Christianity Today Is Not A Ministry

by R. Scott Clark on June 29, 2022 | 17 Comments

One of the episodes of Christianity Today‘s Mars Hill podcast series was actually about the problem of sexual harassment at Christianity Today (to their credit, after exposing the cultic nature of Mark Driscoll’s control over Mars Hill–in the sense that Jim Jones was the leader of a cult–and the abuses attending the Driscoll cult, CT blew the whistle on itself.)

Is CT A Ministry?

Repeatedly in the episode, however, Mike Casper, the now familiar narrator of the CT podcast series, repeatedly describes CT as a “ministry.” Let us be very clear about this. It is no such thing. CT is a news and opinion magazine (and now a podcast) of interest to evangelical Christians and others. That is it. That is not a small thing, but Jesus Christ did not institute CT. He did not authorize CT to preach the gospel, administer the holy sacraments, or to use church discipline. Those are the marks of the ministry, which Jesus, who is Lord of the church, entrusted to his visible church.*

CT is a product of the neo-evangelical movement. It was born of the desire of the neo-evangelicals to move beyond the narrowness of the fundamentalist movement. It was founded by the godfathers of the neo-evangelical movement, Carl F. H. Henry, Billy Graham, and Harold John Ockenga, among others. It was the fruit of the same movement that gave us Fuller Seminary.

As David Wells noted in 1993, in No Place for Truth, CT is a bellweather of the neo-evangelical movement. I found the same thing in the 1980s when, to try to figure out what was happening in Christianity, I parked myself by the CT collection in Love Library (University of Nebraska) and read every issue from its founding, in 1956, until the early 1980s. The change in the 1970s was marked. Even though I did not then appreciate who Carl Henry was, the decline of the quality of the magazine was palpable. I recall seeing reports from G. C. Berkouwer, who was attending Vatican II. Ed Clowney wrote a humor column, “Eutychus and His Pin.” Carl Henry was a serious thinker. It was a magazine of substance. By the mid-70s there was less substance, more mainline influence, and more fluff.

Churchless Neo-Evangelicalism

One of the great weaknesses of the movement spawned by Henry et al. is that it was intentionally church-less. They sought to marginalize the visible church. The Boomer children, the grandchildren, and the great-grandchildren of Henry & co. have continued that churchlessness. They were getting away from the nasty church fights associated with Machen and his “Warrior Children.” In the post-WWII period, every endeavor by the neo-evangelicals became “a ministry.” The every-member ministry ethos, aided by dubious exegesis of Ephesians 4, spread like wildfire through neo-evangelical circles.

So, it is not surprising that, as they work through the problem of sexual abuse at CT, Cosper et al. invoke the now familiar language of CT‘s ministry–yet this is part of the problem. A sexual abuser should be turned over to two authorities: the magistrate and the church. If an investigation finds that untoward behavior was occurring, then that person should be dismissed. This is what magazines, which are businesses, do. CT is an evangelical-oriented business.

What Is A Church?

Just as our newest Supreme Court justice, the hon. Kentanji Brown Jackson, in her Judiciary Committee interview, was ostensibly unable to say what a woman is, so too modern evangelicals have struggled greatly with the doctrine of the church. As I have been arguing for some time here, it is not too much to say that they do not have one. The Reformation churches do, however, have a doctrine of the church. The Reformed are very clear about what the visible, institutional church is.

In Belgic Confession art. 27, the Reformed churches confess the holy catholic church but that church always comes to visible expression.

We believe and confess One single catholic or universal church, a holy congregation and gathering of true Christian believers, awaiting their entire salvation in Jesus Christ being washed by his blood, and sanctified and sealed by the Holy Spirit (emphasis added).

Note that the churches qualify their doctrine of the holy catholic, i.e., universal (not Roman) church with “gathering.” The invisible church, i.e., the universal church, the ecumenical church, the church catholic—”spread and dispersed throughout the entire world, though still joined and united in heart and will, in one and the same Spirit, by the power of faith”—becomes visible in local congregations.

This is made clear in art. 28:

We believe that since this holy assembly and congregation is the gathering of those who are saved and there is no salvation apart from it, no one ought to withdraw from it, content to be by himself, regardless of his status or condition (emphasis added).

One unites oneself to the church visible. One separates oneself from the church visible. According to the Reformed churches, Christians are bound to join themselves to the visible church:

But all people are obliged to join and unite with it, keeping the unity of the church by submitting to its instruction and discipline, by bending their necks under the yoke of Jesus Christ, and by serving to build up one another, according to the gifts God has given them as members of each other in the same body.

