Mike,

This is a pretty good article to consider. I look forward to reading your thoughts on our future. Thanks for your online ministry.

His Peace,
Cheryl

The ingenious stroke of the Protestant Reformation was the proposition that the word of the Lord, the Holy Scriptures, are provided to feed All God’s Children. All children of our Heavenly Father should be able to have free access to his word without official interpretations of the clergy. Pope John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council accomplished two incredible things for those within the Roman Catholic Church: (1) Vatican II sanctioned private Bible reading and study for the laity of the church and also (2) acknowledged that the body of Christ was broader than just the Roman Catholic Church.

When the Christians, who banded together as JESUS Community Center, talk about believing the Bible and following the Bible, this is not some unique claim for them. In a real sense, all those who profess Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord also claim to believe the Bible and follow the Bible whether they are Catholic, Orthodox, some variety of brand-name Protestant or Nondenominational.

The time is right for Christians of all backgrounds to go straight to the Bible again but in a very responsible manner. Mold-breaking disciples believe that faithful Christians do not have to be spoon-fed by the clergy. This is true whether the clergy person is officially designated as called Priest, Pastor, Minister or Elder.

The bottom line is that these disciples believe that the Lord never intended to leave his people with a written message containing such ambiguity that disciples would have to employ Philadelphia Lawyers to decipher its meaning. God’s written word is designed in such a way that it provides both “milk for babes” in the faith and “meat for strong men.” They further believe that the more intimately Christians come to know Jesus the more capable they will be to responsibly handle the Holy Scriptures.

The gathered congregation is pictured in Scripture as the temple of the living God in which the Holy Spirit resides in a special way. With the naked text in hand and the Holy Spirit as the Divine Teacher present, the children of our Father can read and come to understand the meaning of the Bible as a collection of divine and wonderful love letters from their heavenly Father. A dependence upon the clergy-system, by whatever name, makes dependent disciples into weak Christians.

For faithful Christians, properly interpreting the Bible is the real key, interpreting it in a way that the sacred text really speaks to Christians as the Word of the Lord. They insist that the way all persons or groups interpret the Bible is largely born out of their understanding of the nature of God.

Any group’s interpretation of the Bible will be pretty legalistic and unnecessarily rigid if they see the God of the Bible as a “distant deity” who dispassionately holds the world captive to arbitrary rules and regulations. If anyone sees the Lord of the universe as a “hard taskmaster” they will live with some degree of spiritual anxiety and play it safe, neither walking by faith nor enjoying full confidence in the graciousness of the Lord. Such folks will tenaciously grip their understandings or religious performances, with which they feel safe, until their knuckles turn white because “the blood” is literally squeezed out their system. Such a theological approach creates spiritual victims rather than true sons. They feel compelled to protect what little they feel sure about and nervously wait for their final verdict from the Lord at the great Last Day. From this perspective, being a Christian is much like a pardoned man feeling like he is a guilty man on probation from which his life and freedom can be snatched away again for the least infraction of divine law. Such Christians seldom feel secure in their faith. Many subconsciously expect to be executed for crimes against the Lord for which the Gospel joyously announces they have already been pardoned. Probationary religion (as opposed to a full pardon from the King of the universe) is the most deadly of all heresies to contaminate the Gospel of Christ. This approach to the Bible is what drove the Pharisees of Jesus’ day to bind oppressive burdens upon the Lord’s people. Jesus was the Great Liberator who defied the Pharisees’ enslaving rigidity and literally mocked the way they used the Bible to do inflict harm on sincere believers.

A new breed of disciples is fervently praying that they will approach the sacred text in the same way its author, the Son of God, did when he was on earth teaching his very first disciples. Nobody ever took the Word of God more seriously than Jesus. Nobody ever held a higher view of the authority of the Scriptures than Jesus. The truth of God’s Word is not defined by how Popes or Councils interpret the text. It is not defined by how the Protestant Reformers interpreted the text. Furthermore, understanding the truth of the Gospel must not be limited to how Ministers, Preachers, Pastors or Elders interpret the text. The word of the Lord can be understood and dynamically enriched through prayerful study.

This is the one most critical question for any serious Bible student, “How did Jesus Christ interpret and apply the text of Scripture to the faith and lives of his first disciples?”

