What is the church

The Bride of Christ

Ephesians 5:25, 27 · The church, the people of God

The Bible calls the church the bride of Christ, and it is the tenderest name the church has. It means that Jesus does not relate to his people as a distant master but as a bridegroom who loves his bride, who gave himself entirely for her, and who is making her beautiful. To belong to the church is to be loved by Christ with a love that cost him everything and will never let go.

Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.Ephesians 5:25, 27 (KJV)

A love that gave everything

When Paul wanted to show husbands how to love their wives, he pointed them to Christ and the church. Husbands, love your wives, he wrote, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it. The standard of love he sets is the cross. This is how Jesus loves his people: not with words only, but by giving himself entirely, holding nothing back, laying down his own life for her good.

Let that sink in against every lie that says you are unloved or unlovable. The church is not tolerated by Christ. She is cherished. He did not love her because she was already beautiful; he loved her to the point of death while she was still unlovely, and gave himself for her. If you are his, this is the love that is over you: not fragile, not conditional, but the love of a bridegroom who has already proven it in blood.

This is what makes the church precious even when it is unimpressive. We are used to measuring worth by beauty or usefulness or success. But the church's worth is set by what Christ paid for her, and he paid himself. A thing is worth what someone will give for it, and the church is worth the life of the Son of God. That is her true value, and it does not rise or fall with how the church looks on any given Sunday.

A love that makes beautiful

Paul goes on. Christ gave himself for the church that he might sanctify and cleanse it, and present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, but holy and without blemish. The love of Christ is not blind to what is wrong with his bride. He sees every spot. But his love does not wait for her to be beautiful before he loves her; his love is what makes her beautiful.

This is deep comfort for anyone who feels too flawed to belong. Christ is not standing back until the church, or until you, become presentable. He is at work, patiently washing, healing, and making new, so that one day he will present his bride radiant. The church you belong to now is a bride still being made ready, and so are you, and the beauty is his doing, not yours.

Paul even says how the cleansing happens: with the washing of water by the word. Christ makes his bride beautiful largely through Scripture, spoken and heard and obeyed among his people. This is one more reason the church gathers around the word of God. It is not dry religion; it is the bridegroom tending his bride, washing away what disfigures her, so that she comes to look more and more like the one who loves her.

A great mystery, and a real union

Paul quotes the words from Genesis about marriage, that the two shall be one flesh, and then says something startling: This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church. Human marriage, it turns out, was always a picture of something larger, the union of Christ and his people. The love between a husband and wife at its best is a small echo of the love that binds Jesus to the church.

That is why belonging to the church is not like joining a club or subscribing to an organization. It is being joined to a Person who loves you, in a union the Bible dares to compare to marriage. You are not a member number to Christ. You are part of the bride he gave himself for, and the whole story of Scripture ends at a wedding, the marriage supper of the Lamb, where that love is finally and fully consummated.

This runs like a thread through the whole Bible. Long before Ephesians, God spoke of himself as the husband of his people, wooing them, grieving over their unfaithfulness, promising to betroth them to himself forever. In Christ that promise comes true. The distant covenant becomes a person you can know and love, and the ancient longing of God to dwell with his people finds its answer in a bridegroom who will not rest until his bride is home with him.

The waiting bride and the coming day

To call the church a bride is also to say she is waiting. The bridegroom has gone to prepare a place, and he is coming again for her. All the church's present life, its worship, its faithfulness, its endurance through hardship, is the life of a bride keeping herself for the day she sees him face to face. This gives the church its hope: the story is going somewhere good, toward a reunion, not an ending.

So if the church in this age looks weary or plain to you, remember what she is: a bride between the promise and the wedding, loved already, being made ready still. And the invitation of the gospel is finally a wedding invitation. There is room at that table for you, and the Bridegroom himself is the one who calls.

Loved as a bride, so free to love

Knowing you are loved like this changes everything about how you belong to the church. People who are unsure of love grasp and compete and keep score. But a bride secure in her bridegroom's love has nothing to prove. Because Christ has loved the church to the uttermost, its members are freed to love one another without fear, to serve without needing credit, and to forgive because they have been so completely forgiven first.

This is why the New Testament moves so naturally from Christ's love for the church to the way Christians are to treat each other: be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven you. The love you receive from the bridegroom is meant to overflow to the rest of his bride. If you have felt starved for love, the church at its truest is where the love of Christ is passed from hand to hand, and where you are invited not only to receive it but to give it away.

Hold on to this above every disappointment the church may bring you. Its people will fail, its gatherings will sometimes feel ordinary, and it will never in this life be the flawless bride it is destined to become. But the love that defines it does not come from the people; it comes from the bridegroom, and it is stronger than every failure. To belong to the church is to stand inside that love, being made new by it, and to be handed the joy of loving others with the very love you have received. There is a place for you within it.

Across the traditions: Traditions differ on much, but the picture of the church as the bride of Christ is shared across them, drawn straight from Ephesians and Revelation. It is a way of speaking about Christ's love, not a point of division.

An honest word: The church has often been an unfaithful and unlovely bride, and honesty requires us to say so. Her failures are real and have wounded many. Yet the marvel of the gospel is that Christ loves her still and is cleansing her, which is the only reason any of us, spot and wrinkle and all, dare to belong.

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