In the sixteenth century, as now, it could be challenging to discern which congregation is the true church. Then, as now, “all sects in the world today claim for themselves the name of ‘the church'” (Belgic art. 29). So, with all the Reformed churches we confess that the true church has certain “marks” (indicators):

The true church can be recognized if it has the following marks:

  1. The church engages in the pure preaching of the gospel
  2. It makes use of the pure administration of the sacraments as Christ instituted them
  3. It practices church discipline for correcting faults

We also confess that there are marks of a true Christian:

“As for those who are of the church, we can recognize them by the distinguishing marks of Christians: namely

  1. by faith
  2. by their fleeing from sin and pursuing righteousness once they have received the one and only Savior, Jesus Christ. They love the true God and their neighbors, without turning to the right or left
  3. they crucify the flesh and its works.

Though great weakness remains in them, they fight against it by the Spirit all the days of their lives, appealing constantly to the blood, suffering, death, and obedience of the Lord Jesus, in whom they have forgiveness of their sins, through faith in him.”

How A Real Church Could Have Prevented The Mars Hill Disaster

The Reformed churches inherited the ancient Christian conviction, a biblical conviction, that Jesus Christ established a visible, institutional church. He gave to the visible church the keys of the kingdom (Matt 16). He authorized and empowered the visible church to preach the gospel and administer the holy sacraments (Matt 28:18–20). He commanded the visible church to practice church discipline (Matt 18).

One of the faults of the CT Mars Hill podcast series is that it claims, without proof, that a connectional polity would have made no difference. We do not know that. Perhaps a real, genuine connectional polity would have failed, but had Mark Driscoll presented himself to Classis (i.e., Presbytery) Southwest of the United Reformed Churches in North America as a candidate for ministry he would have been asked some basic questions:

  1. Of which church are you a member?
  2. Which consistory (i.e., local assembly of ministers and elders) is presenting you as a candidate for ministry?
  3. Where did you attend seminary?

By his own repeated and highly publicized admission, Driscoll would have failed these three tests. He was not qualified for pastoral ministry. As a seminary prof since 1997, I have seen several young men who were charismatic (not in the theological sense), who had leadership ability, who could communicate well, who were not (yet) ready for ministry. For all his considerable natural ability, Mark Driscoll was not ready for ministry. He was (and remains) an entrepreneur. He is not and never was a shepherd of the sheep. When push came to shove, and it did, he did not lay down his life for his sheep. By his own boast, he got into a bus, fired up the engine, and drove over the sheep.

No real ecclesiastical body saw gifts in Mark, tested him, sent him to seminary for a proper education (and further testing), and then evaluated him as a delegated assembly of churches.

Once a man is admitted to ministry as a candidate and called by a congregation, he remains subject to the discipline and correction of the regional and even national (e.g., synod) assemblies of the churches. Driscoll was never subject to any such authority. When churches, over whom he was the CEO, did try to address him, he crushed them like the pope he was. The CT podcast interviewed those bodies years after they been run over by the bus and they are still recovering. Some of them have PTSD.

Had Driscoll behaved as he did at Mars Hill under the discipline of the Reformed churches, I trust that he would have been challenged, called to repentance, and, had he shown himself to be as impenitent as he did, he would have been removed from ministry and placed under discipline. More than anything right now, Mark Driscoll needs to be held accountable by a real church with the Christ-given authority to make a determination whether he has the marks of a true Christian and, if not, to be declared to have shown himself what he is.

Do the confessional Presbyterian and Reformed (P&R) churches always get this right? No. Have P&R churches sometimes turned a blind eye to abuse and malfeasance. Much to their shame, yes–but at least the potential for discipline exists and we do use it. We need to use that mark of the church more in trust that the Lord will use it to bring about repentance and true faith.

Mars Hill was never a church. It always lacked the marks of the true church. It is no wonder that things went as they did. Likewise, CT is neither called nor qualified to do any of those things. They are qualified to report on the work of the church and the ministry of the church but they are not the church. They are not a ministry. The Christian radio station is not a ministry. The Christian bookstore is not a ministry. The pro-life organization is not a ministry. These are all and each good and necessary things, but none of them is the church and none of them is a ministry. Failure to grasp this distinction and to act in its light has adversely affected the lives of many Christians.

That the confessional P&R churches claim to have the marks of the true church and to have legitimate, divine authority to conduct the ministry of Word, sacrament, and discipline places a great and holy weight on their shoulders. As we call evangelicals to emerge from their sects into the true church, we must be that church we claim to be. The Great Shepherd of the Sheep is watching how we care for his little lambs, for whom he obeyed, for whom he died, for whom he was raised, for whom he is interceding, and for whom he will come when he returns.

