Random Aberrations, Apostasies, and Heresies

“Churches” are getting more and more bizarre every day.

The cult of homosexuality is invading so many churches, and so many Christians have been brainwashed into the idea of “acceptance,” that too many people have never really been told the truth about what God says about homosexuality.  I wrote an article five years ago in which I demonstrated conclusively from Scripture that homosexual behavior is NEVER acceptable to God.  Too many Christian leaders, though, are trying to justify this sin when they should be calling for repentance.

More proof of the cultic nature of the Church of Christ.

Chapter 3 Ministries has part 2 of her review of Beth Moore’s September “Living Proof Live Simulcast.”  Along with this, Pirate Christian radio analyzes Moore’s teachings, allowing you to actually hear what Beth is saying — and it isn’t pretty!

A good examination of the charismatic “hedge of protection.”

The Jehovah’s Witnesses have always had a very bizarre, aberrational, and heretical view of Creation.  Their day=epoch teaching, trying to fit in evolution, is totally unbiblical and scientifically untenable.

Rick Joyner is another false teacher — a ravening wolf in sheep’s clothing — who is really, really dangerous!  Just look at the spiritual damage to the people of his “church.”

Here’s an example of why C. Peter Wagner is another false prophet wolf.

I finally finished an arduous job of making A Reference Blog post of Links for Latter-day Saints Research.  If you are seeking information on Mormons, go here before Googling.  Don’t forget — I also have my own blog exposing Mormonism.

Doug Evans has an excellent article about Roman Catholicism and the road to ecumenicism.

Stop snuggling the wolves.

Oh, my!  It’s hard to comment on this — a church actually accepted this as a conversion testimony!?!?!?!

If you have not been previously convinced that Steven Furtick is a false teacher, you need to take a look at this evidence.

Pastors, protect the women in your congregation.

Fred Butler continues his review of Which Bible Would Jesus Use?

You shall know them by their fruits.  Matthew 7:16, an abused Scripture.

Joel Osteen’s “new age” teachings are in line with many others who seem to think they are God.

Lastly, the Watchman Fellowship has a new profile out on Tibetan Buddhism.

History of the Church of Christ

Due to a request by two of my readers I am posting this history of the Church of Christ.  I wrote this as a section of an introductory apologetics course for home-school high schoolers. I previously posted, also from this section, an article about the cultic doctrines of the Church of Christ.  This history is, by necessity of brevity, not an in-depth examination.  I hope you find it interesting as well as informative.  (One bit of editing from my course is my usual tradition on this blog of using blue for quotations so as to bring attention to them as not being my writing.)

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Another group emerging from the restoration movement of the early 1800s, and in fact considered a central core of the movement, were the churches established by Barton Stone, Walter Scott, and Thomas and Alexander Campbell.  As a matter of fact, in the same way Calvinist churches have claimed the title of being “Reformed” churches, even though other groups were involved in the Reformation, the Stone-Campbell-Scott churches of today claim the title of being “Restoration” churches for themselves, even though other churches came out of that movement. (This group should not be confused with the United Church of Christ, which originated as a merger of four other groups in the 20^th century - and is now one of the most liberal church denominations.)

Stone, Scott and the Campbells started individual movements which merged based on their common beliefs.  “The major development of this movement occurred between 1823 and the deaths of its founders (Barton Stone, 1844; Walter Scott, 1861; and Alexander Campbell, 1866).”  (Craig Branch, “The Stone-Campbell-Scott Movement,” Areopagus Journal, Vol. 9, No.5, p.9)  As with the LDS and SDA, the premise of this movement was that the church was in total apostasy and needed restoration.

“A common name for the members of these churches used by detractors is ‘Campbellites.’  Criticism from evangelicals regarding most of these churches is certainly justified because they have perpetuated a ‘different gospel’ (Gal. 1:6-9) and numerous other heresies.  Among their errors is their belief that all other churches, even evangelicals, are false or apostate.” (Branch, p. 9)

The movement got its start with Barton Stone, a Presbyterian minister who struggled with Calvinist doctrines and with the doctrine of the Trinity.  He was ordained in 1798, and in 1801 traveled to Cane Ridge, KY to witness a revival, and where he participated with Baptists and Methodists.  That August, after spending the previous two months organizing revivals, Stone held what was later called the “Cane Ridge Meeting,” which supposedly claimed thousands of conversions.

