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The Nature, Government and Function of the Church - A Reassessment

The Nature, Government and Function of the Church: A Reassessment
By Stephen C. Perks
The Kuyper Foundation. 116 pages.
ISBN 0 9522058 1 5

This little book is an assessment of the Christian church from a Presbyterian and reconstructionist perspective. The early chapters are unsurprising. For example, the author explores the differences between the visible and invisible church, and the church militant and triumphant.
Local church government is examined, and rule by elders is advocated. They are to be elected by the male heads of households of the congregation (proof text not supplied!). The form of rule is to be by teaching, preaching and pastoral work, with recourse to discipline where required. The elders decide matters of policy, with recourse to the church meeting for election of elders and deacons and in cases of excommunication. Where necessary, Acts 15 gives a precedent for local churches appealing to specially organised synods of church elders from other churches on matters of doctrine and practice.
But it is in the chapter on the function of the church where Stephen Perks moves up a gear and sets out his positive agenda for ministry. The work of the church is to 'equip the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ' (Ephesians 4.12). Perks maintains strongly that the work of service is in the arena of the world: bringing Christian witness and influence to bear in politics, the workplace, the home, transforming culture according to Christian principles. It is by this means that the body of Christ will ultimately be built up. Perks' interpretation of this text needs more justification, but such an emphasis on an outward-looking church with active social involvement is refreshing.
Perks then moves his emphasis from the local church to the wider concept of the 'Kingdom of God'. He even proposes the establishment of a single orthodox Protestant national church. The author's position is radical; he is post-millennial and reconstructionist, believing that Christ will only return when the church has fully come into possession of the earth. So this emphasis, and others, cannot be endorsed. But if we accept Perks's thesis as a challenge to evangelical co-operation and unity in a common purpose of evangelism and social involvement, then that would be a positive application of his work. We need to break out of traditional boundaries, whether that be a denomination which is unfaithful to the Word of God, or an independency which is functionally isolationist. We need to be reminded that all of God's true people are part of the one mighty work of reaching a needy world.

Bill James, Leamington Spa