©R. Scott Clark. All Rights Reserved.

NOTE

* Consider the uses of the noun διακονια (diakonia or ministry) in the New Testament.

  1. διακονια (diakonia) in Acts 1:17, 25 is ecclesiastical
  2. the διακονια of Acts 6:1, 4 is an ecclesiastical ministry of food distribution within the visible church.
  3. The διακονια of Acts 11:29 is ecclesiastical poverty relief
  4. The διακονια of Acts 12:25 is ecclesiastical
  5. The διακονια of Rom 12:7 is ecclesiastical
  6. The διακονια of Acts 20:24 is ecclesiastical, i.e., Paul’s ministry/service as an apostle, ordained and sent by the church, the chief work of which was to plant churches
  7. The διακονια of Acts 21:19 is ecclesiastical
  8. The διακονια of Rom 11:13 refers to Paul’s work of church planting among the Gentiles
  9. The διακονια of Rom 12:7 is written to the visible church in Rome and describes the ways ministry is conducted within the visible church
  10. The διακονια of 1 Cor 16:15 is written to the visible church and describes the ways ministry is conducted within the visible church
  11. Paul’s διακονια in Rom 15:31 is ecclesiastical
  12. The διακονια of 2 Cor 3:7–9 was ecclesiastical under the OT and continues in the New Covenant whenever the preacher preaches the law
  13. The διακονια to which Paul refers in 2 Cor 4:1 is his ministry in and through the visible church
  14. The διακονια to which Paul refers in 2 Cor 5:18 and 6:3 is his ministry to the visible church(es)
  15. The διακονια of 2 Cor 8:4 and 9:1ff is the church’s ministry of poverty relief within the visible church
  16. Paul specifically mentions the visible church re his διακονια in 2 Cor 11:8
  17. The διακονια in view in Eph 4:12 is ecclesiastical, i.e., within the Ephesian church
  18. Archippus’ διακονια in Col 4:17 is almost certainly his ordained pastoral ministry. In any event it is ecclesiastical
  19. Paul’s διακονια in 1 Tim 1:12 is his ecclesiastical ministry to which Timothy has also been ordained
  20. Timothy’s διακονια in 2 Tim 4:5 and Paul’s in v. 11 is ordained ministry within the visible church
  21. Rev 2:19 is written to the visible church and refers to the ministry of the visible church

There are there three outliers: διακονια is used in the NT in the broad, even secular (i.e., common, shared) sense of “serving,” as in serving dinner, e.g., Mary & Martha in Luke 10:40. Such uses hardly warrant extra-ecclesiastical “ministry.” It is also used of angels in Heb 1:14, which doesn’t show us extra-ecclesiastical ministry since Campus Crusade/Navigators etc are not angels.

διακονια (ministry) is used overwhelmingly for the ministry of the visible, institutional church. She has ministers.

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17 comments

  1. Dr. Clark,

    Would you have a problem with many Reformed parachurch organzations who call themselves “ministries”?

    Venkatesh

    • Venkatesh,

      Yes. We specifically do not call the Heidelberg Reformation Association (i.e., the Heidelblog, Heidelcast etc) a “ministry.” It isn’t. We’re not the church. CT is not the church.

    • But, Dr Clark, if you and your church were to enter into an agreement that you were running the Heidelblog as a ministry of your church, then the Heidelblog would become a ministry.

      • Not necessarily. Not everything the church does is a “ministry.” The people who put out cookies between the AM service and Sunday school/catechism are not engaged in ministry except the broadest possible terms. It’s certainly not “the ministry.” I admit that it’s difficult to find language that does not verge on ministry (e.g., service is very closely related and often synonymous). We probably need to recover older church language. There was a time when volunteer church work was not denominated “ministry.”

    • But as a reader of the KJV may I refer to the time before the use of your older church language when putting out cookies between two services might have been seen as a Romans 12:7 ministry of ministering or a 1 Corinthians 12:28 ministry of helps?
      I would have thought that running the Heidelblog was definitely a part of the teaching ministry to which you have been providentially called. My own church prays for members who work as missionaries and a member who works as an army chaplain, as our servants in ministry.

      • Military and police chaplains are typically ordained to ministry and called to it by their churches. It is an ecclesiastical vocation. As a seminary prof I am called by my congregation, as an associate pastor, to the work. It’s a grey/gray area. The seminary is not, strictly speaking, a ministry. It is a school and as such accountable to secular authorities. Around the seminary, however, we speak of the faculty (who are ordained as pastors/teaching elders/ruling elders) as exercising their ministry at the seminary.

