“Will there soon be a ‘one-world church’?”

May 2021 – Grace & Truth Magazine

QUESTION: Is it true that soon there will be a one-world church?

ANSWER: Before answering this question, let’s take a brief look at what the Bible tells us the Church is: first, what God says it is, then what it has become, and finally what people think it is.

The Bible’s first mention of the Church is in Matthew 16:18. Peter had just confessed the Lord to be “the Christ, the Son of the living God” (v.16 NKJV). In the Lord’s response, He told Peter, “On this rock I will build My church.” We read of individual godly believers and of God’s earthly nation Israel in the Old Testament, but the Church did not yet exist at that time. Only after the Lord Jesus had died and risen again, and had ascended back into heaven, did He send down the Holy Spirit in Acts 2. On the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down upon the 120 individual believers in the upper room in Jerusalem and united these into one body, the Church – more correctly, the Assembly.

This one-time happening is what God’s Word calls the baptism of the Holy Spirit in 1 Corinthians 12:13. When we accept the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord, we are indwelt and “sealed” by the Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:13; see 1 Cor. 6:19). Thereby we come into all the good of this baptism of the Holy Spirit. We have become members of the body of Christ, the Church. Since we are members of the Church – the only true Church, the Church for which Christ died – there is no need for us to join any humanly-created church. We want to enjoy fellowship with fellow-believers, gathered by the Holy Spirit unto the Lord Jesus. In fact, the teaching in Hebrews 10:19-25 admonishes us not to be “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together” but rather to be “exhorting one another, and so much the more as [we] see the Day approaching” (v.25).

This Day is that glorious day when our Lord Jesus will come to take His Bride to Himself. The final 12 verses of Ephesians 5 teach us that the Church is also His Bride, for which He died, and which He now nourishes, cherishes, cleanses and is making ready to take to Himself to be forever gloriously united to Him. What a Day that will be! We get details as to this in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 and 1 Corinthians 15:51-57.

In John 17 we read the precious prayer the Lord Jesus prayed a few hours before He was betrayed into the hands of His enemies. We see His love for His own and His desire “that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me ... and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me” (vv.21,23). The Lord wanted the world to see the unity His own would be brought into clearly. When the Church began in the early chapters of Acts, we read repeatedly of the “one accord” that was so beautifully displayed (1:14, 2:1,46).

Soon, however, human failure set in, and it did not take long before what the world could see became sadly divided. “Ungodly men” (Jude 4), indeed “savage wolves” (Acts 20:29), crept in unnoticed at first. Self-seeking leaders drew away followers after themselves (v.30). Today the world sees what professes to be the Church split into thousands of often competing fragments, most a mixture of believers and unbelievers, and some actually wicked cults. Christendom is a hodge-podge of every possible kind of belief and practice. What was once “the house of God ... the pillar and ground of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15) has become a “great house” with vessels “for honor and some for dishonor” (2 Tim. 2:20). In fact, in the final stage of the Christian profession, pictured by the church in Laodicea in Revelation 3:14-22, the Lord presents Himself as standing outside the door knocking, seeking admission and desiring to fellowship with any who open the door to Him. This is the state of what professes to be the Church today. Many true believers are waiting for the Lord to give that shout that will call them to Himself.

Some denominations and churches are trying to unite with others. Many compromises are made to do this. If God’s Word is even quoted, it is generally misapplied. Its teachings and standards of right and wrong have been set aside. The simple gospel is little appreciated. Man is boastful of what he is accomplishing. Religion is admired if it is big, impressive and politically correct. Different religions are all treated as equally valid, and the cooperation of their clergy on civic, social and interfaith religious projects is promoted by the media. True Christians are no more popular in the eyes of the world’s leadership than their Lord was when He was here. They are wrongly castigated, or criticized severely, as prejudiced, intolerant fanatics, while anything and anyone else is acceptable and good.

We who by God’s grace have accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord are waiting for Him to call us to Himself. Scripture shows us this could happen at any time, for there are no signs or events that must take place before He comes for us. However, God’s Word reveals to us what will happen in a seven year-long interval between His coming for His own – we call this the rapture – and His appearing with His own in judgment and to set up His millennial kingdom.

At the rapture, believers who have died will be raised in glorified bodies and all believers who are living will be caught up with them. Our bodies will be changed into bodies like that of our Savior after His resurrection. The Lord knows those who are His. When the rapture takes place, not a single believer will be left upon the earth.

Second Thessalonians 2:3-12 tells us what follows here – a time we usually term the tribulation. With believers being caught up to be with the Lord, the Holy Spirit who indwells us, restraining the evil in the world today, also will be taken away. There will then be no hindrance, and the things the Bible indicates will take place. In this chapter we see “the Man of Sin” (v.3), who is elsewhere called “the Antichrist” (1 Jn. 2:18), the “beast coming up out of the earth” (Rev. 13:11) and “the false prophet” (19:20). In Revelation we are told more of what will happen during this seven-year period. We must, of course, not forget that Revelation is written in symbolic language, the symbols being either from other Scriptures or explained when first used in this book.

With churches today on the one hand combining and putting great emphasis on getting bigger, and on the other hand de-emphasizing doctrine in favor of tolerance and inclusivity, it is not at all surprising that when the true Christians and the Holy Spirit are removed, these features will greatly increase. Churches can and will continue, but not under the headship of Christ. It will probably not be long before what is left of apostate Christendom will feel it advantageous to unite under one human head. The ecumenical movement of today will no doubt wind up in one world church headquartered at Rome, the city known for the seven hills upon which it is built (consider Rev. 17:9). The organizational structure is largely in place already. This world church is called “Babylon the Great” in Revelation 17 and 18 and is pictured as a harlot and as a great city that is a great commercial system. It has a long history of trying to rule the world and has in the past asserted itself to be above secular rulers. This church also has a history of many centuries of persecuting God’s true servants and people. It professes to be the Bride of Christ, while being known for her unfaithfulness to Him and her lust for power.

The things mentioned in Revelation 4–19 are events that take place after the rapture. We Christians are then with the Lord. The dominance of the world church will not last long. The beast upon which the woman in Revelation 17:3 sits is a picture of the revived Roman Empire headed up by the first beast (13:1-8) – the beast that rises up out of the sea, the sea being a picture in Scripture of the Gentile nations. These nations over which she has long sought to rule will in time rise up against her, overthrow her power and devastate her (17:16-17). This is how the Lord’s judgment against the harlot church will be carried out. We, then in heaven, will be called upon to rejoice, and will do so, when this corrupt murderous organization meets its well-deserved end (18:20, 19:1-6).

Our part now as Christians, who love, honor and gather to the Lord Jesus, is to recognize that things are already building up to what will come into full focus during the tribulation. We should walk in separation from all this, not allowing ourselves to be drawn into any of it. May we take to heart the call from heaven in Revelation 18:4, which says, “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues.” Let us rather heed the call in Ephesians 4:1-3, beseeching us “to walk worthy of the calling with which [we are] called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

Answered by Eugene P. Vedder, Jr.