In 750 hundred words or less

With his death and resurrection, Jesus instituted a new Covenant or “contract” between God the Father, and mankind. Simply put, it was the promise of the adoption into God’s family and eternal life, simply by putting one’s faith and trust in Jesus, who was God incarnate, as their savior and Lord.

The church was officially launched in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost, approximately the year 30 AD. It was comprised of anyone, Jew or Gentile, who sincerely put their faith in Christ, and followed him. The church taught faithfully for some 300 years, under great duress and persecution, the import of knowing Christ as Lord and the grace that came from that relationship.

In the mid-fourth century, the Roman Empire, which was the dominant civil government in the Western world, made the strategic decision to adopt Christianity as the official religion of the empire. It was to replace the existing state religion. However, rather than just allowing Christianity to flourish unimpeded, the Roman state took many of the core doctrines of the Christianity and superimposed them upon the existing structure and practices of its ancient pagan religion. The result was a synthesized new religion that looked and acted more like the ancient Roman religion, than the faith that had been birthed in Israel. It adopted the many of the practices of Roman paganism, as well as the structure, language, and calendar.

This pagan Roman hybrid ruled as an extension of the Roman state. It survived the Fall of Rome in the 5th century, and resurrected the empire in the 9th Century as the “Holy Roman Empire”. It made political alliances, waged wars, deposed kings, instituted crusades against the Muslims, pogroms against the Jews, and even inquisitions and violent massacres of churches that didn’t cede authority to Rome. For 1,000 years, it was the dominant political force in the Western World, and as a “church” was the biggest landholder in Europe for many years.

In the 15th Century, however, many sincere people began to question how the simple religion announcing grace and peace through Christ had become nothing more than a corrupt trans-national political machine of wealth and war. Those who were able to read the Bible could clearly see that what called itself “The Church” had gone horrible awry. Some tried to reform the church from within, with small degrees of success. Others realized that the whole power structure, with its self-justifying traditions had to be abandoned. In either case, what was understood is that there had to be a RESTORATION of Christianity, to the beliefs and practices of the primitive apostolic church that Christ started.

The instigators of the Reformation, such as Luther, Wycliffe, and Calvin, had in view the idea of restoring the faith back to it’s original beliefs and practices. They made their contributions, sometimes over-emphasizing their particular interests, or other times, not going far enough. Their followers created denominations after them, to preserve their gains. An unfortunate by-product of the Reformation has been the splintering of Christianity into numerous sects, conferences and denominations, whereas Christ’s church was intended to be of one mind and one accord.

Today, the need remains for a restoration to the primitive Christian church. It is not going to happen by means of a “celebrity” preacher on a Christian cable TV show. It won’t happen by starting a denomination called “the Original Early Church” or something like that. It happens when individuals read the Bible, and differentiate between that which was really part of the beliefs and practices of the early church, versus what is just either Roman or denominational tradition.

The ultimate goal or end of the church is that we all attain the unity of the faith, no longer being blown and tossed by the winds of false doctrine and man-made deceptions. (Eph 4:13,14). It is really just our allegiance to these human traditions, denominations, and unbiblical practices that is holding the true church back!
There is one faith that was delivered once, and for all, to the saints. (Jude 3). It is not contained in a denomination, or “ism”. It is those who hold to the biblical faith in Christ, and cleave to the pristine waters that flowed from apostolic church, rather than the polluted tributaries of pagan Rome or the “Dark Ages’, or even modern day denominational-ism. When we reach that point, we will be the spotless Bride that Christ shall return for.

I was sent a message this week by a teenager this week, who was trying to explain to a friend what “religion” she was, and what Plymouth Community Church was.

“Christian” I said. “Yeah, I know, but what “TYPE”? She replied.

To many, you can say “Christian”… but that requires more definition. Does that mean Baptist, or Roman Catholic, or snake-handling fundamentalist? The liberal “accepting” Episcopalians fall under the umbrella of “Christian”, as does the vitriolic Westboro Baptist Church, though each would exclude the other from the label.

I myself grew up Roman Catholic, but then spent some years with the Assemblies of God, so I understand the pros and cons of being part of a larger and more structured denomination.

Still, I am convinced, that it is the labels and constructs of the denominations themselves that divide as much as anything else. The apostles never had the intention of starting a denomination. As a matter of fact, the were absolutely opposed to the divisions caused by an “ism”. In the 1 letter to the Corinthians, Paul upbraids the church by saying “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 Cor 1:12).

Paul says that this was proof that they were still immature in the faith. Still “missing it”. And today, people identify themselves with a denomination, now substituting Luther, Calvin, the Pope, and even Joel Osteen, in place of Paul, Apollos, and Cephas.

The bottom line is this- there is only one church that Christ started. It was handed on to the apostles. It was faithfully passed on from generation to generation. The fractionalized, divided, tradition-laden constructs we see today are a terrible and pale representation of what that church is supposed to be.

So when answering that question- What type of church- the only answer, as pompous as it might sound, is that we are part of THE church. The one church that Jesus started and ordained the apostles to carry on. And as much as we can understand and are able, we believe and hold to that which they believed, tossing away the man-made tradition that has arisen over the millennia that has only hurt the church. We don’t have a catechism from the middle ages we need to ascribe to. Just the Bible, as properly understood in context. We don’t add to the Word of God. We don’t subtract from it.

Now it all believers in Jesus Christ too this same, common -sense approach, how nice would that be? There would be one “Type” of person believing Christ. Just “Christians”.