The Church

In the midst of what I consider very compelling definitions of the Bible, Seerveld comments on the church:

That scholarly discovery in the Bible sparked a new-old idea of "church." Church is not the clergy, the administrative clerics, or the popes in charge because they are the only one single, true apostolic authority succeeding from Simon Peter. The "church" is the communion of ordinary, sinful saints who have repented! It is faithful people (ho laos, the laity) of God, the believers sealed in the baptism of Jesus Christ and stamped, anointed by the Holy Spirit, ordained to live out and mediate the gospel to others.