Christ built the church (Matthew 16:18). That church is made up of the called out, the world over (Colossians 1:13-14). It is made up of the saved (Acts 2:47). It is His spiritual body (Ephesians 4:4).
The church is all over the world. It is made up of hundreds and thousands of individual congregations. Each congregation is made up of many individual members. This means that the government of the church is local. It is not national or international. In other words, the Lord's church does not have an earthly head or an earthly headquarters.
The Bible teaches that Christ is the head of the church. Let us observe the following verses: "And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all" (Ephesians 1:22-23). "For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body" (Ephesians 5:23). "And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence" (Colossians 1:18). Now what do these verses teach? They teach that Christ is the head of the body, which is the church. How many heads are there? Just one! Christ is that one. He does not share that position with anyone else.
Since Christ is that head of the church, that means He is the head of each local congregation or local church. It also means He is the head of each member of the church. Paul said, "But I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of woman is man, and the head of Christ is God" (1 Corinthians 11:3).
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