Bound to Join: A Review and Defence

Bound to Join: Letters on Church Membership

by David J. Engelsma

Reformed Free Publishing Association, Michigan, USA, 2010

Hardback, 184pp.

 

 

“For my European brothers and sisters of the British Reformed Fellowship [BRF]”—this is the touching dedication at the very start of Prof. David J. Engelsma’s latest book Bound to Join: Letters on Church Membership. The dedication also points to the origin of this work: e-mail correspondence with scattered Reformed believers in the British Isles and Europe about the distressing lack of faithful Reformed churches where they live, arising from discussions at the 2004 BRF Conference in England. The saints asked for instruction on this vital subject and Prof. Engelsma duly obliged.

Contents

The “Introductory Letter” (pp. xiii-xvi) from a concerned sister in France, with its fifteen practical questions and statement of three “issues and scenarios,” sets the scene and gets the ball rolling. What should I do if there are no true churches near me?

In Letter 1, Prof. Engelsma begins with a brief presentation of the Reformed doctrine of the church and church membership. Here and elsewhere he makes it clear that he will be working from Scripture, the Reformed confessions (especially Belgic Confession 27-29 and including the Westminster Confession) and John Calvin (particularly his anti-Nicodemite writings).

Letter 2 answers a question from one of the correspondents in the European forum about the meaning of an “apostate” church. This in turn occasions the erroneous charge that the Protestant Reformed Churches believe that all churches that hold that God loves and desires to save the reprobate are apostate. Engelsma explains that this is not the case and answers a related question on the “Sum of Saving Knowledge,” often bound with the Westminster Standards (Letters 3-4). Back on the subject of false churches, Letter 5 explains the process of apostasy.

The next five letters quote and summarise John Calvin’s call to professing French believers to form or move to Reformed churches (based on, e.g., Psalm 27:4 and Psalms 42, 43 and 84). This is a difficult word to scattered saints in the sixteenth or twenty-first century.

Suddenly two members of the forum revise their estimate of the British churches: they are not that bad after all! Engelsma responds to them in Letter 11. By appealing to the Reformed creeds (Belgic Confession 29, 33-35; Westminster Confession 27-29; pp. 66-67, 111-112), he demonstrates that Reformed saints cannot fulfil their “calling from God regarding church membership by joining a Baptist church” (p. 66).

Letters 12-14 deal with the call to join a true church even above family loyalties, in answer to question 10 in the “Introductory Letter” (p. xiv). This undoubtedly is a “hard saying,” but Engelsma proves the point from the words of Christ in the gospel accounts, other Scriptures (Ezra 10; I Cor. 7:15), the confessions (Belgic Confession 28) and John Calvin (pp. 81-83).

Before his discussion of the three marks of the church, Engelsma gives a fine response to a question from one of the members of the forum who wondered if Christ’s command to the faithful in the church in Sardis (Rev. 3:1-6) contradicted the professor’s instruction (Letter 15). Engelsma begins his “explanation of the marks [of a true church] by clearing up misunderstanding and exposing erroneous notions about the marks” (p. 97). If only the four points he makes (pp. 97-104) were understood and practised in the church world! What harm Christian people would avoid inflicting upon themselves, their families and their friends! The first mark of faithful preaching (Letter 17) and the second and third marks of proper administration of the sacraments and the godly exercise of church discipline (Letter 18) are treated in turn. In this connection, Engelsma states that paedo-communion “is impure, a corrupting of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper” (p. 112). He warns, “The result of child-communion will be the heavy judgment of God upon the church that practices it, as the apostle warns in [I Corinthians 11:30-34]” (p. 112).

In answer to another question, Engelsma provides penetrating analysis of denominations, their biblical and confessional justification, as well as the effects of apostasy in denominations (Letter 19). The professor’s conclusion is pithy and profound: “As patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels, appeal to church unity is the trump card of the false church” (p. 122; cf. p. 143). In Letter 20, Engelsma responds to the criticism that his instruction needs to be more “nuanced.”

The false church’s terrible reality is the subject of Letter 21. Our author gives us his definition:

… a false church [is] a religious organization professing Christianity that has so departed from the cardinal truths of the gospel, and with this departure has so corrupted the sacraments and perverted Christian discipline, that there is no presence of Christ in it at all by his Spirit, bestowing the grace of life, but rather a special presence of the evil spirit, Satan, working out the damnation of the members by a false gospel (p. 130).

In the next letter, Engelsma restates and clarifies his position against objections from a member of the forum. The professor states the wrong reason and the true ground for leaving a church:

One does not leave a church merely because one “does not agree with the consistory,” or because the congregation did something that was not right, or because one is “uncomfortable” there, or, as often is the case, because the church “refused to recognize my gifts by electing me elder.” Such grounds for leaving are not adequate. This mentality sins against the unity of the church. The ground for leaving a church is that the church seriously and impenitently errs concerning the marks of the true church (p. 142).

Letter 23 explains the development of false churches from church history (Romanism, the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands [GKN] and the PCUSA). The last chapter urges joining a true church in the light of apostasy deepening as Christ’s return approaches (Matt. 24; II Thess. 2; Rev. 13). It takes a well-deserved swipe at the World Council of Churches (p. 151) and specifies many raging heresies of our day.

Admittedly, the “Contents” page (p. vii) looks less than inviting—it merely lists the page numbers at which the 24 letters begin, without giving any idea of the subject they treat. However, as my summary of the book has shown, it would be very difficult to provide succinct chapter headings, especially given that Engelsma takes time to answer questions from the forum in the midst of his development of the subject. If the book were to be reprinted in the future, it might be helpful at least to provide headings for several “Parts,” e.g., Part I, covering letters 1-5, could be titled (something like) “True and False Churches,” Part II on “Calvin’s Call to Form or Move to True Churches” (Letters 6-10), etc. Perhaps also the “Contents” page could indicate that certain chapters were a response to a forum member’s question, e.g., “Excursus” or “Reply” on “The Church at Sardis” (Letter 15).

Helpfully, Bound to Join concludes with appendices containing two crucial creedal testimonies: Belgic Confession 27-29 (on the need to join a true church) and the Conclusion to the Canons of Dordt (on the seriousness of the Arminian heresy).

