Polemics, Church of Christ

Initially, just a little over two centuries ago, the guys who were starting the Church of Christ, who initially began out of a Presbyterian background, the guys who were starting this group said, let's get back to the way it was back in the Apostles' time.

So they were trying real hard to get back to the apostolic restoration, if you will. Here's what the church was intended to be. That was their idea. 1801 is kind of the earliest date that someone would set for the origination of the group. It kind of depends on how much is enough difference to say that they started. But at 1801, so just a little over two centuries ago, they claimed that the Church of Christ was the sole restoration of the apostolic era of faith, everything else. down the sink, right? So they claim, you know, we're the only ones, this is it, we're the restoration group, the authentic one.

The originally Presbyterian, we make a point here, by 1811, the Presbyterians had negative, you know, official declarations, you know, bad group, not from us, you know, disclaiming their association. So then they started associating with the Baptists and that didn't work either. So the Baptist group said, no, not from us. You know, you're not a part of us. So they did that. And then they got in conflict by 1827. They practiced the first baptism for remission of sins. This is baptism so that your sins are washed away. So you get this baptism and then your sins are washed away. What's interesting is that's a continuing teaching of the church, and yet none of the founders actually ever had this. So the founders, according to that teaching, would all go to hell.

Yes, Art? When you speak of 1801, was that here in the United States or over in Scotland? That's really looking here in the United States as I understand it. There are connections back to Scotland. But as I understand it, 1801 is the date that they give it and looking here. Now, by 1830, 1830 was the first printing of the Book of Mormon. Joseph Smith, the originator of the Mormon Church, had the Book of Mormon printed, differs substantially from the one you'll find printed today. But nonetheless, he'd had it printed and he was getting a group started up. he challenged one of the founders of the churches of Christ to a debate, which never took place as I understand it, over which one was the true restoration group.

There was a lot of kind of tug of war between these two groups. And frankly, the Mormons were winning out. Because the Mormons had, you know, we've got extra revelations, whereas the churches of Christ were saying, no, we're the restoration and we don't have all these extra books and extra profits and a lot of that kind of stuff. There was a special appeal that the Mormon church had because they had all these extra things. I mean, that had marketing sizzle, right? So at any rate, so initially there was a tug of war and basically the Mormon church was really winning that tug of war. taken that away. Because Mormonism had not only the Bible, which they only claim the King James, and even that with reservations, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, Pearl of Great Price, they had apostles, prophets, tongues, all this stuff. So they had lots of extra revelations and that gave it more marketing sizzle.

Now, then splintering among the group took place about 1849. Now remember when was the great disappointment in the Seventh-day Adventist Church? It was about 1844, right? So this is about a half-decade later. Now you get this Churches of Christ group starting to splinter off, and you also are getting splintering in the Mormon Church. because at the Mormon Church we think of this big one in Salt Lake City, but there's actually better than a half dozen other Mormon split off groups. So you got this one also starts splitting up and splintering up and reacting to the Mormons and intermixing with these other groups. It's confusing, isn't it? Are you confused? Well, good. All right. In 1860, there was then the split up over the use of musical instruments.

I have a quote here or a parenthesis that I need to explain a little bit. It says, the Church of Christ does not use musical instruments in their services, but some splinter groups do. We'll address those splinter groups here in a little bit because there are certainly those who do, including Max Lucado at his church. What he has done is he's included musical instruments at the church and It's called Oak Hill Church, not Oak Hill Church of Christ. And so they've kind of distanced themselves from the original, you know, founding teaching. And so a lot of the rest of the churches of Christ are really ticked off at them. I was looking at a website even just this morning in preparing for this, just looking and here's this other Church of Christ group just pouring hot coal, you know, over Max Lucado's church for his inclusion of this satanic musical instrument use.

Okay, then in the 1870s, there was influence of the Church of Christ and the Christadelphians, oh boy, upon the Jehovah's Witnesses who are primarily of Seventh-day Adventist descent. So now look at this, you've got the Churches of Christ and the Christadelphians and mostly the Seventh-day Adventists feeding into the Jehovah's Witness group.

