In Matthew 13:21-30, Jesus tells a parable about a farmer who plants seed, only for an enemy to intentionally plant weeds in among the crop. The owner’s servants ask permission to go and uproot the weeds but the farmer says no because there is a risk that good crops will be uprooted with bad.
This parable has often been used as the foundational argument for why it is okay to have mixed denominations, those which include both true believers and unbelievers among their number. Partly this includes an emphasis on the potential similarity between wheat and tares, though note that Jesus doesn’t suggest that wheat will be mistaken for tares, just that it risks being uprooted at the same time.
In any case, the developed argument tends to talk in terms of the visible church and the invisible church. The invisible church being the true church of God throughout history including saints already with Jesus. The visible church is as we see it now in the world including all that are part of its external structures. And, so the argument goes, will include both true believers and those who are not.
Well, I think there are problems with the theory and with the interpretation of the parable. As we’ve already seen, the owner’s concern was not about risk of misidentification but of disruption and harm. Furthermore, the point seems to be less about how we organise churches (an anachronistic question to impose onto Jesus’ immediate audience) and more bout he timing of God’s judgement and why it is withheld.
Fascinatingly the founders of denominations such as the Church of England seemed to get this well. In an earlier article, I observed that Article 19 of the 39 Articles that constitute the church of England says
“The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men”
Notice there that the authors of the articles did not view the visible church as a mix of faithful and unfaithful but expects that the visible church will be made up of faithful, or believing people. This implicitly requires church discipline of course to determine who the faithful are.
Now, I think that we are rightly cautious both about presuming someone is saved when they are not and being quick to judge someone as unsaved. So, despite our best efforts at discernment, most people agree that any local church may include among its members those who, it will turn out, never truly believed. However, the presumption is that those who are members of a church, are, to the best of out human knowledge, saved and faithful.
Indeed, whilst we may allow a level of charitable presumption, there is surely a significant difference between accepting that a profession may not be genuine or may be mistaken and knowingly treating as part of the church, those who very clearly are unfaithful to God’s Word and do not believe in the Gospel.
Faithroots 