 

1) “But That’s Just Engelsma’s View!”

Both during and after the e-mail discussion and now since the publication of Bound to Join, Prof. Engelsma’s treatment of the necessity of joining a true church has provoked controversy. Many have been deeply appreciative but some with whom I have corresponded—not just in the British Isles and the United States but also from further afield, such as Scandinavia and Africa—have opposed the teaching. One frequent response to the position that “outside the church there is no salvation” (Latin: extra ecclesiam nulla salus) is “But that’s just Engelsma’s view!”

However, it was the fathers in the early church, such as Cyprian of Carthage (d. 258) and Augustine of Hippo (354-430), the great theologian of grace, who coined and promoted the maxim “outside the church there is no salvation,” as Engelsma notes (p. 5).¹ J. N. D. Kelly, an acknowledged authority on patristic theology, states, "Cyril of Alexandria [d. 444] was voicing universally held assumptions when he wrote that 'mercy is not obtainable outside the holy city.'"² The church fathers have been followed in this position by the historic Christian church in both West and East, which has seen extra ecclesiam nulla salus as a faithful summary of biblical teaching.

What about the great confessions of the Reformation? We turn first to the Belgic Confession (1561), a creed of the denomination to which Prof. Engelsma belongs and which he quotes frequently in Bound to Join. Article 28 is entitled “That Every One Is Bound to Join Himself to the True Church:”

We believe, since this holy congregation is an assembly of those who are saved, and that out of it there is no salvation, that no person of whatsoever state or condition he may be, ought to withdraw himself, to live in a separate state from it; but that all men are in duty bound to join and unite themselves with it; maintaining the unity of the Church; submitting themselves to the doctrine and discipline thereof; bowing their necks under the yoke of Jesus Christ; and as mutual members of the same body, serving to the edification of the brethren, according to the talents God has given them. And that this may be the more effectually observed, it is the duty of all believers, according to the word of God, to separate themselves from all those who do not belong to the Church, and to join themselves to this congregation, wheresoever God hath established it, even though the magistrates and edicts of princes be against it, yea, though they should suffer death or any other corporal punishment. Therefore all those, who separate themselves from the same, or do not join themselves to it, act contrary to the ordinance of God.

Echoing the early church with its ark imagery, the Second Helvetic Confession, written by Heinrich Bullinger in 1562 and revised in 1564, also teaches extra ecclesiam nulla salus:

But as for communicating with the true Church of Christ, we so highly esteem of it, that we say plainly, that none can live before God, which do not communicate with the true Church of God, but separate themselves from the same. For as without the ark of Noah there was no escaping, when the world perished in the flood; even so do we believe, that without Christ, who in the Church offereth himself to be enjoyed of the elect, there can be no certain salvation: and therefore we teach that such as would be saved, must in no wise separate themselves from the true Church of Christ (17).³

The Second Helvetic Confession was accepted by Reformed churches not only in Switzerland but also in Scotland (1566), Hungary (1567), France (1571) and Poland (1578). In fact, it is one of the most widely accepted confessional statements among Reformed Christians throughout the world.

The Westminster Confession of the 1640s, on behalf of Presbyterianism in the British Isles, declared,

The visible church, which is also catholick or universal under the gospel, (not confined to one nation, as before under the law,) consists of all those throughout the world that profess the true religion, and of their children; and is the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ, the house and family of God, out of which there is no ordinary possibility of salvation (25:2).

From these confessions of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, we see that extra ecclesiam nulla salus was creedal in the churches of the Calvin Reformation in Ireland, Scotland, England, the Lowlands, France, Switzerland, Hungary, and Poland. Since then, with this truth being taught in the Westminster Standards (in which the Westminster Confession is included) and the Three Forms of Unity (to which the Belgic Confession belongs), this has been the confessional position of Presbyterian churches in the British Isles and around the world and the Dutch Reformed churches in the Netherlands and globally.⁴

Moving from the Reformed confessions to Reformed theologians, pride of place goes to that blessed son of France, John Calvin (1509-1564). What did he say? Engelsma himself tells us in Bound to Join, especially in Letters 6-10, which chapters include lengthy quotations from the Genevan Reformer. Moreover, most of Calvin’s writings urging believers to join a true church have recently been conveniently collected in the book Come Out From Among Them that Prof. Engelsma cites frequently and extensively.⁵

This truth also occurs in other works by Calvin, such as his Catechism of the Church of Geneva (1545), designed for the covenant children of that great Reformation city:

Master - Why do you subjoin forgiveness of sins to the Church?

Scholar - Because no man obtains it without being previously united to the people of God, maintaining unity with the body of Christ perseveringly to the end, and thereby attesting that he is a true member of the Church.

M. - In this way you conclude that out of the Church is nought but ruin and damnation?

S. - Certainly. Those who make a departure from the body of Christ, and rend its unity by faction, are cut off from all hope of salvation during the time they remain in this schism, be it however short.⁶

Philip Schaff points out that Calvin’s Genevan catechism was written in French and Latin and was soon translated into Italian, Spanish, English, German, Dutch, Hungarian, Greek and Hebrew, before adding, “It was used for a long time in the Reformed Churches and schools, especially in France and Scotland.”⁷

Near the start of the first chapter of his treatment of the church in Book 4 of his Institutes, Calvin writes,

But because it is now our intention to discuss the visible church, let us learn even from the simple title "mother" how useful, indeed how necessary, it is that we should know her. For there is no other way to enter into life unless this mother conceive us in her womb, give us birth, nourish us at her breast, and lastly, unless she keep us under her care and guidance until, putting off mortal flesh, we become like the angels [Matt. 22:30]. Our weakness does not allow us to be dismissed from her school until we have been pupils all our lives. Furthermore, away from her bosom one cannot hope for any forgiveness of sins or any salvation, as Isaiah [Isa. 37:32] and Joel [Joel 2:32] testify. Ezekiel agrees with them when he declares that those whom God rejects form heavenly life will not be enrolled among God's people [Ezek. 13:9]. On the other hand, those who turn to the cultivation of true godliness are said to inscribe their names among the citizens of Jerusalem [cf. Isa. 56:5; Ps. 87:6]. For this reason, it is said in another psalm: "Remember me, O Jehovah, with favor toward thy people; visit me with salvation: that I may see the well-doing of thy chosen ones, that I may rejoice in the joy of thy nation, that I may be glad with thine inheritance" [Ps. 106:4-5 p.; cf. Ps. 105:4, Vg., etc.]. By these words God's fatherly favor and the especial witness of spiritual life are limited to his flock, so that it is always disastrous to leave the church.⁸

