Does God care which church you join, or whether you join any at all?

Does He lead all of them? Does He lead any of them? Are there false churches?

Are true Christians dispersed in many different groups? Will God save the “righteous” from disconnected church groups? Or is there only one true Church of God?

Beware False Churches

Christians are to follow Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:21; 1 John 2:6), and He warned that false churches would arise, claiming to speak in His name. “Take heed that no man deceive you,” He told His disciples. “For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many” (Matthew 24:4-5). Many people today claim to be Christian. They proclaim Christ. Yet they deceive many!

The Apostle Paul also warned against “false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness …” (2 Corinthians 11:13-15). Did you know that Satan has ministers?

To discern a false minister or a false church, you must know the teachings of Jesus Christ. If you casually accept a church’s teaching because it sounds right, you will be led astray. Follow the example of the Bereans: Search the Scriptures to check whether what you’re hearing matches the Bible (Acts 17:11). “Prove all things; hold fast that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

Jesus prophesied of false Christian churches. But He also promised that His Church, which He personally founded, would always exist. “… I will build my church,” He said, “and the gates of hell [the grave] shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18). If you believe Jesus, you know that His true Church exists somewhere on Earth today!

The Purpose of God’s Church

To recognize that Church, you need to understand the purpose for which Christ founded it.

This may shock you, but the Bible clearly shows that the Church’s purpose is not to help God “save the world.” Jesus made no attempt to gain converts or to invite people to “give their hearts to Him” or to “accept Him as their personal Savior.” Instead, He “called out” 12 disciples, or students. He gave them special instruction but hid the truth from almost everyone else!

He gave much of His teaching to the crowds in parables. Why? When His disciples asked Him that very question, He answered, “Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. … Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand” (Matthew 13:11, 13).

Christ was not trying to make the truth more understandable to the public—He was hiding the truth from them! He spoke in symbol and code to the crowds; then He explained the meaning of His parables in private to the 12 disciples, those few “called out” students. He told them, “But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear. For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them” (verses 16-17).

Study this whole passage and think about the fact that Jesus gave true spiritual understanding to only a handful of disciples. That alone exposes a lot of common misconceptions regarding the purpose of the Church.

‘All Men’

God yearns to save all men, not just a few (1 Timothy 2:4; 2 Peter 3:9). Jesus was grieved when He saw the spiritual destitution of His day. He wanted to help the masses. He did all He could to minister to them and heal them (Matthew 9:35-38). But His purpose at that time was not to save them all spiritually. If it were, then you would have to admit that He failed!

Throughout His earthly ministry, Jesus preached to thousands upon thousands. Yet at the end of His human life, how many had committed to following Him? How many true students did He have?

Acts 1:15 reveals the stunning answer: only 120 people!

Jesus referred to those few He was working with as a “little flock” (Luke 12:32). And so God’s true Church has remained throughout the centuries.

The rest of the world was cut off from God—and still is!

The Bible shows that God has a master plan for saving the world—“all men,” including all people who have ever lived. This inspiring truth is revealed in scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. As 2 Peter 3:9 says, God is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” God and Christ have indeed excluded most human beings for most of history from even knowing about Jesus Christ, let alone accepting Him as their Savior. They have allowed false churches to deceive many. Yet they have a plan to give all mankind the opportunity to come to the knowledge of the truth, to repent and to be saved!

This plan of salvation—the biblical plan of salvation taught by the one true Church of God—is more inclusive than any other church or religion can even imagine!

But this universalist phase of God’s plan comes after Christ’s Second Coming. Before that time, God calls out a small number of people to prepare for that phase. That is the purpose of the true Church!

Churches that are ignorant of this fundamental biblical truth are not led by Jesus Christ and will lead you into serious error!

Christ never prophesied that His Church would become a large, impressive, politically powerful church ruling over the nations before His return. In fact, Jesus promised that those in His true Church—far from being more respected in the community, having business opportunities enhanced, gaining more friends, or rising in social status—would be hated, persecuted and perhaps even killed (John 15:18-19; 16:2).

No wonder the true Church is a “little flock”! It is a small group of sincere, converted people whom God has called out of the world, who have repented and forsaken this world. It is a small, generally scorned body of believers who are doing the work of God.

God’s Church has “little strength” (Revelation 3:8). It is a group empowered by Christ, united in beliefs, and under God’s government on Earth, but it is also scattered. It is largely unnoticed by the world. Yet as this verse shows, God sets open doors before it—of mass media and other means—to carry His warning message and the gospel of the soon-coming Kingdom of God to the whole world as a last witness.

