Are churches of Christ a “borderline cult” like Jim Jones' or David Koresh's church in Waco, TX? Or, are we just another denomination? Just who are we? Let me introduce us to you today, will you?
Thank you, thank you, my friend, for joining our Bible study In Search of the Lord's Way for becoming a Christian and living the Christian life. The first four books of the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, reveal to us God's perfect pattern for Christian living in the person of Jesus Christ. Acts, the fifth book, tells us how to become one of His disciples. It gives example after example of true conversion to Christ and His way of life. The letters or the epistles, beginning with Paul's to the Romans, reveals to us the perfect pattern for the church that Jesus established. Although no one has ever measured up to the perfect pattern for the Christian's personal life, as it is revealed in Jesus, all true disciples keep striving for it. And the same is true with the perfect pattern for church life. No church I have ever known has ever measured up perfectly to the pattern for the Lord's church, but many of us keep striving for it. And it is far better to aim for the perfect and miss it, than to aim at an imperfect one of human origin and attain it. Don't you agree?
In all our programs this month, we are responding to the Baptist preacher's charge against churches of Christ on the Nancy Grace segment of the CNN Evening News program awhile back -- that churches of Christ are a young "cult-like sect," established by Alexander Campbell some 150 years or so ago. Of course, anyone who knows anything at all about churches of Christ knows we are not "a cult like sect,"-- like Jim Jones cult in which, well, more than 800 people committed suicide with him in Guyana a few years ago; or the David Koresh fellow whose cult was at the heart of the terrible Waco, Texas incident not too long ago. We are giving our series the title, "Churches of Christ, Who Are We?" At the end of the month they will be published in a little book like this. And you may have one free by mailing your request to In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083. Our e-mail address is searchtv@aol.com. Or you may use our toll-free telephone number and we will pay for the call, too. That number is 1-800-321-8633. Of course, you may access all of them on our website at: searchtv.org.
In the message last week we studied what the Bible says about "Who Began the Church and When?" Today we will be discussing, first, a departure from original Christianity, which departure is foretold in the Scriptures themselves, and secondly, we will be studying some efforts at reforming the apostate church and the rise of denominationalism. Next week we will explore the urgent need for returning to pure, undefiled Christianity as it is revealed in your Bible. We are glad you are with us; we pray we will both be blessed by our study. Ken Helterbrand is going to lead us now in a hymn, and then I will be back.
We are reading from the apostle Paul’s first letter to Timothy, in chapter 4 beginning at verse one. “Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.” Now we read through verse 5. Let us go to God in prayer. Holy Father, we come to You in prayer now in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior, to thank You for the radio and television and network possibilities by which we can come together into people’s homes and at their invitation, and search the scripture with them for truth and especially the truth about Your way to be born again, to be born into Your family which is the church and to live the Christian life. We pray You now to open our hearts to what we find there and may we obey it all. Amen.
In Acts 20, verses 17 through 38, I believe, is the apostle Paul's farewell to the elders of the church at Ephesus. And in that passage he says, "...take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves."
In the passage we read just awhile ago, in his first letter to Timothy Paul wrote, "Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith" (I Timothy 4:1). When he wrote his farewell to Timothy He wrote it again. It was a warning worth repeating! This time he said, "I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables" (2 Timothy 4, verses 1 to 4).
The apostle Peter also warned: "...there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed" (2 Peter 2, verses 1 and 2).
Those and other such prophecies began to be fulfilled before the end of the very first century. The church at Ephesus is an excellent example of that. It had been a great church. But, by about 96 AD, while the apostle John was exiled on Patmos for preaching the truth of the gospel, he received the revelation which constitutes the last book of the New Testament. And the church at Ephesus had ceased to be all it had been. The reason I know that is that in Revelation 1:9 to 20 John described the vision he had of the Son of Man standing in the midst of seven golden lampstands. And he didn't understand what those lampstands meant. We probably wouldn't either if the Lord hadn't explained them as He did to John in verse 20. He said, "...the seven lampstands which you saw are the seven churches." He commissioned John to send letters to each of those seven churches in Asia. One was the church at Ephesus. The Lord's message to that once great church was this: "I know your works... Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place-- unless you repent." That is Revelation chapter 2, verses 1 to 7. That once-great-church would cease to be the Lord's church, if it didn't repent. It isn't that other churches would "mark" or "disfellowship" the one at Ephesus. No, no, nothing like that; that isn't what He said. The Lord said He would remove its candlestick, Himself. So, churches would depart from the faith. a-n-d the Son of God would remove their candlesticks, their identity.