A few pages later the French Reformer states,

... no one is permitted to spurn its [i.e., a true church's] authority, flout its warnings, resist its counsels, or make light of its chastisements—much less to desert it and break its unity. For the Lord esteems the communion of his church so highly that he counts as a traitor and apostate from Christianity anyone who arrogantly leaves any Christian society, provided it cherishes the true ministry of Word and sacraments. He so esteems the authority of the church that when it is violated he believes his own diminished ... From this it follows that separation from the church is the denial of God and Christ. Hence, we must even more avoid so wicked a separation. For when with all our might we are attempting the overthrow of God's truth, we deserve to have him hurl the whole thunderbolt of his wrath to crush us.⁹

Theodore Beza (1519-1605), Calvin’s successor in Geneva, held the same position, declaring,

Finally, we must necessarily confess, since outside of Jesus Christ there is no salvation at all, that anyone who dies without being a member of this assembly [i.e., a true church] is excluded from Jesus Christ and from salvation, for the power to save which is in Jesus Christ belongs only to those who recognize him as their God and only Saviour.¹⁰

This statement occurs in Beza’s confession, a “very popular” document.¹¹ Nicolaas Gootjes argues persuasively that Guido de Brès utilised this part of Beza’s confession in writing Belgic Confession 28.¹²

Caspar Olevianus (1536-1587) was another German Reformed theologian who had (at least) a hand in the formulation of the Heidelberg Catechism (1563). The following quotation makes clear that Olevianus was of the same mind as his teacher, Calvin; his friend, Beza; and his co-worker in Heidelberg, Ursinus:

When God provides our eyes with the sight of an assemblage which is a member of the H. Catholic Church, the mark having been shown of true prophetic and apostolic doctrine (under which are embraced lawful administration of the sacraments and training in all godliness, Matt. 28:20), we ought to unite with that assemblage. For as He is Himself our Father, it is His pleasure that the Church be our mother, Isa. 54:1-2, Gal. 4:27-28, 31. In her we are both born and brought up right to the end of our lives. God is pleased by the Church’s ministry to quicken us by His Spirit, stamp remission of sins on our hearts and reshape us daily in the same unto His own image. On the other hand he who despises such an assemblage possessing the mark of a true Church, to wit truth of prophetic and apostolic doctrine—which happens when a man does not communicate in sound doctrine and in prayers and when he does not attach himself to the communion of saints through the visible witnesses of the Covenant, baptism and the sacred eucharist—cannot be sure of his own salvation. And he who persists in such contempt is not elect, Acts. 2:47.¹⁴

After commenting on the Apostles' Creed's article on "the communion of saints," Olevianus explicitly affirms extra ecclesiam nulla salus:

138 Q. How do you understand the possession of the benefits of Christ in this life?

I understand it as follows: just as there is no salvation outside the Church, which is the body of Christ, so also all true and living members of the Church now possess full salvation, that is, forgiveness of sins.¹⁵

German-Dutch theologian, Peter van Mastricht (1630-1706) writes,

Query, whether any Christian, if he can, is bound to associate himself with any particular, fixed true Church. The Schwenkfeldians, Libertines, Enthusiasts and other fanatics, with whom also act the Socinians, say No. The Reformed recognise that there may be a hidden Church, since you cannot join any Church [i.e., because persecution is so fierce, no visible, instituted church can function]. But where you can, they lay it down that you simply must.¹⁶

The two quotes above from Olevianus and van Mastricht are taken by Heinrich Heppe, a nineteenth-century German theologian and church historian, to be representative of the orthodox Reformed tradition.¹⁷

Richard Muller, the foremost figure in this field today, in his Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms: Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theology, states that this is the standard position of the successors of the Reformers:

Extra ecclesiam non sit salus: Outside of the church there may be no salvation; a maxim from Cyprian (Epistles, 73.21) often cited by the scholastics, who accept it as true with the provision that the church is identified as the communio sanctorum (q.v.), or communion of saints, and by its marks, Word and sacrament (see notae ecclesiae). The maxim is also frequently given as Extra ecclesiam nulla salus or Salus extra ecclesiam non est.¹⁸

Nineteenth-century Dutch theologian, J. J. Van Oosterzee (1817-1882) writes,

Indeed, the "Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus" is here the holy truth; men must belong to the little flock, if they will upon sure grounds solace themselves with the promise of salvation. The community of the saints is saving, not because everyone [who is a member of the visible church] is saved, but because he may be assured of his salvation, who knows himself a living member of the corpus mysticum.¹⁹

Staying with the continental Reformed tradition but moving to the United States, we have the comments of R. B. Kuiper (1886-1966) in his work on the church, The Glorious Body of Christ:

In the first place, Scripture teaches unmistakably that all who are saved should unite with the church. The view that membership in the visible church is requisite to salvation has no basis whatever in Scripture. When the Philippian jailer asked what he should do to be saved, Paul said only: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” The apostle did not command him to join the church. However, when he did believe he was at once baptized (Acts 16:31-33). As soon as the Ethiopian eunuch confessed Christ he likewise was baptized (Acts 8:36-38). So were all who were converted at Pentecost. Now according to Paul’s words, “By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body” (I Corinthians 12:13), baptism signifies reception into the church. It is clear that in the days of the apostles it was universal practice to receive believers into the visible church.

What could be more logical? He who believes in Christ is united with Christ. Faith binds him to Christ. He is a member of Christ’s body, the invisible church. But the visible church is but the outward manifestation of that body. Every member of the invisible church should as a matter of course be a member of the visible church.