Are you confused yet? It's a real mixture. The Jehovah's Witness used a Greek-English interlinear that was produced by one of the men from the Disciples of Christ, which is also part of the Churches of Christ, and who became a Christadelphian. How's that for really mixed up? By 1906, this was a hundred years ago, the Church of Christ separated from the Disciples of Christ and the Christian Church. And about 1920, these groups were further split by controversies over head coverings.

Do we have head coverings or not? Okay. Communion cups, exactly how you do this. You have individual cups or you have a common cup. No, it's not this way, it's that way. And so they'll split over that one. Okay. Then schools. And that includes, do we have Sunday schools? Go ahead and grab a hand out there so you'll be up to speed with us. We're still in the middle of page one. Orphanages. Some said we should have orphanages and others said, no, we should not.

So they split over that. Musical instruments. Roughly speaking, if you take the whole group of those who call themselves in this general circle, roughly about 50%. have musical instruments and the other half do not. And of course, the ones that don't think the ones that do are just awful. Over divorce.

What's that? Oh, yes. Well, we're already written a long written off, long written off. You're correct. Divorce, remarriage. Those were things following this leader versus another. You know, I like this guy. No, I don't like that one. So a lot of them will say, well, I like Max Lucado. And these other guys say, no, he's awfully from Satan. And so anyway, all this stuff, lots of splintering. OK. So after all this, did they ever get back to home plate? All right.

The present teachings of the Church of Christ which stand out from biblical Christianity are as follows. In other words, I'm not going over everything. These are the things that particularly stand out from what's biblical. One, salvation requires faith. Plus. And that's the problem, the plus.

Repentance, confession. baptism by immersion as a believing adult for or unto the remission of sins by someone who holds a church of Christ doctrine is therefore within the church of Christ this person who is the being saved who is this being saved will adhere to the behavioral standards of the church of Christ that is Think about this. You have to have faith, and you have to repent. You have to confess it out loud. You have to be baptized, specifically pronouncing for the remission of sins.

It has to be done by somebody who is in the Church of Christ, believes everything that they believe, and both you and that person must remain in fellowship and in doctrinal harmony with the Church of Christ, but they won't say what that doctrine is. That's the other thing, is whatever I'm telling you here, is sort of backdoor because they don't believe in doctrinal statements. Okay? You have to believe the right thing, but we won't tell you what it is. Okay? Yes. It's a secret because everybody knows. Right? Anyway, you figured that out.

While a valid baptism is looked upon as effective for salvation, the Lord's table is looked upon as symbolic. One of the things that we've discovered already is about the year 220, by that year, the early church had migrated towards general belief in priests, altars, and the effectiveness, spiritual effectiveness, of baptism in the Lord's table. So what have they done? They've gone back, not to the apostles, but back to the year 220. to say that baptism is effective, but they've not gone there with the Lord's table and they said that's symbolic.

So it's a real mixed bag. All right, then page two. Number two, many and perhaps most churches of Christ forbid the use of musical instruments in worship services. Roughly a half, number probably varying, you know, maybe as much as 40 to 60 in there, but roughly a half. No musical instruments. But there are other splinter groups who do use them. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Right. That's correct. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's a very odd thing.

In other words, they they end up coming up with this legalism and yet have a really hard time coming up with real rational justification for why can't I do this. It's about like saying, you know, you are condemned if you wear black shoes to church. Where does it say that? Well, it doesn't exactly say that, but we don't like them, you know. That's right. Doesn't say you should wear black shoes. So it must be wrong, right? Yes. Okay. Certainly.

So, the musical instrument thing is not a categorical thing, especially when you look at the larger group, as we'll look at a listing here in a bit. Anyway, item three. Churches of Christ are typically reluctant to publish a doctrinal statement, as this might be seen as another authority, thus constructively adding to Scripture. So, anyway, that's another one. We'll touch on that in a bit.

Churches of Christ in the present era are usually amillennial in their view of future things. Christ, yes, is going to come in the future, although there were some that even deny that. But without a literal rapture of the church, that isn't happening, no tribulation period, no millennial reign of Christ. Christ is just going to come in the future, and he's going to decide for everybody, and the dead will rise, and that'll be it.

Keep it simple. And all this detail, they don't want to hear it, because the detail means something else. By the way, the serpent in the garden, that was a musically deceptive spirit. He had instruments. Doesn't matter if it doesn't describe him, he did. Okay.

