The Work God Gave the Church

Chapter 3 established that the church operates by authority — that every word and every deed must be done in the name of the Lord Jesus — and that the authority of Christ is found in the Scriptures. Chapter 5 will establish that what Christ authorized the individual to do is not necessarily what He authorized the local church, as a collective body, to do.

Between those two chapters sits a question that cannot be avoided: what did Christ actually authorize the local church to do? Not what does the individual Christian do in his own sphere — that is a separate question. Not what might seem good for a congregation to undertake — the whole point of Chapter 3 was that seeming good is not enough. The question is what the New Testament actually assigns to the local church, as the collective body, for its collective funds to accomplish.

The question matters for a simple reason. The chapters ahead will examine whether a local church may fund a separate institution, may participate in a sponsoring arrangement, may extend its treasury to general benevolence, or may operate a fellowship hall. Every one of those questions rests on a prior one: what is the work the church has been given? If a proposed practice falls within that work, it remains only to ask whether the specific method is authorized. If the proposed practice falls outside that work, it does not matter how well-intentioned or how widely practiced it is — it has not been assigned to the church.

The Pillar and Support of the Truth

Paul writes to Timothy: “I am writing these things to you, hoping to come to you before long; but in case I am delayed, I write so that you will know how one ought to conduct himself in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and support of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:14–15).

The phrase is worth dwelling on. The church is identified not as one institution among many in the culture, not as a general-purpose religious organization, not as a charitable enterprise, and not as a social club. It is “the pillar and support of the truth.” Its central identity is to hold up, support, and make known the revealed truth of God. Every other aspect of its collective work proceeds from that identity.

A pillar holds something up. A support keeps something from falling. Paul’s image is architectural: the truth is the structure, and the church is what holds the structure in the world. If the church fails at that work, the truth is not held up. If the church takes on work that distracts it from that identity, or that dilutes its energy across projects God did not assign it, the pillar function weakens. Paul does not say the church has many pillar-like functions. He says the church is the pillar and support.

With that identity established, Scripture describes four broad categories of work that the local church, as a collective body, is authorized to undertake. Each of the four serves the identity of 1 Timothy 3:15. None of them is outside that identity. And any work not falling within these four is not work the New Testament has assigned to the local church.

Worship

The first and most visible work of the local church is the collective worship of the assembled saints. When the early disciples came together, they came together to worship.

Luke describes the pattern of the Jerusalem church: “They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer” (Acts 2:42). Four elements of the collective assembly are named: teaching, fellowship among the saints, the Lord’s Supper, and prayer. Later in the same chapter we are told they were “praising God and having favor with all the people” (v. 47). Singing is not specifically named in this passage but appears elsewhere as an ordinary element of the assembly (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16; 1 Cor. 14:15). Giving is added as a directed weekly act: “On the first day of every week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper” (1 Cor. 16:2).

The day of the assembly is established by Acts 20:7: “On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul began talking to them.” The pattern is not a command in the form of a direct statute, but it is an approved apostolic example, repeated across the New Testament churches (1 Cor. 16:2), and no alternative is offered. The first day of the week is when the local church gathered to worship.

The content of that worship is likewise specified. Prayer. Singing — vocal music from the heart, as Ephesians 5:19 and Colossians 3:16 describe. The Lord’s Supper, in remembrance of the death of Christ until He comes (1 Cor. 11:23–26). The preaching and teaching of the word. The regular giving of the saints into the treasury.

This is the work of worship as the New Testament describes it — specified, ordered, and central to the life of the local congregation. It is not a vague category into which a congregation may pour any activity that can be called reverent. It is a defined work, and its elements are named.

Edification of the Saints

The second work of the local church is the building up of its own members — what the New Testament calls edification. The local church exists not only to worship God but to help its members grow into Christ.

Paul writes to the Ephesians: “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:11–13).

The purpose of the gifts Christ gave the church was “the equipping of the saints.” The direction of the work is inward toward the members of the body. The goal is maturity — every saint grown up into the stature of Christ. Paul continues in verse 16: the whole body, “being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.”

Peter describes the same work in different language: “You also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house” (1 Pet. 2:5). The local congregation is not a random gathering; it is a structure being built. Every member matters. Every teaching, every encouragement, every correction either contributes to the building or detracts from it.

