I spent the past year examining the Churches of Christ, and soon discovered how badly they are plagued with sectarianism. I knew it was bad, but I had no idea how bad. Probably, what stood out mostly, is how each sect within the Church of Christ seems to ignore each other. You have the conservative side condemning any and all who disagree with them, even calling others in the Body “wayward 
brethren.” There are many sites/blogs with writings that are straight forward, even denying a Moderate and Liberal as part of the Body, calling them Church of Christ denominations. But, what amazed me more than anything, was how they write articles with opposing views, and rarely do they comment and dialog with one another.
The Conservative church of Christ demands one understand the bible perfectly, while the liberals tend to accept our inability to agree upon everything. The Conservative views are often called legalistic by the Liberal Church of Christ, and the Liberal views are seen as not following the pattern. The division seems to mainly come from the Conservative side, who insist on patternism – those who think that they have arrived at some level of understanding, which serves them the right to demand one understand everything as they, or be dis-fellowshipped for not following the pattern. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not denying patterns, standards, and guidelines. Even these are to be followed out of a loving heart, not a heart bent towards legalism. The patterns I am denying are those created from inferences of fallible men and then made law.
I doubt there are many brethren who can truthfully say they are in 100% agreement with every other Christian in their congregation. I’m not sure there are even any two of us who are in total agreement on everything taught in Scripture. Yet, we are quick to divide over just about anything. Our unity in Christ should be more enduring than that; it shouldn’t crumble whenever two people/groups differ. But, it does … and when it does, the Devil wins yet another battle, and the Body of Christ is weakened just that much more. We must work to overthrow the oppressive shackles of sectarianism, legalism and the Pharisaic practices that are so prevalent within our brotherhood.
cthoward said,
January 14, 2009 at 2:30 pm
You know, Randy…
The more I read Jesus’ teachings, and the more I study about the history of Israel the more I come to the conclusion that we need to learn to avoid the pitfalls on either side of the road. Most of Israelite history is littered with examples of “liberalism.” They decided that God’s laws weren’t meant to followed to the letter, so they could be discarded. Then, by the time Jesus came around some of Israel had swung the other way…probably in response to their history. The Pharisees rose up and demanded strict, legalistic observance of the law.
Shouldn’t we learn from Israel? But typically Christians think that it is an either/or scenario…either we are legalistic or we are liberalistic. But, Israel should teach us that the middle ground is best…observance of God’s laws as an expression of our love, and a view of God’s laws that sees them as his blessings for us. He is telling us how to live better. The Sabbath was made for man, as Jesus put it. That means we can’t liberally discard them, but it also means we can’t legalistically observe or bind them.
Anyway…I will quit preaching. Glad you are back.
Truth said,
January 15, 2009 at 7:41 pm
Randy, Glad to see your back too, hope everything’s going well.