        A magazine (e.g., the HB) and a podcast are an extension of my work as a teacher and, thus, indirectly related to the work to which I’m called by the church.

    • May I add further that whilst I would not regard Christianity Today as a ministry, I WOULD regard providing and, when necessary, fighting for sound content on it, as one?

  2. Scott,

    Thanks for viewing Mars Hill in light of its ecclesiastical independence.

    Independents in the 17th century ordinarily employed exegetical defenses for their independence; they read Paul’s statements about the body of Christ (e.g. Rom. 12:3-8; 1 Cor. 12:4-31) as referring to each local gathering/congregation of Christians, which was ostensibly sufficiently gifted by the Head of the church to function independently of other gatherings/congregations. Congregationalists (and all others) believed that this understanding conflicted with the narrative of the apostolic council recorded in Acts 15 (and remember that Congregationalists only differed from Presbyterians on whether such meetings were regular standing meetings or pro re nata meetings called on special occasions; each agreed that there should be unified deliberations and decisions affecting the life of the entire visible church).

    By the twentieth century, however, the matter was not addressed exegetically, but practically, and the common “defense” of independence now is that “denominations hold us back,” or words to that effect. That is, some group decides that they–and they alone–know how to do church, and do not need to be affiliated with any other part of Christ’s body, which body would merely hold them back and prevent them from reaching their potential. The hubris of such a view (not to mention the uncharitable notion that the entire body of Christ other than themselves is little more than a human anchor) is nearly breathtaking. But pride often precedes a fall, and the pride of ecclesiastical independence is an accident waiting to happen, and regrettably, we do not always have to wait very long for such falls.

    T. David

    • T. David,

      I appreciate this.

      The URCs in NA say, in our statement (last document) of principles of Reformed church government, “Federative relationships do not belong to the essence or being of the church; rather, they serve the well- being of the church. However, even though churches stand distinctly next to one another, they do not thereby stand disconnectedly alongside one another. Entrance into and departure from a federative relationship is strictly a voluntary matter.” I appreciate the esse / bene esse distinction—many of the Reformation churches were disconnected until they were able to form connected church bodies— but had I been present for the original discussions I might have asked the brothers about Acts 15 and especially 16:4 where Luke uses “τὰ δόγματα” to refer to the decisions of the “the whole church” (ὅλῃ τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ; Acts 15:22). In the URCs there is a tendency to speak of “the churches” rather than “the church” when multiple congregations are in view. I also understand the circumstances, however, that gave birth to the URCs and the way congregations were treated by some classes in the CRC and the concern about “synodical tyranny.”

  3. What is Christianity Today? How do the editors set its agenda – what stories are published and why? Who funds it?

    • CT was established in 1956 by Graham, Henry et al with a view to bringing fundamentalists out of their huddle s and into engagement with the broader culture. Headquarters were originally in DC. In the 70s, however Henry was marginalized and headquarters were moved to Wheaton.

      Over the years CT has become the flagship evangelical news and opinion magazine

    • I think that CT was also established to compete with The Christian Century, a liberal magazine. Several years earlier, Machen had written Christianity and Liberalism. That liberalism, calling itself Christian, is what, I think, the founders of CT set out to expose and defeat.

  4. That CT is not a church is obvious. That it is not a ministry is less so. Paul in 2 Corinthians 9 refers to the ministry of sharing. The same thought process is referred to in Philippians 2 when Paul says that Epaphroditus risked his life to supply what was lacking in the ministry of the Philippians. These usages of the term “ministry” are not referring to a body of believers, but to the work of a either a group of believers or of a single believer. I guess I would appreciate a deeper dive into why you see the church and ministry as being the same thing?

    • Martha,

      I wish it were obvious to more people. My reading and experience tell me otherwise. The Pietist movement began to minimize the significance of the visible church by establishing “the little church within the church,” i.e., conventicles or “small groups” in the 17th century. In the 18th and 19th centuries the decline of the significance of the visible church was hastened by the various revival movements as itinerant preachers (mostly educated and ordained in the 18th century but increasingly unordained and uneducated in the 19th century) further reduced the significance of the visible church. Add to that the radical egalitarian movement unleashed during the Jackson administration, which had the effect of leveling laity and ministers so that by the time I became a Christian in the mid-70s everyone was a “minister” or had a “ministry.” “Every-member ministry” swept through the evangelical and Reformed churches in the 70s and 80s. Real “ministry” was not thought to be conducted in the church (the old Pietist suspicion of the visible church continued) but on campus in Crusade etc. Ironically, in their fear of mere formalism, the great grandchildren of the Pietists made church a mere formality.