So one one one strike you're out in the old Anyway, that's the baseball theme again The reason why I say that What about these the usual Church of Christ doctrine of salvation where you must? believe repent confess got to say it okay, and you must be baptized specifically and for the remission of sins by a Church of Christ person who continues to both believe, even though what they believe is a secret, and live out their teaching.

So if you fail at any one of those points or fail to maintain any one of those points, what happens? That's right, it's banana peel time. It's banana peel time. You're out of there. Okay, so that's the problem. Okay, so salvation is precarious under that arrangement. Real difficult. By the way, we have at least a couple people in here at Holly Hills who are of that background. I don't notice any of them missing it, but anyway, they are. Let's take a look at it. We asked the question, salvation is precarious indeed under such circumstances, but more importantly, is it biblical? Is it biblical to teach that salvation is precarious? Romans 3, 27, 28. Where then is boasting?

It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? Things that you do? The stuff you've got to do on the list? No, but by a law of faith and repentance and baptism and confession. Oh, wait a minute. It stops there. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the law.

So what about the rest of the list? What happens to it? Yeah, it's not there. It's added on. Okay? It's added on. It's icing on the cake that's not, you know, desirable. It's like putting a layer of grease on it or something. Okay. 1 Corinthians 1, 14 through 17. I thank God that I baptized all of you according to the remission of sins. Right?

No. I baptized none of you. Except he names a couple of guys, Crispus and Gaius. So that no one would say you were baptized in my name. Now, I did baptize also the household of Stephanus. Oh yes, him too. Beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized any other. For Christ did not send me to baptize.

Why? Why not? It's needed for salvation. He didn't send him to baptize. What's the problem? You're supposed to have it. It's apostolic. You're a church, right? What's the problem? Shouldn't he be just anxious as can be to get those people soggy? You would think. No. You have to hold them under. That's the right thing. You've got to go to the right count and hope that somebody's watch doesn't stop. Okay.

For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the Gospel. Because you're saved by the faith in the preaching of the Gospel. Baptism doesn't save. So that the cross of Christ would not be made void. It's the cross that counts. Somebody else would put some other word after that, but I won't. Okay. It's the cross that counts. It is not the getting soggy. Okay.

Galatians 2.16 Nevertheless, knowing that a man is not justified by works of the law, all the extra stuff he had to face. but through faith in Christ Jesus, even when we believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ, and not by works of the law, since by works of the law, everybody's going to get wet. No. By works of the law, no flesh will be justified. None. Zip. Nada. I'll let that suffice. You can certainly read the rest there. Let's take a look at page 3.

All right, since the churches of Christ claim to be a restoration of this first century church, it's a problem to make baptism of any kind essential for salvation, since it's known that baptism did not begin to be seen in the churches effective for salvation until about 220 AD. It was invented well after everybody during the New Testament era had gone home to be with the Lord. over a century after the last apostle had died. Then salvation began to be looked at as effective. It's not apostolic.

The few passages that link believing in baptism are structured in the Greek so as to convey baptism as expression of salvation by faith in Christ, such as Acts 2.38.

We'll look at that in more detail in a minute here. All right, now how about the musical instruments? So that's obviously an issue for us here, right? Which many churches of Christ forbid. I said roughly a half. The Old Testament required priests to use trumpets as part of the holy convocation. Of course, they say, well, that's not the church.

That's fine. Harps were used in the temple. Psalms make repeated reference to the harp and lyre in righteous use. Harps are mentioned in heaven in the book of Revelation. They say, oh yeah, but that's up there, not here. So what they do is they say it's only in the church, here on earth, no musical instruments. Okay, figure that one out. In Colossians, Paul says that the word of Christ dwelling in believers richly would result in psalms, hymns, and spiritual psalms.

As we studied through Ephesians 5.19, found the same three words, okay?

Psalmos, it means to strum. Hmm. Yeah. Psalmas means to strum. So the very first of the three, mentioned in two books of the New Testament, says this is what the word of Christ dwelling in you richly will look like. And he gives those three categories, and the first of those being Psalmas, Psalms, meaning to strum, and that's where the word comes from. It's a Greek terminology.