Edification is done through teaching, through preaching, through the mutual care and admonition of the members, through the exercise of discipline when it is needed (1 Cor. 5; 2 Thess. 3:14–15), and through the oversight of elders who are to “shepherd the flock of God among you” (1 Pet. 5:2). The work is inward, directed toward the saints themselves, aimed at their growth and their faithfulness.

It is important to see that edification is aimed at the saints. Ephesians 4:11–16 does not describe the building up of the community at large, or the spiritual formation of those outside the body. It describes the equipping of saints, the building up of the body of Christ. A work that would edify a saint is within the church’s charter. A work that aims instead at general community benefit is aimed elsewhere — not wrong for an individual Christian to undertake in his own sphere, but not assigned to the local church as its collective work.

Evangelism

The third work of the local church is the preaching of the gospel to those who have not yet obeyed it. Worship is directed toward God; edification is directed inward toward the saints; evangelism is directed outward toward the lost.

Jesus’s commission in Matthew is the central text: “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you” (Matt. 28:18–20). The work is preaching, making disciples, baptizing those who believe, and teaching them to observe what Christ commanded.

The book of Acts is the record of the early churches carrying out this commission. Paul writes to the Thessalonians: “The word of the Lord has sounded forth from you, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone forth” (1 Thess. 1:8). A faithful congregation sends the word of the Lord outward. That sending is its evangelistic work.

The New Testament pattern shows local churches supporting the preaching of the gospel in various ways. Philippi sent financial support directly to Paul while he preached elsewhere (Phil. 4:15–16; 2 Cor. 11:8–9). Local churches selected men to travel with funds (2 Cor. 8:16–24). Paul and his companions preached in cities and established congregations who in turn preached to their own communities. The activity was energetic and widespread, and it was funded out of the treasuries of local churches.

What the New Testament does not show is a local church funneling its evangelistic funds through a separate human organization, or through another congregation that administers the work for it. The pattern of cooperation will be examined specifically in Chapter 7. For the present chapter, it is enough to establish that evangelism — the preaching of the gospel to the lost — is one of the authorized works of the local church, done out of its own treasury and under its own oversight.

Benevolence to Needy Saints

The fourth work of the local church is the relief of needy Christians. The New Testament shows local congregations extending collective benevolence to other Christians who are in material need.

The pattern is consistent. Acts 2:44–45 describes the Jerusalem church distributing possessions “as anyone might have need” — and verse 44 identifies “anyone” as “all those who had believed.” Acts 4:32 describes “the congregation of those who believed” selling possessions and sharing so that “there was not a needy person among them” (v. 34). Acts 6:1–6 records the appointment of seven men to serve the daily distribution to Hellenistic widows — widows who were themselves disciples. Acts 11:27–30 describes the Antioch church sending “relief to the brethren living in Judea.” Paul describes the collection from the Gentile churches as being for “the poor among the saints in Jerusalem” (Rom. 15:26), as “the collection for the saints” (1 Cor. 16:1), and as a “ministry to the saints” (2 Cor. 8:4; 9:1, 12).

Every one of those passages specifies that the recipients of collective church benevolence were saints — Christians — brothers and sisters in the body. Chapter 8 will walk through each of those passages in more detail, along with the two passages commonly cited to extend the scope (James 1:27 and Galatians 6:10), both of which will be shown on closer examination to address the individual rather than the collective treasury.

For the present chapter, the relevant point is that benevolence to needy saints is one of the authorized works of the local church. The New Testament specifies the recipients, which means the New Testament also specifies the limit. The individual Christian’s benevolence is broader — he is to do good to all people, as Galatians 6:10 describes — but the collective benevolence of the local church, drawn from its treasury, is aimed at its own brothers and sisters in need.

What Is Not in the Description

These four categories — worship, edification of the saints, evangelism, and benevolence to needy saints — are the work the New Testament assigns to the local church as a collective body.

It is equally important to see what is not in the apostolic description. Several kinds of activity, common in congregational life today, are not described anywhere in the New Testament as the collective work of a local church.

General humanitarianism — the feeding, clothing, or material relief of the community at large, regardless of faith — is assigned to the individual Christian (Gal. 6:10; Eph. 4:28; Matt. 25:35–40 speaks of individual conduct in the judgment), but is nowhere described as the collective work of the New Testament church. The apostolic churches did not operate soup kitchens for their cities. They preached the gospel in their cities and cared for their own needy.