God is not using every professing Christian to spread the gospel; He has a specific government structure in place to do that.

Connected to Christ

In 1 Corinthians 12, an analogy is made between the human body and God’s Church. “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ” (verse 12). What a clear, perfect explanation: Just as a human body consists of many parts and organs, God’s one true Church is comprised of many individual members, “yet but one body” (verse 20).

This “one body” does not consist of many independent, isolated individuals, people who consider themselves Christian or part of God’s true Church but who choose not to affiliate or assemble with the organized Body of God’s Church. They may believe they are united with Jesus, but they are not part of the unified spiritual Body of which Christ is the Head! They are not receiving that spiritual nourishment that comes only through Christ’s government via His chosen, faithful ministers.

We cannot be connected to Christ unless we are connected to His government on Earth. One of Christ’s parables paints a similar picture.

In John 15, Jesus describes God the Father as the owner of a vineyard, Himself as the one single “true vine,” and the individual members of the Church as the branches. This analogy portrays the Body of Christ, the Church of God, as united and organized, not a collection of “loner Christians” and disparate groups. The one true Vine is not several separate vines. And the individual members are all joined to that one Vine.

To be part of Christ’s vine, you must be connected to God’s government. “And God hath set some in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers …” (1 Corinthians 12:28). God places government in His Church! Unless we follow those whom God puts in charge, we are not connected to His government and are thus cut off from the Vine, Jesus Christ.

Matthew 16:18 states that God’s true Church would be founded on the Rock—Jesus Christ Himself. God’s true Church is actively ruled by Christ as the Head. This Rock is the foundation of government in the Church.

Verse 19 shows that Christ did give authority to Peter, who assumed the role of chief apostle at the beginning of the Church (Acts 2:14). But “the head of the body, the church” was and is Christ (Colossians 1:18).

Jesus Christ actively leads His Church, directing a human leader through the Bible, revelation and the power of God’s Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ is coming in the flesh through that individual (1 John 4:2-3). That human leader exercises authority not as he sees fit but rather as he is directed by Christ.

Government Creates Unity

Ephesians 4:11-13 also describe this government structure and explicitly say that His chosen and faithful ministers are there “for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith ….”

Without government, there is doctrinal confusion—the opposite of unity. Satan is the author of confusion. God, by contrast, “is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints” (1 Corinthians 14:33).

God’s ministers watch over the Church members and “must give account” to God in how they do so. Thus, it is important that the members “[o]bey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves …” (Hebrews 13:17). We must obey those who rule over us. This means there is government, and that government teaches law-keeping.

Mr. Armstrong wrote of this verse in Mystery of the Ages, “The churches of this world of Satan are organized according to humanly devised patterns. But the Bible gives explicit directions in regard to Church government. Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church. God’s form of government is, indeed, hierarchical. God the Father—the sole Lawgiver and supreme authority—is Head over Christ.

“God explains in 1 Corinthians 12 functions, offices, administrations and their officers as God set them in His Church.”

From God the Father to Jesus Christ, to the man He uses, to the leaders who support that man, to the individual members, to husbands and fathers, to wives and mothers and to children—God’s government is effective, just, constructive and essential.

Many churches today admit that they experiment with church governance. Some churches have “top-down” government structures, with one man having final authority—but they are led by those men, not by Christ. This limits division but results in tyranny—in the name of Christ. Other churches have government structures that involve “bottom-up” voting, or rule by a small group, or some other form of rule besides “top-down.” This limits tyranny but produces division.

Practices like voting on what to believe push Jesus Christ aside. He is not the living Head of those churches!

Only the true Church of God has the government of God: top-down, God Family government led by Jesus Christ, motivated by God’s love, and empowered by God’s Holy Spirit.

In the early Church, challenges and disputes arose that had to be settled by those in authority in the Church. The most famous such challenge is recorded in Acts 15. Unordained men, affected by their previous erroneous religious teaching, had begun to divide the Body of Christ. It became necessary to bring this matter to the topmost authority at headquarters in Jerusalem (verses 1-2). It was Peter, the chief apostle, who made the decision (verses 7-11). James, pastor of the Jerusalem congregation where they were meeting, confirmed Peter’s decision publicly, thus resolving the dispute (verses 13-21). This decision was binding on all. It was inspired by God.

