The Right Name
W. Carl Ketcherside
[Page 49] |
In this issue I want to share with you some of the queries which arose during an open forum session in which I was fielding questions from the audience one morning during a series of studies in Illinois, on the nature of God's will as exhibited in the community of the reconciled and sanctified. By some turn of events we became involved in a discussion of "the name of the church" and pursued it for almost two hours. I will give you only some of the highlights of the session and investigation.
Let me say, by way of prelude, that for some reason the subject with which we are dealing seems fraught with possibilities of misunderstanding. I know that when I first awakened to the truth of what I am now saying, I was inclined not only to resist it, but even to resent it. Long after I had given up on the matter intellectually, I clung to it emotionally. I had delivered too many discourses entitled "What Name Shall The Church Wear?" I had written too many articles and passed out too many tracts. My pride was at stake. But even more than this, fear entered in, fear that if I gave up on this I would have no way of identifying with the people of God. I suffered through the whole traumatic complex until integrity won the battle and honesty carried the day.
I eagerly trust that my readers will accept this paper each month as a sharing experience. I have neither the desire nor inclination to make it a propaganda sheet or a dogmatic journal. As you read it you will find much with which you cannot concur but this will in no way militate against my love and concern for you. It is in this spirit I replied to the questions orally and in this spirit I print some of my answers now. If you do not see it as I do you are still my brother regardless of how you feel about it.
1. I understand that you take the position that the church has no scriptural name. Is that correct?
Like so many reports of what I am alleged to believe this is partly correct and partly in error. I am going to forget my personal feelings about the word "church" itself during this interview and simply go along with the conventional usage to avoid unnecessary complication or needless confusion. Most of my brethren are mixed up enough now without me adding to the mix-up. What I have said is that the church has no official title or exclusive designation. The word church is a noun, and is therefore the name of something.
My position is that the church is always designated only by common nouns and these only indicate relationship. They describe the church but they do not give it a title. The church properly has many names but it has no proper name. It depends upon what aspect you are discussing as to the term you should employ to signify it.
[Page 50] |
As to constituency it is a church of saints (1 Cor. 14:33), being composed of the holy ones, those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus. As to heirship, or inheritance, it is the church of the firstborn ones whose names are enrolled in heaven (Heb. 12:23). As to divine relationship it is the church of God which is in Christ Jesus (1 Thess. 2:14).
From the standpoint of its head or authority, it is the church of Christ (Rom. 16:16; Gal. 1:22). As to government it is the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 16:19), the kingdom of God, the kingdom of the Son of man, or the kingdom of God's dear son. As to organization it is the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27), but it is also the temple of God, the garden (or husbandry) of God, and the people of God.
In their eagerness for sectarian exclusiveness, men have lifted first one and then another of these terms of relationship and have elevated it to a sectarian title. Thus we have The Church of God, The Church of the Firstborn, The Church of God in Christ, The Church of the Brethren and The Friends Church. We also have The Church of Christ, and for the very same reason. But if these others are sectarian titles because they are used to designate parties containing only a fragment or part of the saved, or of those who profess salvation, so is the term Church of Christ.
I do not say that the church has no scriptural name. I say that it has a number of them, and that all are valid and bestowed by the Spirit through revelation. But it is not scriptural to fasten upon one of these while ignoring the others and elevating it to titular dignity. To do that is to derogate the other names which were derived from the same source.
2. But did not Jesus say "Upon this rock I will build my church," and is it not his church?
Indeed he did say that and he did exactly what he said he would do, and the church is his. But this statement only shows possession. It does not provide the title or name of the church as a lot of sermon outlines mistakenly imply. If I say, "Upon this lot I will park my car," you know to whom the car belongs, but you do not know the name of the car. You cannot tell from my statement if it is a Ford, Buick, or Chevrolet.
Automobile makers designate or name their creations because they have rivals in the automobile field. But God did not give a title to his new creation because it has no rivals. It does not need to be distinguished from another ekklesia, because there is no other. "There is one body, and one Spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling." The one body does not need to be distinguished from another body, because there is no other. Only sects have to have titles because there are many sects, and all are rivals.