Extremely significant in this connection is Acts 2:47—“And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.” Not only does the Lord Christ require of those who are saved that they unite with the church; He Himself joins them to the church. And the reference is unmistakably to the visible church. Does it follow that he who is outside the visible church is necessarily outside Christ? Certainly not. It is possible that a true believer because of some unusual circumstance may fail to unite with the church. Conceivably one may, for instance, believe in Christ and die before receiving baptism. But such instances are exceptional. The Scriptural rule is that, while membership in the church is not a prerequisite of salvation, it is a necessary consequence of salvation. Outside the visible church “there is no ordinary possibility of salvation” (Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter XXV, Section II).²⁰

Peter Y. De Jong (1915-2005), like R. B. Kuiper, was a conservative theologian in the Christian Reformed Church in N. America. Below is De Jong’s lengthy exposition of Belgic Confession Article 28’s statement that “out of it [i.e., the church] there is no salvation:”

This sounds utterly foreign to most Protestant ears. To many it smacks of Romanism which makes salvation dependent upon its recognized hierarchy as mediators between God and man. Now nothing is farther removed from the Reformed convictions than such a construction of these words. This is a perversion of the Biblical doctrine of the church. The true unity of the Christian congregation may never be equated with organizational oneness. In God’s word emphasis is laid upon our spiritual fellowship with Christ, which comes to expression in sound doctrine and pure worship. This insistence, however, may not tempt us to champion the notion that the external and visible form of the church is of little account. We learn to know God’s church only in and through its historical manifestation. More than that, the Bible warns against trusting our subjective judgments while disregarding and even despising the work of the Holy Spirit in the church of all ages. Always the individual and social, the personal and communal aspects of our salvation in Christ are interwoven in New Testament teaching. They do not exist side-by-side, in isolation from each other. To be a Christian means to have fellowship with the living Christ and in the same moment with his people. To break this fellowship lightly, on the basis of personal prejudices and insights, is to imperil our salvation. How else could we hear the word of the living God, except through the preachers whom he has sent? And how could such preachers receive their commission, except by the church which believes and lives by the word of God? Aptly does J. S. Whale comment, “Certain it is that for St. Paul, and for New Testament Christianity, to be a Christian is to be a member of a living organism whose life derives from Christ. There is no other way of being a Christian. In this sense, Christian experience is always ecclesiastical experience. The gospel of pardon reaches you and me through the mediation of the Christian society, the living body of believers in whose midst the redeeming gospel of Christ goes out across the centuries and the continents.”

Now we can understand why Luther, Calvin and their contemporaries expressed themselves so clearly and circumspectly on the point of the church.

They refused to identify the true church with any specific ecclesiastical organization. Wherever the word is purely preached, there is the church. Constrained by the Spirit who indoctrinates us into the truth as it is in Christ, those who are saved live in fellowship with each other. Apart from Christ there is no salvation. And He is pleased to communicate His grace in connection with the means which He has instituted and preserved in this world. To separate oneself from the assembly where the rich Christ is proclaimed in obedience to the Scriptures is a heinous sin involving most serious consequences. “Hence it follows,” so Calvin warned at this point, “that a departure from the Church is a renunciation of God and Christ. And such a criminal dissension is so much the more to be avoided, because, while we endeavour, so far as lies in our power, to destroy the truth of God, we deserve to be crushed with the most powerful thunders of his wrath. Nor is it possible to imagine a more atrocious crime, than that sacrilegious perfidy, which violates the conjugal relation that the only begotten Son of God has condescended to form with us” [Institutes 4.1.10].

All this is plain language.²¹

Turning to the Presbyterian tradition, Scottish theologian David Dickson (1583-1663), the author of the first commentary on the Westminster Confession, included the following in his remarks on chapter 25, “Of the Church:”

Question 4. Is there any ordinary possibility of salvation out of the visible church?

No; Acts 2:47.

Well then, do not the Enthusiasts, Quakers, and Libertines err, who affirm, That any man may be a true Christian, and be saved, though he live within no visible church?

Yes.

By what reasons are they confuted?

1^st, Because the Lord Jehovah in his visible church (ordinarily) commands the blessing, even life for evermore, Ps. 133:3. 2^nd, Because the visible church is the mother of all believers, Gal. 4:26. By Jerusalem which is above, I understand the true Christian church which seeketh its salvation, not by the first covenant of the law, namely, by the works of the law, but by the second of the gospel, namely, by the merits of Christ embraced by a true faith; which hath its original from heaven, by the powerful calling of the Holy Ghost. 3^rd, Because they that are without the visible church are without Christ, Eph. 2:12. 4^th, Why are men and women joined to the visible church, but that they may be saved? Acts 2:47. 5^th, Because they that are without the visible church are destitute of the ordinary means of life and salvation, Ps. 147:19, 20.²²

Nineteenth-century Scottish Presbyterian, Hugh Martin (1822-1885), in his fine commentary on Jonah, declares, "The Gentiles, as a whole, as nations, were obviously given over in the meantime to the reign of spiritual death, cast out beyond the pale of that visible church, within which alone salvation is ordinarily revealed."²³

Martin's slightly younger contemporary, A. A. Hodge (1823-1886), American Presbyterian and representative of “Old Princeton,” had this to say on Westminster Confession 25:2:

But our Confession intends in these sections to teach further that ordinarily, where there is the knowledge and opportunity, God requires every one who loves Christ to confess him in the regular way of joining the community of his people and of taking the sacramental badges of his discipleship. That this is commanded will be shown under [Westminster Confession] chapters xxvii.-xxix. And that when providentially possible every Christian heart will be prompt to obey in this matter, is self-evident. When shame or fear of persecution is the preventing consideration, then the failure to obey is equivalent to the positive rejection of Christ, since the rejection of him will have to be publicly pretended in such case in order to avoid the consequences attending upon the public acknowledgement of him.²⁴