Scripture nowhere forbids use of musical instruments and worship. So there was no basis for asserting a prohibition other than just somebody says, well, you know, gee, you can't do it. Well, you can make any rule about anything that's not in there. And we can make any rule about all sorts of things. Where's the talk about glasses? Absolutely do not wear glasses in church. All right, Randy. Yeah, that's right.

In other words, if you don't have anything to say that musical instruments are required, then it must be something we can prohibit. The legalist says if it's not specifically allowed, then it must be wrong. The legalist tends to take that approach. If it's not specifically allowed, then it must be wrong. The biblical approach, and one which Paul even lays out, is if it's not prohibited, it must be okay.

So, entirely different approach to things. This is an odd instance where they've taken the musical instruments as a, you know, well, it's not in scripture, therefore, you know, in the New Testament is you got to do this. Well, in fact, it's strongly implied in the two places that music is brought up deliberately, psalmos, to strum. So go ahead and use it. Okay. Second Corinthians 317 conveys liberty in such matters where scripture is silent, or nearly so, where scripture doesn't have that much to say. All right, next question.

Is a doctrinal statement unbiblical, or does it constitute supplementing scripture? There's a strong tendency. I haven't found any exceptions, or maybe as I've looked at this group, what basis is there for denying that there is the opportunity open to put a doctrinal statement together? How do they prohibit the doctrinal statement? They say, well, you're adding to scripture, right? Well, what would be your response to that? How would you respond to them if you said, well, you're adding to scripture, you come up with a doctrinal statement?

Yes. Sure, yeah, they'd want to put every qualification they could. Yes, Randy? Okay. Sure. Okay. So what Randy is saying is your doctrinal statement is not to supplant or replace scripture or even claim the same authority, but it's going to refer back to scripture in the things that you're stating so that you are in the very statement of it. underscoring the authority of scripture. And that's what you'll find.

You go through our, you know, church's doctrinal statement. What do we do? We have scripture references for everything that we say so that it points back to the authority of scripture and underscores the authority of scripture, including part of the doctrinal statement that says exactly that scripture is the authority. So we're not, we're not doing anything that supplant scripture or adds to it. We're in fact, standing on the authority of scripture to draw something like that together.

It is one way of avoiding what has become an odd contradiction where they will say, well, we teach this and this and this and this, but we're not going to tell you. That's a very odd thing to say. And the musical instrument thing that a number of them hold to is an example of just that, you know. Well, you won't actually put something out that says that, and yet you will say it, you know. You'll condemn it. but you won't officially put something out that conveys that message. Okay. The last sentence we have there, such abbreviated doctrinal statements do clearly indicate that these are the doctrinal points that matter and are agreed upon as basic to that church body.

There's Paul's exhortation in 1 Corinthians 1.10. He says, I urge that you say the same thing. And one of the things that the doctrinal statement does is that it lays out here. We are saying the same thing. We believe in these things founded on the authority of scripture. We have the scripture references in there because scripture is the authority and we are saying the same thing. All right, now the next one.

So is the all millennial viewpoint of most churches of Christ a problem? One of the things we've covered before, but not to lose sight of it, The amillennial viewpoint, the idea that scripture is in future things to be allegorized, it does away with a literal rapture, it does away with a literal tribulation, it does away with Christ reigning on the earth, and for some of them it does away with Christ even coming back at all. Everything is allegorized away. Christ isn't coming back again except to come back in your hearts. I mean, why have it in an allegorical form? I mean, why not just cut off the book? Excellent question, Carol. That's the most profound question, I tell you. Excellent question she asked. What's the point? What are you trying to get to?

In the third century, a fellow by the name of Origen was the fellow who propagated this idea. He got it from the Greek skeptics, like Plato, for example, of some centuries earlier, who didn't believe their own Greek myths. And so they said, well, those Greek myths are not really true, they're allegorical.

And so he applied that to scripture. And he made this dictum, and that is that unless you've allegorized it, it isn't really spiritual. So that's how you make it spiritual, is allegorizing it. As a matter of fact, that's the way that the Christian Science group looks at scripture, is the spiritual, the allegorized interpretation, is what makes it worth anything. Other than that, it's like spiritual idiocy to look at it literally in that viewpoint. So you have that that Greek skeptic viewpoint that says, well, this is all allegory carried over from the Greek skeptics, not from Jesus and the apostles, but from the Greek skeptics into the church two centuries after the apostles had been around. about the same time you're coming up with the idea that baptism and Lord's Table are effective. And by those allegories then, and by even insisting in order to be really spiritual, you have to have the allegory. Now you start interpreting scripture.