Is it not noteworthy that the expression "the Church of Christ" does not even appear in the scriptures? How could the apostles avoid it if it was "the scriptural name"? And how can it be the scriptural name if it never appears in the scriptures? The term "church of God" appears repeatedly, and once the apostle wrote to tell the Romans "the churches of Christ salute you," which the Authentic Version renders, "The communities of Christians send greetings."
The term church of Christ is no more the official title than is the term body of Christ. The first signifies that the saints are called out, the second that they are bonded together. The fact is that God has bestowed no official or approved title upon the redeemed as a group. God is not sectarian and he does not want us to be.
3. How do you propose that we be distinguished from the denominations?
Certainly the most ineffective and inconsistent way is by denominating ourselves. Most people who talk so glibly
[Page 51] |
God created no denomination which is the reason he did not denominate His people. It is to be regretted that in our sectarian age we want to develop another narrow and exclusive sect and bestow upon it a denomination. There are too many sects and denominations on earth now, without us attempting to make another one in order to be distinguished from the rest.
Jesus said all men would know we were his disciples if we love one another. Since we have failed to make too good a showing on that basis, and men sometimes think we belong to the devil by the way we treat one another, we want to cover up our shortcomings and make sure the world knows who we are by erecting signboards and draping pulpit hangings with our official motto--The Churches of Christ Salute You (Romans 16:16). That sign has often appeared on structures in which hatred, hostility, and harassment marked every business meeting. But Jesus did not say that all men would know we are Christians by our advertisements!
We have no copyright on either the title or the slogan, any more than we do on "Church of God" or any other designation or denomination. As proof of the fact that you can't trust what you read on signboards, I know of a number of places where groups meet behind signs reading "Church of Christ" and have nothing to do with each other. They blast each other as sectarian, liberal or some other derogatory term. Having a title over the door does not make you Christ-like and if you were Christ-like perhaps you would not need a title.
Watchman Nee wrote very perceptively when he penned these words: "Throughout the Word of God we find no name attached to a church save the name of a place, e.g., the church in Jerusalem, the church in Lystra, the church in Derbe, the church in Colosse, the church in Troas, the church in Thessalonica, the church in Antioch. This fact cannot be overemphasized that in scripture no other name but the name of a locality is ever connected with a church, and division of the Church into churches is solely on the ground of difference in locality." As I generally state it, the proper name of the church is not a proper name. It may be correct to use church of Christ as a name of the church, but it is never correct to use it as the name of a church!
4. If the church is the bride of Christ should she not wear the name of her husband?
I always cringe a little when someone asks this because I fear that my own statements of the past have been misleading. One of my favorite topics in my meetings used to be "Whose Name Shall The Bride Wear?" Once many years ago, when William Hensley and I were laboring at Red Cloud, Nebraska, I wrote a tract upon this very question. It became popular enough that 50,000 copies were distributed by brethren all over the United States.
I now realize that the reasoning I employed was childish and irrational. It was also unscriptural. I am sure it must have grown out of the sectarian attitude and exemplified the arrogance of my view that our faction was the kingdom of God on earth to the exclusion of all his other children. As I began to study the word without partisan spectacles I became amazed at the wide gulf between what God revealed and what I was trying to prove from it. I read into the Word of God a whole lot of things the apostles had not written into it. It made me ashamed of my rationalization and I wished that I could have recalled the tract I prepared with such glee.
Your question provides me an opportunity of explaining what changed my mind and opened up my thinking to new vistas and insights. It also serves to remind me how we take our own culture and read it back into the Bible to estab-
[Page 52] |
Thus we read about Sarah, Abraham's wife (Gen. 16:1); Milcah, the wife of Nahor (Gen. 24:15); Jael, the wife of Heber (Judges 4:17); and Bath-sheba, Uriah's wife (2 Sam. 11:3). Again we read of Ananias, and Sapphira, his wife (Acts 5:1); and Felix and his wife Drusilla (Acts 24:24). No one ever reads of Mrs. Noah, Mrs. Moses, or Mrs. Simon Peter. The reason for this is clear. It is only in our western culture that wives wear the names of their husbands, and even here the custom does not go very far back into history. Thus, the argument that the bride should wear the husband's name is not based upon scripture, and while not scriptural anywhere it would not be culturally relevant anywhere except in our western framework. Our brethren overlook the fact that the body of Christ does not just embrace the saved from Europe and America, but also includes those from Asia and Africa.
