The main issue the every Christian and congregation must
wrestle with is that of Authority. On what basis do you decide and what
criteria do you employ to determine Christian doctrine and life? What do we
believe and how do we apply it?
Most Churches respond with some kind of mixture of Scripture,
Reason and Tradition. Even the churches professing to follow Scripture Alone all
too easily fall into this trap. It's easy to do. We are often affected by our
culture, traditions and patterns of thought without realizing it.
To escape this, we must be conscientious in how we approach
the Scripture and it is our contention that this small town and in fact many
communities presently contain no congregations that are consistent in their
application of Scripture. This is not to say that there aren't some that are
better than others, nor are we suggesting there aren't true Christians in the community,
but this fundamental issue must be addressed before we even begin to move on to
some of the pervasive errors and problems within the Christian community and
especially its doctrine and practice.
We will take it for granted that anyone bothering to read
this will agree that the Roman Catholic Church is not a Biblically defined
legitimate Church. Not wishing at present to revisit its history and
development, suffice it to say that it does not possess the Gospel and that no
one who is concerned with the Word of God can in good conscience be a part of
it.
That said, we're left with really two or three options in
this community, and this small town is by no means alone. We have what can be
called Theologically Liberal or Mainline churches as well as Dispensational and
Holiness groups.
Interestingly these largely represent theological trends that
are scarcely more than a century or so in age. The Liberal Churches abandoned
Scripture long ago, sacrificing it to rationalism and modern science. For the
most part they deny cardinal doctrines that without which there can be no
Gospel at all. The Bible itself ends up being reduced to little more spiritual
stories and helpful sayings. Jesus is not God-Incarnate, the Saviour of the
world, instead he becomes a Gandhi-like teacher whose words and deeds are to be
admired, but in no way is it to be believed that he was born of a virgin, died to
pay for our sins, rose from the dead and is destined to return. As J. Gresham
Machen rightly said in his 1923 work 'Christianity and Liberalism' these
churches in fact represent a different religion, one that utilizes our terms
and language but has replaced them with different content and ideas.
These churches are on almost every corner and yet in terms of
Scripture are not churches at all. This not to say there aren't still some
Christians to be found in these congregations, but it is our hope they will
depart these congregations that no longer follow the God of Scripture.
Dispensationalism is the most common theology of American
Evangelicals. Born in Britain in the 1800's it arrived in America around the
turn of the 20th century and was quickly popularized with the
publication of the Scofield Reference Bible. During the seasons of controversy
and church-splits in the 1920s and 1930s it was the new Dispensational teachers
who 'seemed' to be teaching Scripture and many were carried away by their
doctrines. Today they are almost universal and are represented by the teachings
found in the Left Behind books and popularized by men such as Hal Lindsey,
Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and many more.
Dissecting Dispensationalism and exposing its mistakes is
beyond the scope of this short essay but for now we will only say the system
rests on some key foundational beliefs that are rooted in theological innovation
and consequently have led to its elaborate interpretation of Bible Prophecy
regarding the nation of Israel and modern geopolitics.
We believe this system to be in error and certainly if true
is at best problematic as no one in all of Church history had ever come up with
it prior to the mid-1800's. This does not necessarily mean that its false, but
that alone should give one pause.
It must emphasized that we believe Scripture Alone is the
guide but also that Scripture can be understood and though the story of the
Christian Church is one riddled with false teaching and apostasy there have
always been testimonies to the truth and that the body of true Christian
doctrine has been available and is accessible to anyone grounded in the text.
We do not believe this truth has been preserved by one group or even in one or
two core doctrines. There have been groups and individuals throughout history
that have held to a mix of truth and error but we also believe that in our own
day the American Church has reached a crisis point and that faithful believers
need to re-think the Institutional Church.
Another possible group represented in area is that of the
Holiness camp. These groups born out of the Wesleyan tradition often overlap
with the Dispensational and the even later groups of Pentecostals and
Charismatics. Well meaning to be sure we believe they have buried the gospel
under layers of extra-Scriptural legalistic requirements and in many cases
teach little more than a works-based doctrine of salvation. Those that have
embraced Pentecostalism have abandoned Scripture Alone as the standard and
instead believe in modern prophets and Apostles. We believe the Scriptures
themselves refute this understanding of Authority and the modern groups who
claim to have it.
The application of the Scriptures affect all of life and as
ones renewed in mind and heart we are to be transformed. The Bible will teach
us the nature of God's Kingdom and how to live as strangers and pilgrims on
this earth. While we appreciate the desire to be separate that many groups in
our area express, we believe in many cases they've actually missed the true
nature of our separation as well as the reality of the struggle between those
who would take up the cross and follow Christ and those who would cling to
tradition or find comfort in baptizing the ways of the world.