Jesus’ interpretation of Scriptures comes from his view of God Almighty as the One who was worthy of “love with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.” Jesus painted the picture of his Father and ours as the Father of the “Prodigal Son” who wants to forgive all and grieves until he has all his children back safe at home with him again. For Jesus, the Bible is largely a collection of loving letters from our Father, our Almighty God who always prizes “mercy above sacrifice.” (Hosea 6:6; Matthew 9:13; 12:7)

Jesus did not view the Holy Commandments as spiritual tests to check and grade the meticulous obedience of a believer’s faith. Jesus made it too clear to miss that the faithful were not created to be “commandment keepers” but that the “the Sabbath (any commandment) was made for man, not man for the Sabbath (commandment).”

The Holy Commandments are for the benefit of believers. Jesus also insisted that the Book is stagnant and lifeless until believers permit the Divine Teacher, the Holy Spirit, to “enlighten the eyes of our hearts” (Ephesians 1:18) and “lead us into all truth” (John 14:25-26). It was not just for the Apostles, but is for all disciples, that the Spirit brings to memory the truth of the text as it relates to the living context of a believer’s current faith challenge or life situation.

True disciples recognize the need to be saturated with such a deeply personal knowledge of Jesus that they employ the Bible in the same manner that Jesus did. Christians in Hope desire total immersion in the person and presence of Jesus and in the manner by which Jesus interpreted the Bible.

These Christians also desire to see clearly how the Holy Spirit guided the Apostles of Jesus to interpret the will of the Lord in the New Covenant Scriptures. When people become fully acquainted with the Divine Letters of the Apostle Paul, especially his letters to the Romans and Galatians, they can never again remain silent in the presence of lifeless legalism. Legalism is any notion, ever so subtle, of saving oneself by obeying laws. Legalism may have an appearance of respecting the Law of God but it always creates religious systems which build high hedges around God’s Law. Jesus calls those theological hedges “the doctrines and commandments of men.”

The biblical doctrine of “the priesthood of all believers” does not necessarily suggest that formal training for the ministry has to be harmful. Formal training can be a good thing. But every student of the Bible must rely primarily on the text and the “Divine Teacher” for his understanding of divine will. Study of the sacred text, in its context, is critical to discovering the Lord’s will in Scripture. The context of Scripture includes a study of the linguistic, historical and cultural milieu in which each portion of the Bible was written. An understanding of the shaping of the biblical canon helps Christians understand how God has preserved his Eternal Word through the centuries. A working knowledge of the earliest biblical languages, Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek, may help explain the special ways by which the Holy Spirit used human agents and their languages to communicate the Divine Word of the Lord.

As a congregation working together, the Lord opened their hearts and led the JESUS Community Center in Miami to prayerfully and carefully define their understanding of, and commitment to “Biblical Truth.” Without hesitation, they committed to “go to the Bible” for all that they believe, teach and practice no matter what they might have believed, taught, practiced or the way they might have “done church” in the past. Their absolute and final authority in matters of personal and congregational faith, life and worship is the Lord’s will as expressed in the Holy Scriptures—nothing more and nothing less. They recognize the legitimate place for human reason, human experience and spiritual tradition and also understand how, at times, all these can help contribute to an understanding of the Christian faith. But these Christians affirm, without qualification, that Scriptures alone express God’s divinely revealed word. Therefore human reasoning, subjective experience and tradition must bow to biblical authority. They reject the notion that human reasoning, subjective experience or tradition can be used to promote any teaching or system which is contrary to the overall flow and intent of Scripture.

Few people can fully appreciate how bold these doctrinal expressions of the Lord’s will are for these particular Christians. Their background of affiliations were among different Christian groups of the “right church isolationist mentality.” All of these groups, with their distinctive way of defining authoritative doctrine, were designed and intended to be self-perpetuating, preserving a separatist and isolationist “religious culture.” This kind of religious environment defines its distinctiveness in terms of imposing unnecessary restrictive rules and regulations as these are perceived by others. These rules and regulations create, for each of these groups, a very nervous and insecure approach which tended to stifle the abundant life Jesus came to give in its fullness.