Of course, allegory has no control. Who knows what it's allegorized as properly? Except one group says it means this and another that. Randy? Yes, Randy's point and well taken. It's a good follow-on to Carol's pointed question, and that is, when you interpret allegorically, it's easy. First of all, there's nobody to really dispute that you've come up with the right allegory, is there?

How can you ever tell? No, no, it just makes me feel like this, or it looks like this, and that's good enough. And if you're in a church that follows tradition, It's we have a tradition that it looks like this and makes me feel like this. And so now you're just following the tradition and you don't dispute the tradition. And there you are. It's a piece of cake. But if you're going to look at things literally, you have to look at things carefully. What does this word mean? That's why we'll look up words.

Jesus addressed the Sadducees and he pivoted his entire argument that absolutely silenced them on Is there a resurrection? You see, the Sadducees did not believe in a resurrection, the Pharisees did. And so as the Sadducees came up to Jesus, and Jesus says, look, God says, I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, present tense.

And that tense of the verb says that those guys are still alive. Jesus pivoted his entire argument with them, which silenced them. They never argued with him again on the subject or any other, and also profoundly impressed the Pharisees. The entire pivot of his argument was on a verb tense. So should we look at the verb tenses or just allegorize?

Gabriel came to Mary and said, Mary, You're going to be with child and you shall have a son, you shall call his name Jesus. And then it talks about, and he'll be the one to reign on David's throne, a house, a throne, and a kingdom. So what happens is both the allegorists and the ones who take scripture literally, and that would be ourselves, look at the first part of that, Mary's going to have a son. Did she literally have a son?

Yep, and they take it literally. But the next part of what the angel says, oh, he'll come again, and he will reign on David's throne, and he'll have a house, a throne, and a kingdom. They take that and allegorize it. So you go from literal to allegory. And what's the justification for jumping from literal to allegory in the middle of the prophecy, in the middle of what the angel said? There isn't any.

And do you know what the Jews of that time believed about whether David was going to reign literally or not? They believed it was going to reign literally. How do you think Mary understood it? Literally. Yeah. But what they insist is no. The angel spoke and he really meant to speak allegorically in the last half of what he said to Mary. That's what he really meant to say. So that's what they would tell you. And if you don't do that, it's not spiritual. It's just brain dead to interpret it literally. Okay. Let's look at page four. How many teams are in the league? Back to the baseball theme, right? Well, not exhaustive because remember that we said there's lots of splinter groups. This listing will introduce you to some of the groups and some of the names, right?

The mainline group, these believe in their church only, that is, nobody else is really valid, right? Mostly allowing no musical instruments and do not fellowship with those who do not adhere to their doctrines. So they're exclusive in that mainline Church of Christ group. One of the things I noticed when we moved Randy down to Texas, going through all these little towns that you'll wind through on the roads there, Church of Christ in every little town, and they're mostly of this mainline group.

Now, the non-cooperatives, that's the next group, these that do not support the Herald of Truth television ministry or the missionary societies are the mainline group. So that's kind of the second group there that say, we don't like your TV program and your missionary societies. So we'll have our own group that doesn't practice that.

Then you got the one cuppers. The one cuppers, these use a common communion cup instead of having separate ones divided out like we typically do. And we're going to divide over that, whether they have one cup or a bunch of them. Then you have some that actually are pre-millennial.

I've talked to you about the amillennial allegorized teaching. They actually have some who follow to less allegorical teaching and more literal. So you've got that group still holding to the you've got to believe and repent and confess and be baptized for remission, you know, all that other stuff. OK, you're OK so far or not OK so far. Tough call, isn't it? OK.

Number five, non Sunday school churches of Christ. These do not have Sunday school because it's considered unbiblical. There's about 600 of those. No Sunday school. Bible doesn't mention Sunday school, therefore it's unbiblical. Can't have that Sunday school. because they don't go along with other schools either. Then you got the Black Churches of Christ. It's where they got the Churches of Christ and everything that the mainline group does, but they don't like the, you know, fact that, you know, they're white, we're black.

