APOSTASY: IS IT A POSSIBILITY?

Our preachers use to frequently preach on the possibility of apostasy. In so doing they were addressing the popular false doctrine of Calvinism which says that once a person is saved, he cannot so sin as to lose his salvation.  The question was easily answered, for Paul said to Christians who sought justification by the law, "Ye are severed from Christ...ye are fallen away from grace" (Gal. 5:4). Sadly, our generation does not hear many lessons on this important topic although such teaching is still needed.

We who preach and teach still need to address the possibility of apostasy. We must consider the question, not just of individual Christians, but the possibility of congregations, Christian schools or even our brotherhood departing from our commitment to Christ. That commitment is to restore and practice the faith revealed in the New Testament. That commitment many among us seem to have forgotten, or even have rejected, and some have embraced a new and different approach to serving God. That such can happen is affirmed by Paul in his warning to the elders of the church at Ephesus. "I know that after my departing grievous wolves shall enter in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them" (Acts 20:29-30).

When the question of apostasy is raised, the liberals among us laugh.  They brand those that pose such questions as dinosaurs. They accuse them of disrupting our brotherhood.  They paint them as unscholarly bumpkins.  They suggest that they really don't understand the restoration plea. But it is precisely those liberal minded brethren who are the promoters of change; changes that are departures from the old paths of the Bible. They would be disappointed if their plans were unmasked and thwarted by the discussion of the possibility of a widespread apostasy.

Those who are familiar with our history know without doubt that the potential for a general apostasy involving a majority of our preachers, congregations and schools is real. It happened to our brotherhood here in America at the end of the 19th century.  The first manifestation of that apostasy was a movement to create a governing body to manage our mission efforts.  They  called it the American Christian Missionary Society. Next was an agitation to incorporate instrumental music with our song worship. Those who were the vocal agents of change in those efforts were generally the more sophisticated and erudite preachers from the large city churches.  They persisted in their determination to have these extra Biblical things until division occurred.  So effective had they been that upwards of 85 percent of our churches were lost. A struggling handful was left, primarily in the South.  David Lipscomb and a small band of fellow preachers waged a valiant battle to salvage and rebuild the shattered brotherhood. Today the heirs of those who abandoned the Biblical pattern are known as the Christian Church-Disciples of Christ. 
For the Disciples the apostasy is complete.  They bear little or no resemblance to the church of the Bible.  Many of their leaders have publicly declared the attempt to restore the primitive faith as an unworkable failure.

We have many simple-minded brethren among us.  They believe the Bible and respect its authority. They are happy to walk in the old paths, but they are naive.  They open their pulpits to unsound men who are promoting and introducing strange ideas and practices among us.  They support and promote schools that are seed beds of apostasy.  They support and circulate publications of those who would preach a different gospel. They appoint such men to be elders and deacons.  They remain silent when such are given classes to teach. They speak not when such men are considered for the pulpit.  They can't bear to take a stand; to be found in opposition to error or to stand with a minority, or, god-forbid, to stand alone.  One of the great needs of our people is for good, level-headed men who know God's Will and have the fortitude to stand foursquare for it. Often one person can make the difference in the direction a congregation will travel.  God sought for such an individual in Ezekiel's day. "I sought for a many among them, that should build up the wall, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found none" (Ezek 22:30).

Like our brethren of a century past, we see standing before us the possibility of apostasy.  May God help each of us respond with courage and conviction to defeat that possibility before it can do its evil work. We must be prepared to "fight the good fight of the faith" if we would lay hold on eternal life (I Tim. 6:12).