The church of Christ was established in the first century about 50 days after the resurrection of Christ. People were added to the church by gladly receiving the word of God and being baptized into Christ (Acts 2:41-47; Galatians 3:27). In the first decade of her existence, the church was only composed of Jews. It is not until Acts 10 that we read of Gentiles obeying the gospel, at which time Cornelius and his household were baptized into Christ (Acts 10:1-48). Interestingly enough is the fact that, today, the church is composed primarily of Gentiles. From the beginning, Jews rejected Jesus and resisted the truth that was preached to them by the apostles. Even though Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles (Galatians 2:7), his custom was to first enter the local synagogue of the city where he would go to preach (Acts 17:1-13). Some Jews would almost always obey the gospel, but the majority of them would spurn the invitation, sometimes chasing Paul out of town (Acts 17:5-11, 13-14). It is true that some Jews obeyed the gospel because of the teachings of other apostles (Acts 21:20), but over time, more Gentiles and fewer Jews were obeying the gospel until the church changed from being exclusively Jewish to primarily Gentile in its make-up. Today the church is composed of people from many different backgrounds and ethnicity. This has always been the will of God. Remember, all nations were to flow unto it (Isaiah 2:1-4), and indeed such has been the case over the years. The gospel message invites all, regardless of color or creed, to leave behind the sins of the world and obey Christ. To be a member of the Lord’s church one need only to fear God and work righteousness (Acts 10:37), which includes, of course, the doing of God’s will (Matthew 7:21).

Looking more specifically at the New Testament church, we find that the church is viewed from two standpoints—the universal church and the local church. It is imperative that one recognize the differences between the two if he is not going to plunge into religious error.

The Universal Church

When Jesus promised to build His church in Matthew 16:18, He was speaking of the universal church. The universal church is made up of all the saved. When one obeys the gospel of Christ, he is saved and added to the church simultaneously (Acts 2:47). It is important to see that obeying a man-made doctrine will not put one into the church of Christ. There are many who teach a “faith only” doctrine which advocates that the moment one believes that Jesus is the Christ that person is saved. However, that conclusion is not based on New Testament teaching. In fact, the only time faith and only appear together is in James 2:24 where James tells us that faith only DOESN’T save. A reading of the whole context shows that mere mental assent, a faith that is void of obedience, is a dead faith. Jesus said, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). Faith is not the only part of God’s will so far as salvation is concerned. We saw in our last article that repentance, confession and baptism are also commanded by God. Baptism, itself, has to be scriptural. It must involve the right person (the penitent believer—Mark 16:16), be for the right reason (the forgiveness of sins—Acts 2:38), and done the right way (immersed in water—Acts 8:35-39). Those who have only been baptized as infants, have simply repeated a prayer led by some preacher or pastor, or have been baptized to stay saved instead of getting saved, has not been added to the church. One enters the church only when God’s plan of salvation has been precisely followed.

Another thing that we must note about the universal church is that Jesus only built one. The very definition of the church suggests that such is the case. If the universal church is made up of all the saved, and it is (Acts 2:47), then why would there be a need for two? Paul affirmed the singularity of the universal church when he said that there is only one body (Ephesians 4:4). In the same epistle, Paul informed us that the church is the body (Ephesians 1:22-23). He taught the same thing in his letter to the saints at Colossae (Colossians 1:18). Someone may object and say, but there are many churches in the world today that belong to Christ. No, there are many denominations in the world today, but that does not change the fact that Christ only built one church. In our next installment of this series of articles, we will look at denominationalism and compare it to the universal church that we can read about in the New Testament.