So they got that group. There are still some that are that way, yeah. Now you got the Boston Church of Christ. Now this is the heavy-handed group. You will see this in some of these cult listings. really heavy-handed, where they keep somebody on top of, you know, the new one that's converted into the group and control them heavily. It's one of the things that's, you know, a distinction here.

Well, we'll sit here and, you know, say, well, this is what Scripture teaches, but we won't sit there and try to hold, you know, law over you. Ever been, ever seen a group where the pastor's telling people where to live? I have. Back in Carson City, we had friends where the pastor told them where to live. Sell your house and move into this block where everybody in the church is moving. One couple, they told them, break your lease. You got to come back down here with us. You got to move down where we are.

This group is really heavy handed. The Boston Church of Christ, they will heavily dictate to their members what they may and may not do, what their schedule will be, where they will be, when, etc. And heavy condemnation if they refuse to do so. Any questioning of anything, real heavy-handed response. So this is one of those groups that you'll find quite a bit of noise about. They have a presence here in Denver stretching up towards Boulder, especially at the universities and colleges. And they tend not to be real noisy about it because they just want to keep a quiet presence, but a heavy hand. Disciples of Christ.

This group is generally more liberal, such as not holding to the infallibility of scripture. This was the group that Jim Jones came out of, which of course really pleases me if you know my background. It was a group that was more liberal and so they tend to have more loosey-goosey kind of approach to things. That's why guys like Jim Jones were able to go as far as he did to the point of essentially pulling another group away from him.

The Christian Church. Nancy was actually brought up in that group when she was in her younger years. They tend towards more mainline views. They do have music. Ambiguity in their views of the future. I talked to one fellow in Carson City who was leading a Christian Church just up in the valley north of us in Washoe Valley. And I said, what do you believe about future things like the millennium? He says, I'm a pan-millennialist. It'll all pan out in the end. And then the United Church of Christ.

You ever seen that one? There's one up on Florida, just west of Holly. So there's one there. There's also one at the corner of Hamden and Colorado. That's not Church of Christ at all. The name sounds familiar, but it's actually more out of a Presbyterian background. And one of the Presbyterians don't necessarily embrace, but haven't publicly come out and tried to dissociate themselves.

Yes. Right. Yeah, yeah, your idea. Oh, here's one of the other things I didn't make a big deal of it. They tend to make a big thing out of using biblical words and names for things, even if what they claim is really unbiblical. But that's a part of it.

It's just the Church of Christ. You can't call it Presbyterian this or Episcopal that or anything of that sort. Even there's a problem with Max Lucado because it's Oak Hill Church of Christ and now he's dropped it down to Oak Hill Church. And so to them, they've gotten way off track to most of the mainline folks in the Church of Christ because they've added names, right?

So anyway. Any others? By the way, yeah, thank you for bringing that up. That's just one of the characteristics. This is not an exhaustive thing. Anybody run into any other groups that are part of this general circle? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And that's right. Yeah.

And it is interesting how many of the groups that we've covered here, we're the only ones. Well, it's just amazing. You can imagine being there at the White Throne screaming about, we're the only ones. They can argue all they want. I don't think it'll do any good. But yeah, it's really saddening. And how they arrive at their conclusions is pretty phenomenal. Yeah, yeah.

And think of it, you know what Randy presented with the Christian science? I mean, they'll say that this is the only thing, right? And you go to the Jehovah's Witnesses and that we're the only ones, right? You go to the Mormons and they've got their particular strain of belief. A great many of these groups, we're the only ones. Rather than saying God's the only one, Christ is the only one. Scriptures is written revelation. That's it. Randy. Yes. Yes. But don't write it down. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you start questioning, well, wait a minute. Yeah, it doesn't hold up very well.

But certainly, we're going to teach every Sunday. Certainly, we're not going to like your teaching, but we won't tell you what we believe. That's a very odd thing. At least with the Christian science, as inscrutable as it is, they tell you what they believe, even if you can't make any sense out of it. Yeah. They'll tell you very clearly, as clearly as you can make nonsense come across.

