefore, aptly describe His continuing, post-resurrection ministry through His Body, the Church. Let me emphasize that only if we divorce the mission of the Church from the mission of the Savior can we end up with a pessimistic and uncertain view of the Church's ministry in this world. Only if we treat the Church as though She has no Head can we arrive at the conclusion that the aimlessness and confusion that we see in Her today is what we are to expect.

But understand that Scripture will not let us make such a separation. Scripture will not let us sever the Head from the Body, Scripture will not let us negate the atonement of God's Son, Scripture will not let us de-throne our King, Scripture will not let us exalt the Savior while despising His Church. Therefore, the pessimism that characterizes contemporary Christianity is to be rejected and the Church must repent of Her ignorance, Her slothfulness and Her failure to pursue the ministry of Her Head. We have lived with a century of pessimism and we now can see what this perspective has done to the Church and, as a result, our society.

There are certain consequences to a pessimistic view of the Church's ministry that cannot be denied. First, the Church has been relegated to a position of non-importance in our culture. Very few heed the voice of the Church today and even fewer fear the voice of the Church. This is because the pessimistic Church has become almost mute. She rarely speaks and when She does, She makes only a peep. Compounding this problem is the fact that the pessimistic Church is fractured into dozens of tiny voices, none of which is strong enough and commanding enough to demand a hearing.

And so, other voices, including the voice of anti-Christ, by which I mean all those false churches that claim to be speaking God's truth while denying God's truth, have taken the lead in our society and they are giving the directions and they are deciding how we should live. Does this make sense in light of what Christ accomplished on the cross? Does this seem right when you consider what our Savior has done and what position He now occupies?

A second consequence of a pessimistic view of the Church's ministry is that She has been robbed of Her glory and Her vision. Most Christians think that the Church they see today is the Church that's been here since the time of Christ. Because they know nothing of Church History, they don't realize that there was a time when the Church mattered in the thinking of citizens. This was because the Church carried Herself in such a way that She demanded respect. There was a time when the Church acted like the Body of the victorious Savior and spoke to the world with the certainty of a resurrected Savior and the authority of a sovereign King. But those days have passed away. The glory has departed from the modern Church; She is weak and She staggers because that which gives Her glory, that which enlivens Her has been neglected. The ministry of the Savior is that which gives the Church Her glory and His resurrection and ascension into heaven is that which gives Her life. But modern Christians conceive of a Church that has a mission other than the mission of Christ and they labor to build congregations designed to serve the sinner instead of the Savior.

Inevitably, this leads to a corresponding loss of vision. There probably never has been a time when more local churches were busy drafting Purpose Statements. This is one of the latest trends in church marketing. We search for just the right words, we brainstorm for just the right slogan, all in an effort to define our ministry and tell the world who we are and convince the world that we have something that will make life easier. In all this searching and laboring for a vision, the contemporary Church has no vision. Our pessimism prevents us from believing that the Church might actually succeed in discipling the nations and so we lower our sites; we talk about fixing this tiny problem or that small dysfunction, but we don't announce to the community and to the world that we are here to make disciples of all nations and to teach them what our Savior taught us.

It truly is disheartening to see book after book declaring that, yes, Jesus Christ was victorious on the cross and, yes, He ascended triumphantly into heaven to be seated at God's right hand, but the Church, which is His Body, is destined to limp along down here on earth while God barely manages to save a few individuals. This is the thinking of the modern Church and this thinking is slowly putting out the light of the Church. I say again that we need to repent of holding a view so contrary to the work of Christ, so offensive to the God of redemption and so destructive to the Body of Christ. I say that you need to repent right this very minute if that has been your view of the Church.

A third consequence of a pessimistic perspective on the ministry of the Church is the affect it has on Christian families. Many try to deny that their perspective on the ministry of the Church affects their service to Christ or the manner in which they live their lives, but such denials simply do not hold up in light of what can be proven from recent Church history. We exist in a time when Christian families live for the moment, when talk about a generational perspective on the family is dismissed as archaic. Rare is the Christian parent who views the raising of children as related to the next generation and the next and the next. Rare is the Christian family that is planning and living in anticipation of the next generation's needs and opportunities.

Why is this? This is so because the general pessimism that has swept through the Church, that has commanded Her attention and has filled Her bookshelves also has laid waste the covenantal family model. The covenantal family model that is found in the Bible has parents investing themselves in their children for the sake of future generations; it produces parents who produce children who look for an increasing manifestation of their Savior's triumph. Therefore, those children enter adulthood prepared to work for Christ's Kingdom and they go into all walks of life with a Biblically optimistic mindset. This is how families, communities, businesses, educational institutions and whole societies are transformed. It begins in the family and the family's direction is determined by the Church.

Just as the ministry of the Church is grounded in the ministry of Christ, so the Biblical view of the family is grounded in the doctrine of the Church. If Christians are taught by the Church that God has decreed that the Church will not actually fulfill the Great Commission, but will suffer at the hands of the ungodly and be trampled under their feet, then what perspective do you suppose those Christians are going to have when it comes time to train their children? What are they going to train their children for? What is the motivation to invest in the spiritual nurture of children if it is not to prepare them to serve the Lord and repeat the process with their own children?

Pessimism breeds spiritual laziness; pessimism invalidates goals and hopes and aspirations. Pessimism is contrary to the nature of our redemption, it is contrary to the gospel and it is contrary to God's purposes. A parent with a pessimistic attitude toward the Church might do a fine job of teaching his children about the faith, but he will never instill in his children a covenantal or generational perspective.

Let us be done with that hand-wringing, gloom and doom attitude that threatens the vitality of the Church. Let us return to the more historical view, the more Biblical view of the Church as the glorious and powerful Body of a glorious and powerful resurrected and sovereign Savior.

Conclusion (preparation for the Lord's Supper)

All that I've said leads us to this Table. Displayed before you are the elements of the Lord's Supper. This sacrament portrays the ministry of our Savior. Once again, we see the importance of weekly communion-this sacrament keeps before us the work of the Savior so that we maintain the perspective that I've described. This sacrament reminds us of what Christ did and of His place now as our Head and, therefore, of our mission as His Body.

As you receive the elements, give thanks for your salvation and give thanks for the salvation of the human race that is being accomplished as the atonement is applied throughout the world. Pray for the well-being of the Church as Christ uses Her to call sinners to Himself. Pray that God would deliver Her from deception and would cause Her to shine as a light to the whole world.

And pray for the grace to give yourself to the ministry of the Church. Let us not leave here thinking that our lives are insignificant. Indeed, if what I have said is true, then that makes every Christian life and every Christian family part of a wonderful work of God, a work that is going to become more obvious and more glorious as time continues.