Even if the argument was valid, "Church of Christ" would not be the name of the bride. In the first place, Christ is not the name of the groom. That is his office. His name is Jesus. The angel said, "You shall call his name Jesus" (Matt. 1:21). When he was born, Joseph "called his name Jesus" (Matt. 1:25). Signs and wonders were done by the father in the name of his holy child Jesus (Acts 4:30). The apostles were commanded not to speak in the name of Jesus (Acts 5:40). It is at the name of Jesus that every knee shall bow (Phil. 2:10). So, if the church is to wear the groom's name we will have to call her "Mrs. Jesus" since the word "church" is only a common noun. How would you like to go down the highway and see a sign reading "Mrs. Jesus meets here for worship!"
I get a bang out of people who write in and give me fits for using the expression Church of Christ. They say that using a capital "C" on church makes the title a denomination like Baptist Church, Church of God, or Christian Church. They want me to capitalize "Church" in all of these other titles, but use a lower case letter for "church of Christ." The idea is that if you are a big "C" church you are a denomination, but if you are a little "c" church you are the one the Lord ordained. Of course, it is not the spelling that makes you sectarian. I once knew a Roman Catholic who did not know for a long time that there was a shift key on his typewriter, and he spelled everything in lower case letters.
But what makes me smile is that the same brethren who get on a "high horse" because I write "Church of Christ" will mail me a tract to show that the bride should wear the groom's name. If that is so, then "Church of Christ" is a proper name and it would be silly to use a little "c." Nobody writes about my wife and refers to her as nell ketcherside. They do not even write about mrs. carl ketcherside. You do not even refer to your dog as rover, if that is his name. When our brethren start out to conceal their denominational attitude they always end up with their inconsistency hanging out. I am sure that we need to re-think a lot of our cooked up arguments which seemed so invulnerable in debates.
I have said that Christ is not the name of Jesus, but his office. Because the term Lord Jesus Christ is used some people think that his first name is Lord and his last name is Christ. But "Lord" is his
[Page 53] |
By the same token, Christ signifies his divine office. He is anointed of God. He is prophet, priest and king. All of these are official functions. Jesus is the Christ. Peter was blessed for confessing "Thou art the Christ" (Matt. 16:16). Paul testified to the Jews that Jesus was Christ (Acts 18:5), and publicly spoke, showing by the scriptures that Jesus was the Christ (Acts 18:28). Christ is no more his name than mediator, shepherd or bishop. He is Jesus the Christ exactly as he is Jesus the mediator, or Jesus the Shepherd and Bishop of our souls.
Jesus is the Christ as John was the Baptist, Simon was the tanner, and Zenas the lawyer. And a bride is not called after the occupation, office or function of the groom. The wife of Dr. Gray is not called "Mrs. Doctor," nor is the wife of Mr. Brown, the Janitor, called Mrs. Janitor. If my brethren want to be consistent and make their signs match their argument, they will have to paint out the present title and paint in "Church of Jesus." They will have to leave Romans 16:16 off, but that will be all to the good. They have misapplied it for years.
I predict that the brethren will continue to be inconsistent. They have reasoned themselves into a corner and sectarianized "Church of Christ." It is the recognized, dyed-in-the-wool title of a party with its own unwritten creed, and if someone put up a sign "Church of Jesus--Matthew 16:16" vacationers from Texas and Tennessee would whiz by it like a freight train passing a hobo. They wouldn't even halt if the sign read "Church of Jesus Christ." The name "Jesus" doesn't have much impact upon "Church of Christ Christians" and it will be hard for some of them to bow the knee to it when the time comes. It is possible that some of them from a state which I will not mention may try to convince the angels that they have this thing all wrong and will prowl up and down the golden streets looking for a sign "The churches of Christ salute you" (Romans 16:16).
You may not believe it, but I have heard my brethren make an argument about Peter's statement, when he healed the lame man at the Beautiful Gate, and said, "There is none other name under heaven, given among men, whereby we must be saved." The argument is to the effect that since this is the only name connected with our salvation, that the church should be designated "Church of Christ" and they end up with the implication, and sometimes the statement, that salvation is actually in that title. If you had buttonholed Peter in Jerusalem and asked him where the Church of Christ met, he would not have known what you were talking about. But Romans 16:16 had not yet been written, of course, and folks still thought of themselves as "the Way."
