It is clear from Scripture that we are all under obligation to be joined to Christ's flock, that is, the church. One only needs to read 1 Corinthian 12 where the church is compared to a body with various parts. None of the parts may say or assume that he or she is not needed. We clearly confess this obligation to be joined to the church in Article 28 of the Belgic Confession. When reading a passage like 1 Corinthians 12 about the one body of Christ there appears to be only one, not many churches. Likewise from Ephesians 4 where a similar comparison is made between Christ's body and the church, there appears to be only one church. There we are told that just as there is only one baptism and one faith, likewise there is only one Christ, one Lord and one body implying that there is only one church. At the same time other passages of Scripture speak of various churches in a plural way indicating that there are many churches. Most of the letters of the New Testament are addressed to specific churches. The letter written to the Colossian church is also to be read in the church of the Laodiceans and vice-versa (Col. 4:16). Seven churches of Asia are addressed in Revelations (see chap. 1:11).

Because Scripture speaks about both; the church as the one body of Christ and various churches in different locations, in our confessions we speak the same way without making a clear distinction between the one church and various churches. Instead, generally speaking, we have resisted any attempts to make distinctions here, such as, one catholic church in distinction from many local congregations or an invisible church in distinction from visible churches. These kinds of distinctions are not found in Scripture nor do they help. When making such distinction one is inclined to speak about church membership in an unscriptural dualistic way too, such as, being a member of the invisible church but not of the visible or of the catholic church and not of the local church, or alternatively, being members of both. It is not the intention of going into details concerning this matter in this article, but to give some attention to the relations and unity among the churches themselves. The point for now is that this two-fold way in which Scripture speaks both of the church being one and at the same time there being many churches, some unity among all the true churches as the one body of Christ is implied.

Even though not all that much is said about it, the New Testament Scripture shows evidence of churches relating to one another. The instruction for the Colossians and Laodicean churches to exchange and read each other's letters, as already mentioned, is evidence of churches relating to each other. Further evidence of churches relating to each other is shown by how the Corinthian congregation is given instruction regarding collection of funds to be directed to Jerusalem (1 Cor. 16:1-4) From what we are told there, it is clear that more churches are involved. The Church at Galatian is mentioned by name. Furthermore, as appears from the context of Acts 15, although not said directly, that elders from various churches met together at Jerusalem to resolve certain matters. The conclusions were passed on to the churches in various places by way of letter (see verse 23). They were all informed and expected to accept these conclusions. Seeing that there was this kind of correspondence and relation among the churches of various places, the question is, how should this relation take place?

The autonomy of the local churches?⤒🔗

In the preface of his book on Church Order Rev. WWJ Van Oene writes that; This Reformed church polity stress and uphold the autonomy of the local churches while, at the same time, maintaining and impressing upon the churches their mutual obligation to practise the bond in the unity of the true faith.¹He says this in the context of first emphasising the Lordship of Christ. With this emphasis the word autonomy may be a bit of a misnomer. Autonomy literally means self-law or to say it in more anglicized form, to be a law unto oneself. Especially after Dr. G. Bahnsen in his various lectures and writings contrasted autonomy (being a law to oneself) with theonomy (accepting and submitting to divine law) one tends to shy from using the term autonomy. From what he says, Rev. Van Oene certainly makes very clear that the churches are to submit to the ruling or law given through Christ. At the same time he wants to make clear that the churches are entities on their own.

This is an important point, not just because of semantics, but the Scriptural principle of recognizing each local congregation to be the flock of Christ. It obviously not the entire flock of Christ which is being gathered from the being to the end of ages and from all of the world. Nevertheless, wherever the church is gathered together, there we insist from God's Word, is the church. In this context the term autonomous is really be considered a misnomer because no true church would ever want to become a law unto themselves. True churches willingly submit to God's law and everything He reveals in Scripture. Not only the Church Orderly, but also the Scriptural and Confessional point has always been that the office-bearers appointed and ordained among the churches are directly accountable to Christ, the only Head of the Church (see Belgic Confession Article 31). No office-bearer is to rule over another nor is one church to rule over another church.

In order to keep this principle intact, it is agreed in the Church Order that a consistory is never to be compelled to implement a decision made among the churches which it is convinced is contrary to Scripture. This is the importance of the well-known Article 31 of the Church Order. However, because true Churches confess the same Scripture, one can only expect agreement among the churches. In principle, one could argue that disagreements among Churches only arise when there is unfaithfulness to Scripture in either teaching or application. Having said that, there remains a certain recognition that we are not yet perfect and sometimes differences in practical matters do arise. See, for example, Acts 15:36-41. At times room is given for different insight and different practices. This is reflected for example among us as bond where different churches have slight different order of liturgy. It is in this context that sometimes consistories will implement practical decisions with which they are not so happy while recognising that they are not directly acting contrary to what the Lord teaches in His word. They agree to implement such decisions for the sake of unity among the churches.