  

Stone left the Presbytery in 1803, and was later baptized by immersion “for the forgiveness of sins.”  “He led a group of Presbyterians out of their denomination to pursue the ideal of being ‘Christians only.’  This idea appealed to many in other churches and a movement began.”  (Branch, p. 10-11)

A few years later Thomas Campbell, also a Presbyterian minister, came to Pennsylvania from Ireland and preached the unity of all Christians.  His son Alexander soon joined him and ended up being an itinerant preacher in Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia.  The Campbells said to do away with the early church creeds and have nothing in the church older than the New Testament.  Since infant baptism was one of the things added to the church, the Campbells were re-baptized by immersion in 1812.

  

The Campbells met with Stone in 1824 and they learned each other had the same general ideas of doctrine.  In 1831 most of Stone’s followers joined the Campbellites.

Walter Scott was also raised as a Presbyterian, “but upon arriving in New York from Scotland, he became influenced by George Forrester.”  (Branch, p.11)  Forrester was among a Scottish group seeking to “restore” the New Testament church.  In 1821, Scott “came to believe that baptism was not merely an ordinance or ritual, but a decision of the penitent to release God to wash away our sins - a formal remission.”  (Branch, p.11)

The Campbells met with Scott in 1821.  Five years later Scott attended a Campbellite meeting, and the following year the Campbells asked Scott to be their evangelist.  Scott’s preaching eventually brought in more than 3000 converts over the next few years.

The Campbellites adopted the name “Disciples of Christ” for their congregation.  Stone’s group were known as “Christians,” or “Christian Church.”  The two merging groups, Campbells’ and Stone’s, used either name for their churches.  In 1832 Scott’s group joined both the Campbellite and Stone communities, although about half of Stone’s group didn’t agree with Campbellite teachings on baptismal regeneration and did not join with them. 

The Campbells desired to see a unity of the various denominations based around the Scripture, and to eliminate all man-made creeds.  Their motto was, “Where the Scriptures speak, we speak; where the Scriptures are silent, we are silent.”  

An early cause of division was the doctrine of the Trinity.  Barton Stone determined the doctrine was man-made, and that the Holy Spirit was “the power of force of God.”  “This legacy has had an impact on many Churches of Christ today.  It is not unusual to encounter members who basically hold a view that the Holy Spirit and the Bible are inseparably linked.  The only time the Holy Spirit is present is when the Bible is opened and read.  It is almost like a genie in the bottle.  When the Bible is closed, the Holy Spirit returns to the Bible.”  (Branch, p.12)

The influence of “higher criticism” and other liberal teachings affected the “Restoration” churches in the same way it affected other Protestant churches, causing division among the assemblies.  The more liberal group wanted to use instrumental music in worship and allow missionary societies, and were subscribing to theistic evolution, among other issues.  In 1906 the conservative dissenters formed the “Churches of Christ,” while the “progressives” became known as “Disciples of Christ.”  

The Disciples began emphasizing denominational authority over local autonomy, and became increasingly liberal in their theology and practice, so in 1927 the more conservative members of the Disciples separated to form the North American Christian Convention, a separate fellowship of Churches of Christ and Christian Churches.  “The new convention was not to be a policy-making assembly that had authority over the local churches, but rather was a gathering for preaching, teaching, and good fellowship.  The new convention took a strong stand against all forms of liberalism and sought to defend fundamentalist beliefs.”  (Ron Rhodes, The Complete Guide to Christian Denominations, p. 119)

The Disciples of Christ organized in 1968 as the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).  While still holding to some of the legalistic teachings of the Restoration movement, the Disciples are more orthodox, albeit with some liberal understandings of Scripture and Christ, and we will follow them no further.

