Is there supposed to be only one church?

Then there is the unity of the church. I put it to your consciences, my brethren, How many churches has Christ? We know, indeed, that unity is the false boast of Rome; and there are others who advance the same pretensions. But what is the unity thus gloried in? Not the holy unity for which Jesus prays in the seventeenth of John, but a unity which embraces the whole world in any given sphere where it is pretended that it exists. Rome (and would that in this she were alone) baptizes whole nations, and calls them the church, and then boasts of her unity and catholicity. But a unity subversive of holiness is not the unity of the bride of Christ. Has she, therefore, no unity at all? Has Christ many bodies, many brides? The thought is almost blasphemous. His spouse, his undefiled, is one. It is a solemn thought for us to ponder: "There is one body and one Spirit, even as we are called in one hope of our calling." My brethren, is this that to which we are practically bearing witness — that there is but one church, including all who are living members of Christ, quickened into union with him by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven?

We now pass to the examination of a truth which grows out of the nature of the Church, and which is self-evident — its unity. Scripture has for us again a brief but most definite statement of this fact: "There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling" (Eph. 4:4).

Unity is here connected with three words, each of which gives us a distinct view of the same truth, yet all harmoniously blended together: we have unity of the Body, of the Spirit, and of the hope of the Church. "There is one body;" "the Church, which is His body." Who could ever, with such scriptures before him, for a moment question that the Church is one, and only one?

It must be carefully observed that the churches or assemblies at Jerusalem, Corinth, Rome, etc., were not separate or independent organisations, as in the modern idea of the Church of Rome, the Greek Church, the Church of England, and so on. There was only one assembly, the Church of God, though expressed in different localities, in which indeed there were local office bearers, as elders and deacons, and where also discipline was locally carried out. There was entire inter-communion. In the present divided state of God's people, the man of faith will be careful to recognise that every true Christian is a part of that one body, with which, as has been said, there can be no failure; while, at the same time, he will pursue a path of separation from evil; and will "follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart." 2 Tim. 2:22.

Not only does the apostle address the assembly of God in Corinth, but also “all that in every place call on the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The whole Christian profession is addressed, for the truth communicated to the Corinthian church was for saints of God everywhere, and the injunctions given to the local assembly were binding upon all who professed the Name of Christ. This at once manifests and acknowledges the unity of the church, for there is but one church of God, and the whole church is responsible to God to act according to the divine instructions given by the Holy Spirit.

Such was the Church: how is it now and where does it exist? It will be perfected in heaven. Granted: but where is it found now on earth? The members of Christ's body are now dispersed; many hidden in the world, others in the midst of religious corruption; some in one sect, some in another, in rivalry one with another to gain over the saved. Many, thanks be to God, do seek unity; but who is it that has found it? It suffices not to say that by the same Spirit we love each other; for by one Spirit we have been baptized into one body. "That they all may be one …" says the Lord, "that the world may believe that thou hast sent me." But we are not one; the unity of the body is not manifested. At the beginning it was clearly manifested, and in every city this unity was evident to all the world. All Christians walked everywhere as one Church. He who was a member of Christ in one locality was so also in another, and he who had a letter of recommendation was received everywhere, because there existed but one society.

But in our day of ruin of the visible testimony and multiplied divisions, it is no longer true that all the real Christians in any locality are found together in a visible testimony or united assembly as at the beginning. They are found scattered in many varying groups. Therefore, no one gathering of believers can claim today to be "the Church of God" in a certain place, for that title embraces every true believer in Christ in that community.

The Church of Christ is but one body, though its members are multitude, each one differing from the other, and scattered over the whole earth. "We, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another," wrote Paul to the Romans (Rom. 12: 5). So also he wrote to the Corinthians, "We being many are one bread, and one body" (I Cor. 10:17), and to the Ephesians he said, "There is one body" (Eph. 4:4).

The truth is thus unworthily ignored, or strangely taken for granted. But even if this were a sound and spiritual judgment, how sad! For nothing is more certain than the fact that "unity" no longer exists among Christians. There was a time when the apostolic exhortation in 1 Cor. 10:32 could apply absolutely and without explanation: "Give none offence [no occasion of stumbling] either to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God." There was no Latin church opposed to the Oriental, each claiming to be Catholic and Apostolic, to say nothing of the Russian patriarchate independent of Constantinople. There were no Jacobites, nor Nestorians; no distinct communities of Abyssinians, of Armenians, and of Copts. Again, how refuse the Christian name to the multifarious Protestant bodies who date from the Reformation, or to such as the Anglicans who boast of ecclesiastical continuity of a dubious sort for long ages before it? It must not be forgotten that more of the baptised are outside Rome than within it; and if one may at all speak not of mere profession but of real children of God, the preponderance is enormously against Rome. Yet godly and intelligent Protestants have immensely added to the disunion of Christendom. Who can deny it? or is it a light matter?

In apostolic days the church was one. How could it be otherwise if it were, as scripture declares it to be, the body and bride of Christ? It was not only that the individuals who composed it were sons of God with the Holy Spirit given to each, and crying, Abba Father. They were one with Christ corporately, His body; which relationship created the responsibility of walking as such together on the earth. They were heavenly in title already as belonging to the Heavenly One, before they bear His image at His coming again. "By one Spirit were we all baptised into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free; and were all given to drink of one Spirit" (1 Cor. 12:13). It was not an invisible light here below; but out of the most discordant elements expressly one, that the world seeing it might believe that the Father sent the Son Who constituted it.

But, not only was Israel's separation from all strangers strictly maintained, in the institution of the Passover; Israel's unity was also as clearly enforced. "In one house shall it be eaten: thou shalt not carry forth ought of the flesh abroad out of the house, neither shall ye break a bone thereof." (Ver. 46) Here is as fair and beauteous a type as we could have of the one body and one Spirit. The Church of God is one. God sees it as such, maintains it as such, and will manifest it as such, in the view of angels, men, and devils, notwithstanding all that has been done to interfere with that hallowed unity. Blessed be God, the unity of His Church is as much in His keeping as is her justification, acceptance, and eternal security. "He keeps all his bones; not one of them is broken." (Ps. 34:20) And, again, "a bone of him shall not be broken." (John 19:36) Despite the rudeness and hard-heartedness of Rome's soldiery, and despite all the hostile influences which have been set to work, from age to age, the body of Christ is one and its divine unity can never be broken. "THERE IS ONE BODY AND ONE SPIRIT;" and that, moreover, down here, on this very earth. Happy are they who have got faith to recognise this precious truth, and faithfulness to carry it out, in these last days; notwithstanding the almost insuperable difficulties which attend upon their profession and their practice! I believe God will own and honour such.

The will of God is that His church should be one, not in spirit merely, but also in an embodied form, so as to exhibit its unity in each place, and its unity throughout the world (John 11:52; 17:11, 21; Acts 2:11; Rom. 12; 1 Cor. 1; 10; 12; Eph. 2; 4; 1 Tim. 3:15). This He will accomplish in perfection at the coming of Christ (John 17:21, 23; Eph. 5:27; Heb. 12:23; Rev. 19:7; 21:9). Meantime it is incumbent on all believers to seek this holy and manifested union, and to put away everything that hinders it. We may be weak in meeting our corporate responsibility, as we are in answering our individual calling to holiness. Still in both respects, and in spite of all ifficulties, our duty remains clear, paramount, and inevitable. But this is not by the mass of Christians maintained as a sacred, irreversible, point of doctrine and practice.