Volume 45   Number 12                                                        August 2003

Last month we briefly discussed the failures of testing a "Christian" organization by determining if the organization can trace its roots historically back to Pentecost. Many in the church of Christ have used this criteria to show others that various organizations have been founded by certain men and therefore fail the aforementioned criteria.

However, these same individuals can, and have, used the same criteria to the church of Christ and declare that churches of Christ did not exist prior to the Campbells and Barton Stone. Is their claim any less valid than ours? Not really. Certainly there must be a better criteria.

The Lord's criteria for his own people has always been tracing the beliefs and practices of an individual, a congregation, or an organization, back to his original instructions and explanations.

Regarding the church which Christ built, do we teach the same things that Christ and the apostles taught, do we practice the same things that Christ and the apostles taught, and do we believe the same things?

Consider the young king Josiah. The priests found the lost Book of the Law and brought the words of this book to Josiah's hearing. Upon hearing the instructions of God, Josiah rent his clothes and commanded the priest to "inquire of the Lord for me, for the people and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found; for great is the wrath of the Lord that is aroused against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us." (II Kings 22:13)

Josiah proceeded to restore the covenant with God and bring true worship back to the land. So thorough and precise was Josiah's restoration of the law that when the Passover was reinstituted, "such a Passover had never been held since the days of the judges who judged Israel, nor in all the days of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah." (II Kings 23:22)

Since the law had long since been forgotten and the people's worship far from acceptable in God's eyes, was this restoration of Josiah a new religion or the restored law now the Law of Josiah? Of course not. Josiah simply used God's Word to bring back lost practices, beliefs, and acts of worship.

Later in the history of God's people, Ezra the priest brought the law to a people returning from captivity and thus ignorant in God's Word. In chapter eight of Nehemiah we read of a beautiful scene where adults and children attentively listen to God's words and hear instruction. They read of the Feast of the Tabernacles and immediately prepare to keep this ordinance "according to the prescribed manner." (Nehemiah 8:14)

In Nehemiah 9:2, the Israelites separate themselves from foreigners. In chapter 11, the people took an oath to restore the lost covenant. We follow their progress in separating the mixed multitude, in bringing back the tithe, in restoring rest on the Lord's Sabbath, and in cleansing pagan practices and speech.

Was this restored covenant a new thing from Ezra and now a new religion? Were the people who long forget the Law of Moses now following the Law of Ezra? Of course not.

Both Josiah and Ezra looked upon the nation and compared the people's beliefs, practices, and worship to the original beliefs, practices, and worship of Moses and found themselves altogether different. The religious nature of Israel in their day was not traceable back to Moses. The results of these two godly men was not a creation of new religions, although their teachings were new to their hearers, but instead, they brought back God's Law and renewed a lost covenant.

The Word of God is an eternal seed and time shall never impact its viability. Even earthly seeds of wheat and peas retain their viability for thousands of years. The seed of God's Word, though thousands of years old, when planted in the hearts of men will bring forth children of God.

However, if we plant words which are not God's or fail to plant all of God's words, then the fruit of this seed will not be a child of God.

If any man or woman picks up God's Word and diligently keeps the pattern of the New Testament in beliefs, practices, and worship, this noble individual has not created a new denomination but restored the true Church.

If an organization does not teach what the New Testament Church taught then it cannot claim roots to Pentecost. If an organization, when compared to the described church of Christ in God's Word, looks different in practice, belief, and organization, historical roots mean nothing. The seed of God, when planted today, will irrefutably yield the same Christian and the same church as it did in the first century.

Therefore, if we can trace our doctrines back to God and back to Pentecost, it does not matter what individual of recent history began the process on their own. He or she simply followed the examples of Josiah and Ezra and restored a lost covenant and revived a forgotten law. In essence, when we set out to determine if we are in the body of Christ which is set aside for salvation, we need to consider what we believe, what our church believes, and then "search the scriptures daily to find out whether these things [are] so." (Acts 17:11)