Thinking More About Church: Part II
The Great Marriage

Two biblical concepts and texts have lately been much on my mind. One is more common but perhaps under-appreciated for it’s stunning cosmic implications. The other is rarely quoted—at least in discussions of church formation—but strikes me as nothing short of revolutionary if it were to be truly embraced—but more about that on a later post.

The first, alluded to in Part I on this blog, is the familiar image of the church as the Bride of Christ: “And of course, finally she is Jesus' own bride. Our primary motive and holy fear should be to do no harm, to be terrified lest we insert ourselves between the Groom and his Bride. There is a wedding underway and this is a dance where no sane man dares ‘cut in.’"

The essential picture of God’s people as his bride appears throughout scripture but is probably the most focused and clear in Ephesians 5.

“Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her...For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.” Ephesians 5:25-32 ESV

This is a familiar text used in almost every wedding homily and applied to marriage, the parallels are usually rightly drawn. On further reflection this amazing passage deserves so much more attention as it applies to the church. It takes me to a place where almost immediately words begin to fail, to the utter uniqueness and sacredness of marriage and what marriage pictures. There is sobriety and humility called for when thinking about the church and particularly the leadership of it.There is serious danger in presuming too much while attempting to shape and manage what Jesus calls his own Bride, His own flesh. We had better walk carefully.

It is in that last phrase, “I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church” where the metaphor is most stunning. When we speak of the marriage of a man and a woman, we’re quite literally dealing with something of cosmic significance, a great mystery going to the very heart of God’s relationship with redeemed humanity. His quotation of Genesis and appeal to creation supports the implied claim of a universal truth.

Like so much of God’s word, Paul’s metaphor cuts with more than one edge. Marriage is significant and love is what it ought to be when modeled after Christ and his church. But well beyond this, marriage is significant because it is our most available picture of the Great Marriage, the coming together of the eternal Bridegroom and his chosen bride, the church. This elevates marriage to a place of so much greater importance than that of any natural or sociological explanation. Far beyond providing social stability, remedying loneliness and producing children, marriage is preaching the Gospel, for all time and for all to see.

This is why marital fidelity and sexual purity are treated with such careful and strict guidelines in scripture. Much is at stake here, even more than the possibility of harm to partners, children or society. To compromise or damage marriage is to cloud and distort an eternal picture, and so the word of God cuts to the heart of my marriage. I am to love my wife as Christ loves the church—for her sake and for the sake of God’s glory before a watching world .

The Bible cuts another direction with equal precision. If the relationship between a man and his wife is a picture of Christ and His church, and if the church is His bride, what does that tell us about the Church universal and about church local—the gathering of those who are individually members of Christ’s body, together someplace in his name?

The church is His bride, and no man should dare to tamper with that exclusivity: Not in the name of apostleship “I planted this church, she is mine,” or in the name of pastoring, teaching or leadership. The bride communes intimately with the groom and needs no human interloper, no go-between, no intercessor. “...there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” I Timothy 2:5 ESV This is indeed a dance where no wise man would want to cut in.

What then about human leadership? Order? Discipline? What about the authoritative and shepherding and teaching roles in the church described in Romans 12, Ephesians 4 and other places? They are vital and necessary to God’s plan for the growth and equipping of His church. But it is leadership walking very softly and humbly, using gifts for the benefit of others in ways always tempered and limited and sobered by the reminder of the bride’s identity. She belongs to Jesus.

So leading is by example. Not daring to call any of the bride’s attention to himself or direct any of her loyalty and love to himself or to his organization and away from Christ, the teacher employs great humility and care. The possibility of such an impertinence, however unintentional, strikes fear in him. Discipline, maintaining the purity of the church (who’s in and who’s not) is finally left in the hands of the whole church in Matthew 18, not invested in any individual, subgroup, leadership or otherwise. All this speaks of an understanding of the headship of Christ alone over his church, and her protection from presumptuous human authority.

John the Baptist, who Jesus called “a burning and shining lamp”(John 5:35) and a prophet like no other, understood his leadership role perfectly. “The one [Jesus] who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease.” John 3:29,30

So mature church leadership steps back, terrified lest it insert itself into the precious, intimate relationship between the bridegroom and his bride, recognizing that they themselves and every person in Christ are equally a part of that bride.

What does this mean for church leadership? It means that every ministry, every discipling and mentoring strategy, every counseling relationship, every leadership model, every governing system, every constitutional clause and bylaw must be measured in the light of this mystery, and therefore this question: Does anything we do interfere with, distract from, demean, diminish, or lessen the gathered members’ unique and elevated position in Christ? Have leaders presumed to speak for Christ? Has any condescension crept in? Any usurping of the role of the Holy Spirit who through the Word speaks directly to the believer? Even a little?

More about the authority of the Word later, but on that topic recently our pastor did an interesting thing. In the middle of an exposition of I Thessalonians 2. He paused, asked us to open our Bibles and raise them up in front of us, between our eyes and the platform, so that we could no longer see him. This, he said, was the goal and the point, the power and the role of the scripture. He was right.

In one sense, we should worry when the church demands too little of itself and of its audience—too little repentance, too little faith, too little faithfulness to the word of God. That may well be the larger problem in American Christianity. But we also should worry when the church demands too much—too much conformity, too much loyalty, too much attention for itself and its leaders, and too much authority for itself. That too is a kind of idolatry.

It could be added that in opposition to what some in their motivational zeal suggest, a Christian’s loyalty, love for and obedience and lifelong commitment to Christ cannot, indeed dare not, be measured by his loyalty, love for and obedience or lifetime commitment to any person or human organization.This is reserved for Christ alone, and historically, post-Reformation Christians have all understood this.

So when we think about marriage we should be thinking about how Christ relates to his church. And when we think about how Christ relates to the church, we ought to be thinking about a marriage. And we ought to esteem both highly.