From all this, it is evident that extra ecclesiam nulla salus is not “just Engelsma’s view!” This is the explicit teaching of several major Reformed and Presbyterian creeds (the Catechism of the Church of Geneva, the Belgic Confession, the Second Helvetic Confession and the Westminster Confession) and the churches in Europe and around the world that have maintained them,²⁵ Luther's Larger Catechism of the Lutheran churches and many theologians in the history of the Christian church—including some of the greatest—such as Cyprian, Augustine, Cyril of Alexandria, Luther, Calvin, Bullinger, Beza, de Brès, Ursinus, Olevianus, the Westminster divines, David Dickson, van Mastricht, Van Oosterzee, Hugh Martin, A. A. Hodge, R. B. Kuiper and P. Y. De Jong. Moreover, scholars of historical Protestant theology, such as Heinrich Heppe and Richard Muller, testify with one voice that this is the orthodox Reformed (and Lutheran) view. In this, the Reformers and their successors are following the teaching of the church fathers, as per patristic scholars, such as J. N. D. Kelly.²⁶

Keith Mathison summarizes well the historic Reformation teaching (over against that of modern evangelicalism):

Unlike modern Evangelicalism, the classical Protestant Reformers held to a high view of the Church. When the Reformers confessed extra ecclesiam nulla salus, which means "there is no salvation outside the Church," they were not referring to the invisible Church of all the elect. Such a statement would be tantamount to saying that outside of salvation, there is no salvation. It would be a truism. The Reformers were referring to the visible Church, and this confession of the necessity of the visible Church was incorporated into the great Reformed confessions of faith.²⁷

It should also be noted that many of the above quotations—especially those of Olevianus, Dickson, Kuiper and De Jong—provide scriptural proof and give biblical arguments to show that “outside the church there is no salvation” is not “just Engelsma’s view” or even merely the Reformed view or even the view of the historic Christian church; it is the teaching of the Word of God! Bound to Join itself makes this point more fully.

 

2) “But That’s the Romish View of the Church!”

Another objection to Prof. Engelsma’s instruction that “outside the church there is no salvation” is “But that’s the Roman Catholic view of the church!”

Is Engelsma a crypto-Romanist? Has the British Reformed Fellowship, through its conferences and e-mail forums, been giving a platform to a popish preacher? Has the Reformed Free Publishing Association (RFPA) been printing books by a Romanising theologian? Was the chair of dogmatics at the theological seminary of the Protestant Reformed Churches held for twenty years by a man with Romish views on the church?

All who have read Engelsma’s many articles and books or heard him preach and teach know that he is a sworn enemy of Roman Catholicism, root and branch—as Holy Scripture, the Three Forms of Unity (e.g., Heidelberg Catechism, A. 80’s condemnation of the Roman mass as “a denial of the one sacrifice and sufferings of Jesus Christ and an accursed idolatry”), his denomination, his church vows and his conscience demand of him.

Moreover, if the teaching that “outside the church there is no salvation” is Romanism, then the same opprobrium that some would heap on Engelsma must also be piled on the Reformed confessions, as well as the churches and saints who have held, and still do maintain, them. It would be strange indeed if the Belgic Confession with its “outside the church there is no salvation” were to teach the papal view of the church in Article 28, only to condemn Rome as a “false church” in the very next article. If Westminster Confession 25:2 teaches Romanism, why in the same chapter does it call the Pope “antichrist” (25:6)?

The Reformers were converted from popery by God’s sovereign and irresistible grace. They knew the nature of the beast and fought against it with might and main by the sword of the Spirit. Calvin called the French Nicodemites to join a true church and flee the idolatry of Rome, for some of them dissembled, reckoning it was OK to join in papal worship. Bullinger and the other Reformed leaders understood Rome’s doctrine of the church only too well. De Brès was martyred by this “false church” (Belgic Confession 29) that he had so faithfully opposed. The Westminster divines knew that their great confession was not teaching popery but attacking it with the Word and gospel of Jesus Christ!

The confusion of some arises because the Reformed and Presbyterian churches on the one hand and Romanism on the other both state extra ecclesiam nulla salus. But the similarity is merely formal. Likewise, Protestantism and Roman Catholicism both claim to believe the inspiration of Scripture; the Holy Trinity; creation; the two natures of Christ; our Lord’s virgin birth, crucifixion, burial, bodily resurrection on the third day and ascension into heaven; the Deity and personality of the Holy Spirit; the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church; infant baptism; the general resurrection of the dead; the final judgment; heaven and hell. But if you begin to study Rome’s views on these subjects and understand how they fit in her whole system of false dogma, you will see that the “agreement” between the Reformation and Romanism on these issues is only formal and superficial, masking deep and irreconcilable theological differences.

First, the question is, Outside which church is there no salvation? The Reformed teach it must be a “true church” (Second Helvetic Confession 17), a “holy congregation” (Belgic Confession 28) wherein “the true religion” is confessed (Westminster Confession 25:2). In other words, it must possess the marks of a true church, as the Reformed and Presbyterian creeds (Belgic Confession 29; Second Helvetic Confession 17; Westminster Confession 25:4) and theologians teach (see especially the quotes above from Olevianus, De Jong and Muller), and not the marks of the false church (Belgic Confession 29), borne by the Roman Catholic assemblies, which are “no churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan” (Westminster Confession 25:5).

Engelsma quotes French Confession 28, which is clear and antithetical:

In this belief we declare that, properly speaking, there can be no Church where the Word of God is not received, nor profession made of subjection to it, nor use of the sacraments. Therefore we condemn the papal assemblies, as the pure Word of God is banished from them, their sacraments are corrupted, or falsified, or destroyed, and all superstitions and idolatries are in them. We hold, then, that all who take part in these acts, and commune in that Church, separate and cut themselves off from the body of Christ (p. 132).

A second question is, Why is it that “outside the true church there is no salvation”? Rome’s answer would include the necessity of union with the pope, “the successor of Peter;” the mediation of her ecclesiastical hierarchy; and her whole sacramental system with grace being given ex opere operatum, especially through priestly baptism and the physical eating of the worshipped wafer in the mass.

