Prerequisites for Christian Unity
By Dr. David R. Reagan
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The first thing I want to do this evening is to make my own religious position very clear. I am a member of the Church of Christ. But since that statement is about as ambiguous as trying to define one's political views by saying that he is a member of the Democratic Party of Texas, I will attempt to define my position a little further. I am a member of the mainstream Church of Christ. Well, on second thought I'm afraid that definition has clouded the issue even more! So let's get very precise. I am a member of that segment of the Restoration Movement which is officially opposed to missionary societies, church conventions, and musical instruments, but which supports Herald of Truth, college lectureships, and pitch pipes for song leaders--as well as Sunday schools, located ministers, multiple cups, stained glass windows, carpets in the aisles, crosses on the communion service, and kitchens in the buildings. Oh yes, lest I forget, the group that I'm a member of "has no creedbook but the Bible" (and Leroy Brownlow) and is totally "non-denominational."
Humorous? I suppose so. But it is also sickening and pathetic--for what I've just said is stark testimony to our decimation of the Lord's body--in direct contravention of the prayer of Jesus in John 17 that we "may all be one" so that the world might be brought to believe in Him as the Christ.
And thus, I hope I have established two vital, contradictory points: the desirability of unity as a necessary prerequisite for the salvation of mankind and the reality of division.
This brings me to our question for the evening: "The Prerequisites for Christian Unity." As I see it there are two, and the first is the rejection of Judaism. That's right, the rejection of Judaism. For I believe with all my heart that the Lord's body is as severely plagued today by the menace of Judaism as it was in the first century in Jerusalem. And its effects are just as divisive today as they were then. What am I talking about? Well, first of all, I'm talking about our fixation upon the concept of a New Testament "pattern." All of you know what I mean. You've heard minister after minister speak of the New Testament "blueprint" or "pattern" which must be followed if we are to reconstruct the New Testament church today-the church in which salvation has been vested. My contention is that this is nothing but Judaism-- and simple. We talk to the world about the "new" law of Christ-the law of spirit, the law of the heart. And yet, by our actions we hypocritically cling to one of the basic concepts of the Old Testament: the idea that God has given us--as he did the Hebrews--a detailed plan to govern every minute aspect of our spiritual and secular lives. Brethren, I challenge you to show me the blueprint! Show me the "plan." Show me the "pattern."
"Oh, but Brother Reagan," you say, "everyone knows that the New Testament is crystal clear about such things as worship procedure. Why take the Lord's Supper, for example. There can be no doubt that it is to be commemorated upon the first day of every week. Look at First Corinthians. In chapter 11, verse 20, Paul points out that the Corinthians observed communion whenever they assembled. And five chapters later, in verse 2, he says that the Corinthians assembled upon the first day of the week." My re-
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Is God playing games? Is he playing "cat and mouse" with us? Is salvation a matter of "hide and seek"? Must we he able to engage in sophisticated Aristotelian. logic in order to understand the simple truths of the New Testament? Must we have the intuitive insight of a Sherlock Holmes? Has God ever been enigmatic about salvation? No! A thousand times, No! What has been absolutely essential for salvation God has always made absolutely clear. Today those essentials include at least three things: (1) Essentiality of a faith in Christ which leads one to an act of obedience, namely, immersion; (2) Essentiality of worship of God; (3) Essentiality of a life of love. Beyond these--and within them--there is abundant room for honest differences of opinion, differences which should be viewed as emanations from honest consciences rather than as heresies which are grounds for excommunication.
Another manifestation of Judaism in the Church of Christ today is a corollary of the "pattern concept." I'm speaking of the well known attitude of legalism. It flows logically from "patternism" for if you believe that the New Testament contains a strait-jacket pattern, then you must, of necessity, approach the scriptures with a Pharisaical, legalistic, nit-picking attitude. And it is precisely this attitude which encourages us to elevate our opinions to sacred dogma and then to search frantically through the Scriptures tor some shred of evidence--often out of context and ambiguously worded--that will substantiate our position as being the only one, not the preferable one, mind you, but the only one. The result of this process is inevitably division and subdivision within the brotherhood.
To summarize, I believe that the first prerequisite to unity within the "restoration brotherhood" is to purge ourselves of two remnants of Judaistic thinking, patternism and legalism.
The second and final prerequisite is one that has been debated at length, and thus I will only mention it briefly. I am referring to the contention that the Bible must be rejected as the basis of Christian unity. I accept this proposition without reservation except to state it in a more positive way. As I would put it, the basis of unity and the ground of fellowship must be Christ--yes, Christ--and not the Bible. For those who assert that the Bible must be the basis of unity are in effect saying that their personal interpretations of the Bible must be the basis of unity, in which case there can be no unity! Christ is the only proper basis of unity, for the acceptance of Christ which leads one to the act of immersion is all that God requires for admission to his family. And those who have been admitted to the family of God must be regarded as our Christian brothers, tor how can we dare reject those whom God has accepted? The answer to this latter question, incidentally, is rather simple. We can reject these people only by playing God ourselves.
Let us be reminded of the wise counsel of Paul contained in the 14th chapter of his letter to the Romans. Reading from the Phillips translation, we find these words:
Welcome a man whose faith is weak, but not with the idea of arguing over his scruples. One man believes that he may eat anything; another man, without this strong conviction, is a vegetarian. The meat eater should not despise the vegetarian, nor should the vegetarian condemn the meal eater--they should reflect that God has accepted them both. After all, who are you to criticize the servant of somebody else, especially when that somebody else is God? It is to his own master that he gives, or fails to give, satisfactory service. And don't doubt that satisfaction, for God is well able to transform men into servants who are satisfactory...Why then criticize your brother's actions, why try to make him look small? We shall all be judged one day, not by one another's standards, or even our own, but by the judgment of God. . .Let us therefore stop turning critical eyes on one another. If we must be critical, let us be critical of our own conduct and see that we do nothing to make a brother stumble or fall.
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(Editor's Note, Dr, David R. Reagan is an Assistant Professor of Government, at Austin College. The above article is a statement which he presented to a conference on unity held at Sequoia Park Community Church of Christ, Denton, Texas, November 26, 1965. You may address him at Austin College, Box 554, Sherman, Texas).