When Rev. Van Oene added in the above quotation the mutual obligation for the churches to practise the bond in the unity of the true faith, he appears to have recognised that at times there appears to have been an independent and almost autonomous tendency among Reformed Churches. Sometimes one hears, with reference to Reformed Church Order, that we are all autonomous local churches. One saw this tendency when in the 1960s through to the 1980s in Canada and America quite a number of Churches felt compelled to leave the Christian Reformed Church bond for several reasons, including attempt to reconcile the days of creation with the theory of natural evolution, questions about some of the points regarding God's eternal election as maintained in the Canons of Dort as well as giving way for women to serve in ecclesiastical offices. When these churches felt compelled to leave, they initially became and remained independent churches. It was after quite some years that some initially formed into a bond known as the Orthodox Christian Reformed Churches and later another bond known as the United Reformed Churches of America. By the way, the Orthodox Christian Reformed Churches were involved with formation and became part of the United Reformed Churches. The point right now is that initially the churches that left the Christian Reformed Churches remained independent and appeared to be relatively comfortable in that context. They do not, for example, immediately seek to be joined with another existing bond of churches.

In a bit of a different way, one saw similar tendency among the churches that left the RCN in the late 1960s Netherlands to become known as the Churches outside of the Bond.²Even though these Churches quite quickly joined together, it remained quite loosely organized. The emphasis became focused on the authority and autonomy of the local consistories. It was not without good reason that the name Churches outside the Bond stuck. The insinuation became that as individual Churches they did not want to be directed or ruled by other Churches.

While it remains true that all office-bearers and local Churches are directly related and accountable to Christ the Head of the Church and not to each other, in an effort to help and assist each other they do not ignore but take to heart what they say to each other. One may ask, how can churches expect true communion among members of the same congregation when churches have difficulty exercising the same kind of communion among each other as churches? As members of the church we are told to bear one with one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Eph. 4:2-3) and surely this applies to relations among churches as well.

The point right now is that it appears better to avoid speaking about autonomous local churches, but much better to speak about churches that all submit to the same Lord Jesus Christ as Head. Because they all submit to the same Head and the same ordinances the Lord gives in His Word, one can expect a lot of agreement. As has hopefully already been clearly shown by the previous articles, this unity rests in a particular way on together confessing the same Word of God. Thus the written and adopted confessions really remain crucial for Church unity.

Practicing Unity Among the Churches←⤒🔗

In view of how New Testament Scripture shows a certain recognition of churches in various places while speaking about the one church of Christ, it would be wrong for believers and churches not to recognise each other. If a believer finds himself in a certain location, he is under obligation to look for and join the true church. He has no business starting a church on his own, independent from all other churches. Among Reformed Churches the practice has grown for churches within a country to be joined together in a bond or federation. The terms bond or federation is used to reflect how Scripture does speak about local churches with office-bearers who are all directly accountable to Christ and not to each other. However, churches, in their desire to remain faithful to the Lord, will certainly seek each other's help. Such a bond of churches can be compared to how in a country various provinces or states agree to be joined together as one government. Perhaps, an even better comparison would be the European union. This is what adopted confessions are about for within a bond the churches all agree by their Confessions to rightly uphold what the Lord teaches in His Word. When saying it this way, hopefully one can also understand that in this context no great distinction is made between Scripture and Confession because all agree that the Confessions are in agreement with God's Word.

Furthermore, in the context of assisting each other, certain agreements are made and maintained which include to consult each other in discipline matters. Because ministers of the Word are permitted on the pulpits within the bond, there are agreements in place for other churches to be involved with their acceptance within the bond as well as departure from active service. Within a bond, the churches also agree on how they do things, thus they formulate a Church Order. Within the Church Order it is agreed that certain decisions are only made together as a bond of Churches such as changes to the Confessions, adoption of Psalms and Hymns to sing within the churches, with which churches to relate in other countries of the world and so forth. When being joined together in this way as a bond of churches in one country, there is no good reason for any true church not to participate.

Since the time of the great Reformation the bonds of Reformed Churches tended to be formed within various countries. The background for this is mostly geographical, sociological and political but not Scriptural. Historically it is understandable that while during and after the great reformation there was some contact among Reformed Churches in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Scotland, Britain and Ireland, there were also distinctions and divisions. At that time these countries were too often at war against each other. It made ecclesiastical unity awkward and practically impossible. However, among the early New Testament Churches it was not that way. As has been pointed out, Scripture shows that there was recognition of churches in Galatian, Jerusalem and Corinth. After the New Testament Scripture was completed there were relations among the various churches throughout the world as evident from the ecumenical assemblies that were held. In view of modern day globalization including infrastructure for worldwide communication and travel one wonders whether the churches should perhaps again look at closer ties to one another worldwide.