Theological Term of the Week: Visible Church

visible church
“All those who profess faith in Christ and give evidence of their faith with their lives”;1 “all those who profess the true religion, together with their children.”2 

• From scripture: 

  To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours … . (1 Corinthians 1:2 ESV) 

• From Keach’s Catechism: 

  Question 105: What is the visible church?
  Answer: The visible church is the organized society of professing believers, in all ages and places, wherein the Gospel is truly preached and the ordinances of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper rightly administered. (Acts 2:42; 20:7; Acts 7:38; Eph. 4:11,12)

• From the Westminster Larger Catechism: 

  Question 61: Are all they saved who hear the gospel, and live in the church?
  Answer: All that hear the gospel, and live in the visible church, are not saved; but they only who are true members of the church invisible.

  Question 62: What is the visible church?
  Answer: The visible church is a society made up of all such as in all ages and places of the world do profess the true religion, and of their children.

  Question 63: What are the special privileges of the visible church?
  Answer: The visible church has the privilege of being under God’s special care and government; of being protected and preserved in all ages, not withstanding the opposition of all enemies; and of enjoying the communion of saints, the ordinary means of salvation, and offers of grace by Christ to all the members of it in the ministry of the gospel, testifying, that whosoever believes in him shall be saved, and excluding none that will come unto him.

• From Concise Theology by J. I. Packer: 

  There is a distinction to be drawn between the church as we humans see it and as God alone can see it. This is the historic distinction between the “visible church” and the “invisible church.” Invisible means, not that we can see no sign of its presence, but that we cannot know (as God, the heart-reader, knows, 2 Tim. 2:19) which of those baptized, professing members of the church as an organized institution are inwardly regenerate and thus belong to the church as a spiritual fellowship of sinners loving their Savior. Jesus taught that in the organized church there would always be people who thought they were Christians and passed as Christians, some indeed becoming ministers, but who were not renewed in heart and would therefore be exposed and rejected at the Judgment (Matt. 7: 15-27; 13:24-30, 36-43, 47-50; 25:1-46). The “visible-invisible” distinction is drawn to take account of this. It is not that there are two churches, but that the visible community regularly contains imitation Christians whom God knows not to be real (and who could know this for themselves if they would, 2 Cor 13:5).

Learn more:

1. Brian Schwertley: The Visible Vs. The Invisible Church
2. John Calvin: Distinction Between the Visible and Invisible Chruch
3. James Bannerman: The Church in Its Twofold Character as Visible and Invisible

Related terms: 

• credobaptism
• invisible church 
• paedobaptism 
• saints

Filed under Ecclesiology

1From Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudem. (This is a credobaptist definition.)

2From Systematic Theology by Robert Letham. (This is a paedobaptist definition.)

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