The current churches continuing the Stone-Campbell-Scott “Restoration Movement” usually go by the names “Christian Church” or “Church of Christ.”  This can be confusing because the Churches of Christ which formed in 1906 is not the same as the North American Convention branch known as Churches of Christ and Christian Churches.  The Churches of Christ of the 1906 separation have no conventions, no denomination headquarters, no conferences, etc.  Nevertheless, the ancestry of both groups is the same prior to 1906, with few differences in doctrine, and since 2006 there has been a move to reunite these two groups.  Our main focus in this section, however, is only on the Church of Christ.

A significant split is the International Church of Christ, which is a cult sect.  This sect originated with Chuck Lucas, pastor of the Crossroads Church of Christ in Gainesville, FL in 1967.  Lucas saw that aggressive evangelistic groups like Campus Crusade, and discipleship groups like the Navigators, had great success, so he combined the ideas of both with the legalistic practices of the Church of Christ and his church began to grow.  “One of Lucas’s leaders was Kip McKean… In 1975 McKean and his wife, Elena, moved to a suburb of Boston and began a very aggressive and demanding program.  It was named the Boston Church of Christ.  The traditional Church of Christ legalism coupled with the high demand, close accountability structure and use of guilt and manipulation, produced an abusive, mind and life controlling cult.  After its first ten years of existence, the Boston Church of Christ with its church plants and world missions numbered 25,000 members.  Their primary focus was on college campuses.”  (Branch, p. 13)  Since most of the traditional Churches of Christ condemned McKean and his movement, McKean broke off association with them in 1993 and changed the name of his group to the International Church of Christ.  This cult itself has broken into factions and McKean left the leadership of the original group in 2001 only to later start up another group in California under the same name in 2007.  Since this cult group is not recognized by the Churches of Christ, we will not study this group any further.

A current description of the Churches of Christ is this one found on the Internet:  “Following the plan of organization found in the New Testament, churches of Christ are autonomous.  Their common faith in the Bible and adherence to its teachings are the chief ties which bind them together.  There is no central headquarters of the church, and no organization superior to the elders of each local congregation.  Congregations do cooperate voluntarily in supporting the orphans and the aged, in preaching the gospel in new fields, and in other similar works.  Members of the church of Christ conduct forty colleges and secondary schools, as well as seventy-five orphanages and homes for the aged.  There are approximately 40 magazines and other periodicals published by individual members of the church.  A nationwide radio and television program, known as "The Herald of Truth" is sponsored by the Highland Avenue church in Abilene, Texas.  Much of its annual budget of $1,200,000 is contributed on a free-will basis by other churches of Christ. The radio program is currently heard on more than 800 radio stations, while the television program is now appearing on more than 150 stations.  Another extensive radio effort known as "World Radio" owns a network of 28 stations in Brazil alone, and is operating effectively in the United States and a number of other foreign countries, and is being produced in 14 languages. An extensive advertising program in leading national magazines began in November 1955.”  (Batsell Barrett Baxter, Who are the churches of Christ and what do they believe in? )

Craig Branch sums up the problem with the Churches of Christ:  “The various Stone-Campbell-Scott Movement churches (denominations) exist all over the U.S. and in many foreign countries, with members totaling between three and four million.  A large majority of these members have embraced a false, legalistic gospel and are deceiving many others.  Fortunately, there have been some positive developments in recent years including the recent conversion of some Churches of Christ into the evangelical mainstream… Also there is a group of Restoration Movement pastors and teachers at their numerous Bible colleges who have recently formed a subgroup within the Evangelical Theological Society and continue to interact with evangelical scholars.”  (p.10)

Cultic Doctrines of the Churches of Christ

Unusual doctrines of the Churches of Christ run from legalism to heresy. The first legalistic error is the teaching that the name of their churches are in line with the New Testament, and their names are the only biblical names. However, when we examine Scripture we find that term “church of Christ” is found only once in the New Testament (Rom. 16:16) and it is only descriptive, not a title. In several passages the church is described as the “church of God,” but often in Scripture the church is just called by the name of the town.

