Basic HTML Version
575
IV. The Power of the Church
A. THE SOURCE OF CHURCH POWER.
Jesus Christ not only founded the Church, but also endowed it with the necessary power or
authority. He is the Head of the Church, not only in an organic, but also in an administrative
sense, that is, He is not only the Head of the body, but also the King of the spiritual
commonwealth. It is in His capacity as King of the Church that He has clothed her with power or
authority. He Himself spoke of the Church as founded so firmly upon a rock that the gates of
hell cannot prevail against her, Matt. 16:18; and on the same occasion — the very first on which
He made mention of the Church — He also promised to endow her with power, when He said
unto Peter: “I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt
bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be
loosed in heaven,” Matt. 16:19. It is quite evident that the terms ‘Church’ and ‘Kingdom of
Heaven’ are used interchangeably here. Keys are an emblem of power (cf. Isa. 22:15-22), and in
the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven Peter receives power to bind and to loose, which in this
connection would seem to mean, to determine what is forbidden and what is permitted in the
sphere of the Church.[Cf. Vos, The Kingdom of God and the Church, p. 147; Grosheide, Comm.
on Matthew, in loco.] And the judgment he passes — in this case not on persons, but on actions
— will be sanctioned in heaven. Peter receives this power as the representative of the apostles,
and these are the nucleus and foundation of the Church in their capacity as teachers of the
Church. The Church of all ages is bound by their word, John 17:20; I John 1:3. That Christ
endowed not only Peter but all the apostles with power and with the right to judge, and that
not merely actions but also persons, is quite evident from John 20:23: “Whose soever sins ye
forgive, they are forgiven unto them; whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.” Christ
gave this power first of all and in the fullest degree to the apostles, but He also extends it,
though in a lesser degree, to the Church in general. The Church has the right to excommunicate
an unrepentant sinner. But it can do this only because Jesus Christ Himself dwells in the Church
and through the agency of the apostles has supplied the Church with a proper standard of
judgment. That Christ has given power to the Church as a whole, is quite evident from several
passages of the New Testament, Acts 15:23-29; 16:4; I Cor. 5:7,13; 6:2-4; 12:28; Eph. 4:11-16.
The officers in the Church receive their authority from Christ and not from men, even though
the congregation is instrumental in putting them into office. This means on the one hand that
they do not obtain it at the hands of any civil authority, which has no power in ecclesiastical
matters, and therefore cannot bestow any; but on the other hand also, that they do not derive
it from the people in general, though they are representatives of the people. Porteous correctly
remarks: “That the presbyter is termed the people’s representative shows that he is their