There are “differences of administrations” (1 Corinthians 12:5), but all the apostles submitted to the same government and to the same binding decisions that the chief apostle made. Paul, apostle over the Gentiles, had to make judgments for the churches he oversaw, and so did the other apostles. But never did God’s true apostles teach different doctrines from those that Christ taught, as the churches of this world do! They were united by God’s government, not divided into separate organizations doing their own work.

God gives His ministry authority to serve people and relieve suffering caused by living the wrong way of life. They exercise that authority to back and support the message of God that can bring hope to people’s lives.

God calls each member and places him or her in the Body, within this organizational structure, where it pleases Him (John 6:44; 1 Corinthians 12:18, 28).

Keeping the unity of the faith is an important job of Church government. Through God’s government, God preserves the unity of the Church. It is the only way unity can be preserved. It helps to overcome obstacles, settle disputes and reach decisions. Without it, there would be confusion. There could be no smoothly functioning Body nor effective work of God. Jesus Christ would not be its Head.

True Christians learn a lot by coming under God’s government today. It perfects those who submit to it. God uses it to serve His people (Luke 22:25-27). Paul described God’s ministers as “helpers of your joy” (2 Corinthians 1:24). Authority in God’s Church is not to be abused or used to control people’s lives.

God’s people are admonished to esteem the officers of God’s Church highly (1 Thessalonians 5:12-13). This does not mean exalting the physical man, who is a sinner like everyone else, but the office, which is ordained of God.

No other ecclesiastical institution stresses the importance of godly, righteous government like God’s Church does. God’s rule extends into every aspect of our lives. It is how He establishes and preserves order, purity and unity. It enables God’s work on Earth, including the preaching of the good news of God’s soon-coming Kingdom.

Isaiah 9:6-7 is a prophecy of Jesus Christ—and of the government of God: “Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end …”!

Need You Attend Services?

God instructs true Christians not to forsake the assembling of themselves together (Hebrews 10:25). The New Testament records true Christians meeting together in fellowship with other believers. Yes, for numerous reasons, the Creator of human beings wants us “going to church.”

Further, the Bible says clearly and repeatedly that true Christians must “speak the same thing” and have “no divisions among you,” and that they must be “perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.” God does not have His followers dispersed among various groups with conflicting beliefs. He requires them to be united—as unified as God and Jesus Christ are! Read Jesus’s prayer in John 17.

This is a very different picture from the reality of “Christianity” today, which is splintered into tens of thousands of denominations.

These are easily provable truths in your Bible that disprove what a great many people carelessly assume about church attendance. The fact is, most people simply do not study deeply into what the Bible says. What about you?

Jesus Christ said in Matthew 18:20: “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” We do want to have Christ in our midst. But can just anyone gather in His name and claim this promise?

What does Christ mean by gathering together “in my name”? He means we gather by His authority. For example, when we baptize “in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 2:38), we do so by His authority. Jesus doesn’t authorize any group of His converts to hold meetings on their own, outside the government within His Church—doing so would be acting contrary to Christ’s authority.

The Old Testament established not only that people should worship God each week but also that they should do so in a “holy convocation.” Leviticus 23:1-4 show the pattern God uses: He commanded His ministers to convoke assemblies, or order meetings. He tells us on which days to meet, and He tells His ministers to convey when and where those convocations will be held. It is all God’s doing, not man’s.

Only God’s true Church can claim to have the authority of Jesus Christ to call weekly assemblies and to have God among them. No other church can make this claim on scriptural grounds. Everyone has the responsibility to prove this for himself (1 Thessalonians 5:21). Our booklet Can You Prove Which Church Is God’s? (free upon request) points our readers to the many critical scriptures in this study.

Can You Join God’s Church?

Perhaps you want to attend God’s Church—but where is it? How can you join it?

Believe it or not, the Bible says you cannot simply decide to “join” God’s true Church!

Jesus Christ said, “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him …” (John 6:44). The Apostle Paul wrote, “But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him” (1 Corinthians 12:18). This means it is impossible for you to choose to join the true Church of God. God the Father must specifically call you—draft you—and set you in the Body of Christ!

In fact, the very word the New Testament uses for church is the Greek word ekklesia, which means a group of called-out ones.

These are just a few of the most basic truths you must prove for yourself—straight from your own Bible—before you start attending a church!

The questions of whether you should attend a church and which church is the true Church of God are much deeper and much more important than the vast majority of Christians assume.

You must prove for yourself the answers to these vital questions. You must use the Bible and the words of Jesus Christ to understand the truth.