From the Forward of the Book: The Church: Keepers of the Flame by E. L. Bynum… to be released tomorrow.

If you are here to find “new truth” then you are in the wrong place.
God has given us “all Scripture” that we need for life, godliness and doctrine.

However if you have come to see truth in a “new way” you may have just happened on a book that will unlock some of the precious truths from God’s Word about the Lord’s church.
The doctrine of the church has been taught for centuries by Gods men in the Lords churches.
But equally it has been mis-taught by Protestants and those influenced by them.

I well remember the day when the truth of a local, visible church began to come clear to me in Scripture.
This truth began to shape my heart and actions for the next several decades.

The invisible church theory believed and taught by many left me with a nebulous, empty application of truth. Everywhere I looked I saw the lack of any real importance of the church in christian lives. We see the evidence of it all around us.
Churches abandoned, ministries ineffective and a world that is unreached.

But when I began to understand the church of Scripture is a visible, local entity, then I began to see the importance of the church in my life and others in new ways.
It radically altered my perspective, my practice and my preaching.
As I began to grasp the importance of a local church teaching, I began to communicate it to those I taught and have seen the fruit of faithfulness in churches for Gods people pay great dividends.
No Christian can rightly serve the Lord outside the authority of one of the Lords churches.

E. L. Bynum was one of the men the Lord used through the years to take the teaching of the church from theory to practical reality for me. But not only for me, for many men around the world that read the paper he edited, The Plains Baptist Challenger.
He has been a blessing to so very many men and in turn, to the people they have reached with Bible truth.
Now in this book you will be able to sit at his feet once again and uncover some of the profound truths of Scripture relating to the church that Jesus built.

The church in Scripture is unveiled in many different ways.
But 3 ways specifically should challenge us.

The church is a Building
Ephesians 2:21-22 “In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.”
In the invisible church theory we are left with little application of this verse and only hoping that one day in glory we will see it played out.
But with the understanding of a local congregation being the church, we understand that each member is put in the building with a purpose by the Lord. We then have a growing appreciation for the place that every member fills and will begin to work at ‘growing’ into a temple that the Lord himself can inhabit and show his presence to the world we live in.

The church is a Body
Ephesians 1:22-23 “And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.”
The universal theory says that God is doing his work through all these invisible members around the world that we know nothing of. Nice thought, but little to no real application.
However, the local assembly as taught in Scripture is actively striving to work together in the task of world evangelism. Not leaving the work to cheap words that mean nothing, they put feet to the task at hand and labor together to get the Word of God out to the nations.

The church is a Bride
Ephesians 5:23-27 “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body…Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, 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.”
The invisible church theory leaves a person looking at the bride as a future happening that one can do little to nothing about except wait and see.
Yet the local church view of right Bible doctrine produces an urgency of cleansing, and preparing for the return of the bridegroom to receive his own. The pastor preaches on holiness with a fervency that should be expected, and the congregation anxiously anticipates the coming of the bridegroom for them. This in turn causes a preparation of life and heart to welcome him gladly and unashamed.

The doctrine of the church is a very practical truth with many aspects that the child of God should contemplate.
In this book, The Church: Keepers of the Flame, by E. L. Bynum, you will sit at the feet of a man who for more than 60 years has taught well this doctrine and been used of the Lord to help Gods people understand some of the depth of these truths surrounding the Church that Jesus built.

I highly recommend this work to you for your understanding of sound doctrine and preparation of a separate life that will be well pleasing to the Lord at his appearing.

Doug Hammett