Further illustration of our [forebears] conviction that freedom is implied in the believer's relationship to Christ is seen in their view of the church. For them the church was the fellowship of believers and was brought into being through the redemptive work of Christ and the "renewal of the Holy Spirit." Accordingly, the one basic requirement for membership in the church was the experience of the new birth and a consistent confession of Christ as Savior and Lord. To have added the requirement of uniformity in all doctrinal matters would have been to forget that "our knowledge is imperfect" and would have presumed that a final and authoritative theological position was in their sole possession. Its effect would have been to limit their fellowshito the dimensions of a sect rather than permit it to be the household of God in which the living faith expresses itself in varied ways. Thus, our forefathers found it spiritually meaningful to live in Christian fellowship with persons holding different doctrinal viewpoints in some important areas as long as their life and spirit witnessed to their submission to Christ and devotion to the Word of God.
Such a position did not mean indifference to doctrine or a lack of theological concern. This is evidenced in the lively discussion of doctrinal topics which arose in response to the questions, "Where is it written?" and "What is written?" Our fathers knew that even the simple confession "We acknowledge Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord" implied in itself a number of theological affirmations. They understood that a part of the task of the church was to spell out in systematic and orderly manner the theological structure implied in its confession. They were aware of the danger of heresy and, therefore, insisted that all theological statements must be continually under the judgment of the revelation given in Scripture.
Our forefathers, in keeping with this principle of freedom, were able to move out into the currents and crosscurrents of spiritual and theological influence which swirled about their lives. This is evidenced not by their interest in the work of the theological schools (for there was little of that) but in their participation in the pietistic movement itself, and in the discussions concerning the sacraments, church order, atonement, and other topics of vital concern in the life of the church. Their interest in doctrine was practical and devotional rather than intellectual..... Very few of them were professional theologians. In relation to their own spiritual needs they examined in the light of the Scriptures the movements of which they were aware, accepting what illumined the biblical message and rejecting what they thought contrary to it. Through such discussion they found their own understanding of the faith corrected, deepened, and made relevant to the problems of their day.
If we are to be true to this aspect of our heritage, we should sincerely and faithfully use this principle of freedom as a basic element in our existence as a Christian people in today's world. To do so we must enter into the stream of present theological discussion and exercise our freedom creatively and helpfully with respect to the issues which now confront the Christian church. The theological concerns of the present moment differ in many respects from those of our fathers. Although many of the questions now being debated in the church were well known to our fathers, others have arisen since their day and could not have been known to them. Thus, to say that we may differ only at those points where our fathers permitted differences would be to deny to the present generation the freedom in Christ which our fathers enjoyed. In the basic and central affirmations of the Christian faith there must be unity, but in their expression and interpretation there is room for wholesome divergence.
Covenant Committee on Freedom and Theology, Biblical Authority and Christian Freedom (1963), p. 11.
While the Covenant is "non-creedal" in that we do not make the words of the creeds or the utterances of the Fathers authoritative alongside of or above Scripture, nevertheless we affirm the fundamental expressions of faith in which Christians the world over are agreed, and stand with the apostolic witness of the ages whenever we confess our faith in the Apostles=, Nicene, or Athanasian creeds....
The Evangelical Covenant Church is rooted both in the work of the magisterial reformers, especially Luther, and the principles of the free-church tradition of believers= churches, articulated first by the left-wing reformers and then by English Puritans. The Swedish Reformation was totally Lutheran in character, its leader, Olavus Petri, having been a student at Wittenberg during the eventful months prior to the Ninety-five Theses. So we see that the Covenant is a child of the Reformation, and that we need to study with care and appreciation the riches of that tradition....
But these Swedes were also Pietists who traced their pedigree to the dissenting movements of all ages: the introspection and ecstasy of the mystics; the courage of the left-wing reformers who fought for their believers' churches and the rights of individual Christian conscience and freedom; the spirituality of the great Puritan divines; the "heart religion" of the Moravians and the Methodists all trying to resuscitate with the new life of the Spirit the churches which they believed were increasingly comatose. In a way rather difficult to describe, these early Mission Friends stood in both a "catholic" and a "free church" tradition as seen through the eyes of the Reformation....
