I believe the larger question within our cultural moment is “What does it mean to be the church in the midst of negative world?” Paul asked a similar question in his epistles.  In addition to being an Apostle, Paul was an educator and he wrote his letters with the desire to teach the church and to make his readers into certain kinds of people worthy of the calling to which they’d been called and suited to life in the Kingdom of God. Contrary to some assertions within broader evangelicalism, the church does not exist only as a witness to the world or to show a better way.  

The church is called to make disciples of all nations or put another way, the church exists to make Christians.  Some saints hear this phrase and recoil. They assert that Christian making is a work that belongs to God alone.  It is a well-meaning objection and one that I understand, but I believe it is wrong and one that is partially responsible for creating the negative world we live in today. It is also inconsistant. We reject the idea of the Church making Christians but readily accept the premise when other institutions turn people into citizens fit for rival kingdoms.  

Consider the role of public education. Institutions of public education exist to help prepare students to be educated citizens who are fit to take their place in the secular public.  In this endeavor to educate students, teachers teach them.  If a parent approached a teacher about their concern that their child was not learning in the class, I don’t think a teacher would respond by saying that it’s not their job to teach the student but simply to provide a “witness,” serving as one in the classroom who knows the subject better in contrast to the ignorance of the student.  As a collective faculty in the school district, the faculty does not exist to merely shine a light on ignorance while trusting that a higher authority (a spirit we might call the Administration) will do the work of educating the students.  Rather teachers teach the students directly and thereby change them and help form them into citizens.  If it’s not unusual for us to accept that a public school makes citizens fit for the public, perhaps the church is called to do the same in making citizens fit for the Kingdom of God.  The church makes Christians.  

James Davison Hunter wrote that Christians must offer an alternative way of being in the world and that the best way to do that is by what he calls “faithful presence” or what we might call bearing witness.  But Hunter’s book is entitled To Change the World and his expectation is that faithful presence is the beginning of a process of real change.  Hunter and Christians like him understand the Kingdom of God as Habakkuk did (Habakkuk 2:14), a real kingdom that will fill the earth as the waters cover the sea.  Isaiah (2:1-4) described the Kingdom of God as a mountain that will rise above all other mountains and to which all the nations would flow.  Jesus declared that all the nations would be gathered unto him (Matt 25:32) and so when we say that we are gathered for worship, we are in some sense saying that we must gather the (negative) world unto Christ, which requires change, and in some sense it is a way of taking over the market.  Engaging the market and changing the world is precisely what Paul did in the marketplace of ideas on Mars Hill in Acts 17:22-34.  Paul was on mission to make Christians, and when the church is on mission, it does the same.

But perhaps “we make Christians” is too simplistic of a mission statement; perhaps it leaves too much to be desired.  Perhaps it is simple, but no more simplified than Jesus’ command to “Go make disciples” (Matt 28:19).  However, “Go make disciples” isn’t sufficient on its own, which is why Jesus gave us the expanded text known as the Great Commission, telling us to disciple the nations and change the world by teaching unbelievers to observe (obey) all that I have commanded.  “We make Christians” is also insufficient on its own, but that is why Paul wrote his letters and why the church must always be on mission as it gathers for worship and teaches the doctrines of the faith.

The question before us is, who makes Christians, God or the church?  Tutullian was a church father who agreed with the modern evangelical position.  He could not imagine a truly Christian life without a radical act of conversion, which was the intent behind his statement “Christians are made, not born” (Apol., xviii).  Pagans need to be converted, which is why I agree with Turtullian that God makes Christians.

But I also agree with Cyprian, another church father, who once said, “You cannot have God as your Father unless you have the church for your Mother.”  So, God makes Christians and the Church makes Christians, in the same way a father and a mother make a child.   I affirm the doctrines of grace and believe that only the Holy Spirit can translate a person from death to life, only God can convert a person from a sinner to a saint.  But that is not the end of something, that is only the beginning of something and precisely the place where the church must get to work.  Saying the sinner’s prayer alone is not sufficient for making a Christian. Converts must be made and Christians must be made.