To be absolutely fair I must admit that most of our preachers always say that either "church of Christ" or "church of God" is scriptural, but you'll notice that none of them put the latter title on their temples made with hands. Over near Dayton, Ohio, the brethren sold their building to the "Church of God." On the side of the building facing the highway the sign read "Church of Christ." To save money the new owners just painted out the word "Christ" and painted in the word "God." They didn't bother "Church Of" at all, but there hasn't been a "loyal brother" in the place since God replaced Christ.
Of course, the argument is that we cannot use "church of God" even though it is scriptural, because it is the denomination of a modern sect. Then all that is needed is for some enterprising sectarian to start up under the denomination "church of Christ" and we will have to surrender it along with Romans 16:16, to avoid confusing the Lord's church with a denomination. I predict, though, that we will put up a much harder fight before we'll surrender "Church of Christ"
[Page 54] |
One thing that makes me feel that our brethren will hang on to the title "Church of Christ" is because there are as many as ten different groups in some cities which have the name over their doors, and yet will not recognize one another to even call on the one God. Some of them cannot even advertise in the same display or box in the Saturday paper. They have their own little advertising corral, so that someone who objects to the way Herald of Truth is supported will not be hoodwinked into stumbling in to a "liberal" congregation and breaking bread with "apostates." But to all outward appearances they are all "Churches of Christ" and they all salute you with Romans 16:16.
Since we cannot put up "Church of God" because the sectarians pre-empted it, and we have to put up "Church of Christ" because it is "scriptural" there is only one thing left to do and that is to tack an identifying parenthesis on, like "Church of Christ--Vocal Music" or "Church of Christ-- One Container." That way we will really be both denominational and sectarian. The title is a denomination and the attached rider is sectarian. We may get worse before we get better. When a congregation down in the hills got into a hassle over what kind of a cup to use in the Lord's Supper, a group of them broke away because they contended that a glass is not a cup, and the record did not say that Jesus "took the glass." That is why there is now a congregation designated as "The One Cup With A Handle On It Church of Christ."
However, just because we let "the sectarians" appropriate "Church of God" which really is mentioned over and over in the scriptures, we will not give up "Church of Christ" which isn't mentioned in the scriptures. It is sanctified by the United States Census Bureau and by sermon outlines passed out in "Schools of Preaching." It is sacred to us and is our badge which will admit us to the heavenly realm when inspected by the celestial gatekeeper.
A few years ago a brother who came up from Arkansas, was driving along a highway in our state. He saw a sign for a Christian Service Camp with the notation, "Maintained by Christian Churches and Churches of Christ." It hit our brother like a slap across the face with a sock full of wet sand. He turned off at the exit, drove down to the camp and jumped on the astonished manager with such ferocity that the poor fellow thought he was going to strike him. The Arkansan demanded that he take the sign down and quit operating under false pretence to lure faithful and unsuspecting children of God into a den of thieves where they thumped on a piano while people were trying to praise God in spite of the noise. He asserted that those who were operating the camp were trying to steal "our name" and ought to be sued in the heathen courts, since they were not brethren anyhow. He finally drove off, red-faced and muttering to himself about the ignorance of some folks. The caretaker told me, "That was the maddest one Christian I ever saw in all my born days." It is not likely that this approach will contribute measurably to the unity of the believers, but it served one purpose. It made the caretaker cautious. When he heard a car drive up, he always peeked out through a hole in the window blind to see if it was "a faithful brother" before he went out!
Before I leave this question about the bride wearing the name of the groom, there is another little matter I do not want to overlook. Even if the argument as applied to our present discussion was correct, and it isn't, I would be reluctant to use it. I am a little skittish about women wearing the name of the groom before they are married. That is a little like wearing a wedding ring in advance of the ceremony. And I am not sure that the wedding between Christ and his bride has taken place yet. I expect to be a guest at the wedding supper when it comes, but I am not all that certain it has come!
[Page 55] |
Then John identifies the fine linen as the righteous deeds of the people of God. He continues, "Then the angel said to me, 'Write this: Happy are those who are invited to the wedding-supper of the Lamb!'" And he added "These are the very words of God." So the marriage has not taken place yet. That is why Paul wrote to the congregation at Corinth, "I am jealous for you, with a divine jealousy; for I betrothed you to Christ, thinking to present you as a chaste virgin to her true and only husband" (2 Cor. 11:2). If we are going to make an argument based upon western cultural habits and practices, we ought to be consistent with the mores which form the basis for our contention, and not have the bride wearing the name of one to whom she is not yet married.
