Reclaiming the Reformation: Christ for You in Community

•   CHAPTER 1   •

Evangelical Catholicity

Concerning the Church’s Common Identity

Nathan Söderblom ¹ sometimes used the expression evangelical catholicity. It sounds Roman Catholic, yet he did not understand it this way. In fact, this expression is found already in the foremost representative of Lutheran Orthodoxy, Johann Gerhard. ² Something that Söderblom was quite conscious of. [. . .] Söderblom saw a program for the future, for the achievement of the church’s unity in diversity. The gospel guarantees unity as a spiritual unity that we confess in our faith. Differences that exist in different traditions do not need to jeopardize unity. They can in fact enrich it because they mirror the diversity of God’s revelation. God encounters man in different cultural and national milieus. So every church’s peculiarity should be taken seriously. ³

We Believe in a Universal Church

We confess our faith in a universal church with the Nicene Creed, which is heard every Sunday in churches of various traditions all over the world. As always, faith deals with something we cannot see with the naked eye but is assured by God’s Word. What is it we confess when we use the expression universal church? The original word is catholic. This word is used to describe the church in all three ecumenical creeds. But the word is older than the creeds. This word is already found in the letters of St. Ignatius of Antioch, a second-century apostolic father. Thus, it is in the generation directly succeeding the apostles that Ignatius writes: Just as where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church... ⁴ The Greek word katholikós has two root words, kata, which means of/with, and holos which means wholeness/fullness. In our day the word catholic is often equated with Roman Catholic. When I use the word, I am not referring to any specific church tradition, but to the whole of the Christian church’s inheritance, message, and function throughout history. Christ’s church has always been catholic to her core. The best description of the church’s catholicity is that it is enveloped in and carried by the fullness of Christ. Paul expresses this truth with staggering descriptions like, and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all (Eph. 1:22–23) and, For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head . . . (Col. 2:9–10). So our confession of the church’s catholicity is nothing less than a confession of the fullness of Christ as it has come to be expressed by Christ’s church throughout the whole of history. We do not simply confess to certain parts or fragments of the church, not only that which is typical of our own Christian tradition. Christ’s church is greater and wider than our local context or our specific community of faith. The roots of the church stretch further back than, for example, the arrival of the Pentecostal movement in 1906 or the beginning of the Reformation in 1517. Yes, in fact, even further back than the time of the Apostles. All things are yours, as Paul writes (1 Cor. 3:21). The fourth-century church father Cyril of Jerusalem summarized the contents of the church’s catholic nature in the following way:

The church is called catholic because she is spread out over the whole world, to every corner of the earth, and because she unceasingly proclaims all doctrines that people need to know. Because she nurtures all kinds of people into a right fear of God, be they in powerful positions or ordinary citizens, be they learned or uneducated; because she has healing and remedy for all kinds of sins, soul and body; and because she possesses all kinds of virtues in deeds and in words as well as all kinds of spiritual gifts. ⁵

This Christian church does not start from the beginning in every new generation, but it builds upon the same foundation with the same contents and within the same framework that has been given since its beginning. As a physical body, the church is constantly renewed but still remains the same body with the same soul. She carries her experiences, memories, and insights from times past with her. A true stewardship of this rich inheritance prepares the church to meet new times and challenges. Our physical bodies can be wounded and injured, but these injuries do not cause us to reject or abandon our bodies nor to try and create new ones. When the body suffers, is abused or disfigured, we seek healing and rehabilitation. It is in like manner with the church that is Christ’s body. Christ watches over his body, over her every limb and part. His own body has encountered death and resurrection in glory to never die again, and he has given himself to the church. No one or nothing can extinguish the life of Christ’s body because it is Christ’s indestructible life that fills it. Individual local congregations can fall or be extinguished, but Christ’s body remains in eternity.