The Lord’s Supper
As with other Campbellite churches, the Churches of Christ claim that communion is a weekly requirement and absolutely essential to Christian worship. Some individual assemblies even assert that only one cup may be used and that they could not fellowship with another assembly which used individual cups during communion. “Unless providentially hindered, each member considers this weekly appointment as binding. In many instances, as in the case of illness, the Lord's supper is carried to those who are hindered from attending the worship.” (Batsell Barrett Baxter, Who are the churches of Christ and what do they believe in? http://church-of-christ.org/who.html)

Response: While it appears that in the New Testament Christians celebrated communion weekly, it is a logic fallacy to say it is therefore mandated. As for the single cup, there is no evidence that only one cup was ever used, and, in fact, it appears from studying the Passover meal that each person had their own cup or cups.

Instrumental music
Churches of Christ prohibit instrumental music during worship service because they believe there is no mention of musical instruments in the New Testament except for a negative reference (1. Cor. 13:1). Therefore, as their reasoning goes, musical instruments are prohibited. This is certainly a legalistic misuse of Scripture.

Firstly, even if the New Testament did not mention musical instruments, it would be a non sequitur logic fallacy to say it therefore followed that instruments are prohibited. Secondly, the New Testament often commands the worshiper to sing songs, and the Old Testament numerous times refers to musical instruments being used in worship. Even in Revelation there are several references to harps being used in worship.

The truth is that in the New Testament we see two places where the church is to worship with “psalms, hymns and spiritual songs” (Col. 3:16, Eph. 5:19). In Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words we have the following explanation for the word “psalm”: “pslamos primarily denoted ‘a striking or twitching with the fingers (on musical strings)’; then, ‘a sacred song, sung to musical accompaniment, a psalm.’”

The Holy Spirit and Trinity
One of the early founders, Barton Stone, determined the doctrine of the Trinity was man-made, and that the Holy Spirit was “the power of force of God.” Stone wrote the following about the Holy Spirit: “I understand the Spirit of a person is not the person himself. We often read in the Bible that the Father loves the Son, and the Son loves the Father, but we never read of either the Father or the Son loving the Spirit as a person, or of the Spirit loving the Father or the Son.” (Craig Branch, “The Stone-Campbell-Scott Movement,” Areopagus Journal, Vol. 9, No.5, p.15) Alexander Campbell agreed with Stone that the Nicene Creed’s teaching on the triune nature of God was “humanistic philosophical creation.” (Branch, p.15)

While the official stance of the Campbellite churches maintains the orthodox teaching on the Trinity, this historical foundation can be confusing, and some members have been known to hold these unorthodox views.

Baptism
As with some other denominations, the Churches of Christ believe that baptism is required for salvation. They teach that, although actual forgiveness of sins is through faith in Christ and his shed blood, formal remission of sins can only be had in baptism.

As cited by Craig Branch, Alexander Campbell stated, “I do earnestly contend that God, through the blood of Christ, forgives our sins through immersion - through the very act and in that very instant…. No one has ever received pardon by faith only. Water baptism, with faith as the principle of action, is the means through which God by the power of the blood of Christ imparts remission.” (p.16) Campbell claimed that baptism was not a work.

As pointed out by Dr. Hugh F. Pyle in his book, The Truth About the “Church of Christ,” if baptism saves us, then the person doing the baptism becomes our savior! (p.94)

(A peculiar teaching is that a Christian can lose his salvation, but when he returns to the church and is again saved, he does not need to repeat his baptism. Baptism saved him the first time, yet he does not need it to be saved again!)

Works
The Churches of Christ believe there are six steps to salvation: hear, believe, repent, confess, be baptized, and obey the New Testament commands. Teachings by Church of Christ authors demonstrate just how serious Churches of Christ consider works and salvation to be intertwined. The following examples are cited by Dr. Hugh F. Pyle (p. 12):

“Going to church is pre-eminently essential to going to Heaven.” A.G. Hobbs, Is Church Attendance Essential?
“Good works are not necessary to becoming a Christian, but they are essential to being a faithful Christian, and we cannot go to Heaven without faithfully performing them.” John H. Banister, God’s Way of Salvation.
“We affirm that one is saved at the point of baptism.” Evangelist L.L. Applegate (reference not cited).