Actually, all of this whole thing stems from our desire to be sectarian while making a non-sectarian claim. We choose a "church name" to distinguish ourselves from other religious bodies and sects, and when we do so we give up our contention that there is only one body. The world will always regard us as another sect even though we contend that because we have designated our segment with a special name that we cannot be sectarian.
There is only one church on earth. The church is a divine organism and not a human organization. It is a creation of the Holy Spirit and not a concoction of the factional spirit. That one church contains all of the saved persons on this earth. The church of Christ in Saint Louis consists of every person in the city in whom the Spirit of God dwells. It is not a group of rival parties fighting over instrumental music and orphan homes. It is the whole body of the ransomed and the redeemed.
5. What do you do about the statement of Paul in Ephesians 3:14, 15?
The first thing I do is to point out the danger of trying to build a doctrinal case based upon the peculiarity of but one version, in this case the King James version. It reads: "For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named."
Those who are anxious to prove that the scripturally accepted title is "Church of Christ" fasten on to this passage like a drowning sailor grasping at a floating straw. And a careful examination proves what a frail straw it is. In the first place, the phrase "of our Lord Jesus Christ" does not appear in the best manuscripts at all, and is omitted in the Revised Versions. In the second place, the word for "family" is plural in the original. That this cannot refer to the church is obvious because there is only one church, the body of Christ. Here are some of the other versions.
"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named" (Revised Standard Version).
"With this in mind, then, I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes it name" (New English Bible).
"To this end I bend my knees to the Father, from whom every being both in heaven and earth takes its existence" (Authentic Version).
B. W. Johnson in Peoples New Testament With Notes, after pointing out that the Revised Version translates "every family" makes this explanation. "The idea is that the Father is the Father of all the families of his children, whether Jews or Gentiles on earth, or in heaven. He is "Our Father in heaven" to the be-
[Page 56] |
I think there is a clue to what the apostle had in mind in the context of the epistle. He strikes the keynote when he writes that the will and pleasure of God determined beforehand in Christ was "that the universe, all in heaven and on earth, might be brought into a unity in Christ" (1:9, 10). So far as the earth was concerned its inhabitants were divided into Jews and Gentiles, those afar off and those near, those in covenant relationship and those outside.
Jesus Christ is our peace. He began the great work of universal unification by making Jews and Gentiles one. In his own body of flesh and blood he broke down the wall of enmity between them. He came and proclaimed the good news, peace to those afar off, and peace to those who were near by. Through the Gospel the Gentiles are joint-heirs with the Jews, part of the same body, sharers together in the promise made in Christ Jesus.
But all of this is because of a prior relationship involved in creation. Before God drew us together in a new creation he made us all in the original creation. He did not love us because Christ came, but Christ came because he loved us. Fatherhood stems from our bearing the imprint of the image of God, warped and defiled though it may be by sin. All family relationships begin with God. The reason that God wants to bring all in heaven and on earth into a unity in Christ is because "every family in heaven and on earth" takes its name after him. One of the more outstanding explanations of the terminology, I think, is that given by D. D. Whedon in his Commentary on Ephesians.
The word here rendered "family," patria, is derived from the Greek and Latin pater, which with our word father, are but two different forms of the same word. A patria is a great kin, clan, or race, descended genetically from one primitive progenitor. So the three great patriae, or races of the earth, traced their lineage to Shem, Ham, and Japheth as their progenitors. Of every patria the father-founder is called patriarch. Paul's thought then is, that God is the universal Patriarch. Translating patria by the English word patriarchy, we may render this clause, "Of whom all (or every) patriarchy in heaven and on earth is named." The words then include angels above and men below. Angels are not, indeed, born; yet, as originated from God they are called "the sons of God." The patriae in heaven are the angelic ranks and orders.
The apostle was not talking about the "name of the church" in this passage. It never entered his mind to give us a handle for the community of saints. His affirmation is simply that God is the source of origin of all fatherhood. The very concept of fraternity derives from him, and that is true whether we consider a family in heaven or on earth, the tribes of men or the orders of angels, the family of Jews or that of Gentiles. All originated with him, and all take their identity or name from him.