The Reformed answer is very different. It rests upon a biblical understanding of what the true church is and does. Since the true church is the body of Christ, the kingdom of God, Jehovah’s flock, the temple of the Holy Spirit, etc., how could there be salvation to those who needlessly remain out of it? Can those detached from Christ’s body or living apart from God’s kingdom really be in communion with Jehovah? A faithful church preaches the pure gospel of salvation; administers the two Christian sacraments; practises biblical church disciple; worships the Lord in spirit and in truth; offers prayer to the Triune God through the only mediator, Jesus Christ; and enjoys the communion of the saints. This is precisely what the child of God needs! Why would a true believer not want this and do all he could to join and remain in such a church? Once one grasps the nature and work of the church, it is easy to see why there is no salvation outside a true church. Moreover, extra ecclesiam nulla salus is not something extra to the biblical and Reformed doctrine of the church; it flows from the very nature of the church and what it does.

The quotes from the Reformed confessions and authors above—especially those from Dickson, Kuiper, Olevianus and Calvin—develop the matter further. Engelsma also explains the ground for Belgic Confession 28’s statement that out of the true church there is no salvation:

… the means of grace and salvation have been given by Christ to the instituted congregation and are enjoyed only by the members within the church. Christ, the living, life-giving Christ, is in the church as the savior. As there was salvation only in the ark, so there is salvation only in the instituted church. There are other reasons everyone must be a member of the church institute.

One reason is that one glorifies God by joining the congregation in worship of the triune God and in proclaiming and confessing Christ. First Timothy 3:15 highly commends the local congregation as “the pillar and ground of the truth.” Shall we live apart from that which alone upholds the truth of God in the world?

Further, according to I Timothy 3:15, the congregation is the “house of God.” God lives there as the covenant God of friendship with his people. Outside the house is no fellowship with God (p. 4).

Clearly, Engelsma’s view is not Roman Catholicism; it is orthodox, biblical and creedal Reformed doctrine.²⁸ But those who call his teaching—and that of the Reformed faith—Romish thereby reveal that they have understood neither Reformed nor Roman doctrine, in that they confuse the two. Moreover, they reveal that their position on this point is not Reformed but nearer to those of the false churches. As Dickson and van Mastricht point out (above), the Schwenkfeldians, Libertines, Enthusiasts, Quakers, Socinians and other fanatics are the ones who deny the necessity of joining a true church. On the other hand, as van Mastricht states, where it is possible to join a true church, the Reformed “lay it down that you simply must.”

It is tragic, as De Jong notes, that “many” Protestants think this Reformed doctrine is Romish.²⁹ Many factors could play a part in this: ignorance of the biblical and Protestant teaching on the church; the rampant individualism of society and Christianity today; the high cost of joining a faithful church, especially if it is some distance away; etc.

Right at the beginning of his instruction, in Letter 1, Engelsma recommends “that all read, or reread, Calvin’s treatment of the church in the first part of book 4 of his Institutes of the Christian Religion” (p. 3). In his second letter, he draws our attention to Come Out From Among Them: ‘Anti-Nicodemite’ Writings of John Calvin (p. 8), before quoting it extensively, especially in Letters 6-10 and 13. In the Preface, Engelsma introduces his instruction with these words, “I urge the reader to read [Belgic Confession 27-29] before beginning to read the letters” (p. x). Besides, he quotes Luther, the French Confession, etc., on the church.

Thus there is no excuse for any who have actually read Engelsma’s Bound to Join to charge him with Romanism! After this review article, it is as clear as the noonday sun that the professor stands firmly in the Reformed tradition. Some readers of (or perhaps only “dippers” into) the original e-mail correspondence or the book would be well served with following Engelsma’s recommended reading—and perhaps also reading other Reformed writings on the church, such as the ecclesiology sections of solid works of dogmatics or systematic theology—before returning to Bound to Join with a less jaundiced eye and a more biblically informed mind.³⁰ Equipped with a strategic grasp of the subject of the church gained through such literature, the reader is best positioned to grapple with the more specific—and vital—issue of joining a true church.³¹

 

3) “But That’s a Denial of Justification by Faith Alone!”

Others have charged Engelsma not only with a Romish ecclesiology but also with a heretical soteriology, more specifically, that he denies justification by faith alone! This is alleged, mind you, against one of the main opponents of the Federal Vision (with its attack on justification by faith alone), yea, its most penetrating critic, for Engelsma traces the Federal Vision to, and attacks it in, its theological root: a conditional covenant! The interested reader can turn to Prof. Engelsma's pamphlet, “The Unconditional Covenant in Contemporary Debate” (published by Trinity Protestant Reformed Evangelism Committee in 2003), or book, The Covenant of God and Children of Believers (published by the RFPA in 2005). Moreover, the fifty or so e-mails, Engelsma sent to the BRF forum (2007-2009) in defence of the scriptural and Reformed truth of justification by faith alone, the article of a standing or falling church, are to be reworked into a book to be published by the RFPA (DV). Furthermore, Bound to Join itself clearly and antithetically affirms justification by faith alone (pp. 68, 106-107, 149, 156-159).

Moreover, if teaching extra ecclesiam nulla salus makes Engelsma a purveyor of the heresy of justification by faith and works, there go the Reformed confessions, the Reformed theologians and the Reformed churches. The same could be said concerning Luther, Luther's Larger Catechism and orthodox Lutheran theologians. Thus even the Reformation itself is heretical!

Then Belgic Confession Articles 22-23 on justification are overturned by Article 28 on the church. Likewise, Westminster Confession 11 is overthrown by chapter 25. The same goes for the writings of Luther, Calvin, Beza, Olevianus, etc. Apparently, the modern critics have spotted a contradiction in the faith of the Protestant Reformation that the Reformers and their successors did not notice!

Observe too that Belgic Confession 28 states that “it is the duty of all believers [i.e., those (already) justified by faith alone], according to the word of God, to separate themselves from all those who do not belong to the Church, and to join themselves to this congregation, wheresoever God hath established it.”

Church membership is not a good work compromising justification by faith alone, any more than are loving one’s wife or honouring the Lord’s Day or partaking of the Holy Supper or praying out of gratitude to God. These things are the fruit of our salvation. As has been well said, justification is by faith alone but not by a faith that is alone, for from it spring all manner of good works. As R. B. Kuiper put it above: “The Scriptural rule is that, while membership in the church is not a prerequisite of salvation, it is a necessary consequence of salvation." Likewise, Ursinus states, "I am one of this number [of those truly converted]; and therefore a member of both the visible and invisible church, and shall forever remain such."