Our name says much about the nature of The Evangelical Covenant Church. The word Aevangelical@ indicates its spirit of commitment to the good news of God's forgiveness offered to all persons in Jesus Christ, not a fixed list of doctrines. The word Acovenant@ indicates its principle of voluntary association for the purpose of engaging in the work of the Kingdom of God. The Covenant has no formulated creed but holds to the Protestant principle of the authority of the Scriptures, and to the primacy of a fellowship of believers rooted in the living voice of the Spirit in the Church through the agesBa voice which it must continue to hear and allow to speak through it to future generations. We need to know not only our place in the long history of the Christian Church, but also that we are a part of its ongoing history. What started with the apostles does not conclude with us. The Covenant is not the end result of what began with the primitive fellowship in Jerusalem. Rather, the ChurchBand our CovenantBis a place where we all begin.
Philip J. Anderson (1949- ), One Body...Many Members: The Covenant Church in Historical Perspective (1983), pp. 9,24,30,31.
The Covenant...cannot be so doctrinally unequivocal as the Free Church. It cannot draw with such simple, bold strokes. By character and tradition, it is committed not to doctrine but to life and relationships. Thus it commends itself to people who have come through a convertive crisis and are looking for a fellowship in which there is evangelical life and warmth and a serious commitment to the Scriptures but also freedom to differ theologically and to grow relationally. It may also be able to minister to people disenchanted with liberal churches because of their lack of life and to those who are disenchanted with Fundamentalist churches because of the lack of freedom.
Karl A. Olsson (1913-1996), "Similarities and Differences in the Churches of the FederationBAmerica, " p. 18, from Awake and Free, The International Federation of Free Evangelical Churches (1971).
The basis of the movement is the Church idea, that a Christian church is a free union of persons united by the same spiritual life on the foundation of a common faith in Christ and brotherly love and confidence, and that this union ought to be held open to everyone believing in Jesus Christ and leading a true Christian life, without consideration of different creeds as far as these do not deny the Word of God and the authority of the Holy Scriptures. Each such church is self-governing and owes no authority above its own in all local matters. Through the Covenant each church is bound closely together with all the other churches.
David Nyvall (1863-1946), Report to World Parliament of Religions, 1893, quoted in Scott E. Erickson, David Nyvall and the Shape of an Immigrant Church (Acta Universitatis Upsallensis, Uppsala, 1996), p. 152.
Importance of Membership
You are God's child but you do not belong to any congregation because you do not think it
measures up to your standards. You look at her weaknesses but forget to look at Jesus who created her and lives in her, the promises to the congregation , her mission and her gifts of grace. That you continue apart from her means that you despise her and her Savior. Dear friend, how can you say that you love Jesus and at the same time depreciate his people and his provisions for his own for this time? Pray God to save you from that attitude that you coldly and callously criticize God's arrangements. If you are born of God then you were born to become and to be edified in his congregation; if you do otherwise you are not like the rest of God's children. We need the help of Jesus and one another if we are to be counted worthy of the Kingdom of God.
G. D. Hall (1870-1927), G. D. Hall, Pastor-Journalist: Reports Mission Meetings, 1895-1911, George F. Hall tr. (Typed Script, 1991), p. 97.
Some...join the church, while others may not yet be ready. Why would you join? The Bible tells us that believers really have no choice. "Now you are the body of Christ," Paul writes, "and individually members of it" (1 Corinthians 12:27). If you have entrusted your life to Christ, you are no longer your own: you belong to Christ and, along with all others who have trusted him, you belong to his body, the church. So why not be a member? Because you are one whether you want to be or not! Joining your local church is your public witness to that understanding....
