Brotherhood Function But Not Organization
I asked two of my preacher friends, who try to defend these brotherhood programs operating under a local eldership, "What is wrong with the Missionary Society as Campbell envisioned it?" One of them said there was nothing wrong with it. The other one said it violated the New Testament pattern of church organization because "IT IS LARGER THAN A LOCAL CONGREGATION." I asked him if he didn't think that Herald of Truth did that also, and his answer was no. When I asked him to explain how a church could spend and oversee the spending of money from a thousand (1,000) other congregations without being LARGER THAN A LOCAL CHURCH, his answer was that the New Testament does not limit the function of a congregation. It limits the organization but not the function. (He did not mean, of course, that the congregation can engage in things which are forbidden of themselves. His statement was in reference to the SIZE or SCOPE of the function of a congregation.) Now this is a better argument than I have seen from any of these fellows who promised to write on "What Is Wrong With the Missionary Society?" But there is a fundamental error in the statement of this brother. That the Bible limits the organization of the church but not its function is a contradiction. The very purpose of organization is that it may function. If not, what is the purpose of it? And if this is true, then, just to the extent that the church is limited in organization, it is limited in function. God limited the function of my body when he limited its strength and organization. I used to have visions of flapping my wings and taking off like a bird when I was a boy, but I never could do it because the function of my body was limited by its organization (no wings). The function of the government of the state of Texas is limited by its organization. It is not organized to carry on the work of the federal government. We have another organization for that. This principle is true throughout, whether the body in question be religious, political, fraternal or otherwise. Limit the organization, and it follows as the night follows the day, that you limit the function. But, what is more important just now, remove the restraints and boundaries of function and necessity will soon demand that we remove the boundaries of organization. A brotherhood work demands a brotherhood organization. It is obvious that when a congregation undertakes a work that requires the efforts of a thousand other churches, and invites and urges every church in the brotherhood to have part in it that church has enlarged its function beyond that of a local church.
Just one question before I depart. If God had intended for the church universal to function, as such, would He not have provided some means whereby it might function? Remember brethren that God had a reason for setting up the church in local congregations independent of each other or He would not have done so. And the very fact that He so limited the organization means that He limited the function.