There are moments in life when one truly believes that we have stumbled on to something life-changing or at least worthy of further study. While some of these moments begin as life changing revelations they are later classified as essentially meaningless. Others start out as nothing more than a side note but are later gathered with other side notes and become the kind of discoveries that take our faith to a higher planes. This particular thought started out as a curiosity that has since been fueled by additional theology, contemplation, and prayer.
In one of my former seminary courses, Cross-Culture Christian Leadership, I was given the opportunity to get familiar with the Pentecostal movement. Fire From Heaven, written by Harvey Cox, a professor at the Harvard Divinity School is one of the texts. It was shocking to me that the author was a Harvard man and that I was learning about the most charismatic denomination from the Ivy Leagues. Why is someone from Harvard writing about the
Pentecostal movement? This was my first
reaction to the text but later it birthed a desire to study out the other charismatic movements in the US.
Having studied and written about all of the major
denominational fellowships as well as the major world
religions my mind was racing because it was the local church community that captured my curiosity again. A denomination is simply a piece removed from a
whole and the United States is filled with them. Trying to recount how this began is really
eye-opening, as the first reformers, aside from the Great Schism, did not set
out to build a new movement. Martin
Luther is of course a prime example as he wanted to bring the Word of God back
to the Catholic or Universal church. John Calvin made his mark by reaching out to the poor and preaching the
Word of God outside the Church building, which was not allowed by the clergy of his time. Both men set out to bring God back to the
people not to glorify themselves by heading up the next mega-Church.
Let me be clear and state that I have no problem or concern with different fellowships within a community. That being said, there would be no reason to write this if I did not see problems in
other areas of denominationalism. The United States has perfected the craft of starting new churches and there is no end to that model in sight. That is not a bad thing in it of itself. Religious freedom is a catalyst that can either ignite
real reform or turn the church into no more than a lucrative business. How is this done? My experiences have led be to believe it begins with a gift from
God that ultimately was intended to unify God’s people but instead has been manipulated to scatter the herd, so to speak. Remember Satan masquerades
as an Angel of Light and not as a blood-thirsty vampire.
“So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists,
the pastors and teachers, to
equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built
up
until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of
God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ”
(Ephesians 4:11-13).
These different roles in the church were designed to unify but have gone their own way and begun their own
fellowship. After all, when there are men of impact around us the natural tendency is to follow them. "What I mean is this: One of you says, 'I follow Paul'; another, 'I follow Apollos'; another, 'I follow Cephas'; still another, 'I follow Christ'” (1 Corinthians 1:12) Different men with these
different gifts are easy to follow as their perspective sound fresh and perhaps even original because their ideals have been separated into different categories instead of
being gathered as a whole. For example, the fellowship where I came to know Christ is extremely familiar with Jesus the Evangelist: In fact, we just might be the most connected fellowship to this side of Christ than
any other (In your face Baptists). It is
also commonplace within my fellowship to ask the question, “What happened to
Steve I have not seen him in awhile?” The
answer is usually a very matter-of-fact and frankly cold statement, “Steve left
a long time ago… He’s gone.” While we
are quite familiar with Jesus’ mission to seek and save what was lost and make
disciples of all nations we are unfamiliar with Jesus the Shepherd or
Pastor. We have a shallow relationship with the Good Shepherd, who would
willingly leave the ninety-nine that are doing well to search and rescue the
one sheep gone astray (We just might be the worse at this).
Other movements are extremely family
oriented and while they excel in shepherding they lack in the area of evangelism. These gifts were intended to work together for the good of a much greater cause than those gifted individuals. I have been secretly attending a Sunday
service at the Mainline Church of Christ in town and have come to understand
that this fellowship knows Jesus the Teacher very well. The Messiah who took the time to teach deep
lessons on the side of a mountain and was able to breathe life into the Old
Testament. These sermons from the pulpit
seem to have no agenda other than preaching what is there with no title and no
points… Is that even allowed?! Some are indeed at the
forefront of knowing Jesus the healer. Often
this (in fundamentalism and orthodoxy) is dismissed as the stepchild faction of Christianity... labeled as the Holy Rollers or
the demon chasers. In fact, most of
these movements associate demon possession with addiction and are focused on
recovery through submission to the Son of God.
So which one is right? If we are careful to notice the original purpose of
these roles they are intended by God to build up His people until we all reach unity in the faith. Is that possible attending one comfortable church practice or more
biblically stated knowing only one side of Jesus? What is the fullness of Christ and can it be attained through a single denominational experience? There is a buffet of easy objections to this
line of reasoning but I have found that grace, maturity and freedom have the
ability to trump them all.