Well, it didn't happen in one giant step. Historians tell us that the apostasy developed so slowly, that very likely most members didn't-- and still don't know-- it even happened. Some people living now-- more than twenty centuries later-- still proudly maintain their membership in an apostate church. They take pride in the fact that they can trace their lineage through the centuries all the way back to Acts, chapter two. But, what they don't realize is that they have fallen so far away that that church bears no slight resemblance to the one in the New Testament. The first departures were in organization. Jesus Christ, the risen Lord, is the head of the church that you read about in your Bible (Ephesians 1:22 and chapter 5, verse 23). He has never yielded that position or delegated that authority to any human being, my friend-- no, not even to the apostle Peter. He chose twelve men and taught and trained them to be His apostles (ones sent on His authority) as official "ambassadors" of His kingdom (2 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 20). One of them betrayed Him and was replaced by Matthias (Acts chapter 1, verse 26). The Bible nowhere names successors to any of the other apostles. Later Paul was especially chosen, "as one born out of due time" (1 Corinthians 15, verse 8) to be an apostle-- not a successor to an apostle now, but an apostle. And those apostles live on in the church today through their work and their ministry in the churches. There never were, and there never will be any more apostles in the Lord's church.
According to Ephesians chapter 4, verse 11, Christ also gave some to be prophets. This gift was given to the early church for "the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ; till, we come to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the fullness of Christ;" that is Ephesians chapter 4, verses 11 through 16; or until the will of God was perfectly or completely revealed as it is written in 1 Corinthians chapter 13, verse 10. The apostles and prophets live on in the foundation of the church by their teachings in the Scriptures (Ephesians 2:19-22).
There is biblical authority for evangelists and pastors and teachers in the churches today (Philippians 1:1 for example; and 1 Timothy 3:1 to 14; and Titus chapter 1, verses 1 to 16, and other passages). They continue in each church the work of equipping and edifying the local body of believers.
The New Testament uses six words, elders and presbyters, bishops or overseers, pastors or shepherds, without distinction of office or rank. These were men (always men) chosen from within the congregation by the members of the congregation for the work described in Acts chapter 20, verses 17 through 38 as we read them awhile ago. Titus chapter 1, verse16 also includes that. And in the New Testament you never read of Synods, Councils, Conventions, Associations or Conferences composed of delegates from all the churches in different localities to constitute an Ecclesiastical Legislative Body. There were deacons in every church though (Philippians 1:1). An example of their work and service is seen in Acts chapter 6, verses 1 to 7 right on into the 8th chapter. The evangelist's work is described in the name given him in Ephesians 4:11-- that of evangelizing or preaching the good news of Christ. Yes, at least two men, Stephen and Philip, chosen by the church to serve tables in the Jerusalem church also preached or they evangelized.
Up to this point, we have had the Bible for our guide. And we are perfectly comfortable with what we read there, aren't we? But now we must rely on reliable historians. So now, if you doubt me on any of the following material, I suggest before you write me, that you go to your public library, to the religious history section, and study these things for yourself. I don't know what books there are in your particular library, but I am fully confident with what is there you will find will support what I am saying.
Reliable historians enable us to know that soon after the apostolic age the standing office of the President of the Presbytery must have been formed, and as having pre-eminent oversight, the person was designed, or was designated "Bishop". So began the apostasy. There was the creation of a new class of officers in the churches known as "country bishops". These began occasional conventions, composed of delegates from different congregations, for the purpose of settling disputes among them, which conventions assumed legislative authority. There soon followed General Synods and Councils with permanent presiding officers called "Metropolitans". Bishops claimed supreme power. They no longer counseled with the presbyters.
The first General Council was called by the Roman Emperor Constantine in 325 A.D. It was supposed to have represented the universal church. John the Faster, Bishop of Constantinople, assumed the title of "Universal Bishop of the church" in A.D. 588. But Boniface II, Patriarch of Rome had the title transferred to Himself to become the first Pope in 606 A.D.