These Christians, who are part of JESUS Community Center, are trying to prayerfully yield their hearts and minds to the Lord so that he can continue to help chart the direction of their faith and walk together. What would Jesus do with each situation? How would the Son of God apply the word of God to the present question or challenge facing the believer? Unvarnished truth is seen as the most powerful and liberating force in the entire world. These Christians have one overriding aspiration with regard to their understanding and handling of the “sword of the Spirit” which is the word of God:

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
(2 Corinthians 10:3-5, NIV)

These disciples of Jesus believe that the Lord is guiding their collective study and enlightening their knowledge of the living Lord. They believe that the life, ministry and teachings of the Lord Jesus form the magnifying glass through which all people must look in order to see an accurate picture of the nature of the Lord God Almighty and his will in Scripture. They are deeply grateful for the Spirit’s leading. They praise Jesus for His incredible work among them as they prayerfully approach the Holy Scriptures with great care.

You would get a link back when you link to your own article, if you wish.
You can even re-use some of what you have here, in the last part of the article, “Church (your country)”. That would save you time and still be interesting for readers.
Don’t underestimate this opportunity!

Failing that, if you like the project and you can help me to promote it -even if you don’t write- it would be great.
By making this valuable information available online for free, I truly believe we are helping to make the world a better place.

And you could do your bit for the world too.
Your help is appreciated, and if you let me know your contribution, you’ll be rewarded appropriately in due time. If you link to us or mention us, we can link you back too.
You can even use our valuable articles on your websites, provided that you link back. Any better offer than that?!

Look forward to hearing from you or read your article in Trendirama! Join us!

Best regards
Javier Marti
http://www.trendirama.com

Jeff,
I agree with much of your musing on the whole denominational muddle of Churches of Christ (notice the two capital C’s).

It’s not a bad thing to be a part of a denomination - as long as you are able to see that you’re a part of one.

I’m not even really sure that it’s possible to be “non-denominatoinal” today because we’re all so trained to be a part of something bigger than just our local congregation.

At Shannon Oaks - we’re now - “non-denominational” but are in the process of partnering with other similar “non-denom” congregations for strength and encouragement.

CofC’s will survive for the next 50 - 100 years … of course some will Mike.

The only way they won’t survive - is if the current “Baby Boomer” generation of leaders do something drastic - like completely “merge” with Christian Churches and abandon the cofC denomination.

And I believe - the Universities have more to do with that than the local congregations do.

If ACU, Lipscomb, Pepperdine, and one or two other schools completely united on the abandonment of the “church of Christ” affiliation - and embraced a full merge with the Christian Church - then cofc’s would die off in 50-75 years.

that wouldn’t be a bad thing for the kingdom - but would be a bad thing for the cofC denomination… and it is a denomination.

I don’t think the churches of Christ will grow very much - as is - unless they change ALOT.

Then again - I don’t think ANY church will grow very much in the future - unless it changes ALOT.

This isn’t a cofC question - it’s a Wester Church question.

Thanks for the kind words.

Christian unity through mission and diversity, erring on grace rather than condemnation; finding common cause rather than self-identifying disticntions; taking risks rather than imposing self.

Lord, come and get us, please!!!

No, my brother, the revival has already happened. It is time for us to stop worrying about the perfecting of OUR institutions. This will never come! Satan would love for us to continue our incessant discourse about religion. It keeps us chained to our designs.

The GOOD NEWS is we are already free. Take your fredom in Christ. It is not going to come through the return/arrival of that great day in the church of Christ. It has already arrived and is available right now. Submit to Christ’s athority, seek Him in the word, relate to others as the servant of Christ, rely on the power that comes through Him, be of one mind with your brothers/sisters. If there are those in your chuch of Christ who keep you enslaved, pray for those who can encourage you. God will provide His Spirit.

Although we fundamentally disagree Thanks for words in the face of such trajedy.

I find comfort that you have walked and crawled this painful path yet you still walk. This inspires me.

Randy Harris’s series “Will Churches of Christ Survive the 21st Century” is found online at:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
(No subscription required, temporarily.)

I haven’t been able to post archives for NW far enough back that the site includes Joe Beam’s article … but it’s on my to-do list!