Some may say, "Jesus, yes, but church membership, no." Yet just as becoming a Christian is impossible apart from God's grace, so remaining one by yourself is impossible because of his grace. He who brings us to himself also unites us with his body, "so that through the church the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known" (Ephesians 3: 10). When a glowing coal is removed from a fire and set aside by itself, it soon loses its warmth and grows cold. Returned to the other coals, it begins glowing again. Similarly, joining a church is not necessary for salvation, but it will help us grow in our Christlikeness. It will fan the flame of our commitment. We bring our commitment, our gifts, and our prayers for the betterment of the whole church. In this way, membership becomes a holy opportunity for both personal and corporate spiritual growth.
A Family Matter: An Exploration in Believing and Belonging (Inquirer's Class Manual of the Evangelical Covenant Church, 1994), pp. 14,15.
Today in America we do not need to be secretive about our relationship to the church, but we have that same keen joy over our fellowship with other Christians. It is a great thing to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ. We must remember, however, that church membership is not a thing which just happens. You don't grow into it in the way you grow into being a "teenager." You can 't become a Boy Scout or a Girl Scout without choosing to become one and preparing yourself for membership. Similarly, there are certain requirements which must be met be met before one can belong to the church.
The first and most important of them is to have accepted Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. You will remember from a previous lesson that the Church is made up of believers, and only such
should belong to it. It is true that you may find some members who are hypocrites and only pretend to live the Christian life, but such things should not be. The first questions you should ask yourself when you think about joining the church are: "Do I sincerely believe on Jesus Christ?" [and] "Do I really love Him?" It is not required that you be a perfect Christian, without fault (who of us measures uto that?), but it is required that you confess belief in Christ and a desire to live according to his will. If this is true in your life you may become a member of the church.
Clifford W. Bjorklund (1921-1986), Harry J. Ekstam (1918- ), Karl A. Olsson (1913-1996), and Donald C. Frisk (1911- ), According to Thy Word (1954, 1955), pp. 407,408.
You've come into a Covenant church as a visitor. Unfamiliar, you look left and right and think, AThese people seem pretty normal.@ Sitting through the service you watch people sing, pray, listen, and respond. Yet all the while you may well be asking, "So what is this place? What's a Covenant church anyway?"
Well over a century old, the Evangelical Covenant Church is somewhat unique among denominations in the evangelical tradition in that it maintains a good deal of theological freedom in the context of a larger, conservative, biblical theology. And that isn't all. Each Covenant church is itself unique from the others. True, ours is a growing fellowship of many hundreds of churches in the U.S. and Canada. Though small as some denominations go, it nonetheless maintains a very fruitful world missions program in a number of countries around the world.
Church historian Martin E. Marty has described the Evangelical Covenant Church as "the most ecumenical, distinctively evangelical denomination in the United States." And each church in this family of faith has a character of its own. Yet certain things could probably be said of all Covenant congregations. If you're interested in theology, we are a people who believe in the authority and truth of the Bible; in the loving and just care of a personal God; in the saving grace and lordship of Jesus Christ; in the contemporary work of the Holy Spirit; in the importance of new life in Christ for all men and women, boys and girls; in Christian freedom; in the unity of all believers in Christ; in the privilege of ministering to others' needs; in the joy of bringing this good news to others.
For those not so interested in theology, a Covenant church might be characterized in the following ways. Ours is a conservative fellowship, seeking to be faithful to biblical teaching. Yet within the biblical framework, it allows for choice in individual interpretation; we do not seek to propagate Christian faith by cloning it. The Covenant is congregational in organization, encouraging all members in local congregations to give themselves to the decision-making process--whether that be in the calling of pastors, setting ministry goals and budgets, or providing adequate facilities for ministry.
Further, a Covenant church appropriately asks for the commitment of its people--both to Christ and the work of his church. We ask people to involve themselves significantly in his mission. Years ago, in fact, we called ourselves Mission Friends, and we are no less today. Covenant churches are also celebrative in their worship and life, conveying the joy of having a living relationship with God through Jesus Christ, and seeking the answers to loneliness, confusion, and worry.