Surely brethren are hard put to find an official title for the called-out community if they must take a scripture like this and warp it around. If there is a clear-cut name or title for the body of the redeemed why not just go to it and read it? A case is proven to be weak in proportion to the amount of twisting necessary to make it appear scriptural, and the employment of an argument such as this makes it weak indeed.
6. Are you familiar with the argument used to get the name "Church of Christ" into Acts 20:2
I am not only familiar with it, but I am ashamed of the fact that, in my ignorance I used to employ it. Of course I was as wrong then as my brethren are now who engage in the same fallacy. In those days I wanted to prove that we alone constituted the church for which Jesus died because we had the right name, and the right name was "Church of Christ." It took a little tampering with
[Page 57] |
The passage which you ask about refers to "the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood," as the King James Version renders it. It was fairly easy to get "Church of Christ" in if the people to whom you were speaking did not know any more than yourself. The argument ran like this. There is God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. If we can find which one shed his blood we can find which one purchased the church and now owns it. Property is always registered in the name of the owner. Certainly it was the Son who purchased it with his own blood, and the Son was Christ. Therefore, when Paul referred to the church of God he was really talking about the Church of Christ.
When I used this argument I was really talking about the Church of Christ which I represented--the loyal church--and not the two dozen others which were all composed of sectarians, liberals, compromisers, hobbyists or apostates. Jesus did not purchase them. They were counterfeits patterning after us as nearly as possible to hoodwink and deceive the unwary and unsuspecting. They may have thought they were what Jesus planted and wanted, but all of them had the wool pulled over their eyes through reading the wrong religious paper. Their grave mistakes came from not listening to the faithful brethren, that is to us!
Naturally when one gets his eyes open to his own littleness and bigotry he should be ashamed and repent and do better. That describes me. I am ashamed of my lack of knowledge and my insufferable attacks upon others who were as good as myself. So I have repented and I am trying to undo the mistakes. And one thing that helped me crawl out of the traditional thicket and get back on the road once more, was the realization that a correct rendering knocked my argument on Acts 20:28 into the proverbial cocked hat!
The Concordant Literal New Testament reads: "Take heed to yourselves and the entire flocklet, among which the holy spirit appointed you supervisors, to be shepherding the ecclesia of God, which he procures through the blood of his Own."
The Authentic New Testament has it: "See to it that you tend God's community which he has acquired through the blood of his own (Son)."
The Modern Speech New Testament (Weymouth); The New Testament in Plain English (Williams); The Revised Standard Version; and The New English Bible all have in a footnote "The blood of His Own."
J. H. Moulton in A Grammar of New Testament Greek, Volume I (Prolegomena) says about ho idios without a noun expressed, that the singular is used in the papyri as a term of endearment to near relations, and adds, "In The Expositor (VI, 3, 277) I ventured to cite this as a possible encouragement to those (including B. Weiss) who would translate Acts 20:28, 'the blood of one who was his own.'"
Scholarship was against my sermon outline and I had to make a choice. It would have been easy to have retained the sermon outline since many of those who cheered the loudest when I spoke were not scholars. Come to think of it, I do not remember a single scholar who was overjoyed with my speaking. But integrity won, thank God, and I threw all of my outlines on the name of the church into the trash can. I shall never forget the day when I saw clearly for the first time that church of Christ could be a name for the church, but if it ever became the name of a church, we were as sectarian as we could be. From that day on I ceased to contend for "a name" as the name, and I worked out this simple little formula to express my conviction:
1. It is scriptural to designate the community of saints by any term employed by the Holy Spirit in the sacred writings.
2. It is unscriptural to designate the community of saints by any term not employed by the Holy Spirit in the sacred writings.
[Page 58] |
7. Are you saying that our usage of the name Church of Christ in our advertising is sectarian?
Let me commend you for your perceptiveness. That is exactly what I am saying. But do not misunderstand me. I am saying that the way we use it is sectarian. I do not say that all who meet behind a signboard bearing this title are sectarian. I doubt that all who meet behind a signboard bearing the title of Oak Hill Presbyterian Church or Saint Ferdinand Catholic Church are sectarian in the fair sense of the word. To be sectarian is to be possessed of the party spirit, the spirit of exclusiveness. It is to attribute to the group with which you affiliate all of the blessings of divine grace while assuming that no others share in it. One who is not sectarian is content to belong to God; one who is sectarian believes that God belongs to him.