The Church’s Customs and Traditions

A body has certain orders and functions. Life does not just flutter about as an invisible substance. It is always found within the structured framework of a physical body. At the beginning of our Bibles, we read that God breathed his life spirit into Adam’s body, and in a similar way God has breathed the life of the Holy Spirit into the body of Christ. The life of Christ pulsates in this body, and through this body, Christ is manifested in the world. Thus, the church is no abstract community but a visible and concrete assembly. Therefore, to hold fast to the church’s particular framework, Christ’s body, and the given contents of the faith does not mean that the spiritual life is stifled or that we are deprived of spiritual experiences and mysteries. On the contrary, it is actually this framework and given content of faith that is the prerequisite for spiritual life to flood in and be delivered according to God’s will through God’s instituted means. The imagined opposition between life and doctrine, freedom and order, that is so common in our day builds upon a false understanding of how God works. To speak of the church’s established doctrine and order, to be confessional, is not particularly popular today. It is not considered inspiring; rather, it is regarded as authoritarian and limiting, or stale and lifeless. However, when, as happens in both success and adversity, pressure on the church and individual Christians intensifies, when inspiration fails us or confusion affects us, it is good to have something to hold to and lean on for support. The simple realization that it is not we who carry the church but the church that carries us comes as a relief.

These churchly orders and the content of the faith have a different name: tradition. The word comes from the Latin tradere and means to hand over something. Where the Bible and the church are concerned, tradition deals with retelling and handing over tested and approved theology, patterns of sound teaching, formulations of the faith, liturgies, and customs of the divine service. So, tradition is rather important for the church because we otherwise would need to reinvent the wheel in every generation. A citation that is sometimes ascribed to Sir Thomas More and sometimes to the famous composer Gustav Mahler illuminates the meaning of tradition: Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire and the passing of the flame. Thus, tradition is not synonymous with traditionalism where a person mechanically and mindlessly repeats word and actions without any care or thought about what is being done. Someone has formulated it in the following way: Tradition is the living faith of the dead. Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. So, in this good sense, tradition is the living faith of our ancestors, something that needs to be handed over to new generations that, in their turn, need to learn to discover and appreciate the wealth they possess in the great inheritance of the church.

Tradition accommodates and carries the church, gives her patterns, actions, and symbols for that which is too big to embrace with reason alone. Our era is to a large degree characterized by rebellion against traditions. The newest and latest is rewarded and valued higher than that which is old. People like to imagine freedom as a state where there are no orders or given forms to keep; everything happens spontaneously according to one’s own thoughts and inspiration. But the order that God has given us is not to limit life but, on the contrary, it is that which makes real freedom possible. In the house where I am now sitting and writing, there is a structure of load-bearing beams and pillars. They stabilize the building so that I can feel secure and write in peace and tranquility without fearing the roof and walls will suddenly fall in on me. These beams and walls do not occupy my attention; I take them for granted and do not even think about their presence. However, had the building been poorly constructed and the instability of the house could cause it to fall in, suddenly questions concerning structure and order become very important. It is similar with the church’s order and structure; without them, confusion and chaos rule, and great injury can happen.

In many of his letters, Paul referred to the order that he himself has established and handed over to the congregations. Most likely, he was referring to a framework for sound teaching and a given content of the faith, the celebration of the divine service and the Christian life. When he could no longer be present himself, it was precisely these customs he referred to and reminded them of.

For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ. Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving (Col. 2:5–7).

That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere in every church (1 Cor. 4:17).

Exegetes usually point out that the letters of the New Testament are situational. Paul did not write compendiums where he presented abstract theological dogmas, but he gave answers to specific problems that came up in the congregations. These problems arose from different situations where there had been a sliding away from the center and where this order that Paul had handed over to the congregations had been distorted. Against this background of the New Testament’s instruction and the good tradition, every Christian generation needs to watch over their theology and their order. The Christian church needs both reformation and tradition. Some see these as counterparts to each other, but tradition and reformation belong together. The reformers in the sixteenth century wanted to restore and preserve the church’s true tradition, such as it had been given over to the church of the apostles and administered during the first centuries of the church. What was wanting of correction were abuses and aberrations of different sorts. There was no need to reject the tradition as such. When the church gives up the tradition such as the faith once and for all entrusted to the saints (Jude 3), God sends prophets and reformers who call the church to repentance and to once again return to the original sources. So, the question is not whether the church ought to stand on a tradition, but rather what the contents of this tradition are, if the tradition is good and promotes the gospel or if distortions of it have sneaked