Finally, don't overlook what's in our name! The Evangelical Covenant Church asks people to live out its name--to preach, teach, and live the evangel, the good news of Jesus Christ, and to covenant with other believers for growth, friendship, hope, encouragement, and accountability--all of which help to connect and build us up.
That, in a nutshell, is a Covenant church. You may well have come in wondering. In any case, and in God's name, we say, "Welcome!"
Richard G. Mylander (1954- ), "So What Is a Covenant Church?" (Covenant Tract, 1993).
Local and Universal
In affirming the sacred nature of the church covenant, the Evangelical Covenant Church believes the local congregation to be a part of the sacred body of Christ. It is holy. It thus takes a strong stand against all those who would look at a congregation as "a human-made church." Radical notions that repudiate the "organized church" spread among some of the early Free Mission Friends and are found in the broader evangelical movement of our own time as well. Such views are not born of New Testament Christianity. The radically anti-institutionalist fringes of the evangelical movement are born of the secular Enlightenment and its modernism, not the New Testament.
Paul E. Larsen (1933- ), "Democracy and Congregationalism." From Servant Leadership, Volume One: Authority and Governance in the Church, James R. Hawkinson & Robert K. Johnston, editors (1993), pp. 142,143.
It is true that we are born into God's church, and no congregational resolution ... can separate me from Christ's church--which is His body--if I live in Him. This simply means that a local church is not the same as the Church of Christ in the greatest definition of the word. However, the local church can and should be a real representative of the Church of Christ where it is located, and to this extent, it is the local congregation that constitutes the fellowship of the friends of Jesus there. Accordingly, this goal is won when those of us in a certain place belong to Jesus by coming together through the ministry of a local church. If, for example, you stand outside a local church of believers, it is the Church of Christ minus you and any others who choose to stand outside with you. But if you associate with the church, it is in some degree closer to the goal of fully representing the Church of Christ in that place.
David Nyvall (1863-1946), Letter to Andrew Nelson, January 3, 1897, quoted in Scott E. Erickson, David Nyvall and the Shape of an Immigrant Church (Acta Universitatis Upsallensis, Uppsala, 1996), pp. 153,154.
I often think that we are terribly parochial. We get the idea that Awe are the people@ and we are afraid of fellowshiping with others. We have heard it intimated so often that all other churches are modernistic that we have believed it. As a matter of fact, there are great reservoirs of Christian faith in churches all around us, and I think we would do well to cultivate acquaintance with our neighbors. Whatever one says, there is a true ecumenicity in the Christian church. It would have been difficult for me, had my eyes been closed, to know just what church I was attending. I felt that I could have been either a Presbyterian or an Evangelical Reformed without stretching myself too much out of shape. Perhaps it wouldn't have been any more difficult than it has been at times to be a Covenanter.
Herbert E. Palmquist (1896-1981), Wait for Me! (1959), p. 153.
There is no other organization in the world that can compare with the community of God=s redeemed people, the church, for satisfying the soul=s need for companionship. It always gives more than it requires. It is a fellowship born in love rather than convenience.
...The church is powerful because it combines the resources of all its members with the resources of God. As a member of the church, our witness becomes world-wide. It is not limited to the sound of our voice or the sphere of our personal influence....
This is why your local congregation of believers exists, and that is why the denomination of which it is a member exists. It is your church, designed by God for people like you that you may enjoy the finest fellowship possible on earth and accomplish God=s purposes for your life.
It is impossible to be loyal to Christ and not be loyal also to his body (Ephesians 4:15,16), the Church. Christ has his habitation in the believer and in the fellowship of the believers (Colossians 1:18). To be loyal to him, one must be loyal to the fellowship. The physical expression of Christ in your vicinity is your local church, your spiritual family. Loyalty to it is a sign of spiritual maturity.
