Chastised Congregations?

Last Sunday evening after dinner, I read a sermon by JC Ryle (1816-1900) entitled “The Unchanging Christ.” It was based on Hebrews 13:8. In the sermon, Ryle discusses the faithfulness of Christ, in both His character and His work. He contrasts Christ’s faithfulness (his remaining the same) with the world’s changeableness. But an element of the sermon struck me as especially important. As part of his argument, Ryle takes aim at the erroneous idea, which often springs up in the Church, that once a church (in this context a local congregation—or even a denomination) has become established, the Lord will preserve and continue to bless her to the time of His second coming. But surely such a view is not warranted, either from personal experience, history or Scripture. Permit me to quote Ryle at length:

“... we ask you to mark that even churches continue not the same. Alas! There is only too much evidence that they too may fall to pieces and decay. Where are the churches whose faith and patience and love and zeal shine forth so brightly in the Acts and Epistles of the New Testament? ...They are gone, they are dead, they are fallen; they kept not their first estate, they became high-minded and puffed up with self-conceit; they did not persevere in well doing, they did not abound in the fruits of righteousness and so the Lord who had grafted them in, did also cut them off like withered and useless branches…. Doubtless, beloved, there are promises belonging to Christ’s church generally—the gates of hell shall not prevail against it; the Lord will never leave Himself without a witness—but there is no assurance that the church of any particular place or nation shall abide unchanged, except she continue faithful…if she does not hold forth the light of the pure gospel, if she leaves her first love, if she suffers false prophets to teach and seduce, if she becomes lukewarm, and says, “I am rich and increased with goods,” if she rests content with having a name to live while she is dead, and plumes herself on keeping hold of the truth while she does not witness to it—we are bold to tell you, however long God’s mercy shall spare her, her candlestick shall sooner or later be removed, for we know this fearful threat has been over and over again made good.”

And we can see from Scripture what Ryle was talking about, in the book of the Revelation. In chapters two and three, we have a record of congregations who were far from perfect. These congregations were, at least by our own often dismally low standards, what we would suppose to be God-fearing, holy and pious; and so they were, to a degree. Yet of the seven churches mentioned, only two were not soundly rebuked by the risen Christ for one thing or another. And was not even the Temple itself cataclysmically overthrown because of the complacency of the priesthood and the Jewish Elders and the general apostasy of the whole Jewish nation? Therefore let no one assume that his own church or congregation has been blessed or is being blessed by the Lord. (An obvious example of a contemporary denomination which is not being blessed by Christ is the Anglican/Episcopalian. It is in jeopardy of being torn asunder because of its own rebellion and especially by the open sinfulness and worldliness of its leadership. In the same sermon quoted from above, Ryle has these prophetic words about his own Anglican denomination: “Yes! Even we have reason to watch and to pray and to be humble and fear; no church so well ordered but through the sin and faithlessness of her members she may be overturned.”)

The Laodicean congregation (Rev. 3:15-17) is probably the best NT example of the harm of complacency within congregations. This was a church, a congregation, which had developed a kind of indifference to her own condition. She was a stagnating church and her leadership was therefore likely complacent. We can imagine a very sleepy, perhaps self-satisfied, congregation. I don’t know how long this church had been stagnating in its complacency but we do know that Paul was concerned with her spiritual well-being when he wrote his epistle to the Colossians in the late 60’s or early 70’s AD. If Revelation was written, as most believe, in the early 90’s AD that means she had been in her sleepy condition for at least thirty years. Did God speak to her in all that intervening time? Was he expressing His displeasure with her by chastising her repeatedly or was He silent after His first warning in the letter to the Colossian church? I don’t know.

We must realize that God does not always bless us as we would choose to be blessed. Nor do we often recognize that a blessing may start out as a rebuke. Indeed, often He will bless us, both personally and corporately, with that which may cause short term discomfort and pain. It is rather like—pardon the rather obvious illustration—a woman in childbirth. She is at first in discomfort, then severe pain, but finally after much travail and effort, she is joyful. What mother would later say, as she held her little one in her feeble and weary arms, that her pregnancy and even her labour was not ultimately a blessing to her? And what will she do? She will praise God and glorify Him for giving this blessing to her. So it is with Christ’s will for His Church. Certainly, the gates of Hell shall not prevail against her as the True Church. But that is not to say that any congregation, as Ryle warns us, will not come, at some point, for some known or even unknown sin, under chastisement or even judgement, as was true for the Laodicean congregation. Because ultimately, He must have the glory. It must be for Him that the church receives her blessing from Him. If by her activity or lack thereof in bringing God the glory that is His due through her ministry to Him, to herself and to the world, how can a congregation, or even a whole denomination, ever expect to receive His blessing? May He then not do to that church as He pleases, just as the potter may do with his clay, destroying one vessel and creating another?

Soli Deo Gloria!