When Did We Stop?

When did we stop being the Church of the first century? When did we stop trying to be the Church of the first century? Those questions are actually a bit misleading, so let me try again. The Church in the first century included congregations with issues - some with fairly significant issues. So, probably a better question is to ask is, when did we stop trying to restore New Testament Christianity? Was there a point in time when, collectively, we agreed that we had arrived at our goal and then set up camp and stayed put? I don't know about you, but sometimes it feels like that is what we have done.

We worship at different congregations. We worship at different types of congregations - some with very little in common. But the one consistently correspondent trait is that we all think we are being the Church that Jesus established and the Apostles gave their lives to grow. Is that possible, that we can "do Church" so differently yet all be "doing Church" correctly? Some Christians passionately say yes. We can have our differences and no one has the right to judge my preferences. Others passionately say no; and insist that there is only one way and if it's not done that one way then all is lost, and there can be no fellowship.

It seems that we are at an impass. We can continue to throw rocks at each other. What I mean is, we can continue to call each other names like, liberal or legalist; and we can continue to refuse fellowship with one another. Or, we can commit to one other to seek the Truth of God's Word and only God's Word; and thereby find a common ground where we can live in harmony. Because, make no mistake, we are at an impass and something has got to give. We are losing souls because we can't agree on whose opinion we are going to honor.

So what did the First Century Church look like? Well, that's a question that I am hardly qualified to answer and couldn't attempt in a short amount of time. But there's some things that we can't know because the Bible just doesn't tell us. But there are many things that we can know. For example, we can know that the Apostles thought it was wrong for women to take a leading role in public worship. We can also know that the New Testament Christians didn't use instruments in worship. It's not because there were no instruments available. For some reason they purposefully excluded them. Probably because the teaching they were receiving from the Apostles and their local prophets was telling them only to sing. That's all the New Testament gives us. So that's what we have to go on.

There's other things we can know for sure. The Apostles and prophets never mentioned how God desires the singing to be led. Nor did they mention when, where and how often they must meet on the first day of the week. Nor did they talk about translations of the scrolls (i.e. scriptures, doesn't that sound silly. I can't believe we argue about that one). They also didn't give any direction on how we are supposed to dress when we assemble together for worship and Bible study. The list could go on. Throughout the course of the past few generations we have developed customs and preferences based primarily on practical necessity and culture. And now we stand here today insisting that our customs and preferences be honored or else.

Like I said before, when did we stop trying to restore New Testament Christianity? When did my opinion become more important than God's Word? When did I stop deeply searching for the Truth of God's revelation and begin accepting man's interpretation of it? Family, I could very well be completely mistaken. If I am please correct me. I love God too much to disappoint Him, especially when I could easily be corrected. And I don't want to stand before Him having taught people incorrectly. It is past time for us to kick Satan out of the Church, bring Jesus back in and get about the business of being followers of Christ and growers of the Kingdom. What do you think? Is it time for another Restoration Movement?

Considering Romans 14

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Romans 14 is such a tough chapter. Not really tough to understand, but tough to do. It seems that the summary verse is 13. It says, "Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother." What's so hard about that? Have you struggled with fulfilling this scripture? Have you been on the other end of someone else struggling to fulfill this scripture? We do this in the church - too often. Instead of considering ways to encourage and help strengthen our "weaker" brothers we expect them to rise to our level of spiritual maturity. And when they don't, we isolate, alienate and marginalize them.

Try to be objective for a moment and consider whether or not you are guilty of this. Think about this question as a litmus test for yourself - do I doctrinalize issues that are were not meant to be doctrinal? This seems to be the starting block for much of the issues we have. We read issues, contexts and opinions into scripture - when in fact it does not belong. This was the issue that came up in Acts with the Jewish brethren who insisted that their gentile brothers ought to meet their traditions before they could be accepted into the body. That was wrong. So why do we do the same thing? Why do we carry on our traditions, call them scriptural or doctrinal and insist that others follow us down this road?

It's past time for us to come together under the umbrella of scriptural unity. Understanding that we will not always agree, we can not continue to doctrinalize issues that make us uncomfortable and expect to be able to call names because people don't follow "our" doctrine.