Has there ALWAYS been a true church?

[Aquila]

Originally Posted by Esaias

Does this not teach that in world there are sons of God and also sons of the wicked one, and that the wicked will be cast out and burned but the righteous will inherit the kingdom? How can this be teaching "the Lord will have no identifiable ekklesia until Judgement Day"? Seems quite a stretch to get that from the text.

Christ's very point was that we can't separate the wheat from the tares because they grow together. In other words, in any given body there will be false believers and true believers. Even within churches affiliated with mainstream Apostolic organizations we have to keep in mind, not every member is a true believer. And if that can be said of nearly any congregation... we can't truly differentiate all the true believers from all the false believers.

Paul wrote to a definite assembly and says there are divisions and factions (heresies) among them. Nevertheless it cannot be denied he was speaking to a definite local apostolic assembly of believers.

True, but we also realize that churches today are not much different than churches then. Thus, we should expect that a degree of false teaching exists within every congregation.