You forgot to include more of that passage.
Matthew 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.
The “church” in that instance was the local group of believers, not a central overall ruling organization.
>>Not churches, THE church. Singular.<<
You mean like the “church” at Corinth? Or like the “church” at Ephesus. Or maybe the “church” in Smyrna? How about the “church” in Sardis or the “church” of the of the Laodiceans?
Interesting how they were not included in some overarching ruling hierarchy like the RCC isn’t it?
-—You mean like the “church” at Corinth? Or like the “church” at Ephesus. Or maybe the “church” in Smyrna? How about the “church” in Sardis or the “church” of the of the Laodiceans?——
Jesus would not COMMAND us to take our disputes to THE Church, unless It was His Church (SINGULAR), a visible Church, and unless it taught authoritatively.
Otherwise, His COMMAND would be impossible to follow. His command would be void.
Therefore, any individual church, to be fully in communion with Christ’s Church, would have to be obedient in its teachings to those teachings proclaimed by the apostles, or their successors, the bishops, when meeting in Council, or the Pope, when invoking his infallible teaching authority.