John Calvin, the magisterial Reformer beloved by Presbyterians, agreed with Cyprian and saw the necessity of the church in making Christians.  He wrote, 

“I will begin with the church, into whose bosom God is pleased to collect his children, not only that by her aid and ministry they may be nourished so long as they are babes and children, but may also be guided by her maternal care until they grow up to manhood and, finally, attain to the perfection of the faith. What God has thus joined, let not man put asunder (Mark 10:9): to those whom he is a Father, the church must also be a mother. This is not merely under the Law, but even now after the advent of Christ; since Paul declares that we are the children of a new, even a heavenly Jerusalem (Gal. 4:26).”   

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 4.1.1

And also he said, 

“But as it is now our purpose to discourse of the visible church, let us learn, from her single title of Mother, how useful, no, how necessary the knowledge of her is, since there is no other means of entering into life unless she conceive us in the womb and give us birth, unless she nourish us at her breasts, and, in short, keep us under her charge and government, until divested of mortal flesh, we become like the angels. (Matt 22:30)… Moreover, beyond the pale of the church no forgiveness of sins, no salvation, can be hoped for, as Isaiah and Joel testify (Isa 37:32; Joel 2:32).”

 John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 4.1.4

Yes, a Christian life begins with the work of the Holy Spirit, who alone saves (justification, monergism, one energy, God alone) but Christians are also called to the Church, which forms us in Christ (sanctification, synergism, two energies, God and Church).  I believe the church does have a program, a curriculum, a formula for making Christians, it is called the doctrine of the church (ecclesiology). But through our American hyper-individualism, most modern evangelicals have forgotten this doctrine.  When we locate the work of discipleship (Christian-making) exclusively with the Holy Spirit, then the Church, Christian parents, and individual believers fail to take up their God-given responsibilities.   Perhaps the church has indeed shirked its responsibilities to make Christians, which is why we are in negative world.   

As Edward Fisher shared in The Marrow of Modern Divinity, the world is not served by dower legalists who strictly adhere to a set of rules and appear to be Christians but lack the power of God (Nomista). But neither is the world served by evangelicals who think it’s okay to sin because God will forgive them anyway, believing the Holy Spirit will take care of their discipleship (Anitnomista).  The world needs Christians, saved by God and nurtured in grace by the Church.  This is why we must confess every Lord’s Day, through the Apostles’ Creed, that we believe in the holy catholic Church.

I’ll end with the Apostle Paul’s vision, which I believe is the vision of the church.  Paul believed in the need for conversion, through Christ alone by the power of the Holy Spirit, by grace, through fatih (Galatians 2:15-21).  Paul taught that God makes Christians and that God calls us to be saints.  But the Galatians were also bewitched (Negative World?) and came to believe that their formation could be achieved by the flesh. 

“O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?”

Galatians 3:1-3

Christians need Christ through the Spirit, but Paul also believed in the formational necessity of the church through the apostolic ministry, which is why he then said,“my little children, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you!” (Galatians 4:19).  

We see this same logic again in Paul’s curriculum for his student Timothy.  Timothy is a Christian, by grace through faith, and yet he must become a Christian, which is why Paul says, 

“Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching…Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress.  Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers.”  

1 Timothy 4:13–16

Paul expected progress (change) in his student Timothy and in Timothy’s “students” through the ministry of the Word in the life of the church.  

We’re in negative world for a reason and the church must be reacquainted with its responsibilities.  I don’t think we’re here because God is failing to do his part, he continues to successfully call sinners to salvation.  Perhaps the church is failing to do her part, by not taking what God gives us and making Christians out of converts, forming converts more and more after the image of Christ, and making disciples of all nations.  

Photo by Ilia Zolas on Unsplash