This is what we have in Acts 2 on the occasion of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the preaching of the first Christian sermon and the birthday of the New Testament church. Some three thousand people believed in Christ and so were justified—by faith alone! (Acts 2:37-41). Then they “were baptized” and “added” to the church (v. 41). These new disciples “continued steadfastly in [1] the apostles’ doctrine and [2] fellowship, and in [3] breaking of bread, and in [4] prayers” (v. 42). Also [5] they supported each other materially (vv. 44-45). Verse 47 continues, “And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.”

Joining the church did not compromise or deny justification by faith alone any more than did water baptism or any of the other five “good works,” such as fellowship and prayer.

But if someone claimed to believe in Christ alone for salvation but refused to join the church or support his poorer brother financially or did not continue in apostolic doctrine, this person is not making a credible profession of faith (John 8:31; I John 3:17). What right has such an one to profess to be a brother or sister or be received as such by others?

In short, those who are united to Christ by faith alone unite themselves to His body, the church; those who are in the invisible church join the visible church; true saints seek the communion of the saints in the holy church!

 

4) “But That’s an Attack on Marriage and the Family!”

A fourth charge against Engelsma’s instruction on the necessity of joining a true church is that it undermines and attacks marriage and the family. What a veritable plethora of terrible heresies there are in Bound to Join—concerning the church, justification and now marriage and the family! All between the covers of a book of only some 180 pages!

Engelsma is no stranger to taking flak for his forthright teaching on marriage (which is at the heart of the family). In his Standard Bearer editorials, various pamphlets (“Marriage and Divorce,” “The Lord’s Hatred of Divorce” and “Until Death Us Do Part”) and his RFPA books, Better to Marry (1993) and Marriage, the Mystery of Christ and the Church (rev. 1998), he has defended the covenant bond of marriage between one man and one woman “till death us do part.”³² Here he was attacked from the left, as it were, for making too much of marriage. Now, through Bound to Join and perhaps for the first time, he is criticised for making too little of marriage!

Let us hear the professor begin his treatment of this subject:

I come now to the extremely difficult and painful matter of one’s relationship to his or her own family, when this family is not one with him or her in the faith and in the conviction of faith that he or she must belong to a true church. The rule is that membership in a true church and the right worship of God in a true church prevail over the earthly family relation. Also family must, when necessary, be sacrificed to the calling to worship the triune God and Father of Jesus Christ rightly (p. 72).

The professor goes on to explain that this may involve separation from family and spouse in order to join and attend a true church (pp. 72-76).

Some negative responses from the European forum reached Engelsma before he wrote his next instalment. Indeed, this was the most controversial aspect during the professor’s e-mail instruction. Here Engelsma especially responds to “Dr. Fierce” (pp. 78f.), a name he gave to his most “hostile correspondent” (p. 78, n. 1).

How does Engelsma defend his teaching? First, he appeals to Scripture on the difficulty of the Christian life (Matt. 10:32-39; 19:27-30; Luke 14:25-35; Phil. 3:8; pp. 71-72, 81) and our calling as pilgrims (Heb. 11:13-16; p. 72).

Second, he quotes Christ’s famous words specifically teaching that we must follow Him, even before family (pp. 72, 84):

If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:26).

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me (Matt. 10:37).

And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life (Matt. 19:29).

Engelsma notes we must obey God rather than man or woman (Acts 5:29; p. 74). He adds, “We require this of the Muslim who converts to Christianity. Why should it be different among Christians?” (p. 73).

Third, the professor appeals to Belgic Confession 28 which declares,

We believe, since this holy congregation is an assembly of those who are saved, and that out of it there is no salvation … it is the duty of all believers, according to the word of God, to separate themselves from all those who do not belong to the Church, and to join themselves to this congregation, wheresoever God hath established it, even though the magistrates and edicts of princes were against it, yea, though they should suffer death or any other corporal punishment.

As Engelsma notes, loss of life or liberty is a higher cost than loss of contact with an unbelieving family member (p. 72). Belgic Confession 28 is the calling of all Christians of “whatsoever state or condition” they may be, including married or single.

Fourth, Engelsma proves with lengthy quotes that his doctrine is the same as that of Calvin, the great Genevan Reformer (pp. 81-83). He adds, “If my advice was wicked, so that it can be summarily dismissed as a troubling of God’s people, so also was the instruction of Calvin” (p. 83).

Fifth, Engelsma turns the tables on his critics, showing the dead end position of those who contradict this teaching:

It is easy enough to denounce my instruction with the emotional charge that I break up marriages and families ... But note well that rejection of my advice (which was that of Calvin) in this matter implies that one rather instructs a believer, “Stay outside a true church! Your wife comes before your worship of God and before confession of Christ! There is salvation outside the true church, apart from the preaching and the sacraments!” Let one take this position who dares (p. 83; cf. p. 89).³³

 

(5) “But Engelsma Is Hardhearted!”

In a sort of last desperate attack, some have criticised Engelsma as hardhearted or heartless. Not content to malign his instruction as merely his personal opinion or as a Romish doctrine that attacks the church, justification by faith alone and marriage and the family, the poor man is also regaled as lacking in compassion!

Engelsma is no stranger to such criticisms. In his exposition of the book of Ruth and in connection with her forsaking family and country for the church and covenant of God, he writes,

How suspect is the faith professed by many church members today! Their professed faith will give up no one and nothing for the sake of Christ, least of all a blood relative. Friendship with an unbelieving son or daughter is more important than friendship with God. Their faith esteems the love of a husband or wife to be worth more than the love of God in Jesus Christ. Of one who today is willing to leave father and mother or a son or daughter for the sake of the covenant, this alleged faith cries out, “You are hardhearted! You are not loving! You are un-Christian!” This dubious faith of many professing Christians stubbornly holds on to the old friends, the old ways, the old pleasures of spiritual Moab, regardless of the unique friends, unique ways, and unique pleasures of the covenant. It is a dead faith.³⁴

As the professor points out, “You are hardhearted!” is merely the same charge hurled at Calvin by the Nicodemites (pp. 8, 77-78, 82). It is Belgic Confession 28, not Engelsma, which declares that we must join a true church “wheresoever God hath established it, even though the magistrates and edicts of princes be against it, yea, though they should suffer death or any other corporal punishment.” Yea, it is the Lord Jesus Himself, not the professor, who lays down costly terms for Christian discipleship (Matt. 10:32-29; 19:27-30; Luke 14:25-35). If Engelsma is too hard, then the same criticism must be made of Calvin, the Belgic Confession and even our Saviour Himself! Ultimately, this is a complaint against the goodness of the Triune God (cf. Matt. 25:24; Luke 19:21).