By adding baptism, and the 6th step to salvation (that of obeying the New Testament commands), the Campellites have made salvation dependent upon works. When we look at the New Testament, however, it plainly teaches that the only thing necessary for salvation is faith in the atoning work of Jesus Christ, and that works are of no benefit for salvation.

Legalistic views on the name of the church, the Lord’s Supper, and instrumental music in church, mixed with some confusion about the Trinity, and heretical views on baptism and works, puts the Churches of Christ in the category of being a cultic church group.

Are Musical Instruments Unholy?

I was in a train station sending my mother back to Alabama when I found a “gospel tract” collection planted by “Gospel Tract and Bible Society,” published by the Church of God in Christ, Mennonite. Much of the stuff was good, but much of it was also very legalistic and often aberrational. But I want to mention just one of them because the subject is something the Church of Christ also teaches.

I am referring to the idea that musical instruments should not be used in the assembly because there is no mention of them being used during worship in the New Testament. Now, if you happen to think that is arguing from silence, I whole-heartedly agree with you! I don’t remember reading about pews being mentioned in the N.T either but I suspect these churches all have pews. There are many things these churches use for their worship service that aren’t mentioned in the N.T., such as collection baskets/plates, air conditioning, furnaces and even hymn books! I guess when one argues from silence he can come up with all sorts of things not allowed in the church because they aren’t mentioned in the New Testament.

The Church of Christ (often referred to as “Campbellites”) has no problem with singing hymns as long as they don’t have any musical instruments. Of course a pitch pipe is okay (isn‘t that a musical instrument?).

I was unaware that Mennonites also were against instrumental music; or is it just this particular sect?

Anyway, the tract I picked up was titled, “Worship Without Musical Instruments.” The reasons given in this tract again include an argument from silence: “There is no evidence in the New Testament that the apostolic Church used musical instruments. There is little mention of them in the New Testament other than as examples for comparison (1 Corinthians 13:1; 14:7), and in Revelation referring to music in heaven (Revelation 14:2; 15:2).” The tract then discusses many passages of Scripture that speak of singing but not of musical instruments.

From what I have read, the Greek in the N.T. passages that mention singing (Rom. 15:9; 1 Cor. 14:15; Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16; James 5:13) carry the idea of singing with instruments. The word “psalm” in Ephesians and Colossians especially includes the meaning of instrumental accompaniment. So I guess musical instruments are indeed mentioned in the New Testament!

My first thought when encountering this teaching for the first time through a member of the Church of Christ was Psalm 150’s mention of playing musical instruments. But this Mennonite sect tract says, “Before the time of Christ…worship included the use of musical instruments… The sacrifices and rituals so important to the Old Testament-era worshipers were abolished, and worship from the heart became the only acceptable worship…. Salvation is of the heart. God is worshiped and praised from the heart.” So what they are claiming is that all use of musical instruments in worship was done away with in Christ. I’d say that was some very convoluted reasoning!

Dr. Hugh F. Pyle, in his book, The Truth About the “Church of Christ,” makes a very good point: “Do we really believe that God has changed? If musical instruments were used by godly men in the Old Testament ([cites several passages]), is it wrong to suppose that God would still bless the use of musical instruments by godly men today?” I have to agree with Pyle, and I personally worship the Lord and praise Him in my music while playing my bagpipes. (A funny side note - I have had Catholic priests tell me I couldn’t play at weddings because the bagpipes are a secular instrument - as if there was such thing.)

If you are a member of a Christian assembly where this legalistic silliness is taught, I would suggest you find another place of worship. I have observed that when an assembly has this sort of legalistic teaching it is only one of many legalistic ideas that keep its members in spiritual bondage. Christ has set us free from this sort of Pharisaical bondage.