When you find one obsessed with a sect among the brethren you will find a sectarian, but when you find one endeared to brethren among the sects you will find a non-sectarian. To the first the party spirit is above the Holy Spirit; and the party means more than brethren. To the second brethren are first. Sectarianism always results from a confusion of values. It is not necessary to deny Christ to be a sectarian, it is only necessary to disown brethren. One need not advocate a doctrinal error to be sectarian. He may form a party around a truth lifted out of context and elevated to a superior position. The word for sect in the scriptures is hairesis, which has come into our Anglo-Saxon language as "heresy."
I want to quote what William Barclay has to say about the word, but I must mention to you that Barclay is a Presbyterian. As such, he is much less sectarian than brethren with whom I break bread every Lord's Day. I get a kick out of the fact that a lot of brethren who would not call upon Barclay to stand up and explain a passage if he were present in our gathering, will reel off whole paragraphs of what he wrote. Sectarians present a lot less problems to us if they are safely ensconced in Scotland. It would be a sin to ask one to tell us orally what he thinks, but we can steal what he has written, sometimes without even giving him credit for it. But here is his statement:
"In Corinth, instead of sitting down as one, sharing united fellowship, the members of the group were divided into cliques and sections, haireseis (the plural form of the word), and, instead of sharing all they had in a common stock, each little group within the group kept to itself what it had brought, and the result was that some had far too little and some had far too much. What should have been one harmonious, sharing, loving unity was broken up into little self-contained, selfish, exclusive fragments. This is what Paul calls hairesis. It is the breaking up of the unity of the Church into cliques who shut their circle to all but their own number.
"A fragmented Church is not a Church at all; a group whose circle is closed is certainly not a Christian group. If anyone regards his social status as something which shuts him off from others in a different social status, then he has not begun to see even the first meaning of Christianity. There is all the difference in the world between believing that we are right and believing that everyone else is wrong. Unshakable conviction is a Christian virtue; unyielding intolerance is a sin."
It is my intention to acknowledge every person as my brother in Christ who has responded to the good news about Jesus in God's own way. I want to be like Paul with reference to Corinth. I shall refuse to be identified with a Pauline, Cephasite, Apollosite, or Christ party. Instead, I will see my brethren in all of these and I will recognize them as brethren. I will also treat them as such, and that is something else. I think that
[Page 59] |
I think Watchman Nee said it very well indeed in his book The Normal Christian Church Life, page 59: "Our receiving anyone is merely our recognition that God has already received him. If he is the Lord's he is in the church. If he is not the Lord's he is not in the church. If we demand anything beyond the reception of the Lord before admitting him to fellowship, then we are not a church at all but only a sect."
While we are on this matter, let me pass along to you another observation by the same author in the same book, page 69. "God has placed believers of different races in one locality so that by transcending all external differences they might in one church show forth the one life and the one Spirit of His Son. All that comes to us by nature is overcome by grace. All that was ours in Adam has been ruled out in Christ."
This does not mean that I am going to leave the brethren whom I have always known and loved. Indeed they are all very dear to me. If I wanted to be sectarian I could well be so in the Church of Christ. But if I could not be free from sectarianism there, it is not likely that I could be anywhere else. Sectarianism is a matter of attitude and spirit. It is not necessarily a matter of where you attend or with whom you meet. All of us are human and all of us have our hangups and problems. This is as true of preachers as of anyone else. Really there is not that much difference because all of us are preachers, or should be!
The proper solution is to name the place where we meet and not give a title to those who meet there. The early saints were always designated by where they met and not by a particular title or denomination. I am sometimes asked how members of "The Church of Christ" who are traveling will find us. There are some of them that I do not want to find us. We have problems enough of our own without having more of them imported from Texas or somewhere else. I know congregations that were doing a great work until some of their brethren found them, and splintered them to smithereens.
I am content that the Lord has found me and I want to share him with everyone else I meet. I do not think that all whom he has found are in our corral and if I get to feeling that way he may have to find me over again. I am a little leery of those who think they have arrived and everyone else has departed!