Articles
Why I Left Institutionalism (Part 1)
I became a Christian on March 5, 1972 at the Hickory Knoll church of Christ in New Orleans, LA. At the age of 11-years-old, I can remember walking up front during the invitation hymn and being baptized “into Christ” for “the forgiveness” of sins (Galatians 3:27; Acts 2:38, NRSV). That amazing day began my almost half a century spiritual journey of following Christ.
The purpose of writing “Why I Left Institutionalism” is to share my personal quest for truth and wrestling with the “issues” that effect churches of Christ today. I hope “my thoughts” may be helpful to brethren who may be questioning and studying these significant “issues” that presently divide the “people of God” (1 Peter 2:10). My use of the terms “institutional” and “non-institutional” are only to facilitate discussion and are not intended to offend anyone nor to advocate a “sectarian view” the body of Christ (cf. Ephesians 4:4).
My intent for these articles is not to judge the hearts of brethren who may hold different convictions than my own. I believe difficult “issues” deserve our examination by consulting the Scriptures, and giving one another time to study, think and rethink what the Bible teaches (2 Timothy 4:2). The Bereans were “noble” because they “searched the Scriptures” (Acts 17:11). In addition, I believe we can have strong convictions while behaving and speaking with love and respect towards one another, without compromising our convictions when we may disagree. I believe we should “Love the brotherhood” (1 Peter 2:17).
First, I want to share why I didn’t leave “institutional” churches of Christ. I didn’t leave because my parents changed churches. The majority of our family’s beliefs about “truth” are identical, but we hold differing beliefs on the “issues.” I am grateful to my father for encouraging me to think independently in my study of God’s word. Though we differ on the “issues” we’re still family!
Neither did I change because of an unloving or warped desire to condemn my “institutional” brethren. Honestly, I owe my early sprouting faith and spiritual growth in God’s word to many preachers and brethren in “institutional” churches. These preachers and brethren helped to nourish my faith as a teenager and young adult. I owe “part of my faith” in God to brethren who believed the same basic Bible “truths” which are also believed in “non-institutional” churches. I treasure the friendships and brotherly love of my “institutional” brethren today.
I lost many things in the way of local fellowship and worshipping together with friends and brethren when I studied and changed my convictions on the “issues.” It “cost” me something to change my convictions. My personal faith didn’t relocate to a new “brotherhood camp,” but only a desire for a good conscience, to abide in Christ’s doctrine and to please God in everything. It’s interesting, I first learned these good faith-attitudes from my “institutional” brethren.
The “crux” of the reasons why I left the “institutional positions” are basically two-fold: attitudes towards Bible authority and the biblical-scripturalness of specific “institutional” church practices.
While both “institutional” and “non- institutional” brethren correctly appeal to the Bible as the “only authority” in all matters, in practice I have seen two fundamentally different “attitudes” towards Bible authority. For several years, I had read and seen a “sectarian view” of Bible authority among “institutional” churches and affiliated publications. Although the Bible (“book, chapter, and verse”) was appealed to as “the standard of authority,” the prevailing attitudes and behaviors seemed slanted more towards “What does the church of Christ teach” or “What is our brotherhood position,” which is a subtle non-biblical “standard of authority” instead of the Bible alone. Essentially, the “church of Christ” was ultimately used as “the standard” for truth, and to decide the scripturalness or unscripturalness of religious practices and questions.
For example, when I casually asked about the “issues,” in one large congregation the eldership answered and said, “We can do anything we believe is a good work.” To say this eldership’s emphasis on “we” and “anything” jolted me would be an understatement! These elders, whom I esteemed as good men, did not offer “book, chapter and verses” or to study what the Bible teaches about the “issues.”
Later the same large congregation began using the church building for a community daycare center. People in the community would pay the “church daycare” for monthly childcare, and the church paid “the daycare employees.” I remember when my wife began working in the “church daycare” and brought home her first “paycheck.” Although I didn’t know what the “issues” were all about, the Lord’s church being involved in a “daycare business” didn’t somehow seem right.
About four years later, I finally gave the “issues” a serious study from the Bible. Gene Taylor (a “non-institutional” preacher) and his wife were invited to eat dinner in our home. I asked him to explain why brethren were divided over the “issues.” During our study, he opened the Bible and appealed to it for our authority, not “the church of Christ,” as we examined the institutional “issues.” We compared each “issue” to what the Bible taught. We studied what the Bible has to say about an eldership overseeing more than one church (Acts 14:23; Philippians 1:1), using the church treasury to support non-Christians, colleges and schools, daycare centers, recreational activities and facilities for the elderly and orphans (2 Corinthians 8:4; James 1:27).
We also studied what the Bible says about “sponsoring church arrangement” and financially supporting colleges to send out preachers and to do the missionary work which God gave to local churches to do (Philippians 4:15). While we were studying, I was a member of a smaller “institutional” congregation when, from the large congregation, one of the elders exercised his elder-bishop authority over our smaller church which was in another city. This elder directed and controlled what our congregation could or could not do. The men of our congregation allowed the “powerbroker” elder to oversee and control our congregation.
In the New Testament, an eldership is only given authority from God to “Shepherd the flock of God which is among you” (1 Peter 5:2). The elders at Ephesus were instructed “Therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God” (Acts 20:28). Elders have authority from God to only “shepherd” and oversee “the flock” (local church) “which is among you,” not multiple local churches.
I want to be candidly honest...a sectarian view of Bible authority (or church authority?) can be fostered in either brotherhood camps! No brotherhood “camp” is immune from denominational attitudes and behavior. However, we must be cautious to not “paint” brethren and autonomous local congregations with the same brush. Both individual and church autonomy, coupled with an honest and fearful searching the Scriptures (like the Bereans), is the best inoculation against “sectarian thinking” in any brotherhood camp.
In conclusion, being a Christian means being only a disciple of Jesus Christ and His teaching — and following where His footsteps lead us. We are not disciples of “the church of Christ” or a brotherhood movement. In my next article we look more closely at specific “issues” that divide us as brethren. God’s desire is brethren to have unity. To have unity we must agree to use the Scriptures as our only standard of authority.
