The Bible is God's Holy Word. The Bible tells us the church was established by Christ Himself. He did not leave us in the dark as to what the church should be. He left His Word and complete instructions to deal with every aspect of the church. But there is a problem. Most claim their opinions of what a church is was taken from the Bible. However, it can be easily shown that many beliefs are not in fact based on what the Bible says at all.

The whole purpose of attend a local church is to worship God in thanksgiving, to learn God's word and thus be edified or "built up" by it. The local assembly of believers, which is what a church is lets us fellowship and serve one another and collectively seek the lost through our missions program.

Biblically the Local Church Is Self-governing.

In Acts 1:23, Jesus's disciples chose two men from among them, Bar-sbas and Matthias to replace Judas who betrayed Christ. The Greek word used for "appointed" is "histemi." It means to put forward or "propose."

They proposed two men and then sought God's choice by casting lots. We do not cast lots today for two reasons.

First, we have the complete Bible with instructions as to how we are to chose men for service.

Second, they were choosing an apostle. We do not have apostles today. Christ called each apostle. There is no record of the assemblies after the death of the apostles appointing men to replace them.

God gave Paul instructions as to qualifications of pastors and deacons. 1 Tim. 3:1-7, 3:8-13, Titus 1:5-9.

But they did begin the procedure of choosing men from among themselves. In Acts 1:6 they chosen seven men as forerunner of the deacons. The assembly was instructed to chose from among them seven men of good report, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom to elect to the position of administering over the distribution of food to the widows.

In Acts 15:2, the Antioch assembly elected Paul and Barnabas with several other men to go to Jerusalem and question the apostles about the matter of the Gentiles.

After the matter was decided the Jerusalem church to send men of their assembly with Paul and Barnabas, to convey the message. The message was that the Holy Spirit had directed them to their decision and the local church agreed. It was not a command. It was a recommendation.

The local church is to discipline its members. 1 Cor. 6:13. 2 Thess. 3:6,14-15.

It is scriptural for local churches to associate with each other for fellowship and the propagation of the Gospel. Romans 16:1-2, 1 Cor. 16:1-2, Acts 15:2-4, 22-27, 30-33, 18:27.

The local church sends out missionaries. In Acts 13:1-4, the local church at Antioch under the direction of the Holy Spirit commissioned and sponsored the first missionaries. In Acts. 14:26-27, they returned and reported to the church what God had done.

The local church is pictured in Scripture as autonomous, meaning it governs itself under the direction of the Holy Spirit. The local congregation rules itself lead by the Holy Spirit with no hierarchy of individuals or organization over it in our or out of the local assembly.

THE PRIESTHOOD OF BELIEVERS

The New Testament church is made up of individual born-again believers who can go directly to God in prayer without the intercession any man. Christ is our only Intercessor and is our High Priest.

In 1 Tim. 1:20, Paul instructs that individuals to pray, and described various subjects of prayer. In Verse 5, he states, "For {there is} one God and one Mediator between God and men, {the} Man Christ Jesus." (1Timothy 2:5) There is both private (Matt. 6:6) and public prayer (Acts 4:24-31).

Hebrews 4:14-16, states Christ is our High Priest who knows our every emotion and need personally. We are to boldly go to the throne of Grace (God the Father), to find help in a time of need.

In the Model Prayer, Luke 11:1-4, Christ instructed us to pray to the Father. All prayer in the Bible is addressed to God the Father. When we pray to God the Father we are praying through Jesus Christ and being lead of the Holy Spirit. We address our prayer to the Father because He is the Head of the Trinity.

Nowhere in Scripture are we instructed to pray to a "saint" or anyone but the Father. Christ is our sole Intercessor, no other exists. We are to confess our sins to God and personally ask Him for forgiveness. (1 John 1:9)

In the Old Testament the priest offered sacrifices and interceded for the Children of Israel. Everything the did was a picture of the coming Messiah and Intercessor Christ Jesus. After Christ has come we no longer need the picture or symbol, we have in fact the reality of Christ as Intercessor. Every believe is a priest.

"Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ." (1 Peter 2:5)

"But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light" (1 Peter 2:9)

The Holy Spirit leads us in prayer. ". . .praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints." (Ephesians 6:18)

"But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit" (Jude 20)

Every believer has the Holy Spirit, who leads him and enables him to know the things of God.