Right from the start of Bound to Join, Engelsma acknowledges the deep and heartfelt concerns of the scattered sheep (pp. xv, 1). On the first page of the Preface, he describes the “informal meeting” to discuss church membership, “called by the group” of saints at the 2004 BRF Conference, as “distressing, indeed heartrending” (p. ix).³⁵ Repeatedly, he explains that he undertook to write about joining a faithful church because his brothers and sisters specifically asked him to do so (pp. ix, 80, 86-87, 160).

Engelsma acknowledges—as does the Westminster Confession (25:2) and, following it, David Dickson, Hugh Martin and A. A. Hodge—“there is no salvation outside the institute [church] ordinarily” (p. 5; italics his).³⁶ He gives as an example a believer being “wickedly confined to a dungeon or prison by the foes of the saints” (p. 5). A biblical instance would be the penitent thief on the cross. Earlier in this review article, R. B. Kuiper was quoted giving another example: “It is possible that a true believer because of some unusual circumstance may fail to unite with the church. Conceivably one may, for instance, believe in Christ and die before receiving baptism.”

It is in Letters 12-14, as one might expect, given that they were the most controversial chapters when this instruction was first given, that the professor is most pastoral. He acknowledges that leaving family for the sake of Christ and His church is “extremely difficult and painful” (p. 72). Any Christian faced with the option of leaving his or her unbelieving spouse or remaining without a true church should not immediately desert him or her. “He must, of course, patiently and lovingly explain his calling to her, as he works and prays to bring her to Christ” (p. 73). Later, Engelsma writes,

The actions of a believer … seeking to fulfil his or her calling to join a true church may not be taken hastily, but only after sufficient time of pleading with the unbelieving mate and of prayer to God has made plain that the unbelieving mate will not permit the believer to be a member of a true church and will not accompany the believer to a place where he or she can be a member of a true church (p. 75).

In seeking to join a true church, the Christian must also be concerned for the salvation of his children and his fellow saints, since the Word of God teaches us to think covenantally and generationally (e.g., pp. 5, 9, 35, 160). Above all, he must be ruled by zeal for the glory of God: “This, even more than our own salvation, motivates the believer to be a member of a true church, whatever the cost and difficulty” (p. 58).

It is not hardhearted of Engelsma or anyone else to follow the Word of God and teach its doctrines, even the ones with rough edges, refusing to “smooth” them down (Isa. 30:10). Jesus calls it greatness in the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:19). It is hardheartedness to resist the Word of God and tenderheartedness to humble oneself before it, repent and obey it (II Kings 22:19).

Sometimes a good defence—if such this is—can be, in effect, a good attack. Yet sometimes, even a good defence cannot placate an inveterate opponent. No matter what you say, you always meet with “But …!” Remember the apostle Paul’s plaintive question: “Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?” (Gal. 4:16).

In signing off his last letter, Engelsma writes, “I trust my instruction has been profitable to some” (p. 160). It has been. For several people I know, it has been a factor or a confirmation in their moving house to join a true church—some of them even left their own country. All of them are glad they did so. And what a great witness they are to a watching world (which is amazed that they should think Christ and His gospel so precious) and to church members in danger of taking the privileges of church membership for granted! May Bound to Join be used by Jesus Christ, the head of the church, to stir up others!

The CPRC Bookstore in N. Ireland has bought several boxes of Bound to Join. It is the most faithful, sustained and thorough treatment of the subject; the best book on the need to join a true church since Calvin’s anti-Nicodemite writings in the sixteenth century. Its message needs to get out and be discussed widely. This truth must be appropriated and obeyed, after duly counting the cost (cf. Luke 14:28-32). This book is desperately needed in the British Isles and continental Europe, where understanding of the doctrine of the church is weak and few live as members of a faithful Reformed congregation with Christ and His church central in their lives (cf. pp. x, 1, 66-69). This need is shared in the other continents of the world, including N. America.³⁷

On average, people move house every seven years. Getting married, upsizing when God grants children, a new job, downsizing when one’s children leave, the desire to be nearer one’s (grown-up) children or grandchildren or to help care for elderly relatives, retiring to the sea or countryside or warmer climes—all these and others are reasons why people move.

What of moving home to join a good Reformed church? Many of God’s children have become the sons and daughters (so to speak) of Ruth the Moabitess.³⁸ In the days of the Reformation, saints from Spain and Italy moved north to join Reformed churches, such as the Turretin family from Lucca, whose son, Benedict, and grandson, Francis, were to adorn the church of Geneva, as theological professors and successors of Calvin.³⁹ Reformed saints in France, some of whom had earlier dallied with Nicodemite ideas, moved to join true churches in Switzerland, the Netherlands and elsewhere, in part through the anti-Nicodemite writings of Calvin. Later many Protestants from the British Isles and continental Europe moved to America for freedom of worship. This was the case with the ancestors of some members of the Protestant Reformed Churches. The Covenant Protestant Reformed Church in N. Ireland has members who moved house and even country to join. Such could be said of many Reformed churches over the centuries.

If you, dear reader, are not a member of a true church, let me plead with you to doubly redouble your efforts to join one!⁴⁰ An internet, or virtual, church is not enough. Shall not we who will inherit many mansions in the next world be prepared to move house in this world for the sake of Christ and His church? “Where there is a will, there is a way”—even more is this true for the people of God. Our Lord commands us, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God” (Matt. 6:33). He calls us to pray in faith, for the Triune God opens doors for His people (I Cor. 16:9; Rev. 3:7-8) and gives us the godly desires of our renewed hearts (Ps. 37:4). “Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen” (Eph. 3:20-21)!

Rev. Angus Stewart

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