 RADICAL RESTORATION
Bro. LaGard Smith has given us a book entitled, “Radical Restoration.” Rather than help elders and preachers navigate through stormy waters now before us, Bro. Smith’s approach to “restoration” would do irreparable harm to any church which chooses to follow his suggestions. He perhaps inadvertently predicts the fruit of his plan by saying, “The very nature of radical restoration is such that the act of demolition is as vital as the act of creation. Invariably, wrecking crews must raze the old structure before they can begin to build anew” (p. 39).
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Smith would resurrect the “mutual ministry” practice of the late Carl Ketcherside and Leroy Garrett. To see just how successful that approach to teaching and church building is, one need only consult Mac Lynn’s directory of “Churches of Christ in the United States.” Those who do will note that congregations identified by a “ME,” i.e., a mutual edification symbol, are few in number and often as few as 10 or 15 in membership. That is the result of 75 years of mutual ministry without “located preachers.” |
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He would confound the Lord’s Supper with a common fellowship meal. Paul addressed this question in I Cor. 11:20-23. He made it clear that the Lord’s Supper is not a meal where hungry appetites are satisfied. For those who wished to dine and commune together, he said, “In this I praise you not.” Coziness and intimacy are not ingredients of the Lord’s Supper. |
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He would have our congregations abandon their public meeting houses and resort to private homes. He and others who are enamored with house churches seem to overlook that literally hundreds of our congregations began in homes of members. As they grew they eventually secured their own public places of assembly. Generally we build because it is more economical in the long run than renting and provides facilities that are designed to meet congregation needs. Also, because it gives us permanency and presence in a community that a rented hall cannot provide. His recommendation would forever limit the church to small “home” sized congregations that would be endlessly dividing into more small groups. |
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He would have us consider the possibility of having one set of elders to supervise all the churches in a particular city. Even this concept has been floated before. It has flourished best in the diocesan concept of Catholicism with its citywide bishop, but it is not biblical. The apostles “appointed for them elders in every church” (Acts 14:23). |
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To further complicate our survival, he would have us to exist without specific identify in a world of competing and confusing religious organizations. Although he cannot fault the Bible name “church of Christ” he would have us discard it for other, less distinctive, names that would not help the most diligent searcher find in which private home we are meeting. Also he evidently would have us discontinue placing our addresses and phone numbers in the yellow pages of the phone directories lest we by so doing join the ranks of denominations. |
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He would have us operate without funds except those gathered for occasional emergency benevolent situations. |
Granted, Bro. Smith is a learned man of the law and he is currently riding a crest of popularity on the campus scene. He would have been more convincing if he had first launched just such a congregation as he proposes and after ten years reported back to us with a progress report. But one need not have a PhD to perceive that his “Radical Restoration” will only result in radical decline and ultimate demise for those who follow his program. His suggestions are indeed radical but they have nothing to do with the restoration of New Testament Christianity. They might however eventuate in a new kind of church...one looking back to Smith as its originator.
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