Where is the Church today?

This is the seventh post in a series looking at the reasons why some Lutheran pastors left the LCMS for Eastern Orthodoxy. The focus is an article written by the Reverend Thomas L. Palke in 1999 entitled “MY JOURNEY TO THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH ESTABLISHED BY JESUS CHRIST: A Son of the Reformation Enters the “Mighty Fortress” of the Orthodox Church.”

What did the early fathers mean when they used the word “Church”? Where is the Church today?

Lutherans say that the Church is wherever the Gospel is preached and the Sacraments are properly administered.

Of course, what is really meant is that the Church is wherever the Lutheran take on the Gospel is preached and where the two Lutheran Sacraments are administered according to Lutheran tradition.

Rev. Palke discusses these issues when he states:

“Ultimately, for me the key issue was the Church. How did the fathers and Creed understand “one, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church?”

I felt that the Protestants had, to varying degrees, “gnosticized” the church. In other words, since they had broken from Rome, which claimed to be the true visible church, Protestants, in reaction, tended to spiritualize the church, emphasizing its invisible character through “faith alone.” Hence, there was no need for anything “human”--bishops, fasting, monks, liturgy, iconography, councils, etc.

Yet, few of our Protestant friends realized that the Church determined the canon of Holy Scripture in the late 4th century. It did so through application of holy tradition (rule of faith) which preceded even the writing of the New Testament. The Church formulated the Creed. The Church established canons that regulated its life (The Orthodox Church still observes these canons. For example, the canons do not permit divorced men to become clergy. This stands in sharp contrast to Protestantism, which finds itself with increasing percentages of divorced clergy.). Those who confessed and taught the faith and were in doctrinal and sacramental fellowship with other bishops (who were commemorated in the worship of Orthodox churches) and their respective flocks comprised the “One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church” (many Church Fathers refer to the Church simply as the “Catholic Church”). Virtually every Father testifies as to those who were in the Church and those, who, due to false teaching or noncanonical practice, put themselves outside of the church.

The Creed affirms that the Holy Spirit is the Lord and giver of life. He forms a body and unites it to Christ, the head of the church. Because it is united to Christ, it is described in the book of Ephesians (1:23) as the fullness of him who fills all things. It is one. It is complete (this is primarily what the word "catholic" means). It lacks nothing. It is universal. It transcends any one culture. And it transcends any period of history. It is both divine and human at the same time. It is local and also universal. It has one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. The gates of hell will not prevail against it. Thus, it will exist from Pentecost until our Lord’s parousia.

Protestants will be surprised that, while the Scriptures affirm the Word of God as reliable and true, the same Scriptures declare that the Church itself is "the pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Tim 3:15). Without this pillar, everything comes crashing down. To this body the Word of God was revealed. And only this body, instructed in the apostles’ doctrine, could decide which Gospels and epistles belonged in the canon of Scripture. And this body alone, through its ecumenical councils and right-teaching fathers, is equipped to interpret the contents of Scripture. “