Recreation, entertainment, and social life — activities oriented toward the enjoyment or the social bonding of the members — are not described as the work of the church. Meals, in the New Testament, are the work of the home (1 Cor. 11:22, 34). Fellowship among Christians is real and important, but the apostolic record shows it occurring naturally in homes and alongside the worship and the work of the church, rather than as a distinct activity funded out of the church’s treasury and conducted on the church’s property.

Education as an end in itself — academic instruction, vocational training, cultural development — is not described as the collective work of the local church. The teaching the church is commanded to do is the teaching of the gospel and the equipping of the saints. A Christian college, a private Christian school, or a cultural institute may all be worthy undertakings supported by individual Christians, but they are not assigned in the New Testament as the collective work of the local congregation.

Civic and political engagement — the attempt to shape society through the church’s collective voice or funds — is likewise absent. Paul did not direct the Corinthian or Ephesian churches to organize against the pagan institutions of their cities. He did not direct them to lobby Caesar. He directed them to preach the gospel, edify the saints, worship rightly, and care for their needy brethren.

None of this is to say that individual Christians may not engage in humanitarianism, social life, education, or civic action. The New Testament is clear that individual Christians will do many of these things in their own spheres, and some of them they are commanded to do. Chapter 5 draws the distinction between the individual and the collective in full. For the present chapter the point is simply this: the collective work of the local church, as Scripture describes it, is defined and limited. Adding to that work on the grounds that the addition seems good is the very move Chapter 3 identified as operating outside authority.

Why This Chapter Matters

Every specific question examined in the chapters ahead comes back to this one.

Chapter 6 asks whether the local church may send money to a separate human institution — an orphan home, a home for the aged, a college — to do a work on the church’s behalf. Before that question can be answered, one has to ask: what work? Is it worship? Edification of the saints? Evangelism? Benevolence to needy saints? If the proposed work falls within the church’s charter, the question becomes whether the specific method (a separate institution) is authorized. If the proposed work falls outside the church’s charter, the question of method does not arise — the work itself has not been assigned.

Chapter 7 asks whether one congregation may oversee a work funded by many congregations. Before that question can be answered, one has to know what work is being undertaken and whether it is within what the New Testament assigns to the local church.

Chapter 8 asks the scope question that this chapter has already previewed: to whom may the local church’s treasury extend benevolence? The answer will come from examining every New Testament example, not from extrapolating what an individual is commanded to do.

Chapter 9 asks whether common meals are the work of the church or the work of the home. The answer begins with asking what Scripture actually describes as the work of the church.

The New Testament has not left the church’s work to the imagination of each generation. It has told us what the work is, and in doing so, it has also told us what the work is not. A congregation that confines itself to what Christ has assigned it will not find itself short of work; the four categories above are more than enough to occupy the full energy of any faithful congregation. What it will not do is take on work that Christ did not assign — and that restraint, as Chapter 3 has already established, is not stinginess. It is faithfulness.

For Reflection and Discussion

1. Paul calls the church “the pillar and support of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15). In your own congregation, would an outsider looking at the activities funded from the collective treasury identify the congregation primarily as a truth-holding, truth-proclaiming body? If not, what else would he identify it as, and why?

2. Ephesians 4:11–16 describes the purpose of the gifts Christ gave the church as “the equipping of the saints” for the building up of the body. Where in this passage does Paul speak of the building up of the community at large or of those outside the body? What does the direction of the work — inward toward the saints — tell us about how the local church’s edifying energy is meant to be spent?

3. Consider the four categories of the church’s work as described in this chapter. Name one activity your own congregation currently funds from its treasury. Under which of the four categories does it fall? If none, what is the Scriptural basis on which the activity has been added?

4. The chapter argues that “adding to the work of the church on the grounds that the addition seems good” is operating outside authority. In your own experience, have you seen activities added to a congregation’s life on the basis that they “seemed good”? What happens over a generation when many such additions accumulate?

5. Compare the life of a first-century congregation as Acts 2:42–47 describes it with the life of a modern congregation familiar to you. Set aside questions of culture and technology and focus on the work being done. Where do the two match, and where do they diverge? What does the comparison suggest?