American Christianity has been severely synchronized to the idol of individualism. This has been clearly illustrated to me time and time again by the numerous amounts of Christians who have a complete disregard for the centrality of the local church. They act as if belonging to a church is an option on par with belonging to a gym or pouring cream in their coffee. They see church as merely an additive that is optional. This, of course, is a lie bellowing up from the smoky pits of hell. I have spent the last few years of my life working hard to confront this hersey. When I speak on this subject I will often cite the following quote from Cyprian: “You cannot have God as your Father if you do not have the church as your mother.”

I love this quote because it powerfully rattles the spines of lone ranger Christians who so effortlessly cast off God’s provision of the local church. Naturally, I have gotten some emotional push-back on my frequent use of this quote from the laity and even pastors. One pastor told me that he doubted Calvin would ever cite a guy such as Cyprian because of his various theological errors. However, Calvin most certainly did use this quote throughout his writings. For example, Calvin wrote:

Shut up as we are in the prison house of our flesh, we have not yet attained angelic rank. God, therefore, in his wonderful providence accommodating himself to our capacity, has prescribed a way for us, though still far off, to draw near to him. (And that way is the) church, into whose bosom God is pleased to gather his sons, not only that they may be nourished by her help and ministry as long as they are infants and children, but also that they may be guided by her motherly care until they mature and at last reach the goal of faith. “For what God has joined together, it is not lawful to put asunder,”  so that, for those to whom He is Father the church may also be Mother. ( Institutes IV.1.1, “The Necessity of the Church.”)

Calvin’s point is that the visible church is instrumental to the maturing of all believers. God uses the church as his vehicle of transfromation in the world. That all seems simple enough, right? But, what is with all this hesitance towards placing a great importance on the local church? Dr. David Calhoun, a professor at Covenant Theological Seminary, gives a few qualifications regarding this quote and makes clear the source of our hesitance in one of his lectures in Ancient and Medieval Church History:

It has also been asked, what did Cyprian mean when he said that you cannot have God as your Father if you do not have the church as your mother? Cyprian and Augustine would always qualify that by saying, “ordinarily.” I think they viewed some possibility of this not being true in rare cases. Generally, where there is the church a person must be part of that church to be a Christian. You cannot really be a Christian all by yourself. Part of the definition of what a Christian is is a person in fellowship with God’s people on earth. So this was their way of discouraging any individual or private Christianity. Calvin also held that, but I think Calvin as well as Augustine thought it was possible — possible — for a person to be a Christian without being a church member, but not ordinarily. And it is certainly possible for church members not to be Christians. Calvin believed that, as did Augustine and probably Cyprian as well. This is a rather difficult quotation to understand, especially for us Protestants in the West. We Protestants tend to diminish the role of the church, to see it as not so important. I think that is a mistake. Then when we hear a quotation like this it startles us that you could say that you have to be a member of the church to have God as your Father.  (Emphasis mine)

Yes, Christians can exist outside the local church. Calvin said there is many true believers without and many false believers within the church. However, that is an extraordinary situation. I think very few of us Christians here in America would qualify for such an extraordinary circumstances. Most of us can find a gospel preaching, albeit flawed, church somewhere relatively close to our home. It is not for lack of a church that we opted out of the mothering of a local congregation. The true motivation behind us isolating ourselves for the local church is that we simply do not think the local church is that important. Calvin, Cyprian, Augustine, Dr. Calhoun, and myself would all disagree. It is as Augustine said elsewhere, “The church may be a whore but she is still my mother.” She will teach us to love the Father as the Father teaches us to love her. Commit yourself to a local church. It is a necessity and not an option.