It appears that you are saying that only individuals do things and not the body (church), is this what you mean?<\/p>\n
Thank you.<\/p>\n\t
It depends on what “things” you are referring to.\u00a0There are things commanded of the church and there are things commanded of the individual Christian. A few of them overlap, but many of them do not. For example, a Christian is commanded to teach (Matthew 28:19-20), but so is the church (Ephesians 4:11-16). However, an individual is commanded to be baptized (Acts 2:38), but a church cannot be baptized.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Question: It appears that you are saying that only individuals do things and not the body (church), is this what you mean? Thank you. Answer: It depends on what “things” you are referring to.\u00a0There are things commanded of the church and there are things commanded of the individual Christian. A few of them overlap, but…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[20],"tags":[193,1508],"class_list":["post-27862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-individual-vs-church","tag-institutionalism"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1995,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-there-any-spiritual-work-that-an-individual-christian-may-do-that-the-church-may-not\/","url_meta":{"origin":27862,"position":0},"title":"Is there any spiritual work that an individual Christian may do that the church may not?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 15, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Comment: The following is taken from a list of questions sent to me by my request. The author is from a more liberally-minded group who is preparing lessons on the issues that separate some churches of Christ. He was interested in the other side's point of view and I was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":88704,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-individual-member-versus-the-church\/","url_meta":{"origin":27862,"position":1},"title":"The Individual Member Versus the Church","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 16, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Charles Spence via\u00a0Sentry Magazine, Vol. 17 No. 4, 31 December 1991 As those who obey the gospel are added to the Lord's church, they have a responsibility to join with disciples in their area. 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I am not Catholic and the baptism meant nothing because I lived a life\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":30900,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/does-a-person-leaving-the-christian-church-need-to-be-baptized-again\/","url_meta":{"origin":27862,"position":3},"title":"Does a person leaving the Christian Church need to be baptized again?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 11, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: What is your thinking (based on Scripture) on a situation where someone has been baptized in the Christian Church but says they were baptized for the remission of sins and they want to place membership in the church of Christ? Do they need to be baptized again? 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But\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":23490,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-do-you-do-about-helping-the-downtrodden\/","url_meta":{"origin":27862,"position":5},"title":"What do you do about helping the downtrodden?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 11, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hi, I noticed something through\u00a0your home page description\u00a0and\u00a0the social gospel question answered\u00a0that makes me have a question for you: What do you do about feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting sick and imprisoned? 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