With the exaltation of mere men to positions of legislative power, came significant, there also came significant changes in fundamental doctrines and in worship of the church. For example: First and most obvious is that Christ is no longer head of the apostate church. Second, the Scriptures are no longer the final word, as we are taught in Colossians 3:16-17. Now, it is "church tradition," approved by the council. The First Vatican Council, convened by Pope Pius IX, declared the doctrine of Papal Infallibility; that is when he speaks ex-cathedra (meaning from the chair) on matters of faith and morals he then speaks the law of the Lord.
Third: In the beginning of the church, baptism was for repentant believers only (Acts 2:38). But by the middle of the second century, there appear references by notable "scholars" to baptism of infants, some for it, some opposed it. Baptism had been "for the remission of sins," as taught in Acts 2:38, and it came to be thought that babies were born sinful, it was felt their baptism on their second day of life was essential, lest they should die with inherited sins upon them. Fourth: In the New Testament, baptism was always administered by immersion (Romans 6:3 and 4). That is the meaning of the word. Baptism is not "by immersion." It is immersion. The first case of sprinkling for baptism was called "clinic baptism," because the subject was very ill. When he had recovered and was about to become a Bishop, he was rejected because it was contended he had not been baptized. Sprinkling for baptism was not fully approved until the Council of Ravena in 1311 A.D. It has never had the approval of Christ.
Fifth: Instrumental music was not accepted in public worship until in the eighth century A.D. Other matters of worship will have to be taken up later. And we have mentioned these only as illustrations of the apostle Paul's statement in our text that, "...in latter times some will depart from the faith..." They have. And let us pray about it. Father, we are thankful to You for your preservation of your church through the centuries based on the truth that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead as revealed in the Bible. We pray, Father, that we can persuade people everywhere to follow your teachings as they are revealed in your word in the Bible. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
You may be wondering about the title that we have given the message today-- and we haven't touched on it yet, have we? Well, the question so many, "Why So Many Denominations?" Let us use the rest of our time there, whatta ya say?
As the centuries rolled on, the departures from the faith became more, and the apostate church, led by men obsessed with their great power, became corrupt morally as well as doctrinally. But, not every one acquiesced or yielded to them. Men of unusual courage--members of the apostate church they were now, who had opportunity to know the Bible and the kind of church they saw in it, sought a "reformation" of the church so as to it fit the one they read about in the New Testament. John Wycliff was one such person. He was born sometime around 1320. He has been called "The Morning Star of the Reformation." He is best known for his translation of the Bible into English, making it possible for the English-speaking world to read it for themselves. He made fifty charges against the apostate church. He died in 1384. Martin Luther who lived from 1483 to 1546, has often been called "the father of the reformation." He had 95 objections to the church. He is remembered for having nailed them to the church door in Wittenburg, Germany. John Calvin, 1506 to 1564, was another great reformer. His influence may be stronger among protestants these five centuries later than any of the others that we have mentioned or even could mention.
While these reformers-- and many others we don't have time to mention-- were great men and they came forth with great ideas and a dogged determination to reform the apostate church as it was then, they were just men. And we should accept what they taught only when it is in agreement with the plain teachings of the New Testament. They were united in noble idea of reformation, but they differed sharply on some critical matters of faith and doctrine. And because of those differences, "the old-line" denominations were born. With the idea that denominational Christianity has the approval of God, the door then was opened to the birth of any new denomination a person wants to start on whatever grounds he wants to found it. We can't help but ask the questions Paul asked: "Now I say this, that each of you says, I am of Paul, or I am of Apollos, or I am of Cephas, or I am of Christ. Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?"
Next week, we will begin here with the idea of-- not reformation, but the need for a returning to the New Testament in our present society and the church as we read about it there. I hope you can be with us then. If you think you would like to have a free copy of these messages published in this little book, you may have it, free, just by sending your request to In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083, or by e-mail searchtv@aol.com. Or, if you prefer to call, please use our toll-free number. That is 1-800-321-8633. Say we are so glad you were with us today. Do it again next week, will you? We love you. |