      The word for ministry (diakonia) refers in the NT exclusively to the life and work of the visible, institutional church. The Apostles wrote letters to visible, institutional churches with pastors, elders, and deacons. The ministry described in the NT is always ecclesiastical and it is always the ministry of word, sacrament, or mercy.

      The groups of believers or the individual believers are carrying on a ministry within the confines and under the authority of the visible, institutional church.

      A magazine or a website (which is mainly what CT is these days) such as CT or the HB or the Heidelberg Reformation Association is an endeavor, a work, a service (broadly understood since sometimes “service” is used for “ministry”) but it is not a ministry.

      E.g.,

      1. διακονια (diakonia) in Acts 1:17, 25 is ecclesiastical
      2. the διακονια of Acts 6:1, 4 is an ecclesiastical ministry of food distribution within the visible church.
      3. The διακονια of Acts 11:29 is ecclesiastical poverty relief
      4. The διακονια of Acts 12:25 is ecclesiastical
      5. The διακονια of Rom 12:7 is ecclesiastical
      6. The διακονια of Acts 20:24 is ecclesiastical, i.e., Paul’s ministry/service as an apostle, ordained and sent by the church, the chief work of which was to plant churches
      7. The διακονια of Acts 21:19 is ecclesiastical
      8. The διακονια of Rom 11:13 refers to Paul’s work of church planting among the Gentiles
      9. The διακονια of Rom 12:7 is written to the visible church in Rome and describes the ways ministry is conducted within the visible church
      10. The διακονια of 1 Cor 16:15 is written to the visible church and describes the ways ministry is conducted within the visible church
      11. Paul’s διακονια in Rom 15:31 is ecclesiastical
      12. The διακονια of 2 Cor 3:7–9 was ecclesiastical under the OT and continues in the New Covenant whenever the preacher preaches the law
      13. The διακονια to which Paul refers in 2 Cor 4:1 is his ministry in and through the visible church
      14. The διακονια to which Paul refers in 2 Cor 5:18 and 6:3 is his ministry to the visible church(es)
      15. The διακονια of 2 Cor 8:4 and 9:1ff is the church’s ministry of poverty relief within the visible church
      16. Paul specifically mentions the visible church re his διακονια in 2 Cor 11:8
      17. The διακονια in view in Eph 4:12 is ecclesiastical, i.e., within the Ephesian church
      18. Archippus’ διακονια in Col 4:17 is almost certainly his ordained pastoral ministry. In any event it is ecclesiastical
      19. Paul’s διακονια in 1 Tim 1:12 is his ecclesiastical ministry to which Timothy has also been ordained
      20. Timothy’s διακονια in 2 Tim 4:5 and Paul’s in v. 11 is ordained ministry within the visible church
      21. Rev 2:19 is written to the visible church and refers to the ministry of the visible church

      There are there three outliers: διακονια is used in the NT in the broad, even secular (i.e., common, shared) sense of “serving,” as in serving dinner, e.g., Mary & Martha in Luke 10:40. Such uses hardly warrant extra-ecclesiastical “ministry.” It is also used of angels in Heb 1:14, which doesn’t show us extra-ecclesiastical ministry since Campus Crusade/Navigators etc are not angels.

      διακονια (ministry) is used overwhelmingly for the ministry of the visible, institutional church. She has ministers.

      I’ve worked in the parachurch world full-time since 1995. I teach in a parachurch school and I’m president of a parachurch. If anyone had incentive to make the parachurch a “ministry” it is I but the NT evidence is too strong. It just won’t allow it.

      • Thank you for such a substantive reply. Much to chew on here.

        If I understand you right, you would say that ministry is only happening when the church has, in an organized way, affirmed the people carrying out the ministry of the word or sacrament or mercy?

        I’m unconvinced, but again, have much to chew on and study through. I truly appreciate the clarity of the articles on this blog. Thank you for your… endeavor/work/broadly writ service/not-ministry. 😉

  5. “The Christian radio station is not a ministry.” I would agree that a Christian radio station is not (a) church, and the vast majority of such stations in the US are run and overseen by parachurch organizations. But what about (selfishly) the few of us who are run and overseen by a church? In common parlance we say such a station is a ministry, as part of a church, but is more proper than to say “extension of our ministry”? Or shall we now hold a station to a confessional standard, eg. with the limitation that radio is a passive medium – yet can make calls to action? I know some church-run stations that would not be ministries of any kind since they (rarely) deliver a gospel message… so that failure is likely genetic (the parent church is not delivering a gospel message either…

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