The Body of Christ in Mission: Paul’s Ecclesiology and the Role of the Church in Mission

Abstract

The debate among New Testament scholars regarding the question of whether or not Paul assigns a mission mandate to the church as a body has reached a veritable impasse. This article argues that the exclusive focus on the issue of a Pauline ecclesiological mission mandate has resulted in an attenuated reading of the apostle’s epistles that fails to consider whether his understanding of the church precludes the necessity for such a directive. Rather, the author avers that Paul’s metaphor of the church as the body of Christ, as it is used in Rom 12:4–8;1 Cor 12:12–30; Eph 1:22–23; 4:4–16, and Col 1:18; 2:18–19, functions to hold the centripetal (attractive) and centrifugal (outward-directed) roles of the church together in a way that makes it unnecessary for the apostle to frame a mission mandate to the church as his interpreters envision it; that is, as something akin to the “Great Commission.” Moreover, this particular and pervasive metaphor highlights the dialectical tension in Paul’s ecclesiology between the essential unity of the body of Christ and the diverse spiritual gifts among its members, which makes it problematic to view the individual and the church as polarized entities. Accordingly, the task of mission includes not only the exercise of the gift of evangelism, but also those charisma aimed at bringing individual members of the body to spiritual maturity which, in turn, is evidenced in winsome ethical holiness and loving, godly relationships. In other words, for Paul, evangelism and discipleship are inextricably linked.