BEFORE YOU INVEST IN A NEW THING, CHECK IT OUT
Folk-wisdom is a wonderful thing. Without the advantages of higher education, our forefathers learned valuable lessons of life and encoded them in wise sayings. "Don't buy a pig in a poke," i.e. don't make a purchase without first inspecting the item. There is a certain risk in ordering merchandise from a catalog. The actual product is often not the quality that the picture implies.
Those progressive-minded elders, preachers and members, who are taken with the proposals for change being promoted by some of our university scholars, really need to check out the actual product before they buy the package.
What sounds exciting in a religious journal or a book may appear quite different in a real life setting. They owe it to themselves and the church to visit a Disciples of Christ/Christian Church. There was a time (125 yrs. past) when these folks were one with us in faith and practice. They chose the road now being promoted in a flurry of books being produced and circulated by faculty members of Abilene Christian University and endorsed by the president of that institution. To see the end results of the "drive to introduce change" in our brotherhood, "go and see." Then you can make an informed decision whether or not to proceed.
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In a Disciples Church you can see the "new hermeneutic" at work. Their seminaries have been instilling in their students this approach to the Bible for a full century. One's approach to the Bible plays out in the faith and practice of the congregation. |
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You can see the kind of music the agents of change will bring into your worship assemblies. When the question of instrumental music in worship is no longer a "faith or salvation issue," you get not only the pipe-organ, the piano and the chorus, but the rock band as well. |
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There you can see first hand what the talk about "freeing our women to serve God" is really all about. They have women preachers and elders. |
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You can see how replacing the search for Bible authority on questions of faith, practice and morals with the "story telling" approach can lead to gay membership and ordination. |
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You can see for yourself the real meaning of, "we are Christians only, but not the only Christians." There you will find participation in the Billy Graham type of crusades, membership in the ministerial alliance, acceptance of the unimmersed as fellow-Christians and membership in the World Council of Churches. |
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You can see how "we can do anything the Bible does not condemn" plays out in the practice of a church. First they rejected the idea of "the law of silence" that says we can only do what the Scripture authorizes us to do. They then abandoned "book chapter and verse" Bible preaching. They now have no trouble embracing things clearly forbidden and condemned by Scripture. |
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You will see the fruit of theological liberalism in the life and teaching of a church. Many of their theologians and preachers blush not to lay their sinful hands on the sacred text of the Bible and question if it is even legitimate. |
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You can see a full blown denomination. With its national governing body, headquarters, presiding officers. They now proudly acknowledge that they are truly a denomination. |
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You can see the kind of preachers it genders; reverend pastors whose preaching has been reduced to the level of cold water |
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You can see a dying church. For half a century the Disciples have been declining in membership. Standards have been lowered to the bottom notch, entertainment has replaced worship. Every new social fad of liberalism has been embraced, still they are dying. |
Please, Christian leader, before you buy the "change" package being promoted among us, make the visit; check it out. Is this where you really want to go? Once you invite the change-makers in, the likelihood of restoring the Biblical faith and practice of the past is almost nil.
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