...Disloyalty to the local congregation and to its larger denominational family has never displayed itself to my attention apart from either spiritual immaturity or spiritual deterioration. I have never yet met a person obviously devoted to Christ who was not also obviously devoted to the church of which he [or she] was a member.
C. Milton Strom (1911-1963), "Is Our Church Really Our Church?" From Carl Philip Anderson, Aaron Markuson, and Gerard Johnson, editors, What Makes Our Home Christian? (1956), pp. 43,44.
While there are tremendous advantages to the church situation as it has developed in the United States--not the least of which is the zeal of people who feel a strong sense of ownership for the churches they join and serve--there are also dangers which are becoming ever more obvious. Clergy and laity alike struggle with new conceptions of the ministry; the model of the pastor has sometimes been replaced by the model of the professional, the chief executive officer. American freedom with its credo of the value of every individual has its dark side in the erosion of community and a rampant spread of individualism. Finally, the distrust of authority and fears of bureaucracy have contributed to an extreme localism that handicaps the efforts of cooperative agencies and suffers from narrowness of vision.
Stephen R. Graham (1957- ), "Democratizing= the Church: Varieties of Leadershiand Authority in the United States," from Servant Leadership, Volume One: Authority and Governance in the Church, James R. Hawkinson & Robert K. Johnston, editors (1993), pp. 97,98.
While we recognize that traditional religion has value, we must not consider its value to be unending. Religious traditions must never become so sacrosanct that they cannot be changed or removed without affecting our faith. People must never become the tools for maintaining the religious scaffold. The scaffold must be the tool to maintain the people. Although religious furniture and religious rites are worthy of respect, God's people are God's building and they will remain long after the furniture and the rites have disappeared. What happens to people must always be primary. As pilgrims we must respect religious traditions, but we should never permit them to distract us from the ever-changing pilgrim life. We recognize that the only permanent values are the values that reside in redeemed human beings with whom God himself will dwell forever.
Since we can never be sure when the old and familiar religious traditions have lost their value, we are never justified in rejecting them. There had to be an old, familiar Judaism to be a cradle for the newborn church. There had to be an old, familiar medieval church to provide the resources for the reformation church. In times of revival there must be an old, familiar, and established church to be revived. If we give any attention to the voice of history, we must recognize that God will use the old and the familiar as resources for renewal today. Even though we are pilgrims, we cannot look cynically at the old, familiar, dead bones. It is these bones which will come alive and be clothed with new flesh at the Word of God. While we recognize that it will take new methods to reach the secular world of today and tomorrow, we must also recognize that it is the old church of yesterday that must be awakened to these new methods. Therefore we cannot join those who scoff at the old institutions and look for action in areas that are completely unrelated to them.
Wesley W. Nelson (1910- ), Salvation and Secularity (1968), pp. 146,147.
While the discussion of ecumenism [April 28, 1902] has never really been prominent, there are those here and there who think deeply about it. But many obstacles block the road that will lead to the open unity of God's children about which Jesus prayed the night before his death (John 17:22-23).... Clearly the divisions of believers everywhere hinders the salvation of the world.
But does this unity mean that the true disciples of Jesus in one place all become members of one congregation in that place, formally associating themselves with the local congregation? Instead there is discord almost everywhere. The faithful decide not to unite with the faithful in that place although they hear the same Word of God and do some work together but not under the aegis of the congregation. About such Paul writes. that "they wander without regard" to their brothers and sisters. Others are found who believe in God and are his children but have membershiin worldly churches which have the appearance of godliness but lack its power. They say: Certainly we will be saved even if this is not proper. Yes, You are saved but you have never taken your valid place among God's people. Your spirit grows careless and sleepy when you sit among those many dead. Many have indeed sat in their places and slept into death. Worldly pastors. have quieted their restless consciences with "we still have many believing members."
