The Thirty-Nine Articles: A Faith for Today: Articles for Today (Part 2)

(j) The Church Invisible and Visible
The one universal church of God has two aspects, visible and invisible, but is not two churches. It is invisible in that God alone knows those whom he has chosen and whose repentance and faith are sincere. It is visible in that the public ministry of the word and sacraments, for which local congregations or churches gather, are visible. When a man repents and believes, which normally occurs through the witness of the church, he is thereby joined to the church invisible, and it becomes his right and duty to join the church visible, or to confirm his existing membership of it.

(k) The Unity of the Church
The smallest unit of the church is the Christian family and the next in size is the local congregation, which binds together the Christian families and the Christian members of non-Christian families in a particular locality. However, all the congregations of the universal church have the same word and sacraments, believe in the same Lord and Saviour, and are inhabited by the same Holy Spirit, so fellowship and co-operation should not be limited to the local congregation. Still less should this be so where orthodox congregations of different polities exist in the same locality. Since episcopacy, presbyterianism, independency, infant baptism and believers’ baptism are none of them unmistakably commanded by Scripture, they ought to be no obstacle to the mutual recognition of ministries and sacraments, to close co-operation in Christian worship and witness, or to fellowship at the Lord’s Table, even when it is not expedient to join in a single congregation. On the other hand, where there are fundamental differences of doctrine, close fellowship must wait until they have been resolved.

(l) The Christian Ministry
In the New Testament, ministry is as manifold as are spiritual gifts, but there already exists within it an institutional ministry, to which outward appointment by the church is required, and not just an inward call from God. Presbyter-bishops, similar to the elders of the Jewish synagogue, were normal in the apostolic churches, sometimes assisted by deacons, and it is from these that the bishops, presbyters and deacons of later Christendom developed. The main tasks of the presbyter-bishops were teaching and pastoral oversight, not the administration of sacraments. The name ‘priest’ for presbyters was retained at the Reformation only because it is etymologically a short from of ‘presbyter’, not in a sacrificial sense. To read more, click here.