What do you know of my upbringing? Let me answer my own question... Absolutely NOTHING. You don't know that I was raised in a home that was quasi-religious, but we knew nothing of the true gospel of Christ. I can honestly say that none of the ministers I knew in my early years had a clue about any of this theology. I later was married in a church where the pastor was Methodist and his wife was Buddhist. They didn't have a clue either... I then dropped out of church altogether -- and at first became an agnostic, and later an atheist.
It was by GOD'S GRACE that I am now born again, and that apart from the actions of ANY local "ekklesia." I had promised to never darken the door of a "church" again when I walked away from religion earlier, and had God not sought me, and eventually won me, I would still be lost.
I learned my theology by studying the Word. I was named associate and later senior pastor of the church we finally united with 2 years after my salvation. I promise they didn't have a clue about any of this stuff either, but looking back, they were very Arminian. How do I know that? Everyone was constantly rededicating their life to God. Several were baptized multiple times. They were always afraid that they would loose their salvation. What they held did not match what I saw in the Word, nor my own testimony of salvation and/or God's calling me into ministry.
Fully 10 years after my involvement in ministry, I left that church and headed to seminary, and it was there that I found men of God who taught the Scriptures (not John Calvin!). After 12 years of education in multiple degrees at Southern Seminary (of all places...) I never had to read any Calvin for any class. I read Calvin on my own because I believe in reading source material. I also read Luther, Arminius, Augustine, Thomas, etc., etc., etc.
I am sorry if I offended you. I did make some assumptions, assumptions that I believe are correct, so if I am wrong (after explaining myself once again), then please tell me. By experience, most pastors that I have met that are associated with SBC, most evangelical churches, and to plainly put it most Baptists including a good majority of IFB churches, believe in the universal church. You have already stated you believe in the universal church. As you say you have gone through seminary. You have a lot of good education, and I do not discredit any of that. I respect you for that.
But this one fact remains. When discussing this one doctrine--ekklesia can only be translated local church, and thus there is no universal church--most Baptist pastors recoil (as you have done) at this very thought. They have never heard of it. It is strange. They may have spent years in the ministry and then all of a sudden, out of the blue they are presented with this view that vehemently denies the universal church and has strong Scriptural support for it. It is only natural for you to dig in your heals and rely on what you have been taught and what you have been teaching all these years. This "Landmarkist" doctrine, as some people call it, is completely foreign to you, and you reject it completely--even if you have not completely studied it out. And that is where I think the problem lies. You are allowing you bias of previous years of study to get in your way of objectively looking at this subject with any credibility.
I admit, it is not a popular doctrine. But on the other hand, I believe it is Biblically sound. And I also believe that if you stick to the Scriptures you will have a very difficult time defeating these men's arguments as they present from the Scripture. They have a solid case.
And, so we are! Now, the next thing that we need to hash out is WHO'S congregation. Yours or Christ's? I suspect, that along with your radical separatism, and your Arminian-semi--Pelagian leanings, that your fully human-centered point of view has also colored your concept of "church" to the point where you actually think that you (or your pastor) IS the shepherd instead of the under-shepherd who serves Christ.
The term is often used in its generic sense, where one assembly is representative of many. The seven messages of Christ to the seven pastors of the seven churches in Rev.2,3 are applicable to us all. But they were 3 distinct churches that existed in history. They were assemblies located at the cities described. Many of our churches have some of the same problems that those churches do. Thus the warning: "Let him who has ears, hear."
Christ is the head of every Bible-believing church, as Christ dwells within every believer. How is this human-centered. This is as Christ-centered as one can be. Both the local church and the individual is centered around Christ and His Word. This is what the Bible teaches. With a universal so-called church, there is no accountability to anyone, much less Christ. It is a mystical, nebulous, existential organism that exists somewhere out there in the metaphysical realm that is completely undefinable. Universal Church = Unassembled assembly--a total contradiction of terms.
So, you're telling me that Revelation is a bunch of hooey? We assemble every time God's people get together! We assemble at your place (assuming that your place is indeed a biblical church) and my place. We assemble all over the world, wherever God's people come together for worship and ministry. And, we'll finally assemble forever in God's eternity.
The only time that there will be an assembly of all believers is after the rapture occurs in heaven--when all believers will be together. There is no such assembly today. What you seem to be suggesting is "the communion of saints," that heretical doctrine of the RCC that allows them to pray to the dead saints in heaven. I am sorry but we don't believe in that. A church is an assembly, an organized local assembly that has assembled for the purpose of carrying out the two ordinances that Christ gave us (baptism and the Lord's Supper), and to obey the Great Commission. It is composed of regenerated baptized believers who have voluntarily assembled themselves together for this purpose. That is what a local church is. The word "church" is ekklesia. It is a word that translates "assembly" all the time. It has no other meaning. It is a physical entity.
Of course it can be translated "local assembly" but it also means universal assembly!
Give documentation. Where in first century did the word ekklesia ever refer to a universal church? Please prove your point. Give evidence for what you are asserting here.
Why is that so difficult to grasp... Oh, wait, I know. I explained it above.
Why?? Because it is a statement you affirm, but cannot demonstrate to be prove. Why assert a false statement? If it is true then give the evidence.
Again, if at any time the word ekklesia ONLY means local church, then we have no Bible for us, as the Word was written only to THAT PARTICULAR GATHERING. Of course, it was not... We preach it just as well today, because we realize that the Word -- written to the "ekklesia" at Rome, Ephesus, Phillipi, etc., is also for the ekklesia meeting in 2011 in whichever community we meet.
And as you just pointed out ekklesia always referred to those specific churches, always local churches. They always referred to those particular local churches that you mentioned, plus others, but never a universal one.
Every one of Paul's epistles was written to a local church or a pastor of a local church.
Paul went on three missionary journeys and established over 100 local churches, never a universal church, never a denomination.
There is no such thing as denomination mentioned in the Bible.
There is no such thing as universal church mentioned in the Bible.