1 Corinthians 2:1-16. Tells us we can know nothing of God apart from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Rom.8:26, tells us that the Holy Spirit helps us in our weaknesses. The Holy Spirit himself makes intercession for us for things we do not know how to express. You may not know exactly how to pray or what to pray for, yet the Holy Spirit knows and intercedes for us. Note the phrase, "groaning with cannot be uttered." This is not verbal prayer, it is not our own prayer, this is the interceding of the Holy Spirit that we are not aware of. We are told this to help us to understand we are to prayer as best we can, but it is the Spirit who knows our hearts. Even our prayers are purified and corrected by the Spirit. This has nothing to do with ecstatic speech.

The Bible knows nothing of praying without understanding what we are praying. We pray the best we can and the Spirit intercedes.

THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH HAS ONLY TWO ORDINANCES

Baptism and the Lord's Supper are the only two Ordinances given to the local church.

"Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls. And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers." (Acts 2:41-42)

Baptism

In Acts 2:41, the three thousand souls who received Christ withdrew from the crowd and were baptized. In doing so they identified themselves with the death, burial and resurrection of Christ. They believed Peter's sermon and received "his word." Peter's word was the Gospel, the Good News that Christ was the Messiah and that He had died for the sins of the world, that He was buried and rose on the third day for the grave.

They were baptized which was a public dedication of their belief in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, the Messiah. The showed by their submission to baptism that they believed in His death, burial and resurrection.

Baptism always follows salvation. It is never presented as salvation or as a sacrament. A sacrament is defined as a religious act which has saving properties. In other words, an acts which helps in saving a person. The Bible knows nothing of any sacrament. Men are saved by faith in Jesus Christ and salvation is the free gift of God. "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; {it is} the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)

In Hebrews 11, the Old Testament saints presented as being saved because of their faith in what God told them to do. The trusted God and obeyed. The acts of the Old Testament sacrifices were understood as being a picture and symbolic looking forward till the day the Messiah would come and make the atonement for sin.

The Bible knows nothing of infant baptism. Only those who trusted in Christ were baptized. An infant can not understand and receive the Gospel by believing. Therefore an infant should not be baptized.

The Mode of Baptism

The word baptism means to immerse. Actually the Greek word is transliterated into an English spelling. If it was to be translated, it would mean to dip, bury, submerge or to immerse. There are other Greek words with mean to sprinkle or pour, but they are not used in reference to baptism.

Romans 6:3, clear pictures baptism as a picture of the death, burial and resurrection of Christ. Sprinkling or pouring does not symbolize this.

History records that all churches immersed until about 250 AD when for the sake of convenience at a time of sickness(Clinical Baptism) was practiced. Once allowed in time others ask for sprinkling including old people and later for any who ask for it. Most Protestant Denomination will immerse if it is requested, however it is not taught or encouraged. The Roman Catholic church did not make sprinkling its mode of baptism until 1311.

Is convenience or Scripture the authority for the mode of baptism?

The Lord's Supper

Christ instituted the Lord's Supper the night before He died. (Matt. 26:26-30) The Lord's Supper was a memorial act for believers. It was given to bring to remembrance Christ's sufferings and death for our sins.

1 Corinthians 11:26. When an assembly takes the Lord's Supper they show or proclaim their belief in Christ's death for the remission of sin, looking forward to the day when Christ will return.

The Lord's Supper is only for believers. It is mockery for an unbeliever to take the Lord's Supper. An unbeliever has not believed or received Christ as their Savior and thus has no part in salvation.

In verse 28, a person is admonished to examine himself before he takes the Lord's Supper. It warns that one who eats and drinks unworthy eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body.

The Lord's Supper is a picture of Christ's suffering and death for our sin. For a man to take the Supper and not receive Christ's is blatant sin. To have knowledge of Christ's suffering for one's sins and then to reject Christ as one's Savior is belittling and mocking Christ.

It also mocks Christ and makes little His suffering for a believer to have unconfessed sin in his life and still take the Lord's Suffer which is a memorial remembering His suffering. The believer is to examine himself first, confess sin and then take the Lord's Supper. No one is "worthy" in himself to take the Lord's Supper. But it honors Christ when we confess our sins and receive His free gift of forgiveness. It show a deep respect and regard for Christ's suffering when we repent of sin and turn from it.