Now I have an addendum that ends up taking five pages. We won't go through it all, but it helps address this question. What about those passages that appear to link up faith and baptism? Because that's one of their common ones. Some of the obvious and glaring contradictions to that would be, you know, here's the thief on the cross. Okay, he's up on the cross. Jesus says, Today, you're going to be with me in paradise. Now, was that thief immersed? Was he baptized unto the remission of sins? He might have gotten sprinkled with some sweat. But there's no record of anything that's even sort of like a baptism at all.

Yes, because they're all millennial in great part. Most of them are amillennial, except for that number four group, the premillennial group. The church replaces Israel, and therefore they don't have a separation of Israel and the church distinction. So yeah, it's a problem.

And also this passage we looked at before with Paul, where he says, look, I didn't baptize but a few of you, and one reason is I don't want to get the focus off what really counts, and that's the gospel. You've got to believe it. You've got to have faith in that gospel and nothing else. 1st Corinthians 15 first several verses he says here's what I gave to you as the gospel that you believed and were saved and he lays out you believe that Christ died for your sins he was buried and is resurrected you believe that you're saved end of story he lays out clearly here's what salvation means and so anyway this goes through some of the Greek and you're free to take a look at it we won't go through the detail But the point is, and I know you mentioned your experience, Bev, with your friend who says, boy, it just grieves me that you're not going to heaven. Well, basically, they've been fed a line that they're not allowed to write down. They've been fed a line about this is what the gospel is. And so now they've added this whole bunch of things. The works that we see repeatedly are denied, are now put in as a requirement.

And rather than saying, you know, we have one mediator, we've got, you know, faith alone in Christ alone, rather than that, it's now stuff you got to do. And like all these other groups, and we're the right group, all of a sudden, The church is not those whom the Holy Spirit, 1 Corinthians 12, 13, has placed into the church. The church is the ones that are part of our group. It's what we do. It's who we are. All of a sudden, it's about human beings instead of about Jesus Christ.

We gather together here because we are, by God's doing and nothing else, made a part of the church. We gather here together to fellowship and to gather on his word and to gather on the Lord's table and to have baptisms. All the things that we do here, we do here because we have been made by the Holy Spirit a part of the church and not because we've got the right organization or the temperature and pH of our water is just right to get saved. Okay. or because anybody did any special blessings in Aramaic over the water. Nothing. There's no special words that we do that mean that you'll get saved and just in this particular group and only this building.

Yeah, Art? Do they have air conditioning in the summer and heat? That's a good question. I don't know where they have air conditioning and heat. The Bible doesn't describe it, so certainly you could argue against it. And I'm certain that you could come up with some sort of, you know, versus that support the idea that you absolutely should not do that, that that's demonic at best. But good question. Yes.

Open air environment, that's it. That's their solution. There's your answer right there, Art. The guy fell out of the window, Uticus fell down, second story. It also tells you we've got a serious problem. We don't have any windows you could fall out of high enough that you could get injured and be considered dead. So we have a serious problem. You're correct. Yep. It is easy if one wishes to begin looking at superficial things. What's the externals?

Have I got the right group? Has the guy that I've been through to get baptized, has he jumped through the right hoops? Is the water the right water? Have I got everything on the refrigerator list checked off? All these groups are basically some variation on that theme, aren't they? We're the right group, and this is the right gospel. We have the right procedure to go through.

By the way, if that isn't baptism for remission of sins, sorry, it's no good. We've got the right things to say, and the right formula, and the right little abracadabra to do just the right magic, and only we've got it. That's their message. Instead, if there is one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ, there's salvation in no one other. Him alone. Must hear and believe to be saved. Did you hear it? Did you believe it? You're saved. That's it. That simple. Let's pray. Lord, as we look at this, it's another example of incredible confusion and distortion.

And boy, Lord, we're thankful not because we've got some corner on the truth, not because we're the special people that have got the right building or the right procedure or the right external atmosphere or the right words, but we acknowledge you as the right Lord, the one Lord, the one and only Savior. And it's you who have designated that we be saved by faith alone. And by that, are blessed immeasurably. By that, are placed into the body of Christ. And with grace so immense, so marvelous, so unscrutable, that it will take eternity for us to begin to fathom how deep and amazing that grace is. Lord, what a wonderful thing you've given to us, because you love us. In Jesus' name, Amen.