My friend, go through the New Testament in the fellowship of God=s Holy Spirit and you will soon see where you belong. You belong in the congregation of the God-fearing. When all the believers in one place have become one body, they should work with other similar bodies in the district. As we observe in the East, bodies can work together in exciting harmony even though they differ in sundry matters.. This is also true elsewhere. Why do we put one another off with: "You belong to the Covenant, you to the Free, you to the Congregationalists, and you are on the fence." Why not ask: "Are You living in Jesus? Are you working for God? Are you gathering or scattering for. the Savior?" When we fuss about denominational labels we attract to ourselves trouble makers and hypocrites. Let us raise instead prayers of truth: "Are You born of God? Have you gone through the door of the sheepfold or jumped its walls?" Let living questions precede program questions....
G. D. Hall (1870-1927), G. D. Hall, Pastor-Journalist: Reports Mission Meetings, 1895-1911, George F. Hall tr. (Typed Script, 1991), p. 67.
He is a fool, indeed, that Covenanter who says that the Evangelical Covenant Church is the best church in all the world, but he is poor indeed who doesn=t think so at least at times and much to be pitied if he can never enjoy that delusion. There is a sense of loyalty and even duty that binds me to support my church. He who is more concerned about the whole church of Jesus Christ than he is about the needs and program of his own church is irresponsible and profligate. Just as I can best serve the human race by serving unselfishly and intelligently through my family and community, so I can best serve the ecumenical church by serving with devotion and dispatch in my local church and denomination. But the other side of the truth is both obvious and essential. Just as my family and I can become isolated and destructively selfish by closing our hearts and minds to the community and world about us, so my church and I may destroy ourselves and hinder the larger Christian fellowship by a spiritual isolation and an ecclesiastical superiority or indifference.
Earl C. Dahlstrom (1914-1992), The Christian Church (1959), p. 92.
We "build up the body" when we are ecumenically at ease. There is about the sensitive church with our kind of history and our kind of unique place in the contemporary world an understanding that much cooperative ministry needs to be done in the local community to make sure that the larger body of the church in that community does not suffer for lack of love and, because of that, restricted impact. By being "at ease" I mean simply that our style is such that we are disciplined enough to know where we cannot subscribe to certain peripheral positions and functions without failing at the same time to see the larger church organism as an area of responsibility whether that cooperation demands structural unity or not.
Today, the ecumenical thrust is more and more at the level of cooperation closest to home. It is not any more so much a question of our affinities with distant bodies in a large theological arena. It is now more than ever a question of what we can do in conjunction with the other churches that name the name of Christ in our neighborhood to bring the priority news of salvation in Jesus Christ to people on our piece of geography near home. There is a real feeling of strength that comes to a church when it realizes that there is a network of prayer and initiative for healing hurts carried in people's hearts, among churches of many "family" names or no family name at all.
Arthur A. R. Nelson (1934- ), "...To Build Up the Body," in Bound to Be Free: Essays on Being a Christian and a Covenanter (1975), pp. 72,73.
To Aaffirm that the Church's visible unity in truth is God's purpose@ in no way places a moratorium on emphasizing differing theological positions, holding diverse doctrinal beliefs, practicing different methods of ministry, or even supporting contrary attitudes on global social and civic responsibilities. It does, however, severely prohibit individualism and party rivalry that feed on suspicion among Christians, the cultivation of views that nurse bitterness, hatred, and division, or attitudes that cause anyone to seek revenge or cause discrimination in any form among Christians. There are other areas that could be catalogued, but these give ample indication of what is intended.
What evangelicals should realize is that the whole cause of Christ has been set back too long by too many well-meaning people. It is time to reconsider who the church is trying to impress. Is it God or man? Is it the Church of Jesus Christ or the non-Christian world? We need to set serious teaching and preaching in motion, and we sorely need actions designed to draw Christians together. As William Temple said long ago, "I would ... urge that we try to recover in some measure the horror of divisions among Christians."
Milton B. Engebretson (1920-1996), "...To Foster Unity," in Bound to Be Free: Essays on Being a Christian and a Covenanter (1975), p. 93.