"What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?" (Romans 6:1-2)

"Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid." (Romans 6:12-15)

The elements of the Supper, the bread and the cup are only symbolic of the body and blood of Christ. They do not, as practiced by Catholicism, magically become the actual body and blood of Christ. Or as practiced by Protestants do they become spiritually "blessed" thus affording the taker some spiritual benefit. They are only symbolic. The value in taking the Lord's Supper is in honoring and revering Christ for His suffer for us and self-examination to judge sin in our own lives.

For a more detailed article on the Lord's Supper please read "Is the Eucharist Biblical?" ( https://bible-truth.org/Lord'sSupper.html )

The Relationship of the Ordinances to the Local Church

We called this to symbolic acts "ordinances" because the Lord ordained or appointed them. They are not sacraments or a means of dispensing Grace. Grace is only obtained by faith in Christ Jesus.

Believer follow the ordinances because Christ commanded us too. Matthew 28:19-20. When Christ commissioned the disciples to baptize and observe all things that He had taught He also told them to wait until they were indwelt and empowered by the Holy Spirit. Acts 1:4-5. The church begin when it was empowered by the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost. Christ forbid them to go before they receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Christ commission the church not individuals, schools, Christian youth groups, camps and etc. 1 Corinthians 11:20, states that this local church "came together" for the purpose of taking the Lord's Supper. Note V17,18, 33. The context is clearing in the setting of the local assembly which had come together.

A memorial is a public declaration or remembrance. Ephesians 5:25, states Christ died for the "ekklesia" the local assembly or church. The Lord's Supper was taken with all Christ's disciples present. The Lord's Supper is an act of public worship. Note 1 Corinthians 11. There is no record in the Bible of an individual or anyone apart from the church taking the Lord's Supper.

How often it is to be done is left up to the church. The only instruction is in 1 Corinthians 11:26, as "often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till He come."

The charge and instructions are given to the "whole church." Individual ministers are not given the authority to conduct the Lord's Supper at their discretion, but as the assembly desires.

THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH PRACTICES SOUL LIBERTY "But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him." (1 John 2:27)

Every believer has the responsibility and right to interpret the Scriptures, to hold and profess and to worship God as the Bible teaches. No church or religious organization has the God's authority to direct us to obey it or recognize it as our authority.

God deals with us as individuals. "But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift." (Ephesians 4:7)

The gift of God are given to us as individuals, being used in the context of the local assembly. "But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit {of all." (1 Corinthians 12:7) See Romans 12:3-8.

We are taught of the Holy Spirit as individuals. "But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him." (1 John 2:27)

We are judged as an individual. For Christians we are individually judged at the BEMA judgment of Christ. 2 Corinthians 5:10. Romans 14:10, says we all shall stand before judgment. 1 Corinthians 3:13-15, shows examination of Christians is on one's individual work.

2 Peter 1:20, states that ". . .no prophecy of Scripture is on any private interpretation."

As believers we have the personal responsibility to God to know what the Bible teaches and to follow it alone. We can not at the judgment plead that we were mislead by our church, pastor or anyone else. We have the right to believe the Bible without regard for the creeds or traditions of churches.

THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH IS MADE UP ONLY OF SAVED INDIVIDUALS

"Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added {to them}. . . praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved." (Acts 2:41,47)

The church is an assembly of people who have received Christ as their Lord and Savior. It is made up of those who have made a public declaration of their faith in Christ by being baptized.

The Bible teaches one should be a member of a local assembly of believers. This is demonstrated in the definite step the first Christian followed. This order is always the same and does not differ.

1. The believer received Jesus Christ as his Savior by believing the Gospel. The grammatical construction of the phrase "they gladly received his word" meaning the message of Peter, teaches that "received the word" is an action that takes place before the action of the main verb "baptized." "Receiving the word" came first and based on that they were baptized. 2. Following salvation the believer gives a public declaration of his faith by submitting to baptism. Jesus said He would be ashamed before His Father of those who were ashamed of Him and His word before this adulterous and sinful generation. (Mark 8:38) Many other verses in the New Testament speak of the fact believers are not to be ashamed of Christ before men. (See Rom. 1:16, 5:5,9:33,10:11, 2 Tim. 1:8,12,2:15) 3. Following conversion and baptism the believers were "added" to the church.

The fact that Christ died for the church (Eph. 5:25) shows the importance of the local church. The gifts were given in the context of the local church and is never shown as existing apart from the local church. 1 Corinthians 12:7,11,18,28.