No. 48, April 2001

 

                        WHAT HAPPENED TO WALTER SCOTT’S FIFTH FINGER?

 

            To call this “the case of the missing finger” might be to overdo it, but we need something to get our attention. Something happened to us in Churches of Christ during the first century of our history – something not so good – which might explain why so much has gone wrong, such as dividing and subdividing in so many different kinds of Churches of Christ, twenty-odd by some counts.

 

            To say that we lost a finger along the way may sound a bit macabre, but that seems to be what happened, “the finger of God” that is. I am assuming that when our Lord said, “If I by the finger of God cast out demons, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you” (Lk. 11:20), that he was referring to the Holy Spirit as the finger of God. The parallel passage in Mt. 12:28 where “the Spirit of God” is used in place of “the finger of God” indicates this.

 

            The finger we have lost is the power of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church. Each of us as believers received the Holy Spirit as a birthday gift when we were born anew through baptism into Christ, according to the promise of Acts 2:38. And Acts 5:32 plainly says that God gives the Holy Spirit to all those who obey him.

 

            But have we as a people claimed the gift? Are we a people who “abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15:13)? Do we have the assurance of those earliest Christians who could avow: “We know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit” (1 Jn. 4: 13)?

 

            Not only is this the testimony of Scripture, but of our own heritage in Stone-Campbell as well. All of us old-timers in Churches of Christ know of “the five-finger exercise” that goes back to one of our founding pioneers, Walter Scott. He was effective not only because he preached the crucified Christ as the risen Lord, but also because he couched the terms of responding to the gospel in such concise and understandable language. And so Scott counted out five-fingers, based on Acts 2:38: Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Remission of Sins, the Holy Spirit.

 

            It was this Bible-based, Spirit-filled preaching that gave rise to the Restoration Movement, which was an effort to unite the Christians in all the sects. If this unity movement eventually came upon hard times because of factions within itself, one reason may be that it lost Walter Scott’s fifth finger.

 

            Scott’s fifth finger was “the finger of God” that our Lord used to drive out demons and usher in the kingdom of God.

 

            My own experience points up how we lost that finger in Churches of Christ. While yet a teenager I was off to Tennessee to study with “those who were somewhat” among Churches of Christ. And I was taught the five- finger exercise or the five-step plan of salvation. But 10, as I was to discover many years later, it was not Scott’s five fingers! The old evangelist’s hand had undergone some radical surgery.

 

            Here’s the way I learned it, as our folk did all across the land: Hear, Believe, Repent, Confess, Be Baptized. It found its way to many a bed sheet, often in bold color and forming a staircase leading right into heaven. Those charts were used in debates all across the country, mystifying if not silencing many a “denominational preacher.”

 

            But what happened to the Holy Spirit?

 

            Not only did we excise the Spirit from Scott’s emphasis, but we disturbed the balance that he gave his preaching, the balance between grace and obedience. Scott preached the gospel of the grace of God, not a five-step plan; he then explained how they were to respond to that grace. When the sinner responds through faith, repentance, and baptism, God promises forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit. There is no “work” involved; it is all by grace.

 

            Our five-steps list what man is to do, nothing about what God does. And that may go far in explaining what has happened to us. It is up to us to get it right, step by step! We’ve got to get it right! This led us into legalism and legalism led us into factionalism.

 

            We amputated Scott’s fifth finger and thus reduced the Holy Spirit to little more than words on a page. In doing so we deprived ourselves of that power that drives out demons and brings on the kingdom of God.

 

            In facing a new century we have an important mid-course correction to make. We must recapture Scott’s emphasis not only upon repentance and baptism, but upon God’s forgiveness and his gift of the Holy Spirit. We must once more become a Spirit-filled people, bearing the fruit of the Spirit and allowing the Spirit to transform us more and more into the image of Christ (2 Cor. 3: 18). - Leroy

 

 

 

CAN WE REDUCE IT TO MATH?

 

            Most of us are impressed with mathematical formulae. We like certainty, and what is more certain than math? We all know that 2 plus 2 equal 4, and if the issues of life could be settled with such certitude we would take heart. But we know that life doesn’t work quite that way. We can’t usually reduce life’s difficulties to math.

 

            It might therefore be surprising that one of our pioneer historians would describe the Stone-Campbell unity plea in mathematical language. W. T. Moore in his Comprehensive History of the Disciples of Christ (1909) put it this way: “The Disciples have always contended for the greatest possible, numerator with the least possible denominator.” He saw this principle, put in mathematical terms, as the genius of the Restoration plea.

 

            He meant by this that in our acceptance of each other and other believers we are to allow the greatest possible individual liberty (numerator) while requiring the fewest possible essentials (denominator). It was an equation that inspired a motto: In essentials, unity; in opinions, liberty; in all things, love.

 

            Moore is saying that the motto really means:

 

            In essentials (the fewest possible), unity.

 

            In opinions (methods, theology, scruples), the greatest possible liberty.

 

            The longer the list of essentials one has the shorter the list of those he accepts. This is behind all sectarianism. A sect accepts one only as he conforms to the party creed, which is often extensive and detailed. It is a matter of conforming to a doctrinal check list. The more extensive the check list the fewer that are accepted.

 

            Multiplying the essentials has led to the multiplication of sects, with each sect having its unique requirements or pet “issues” that are made tests of fellowship and acceptance.

 

            Any meaningful plea for unity must seek to reduce the essentials. Our pioneers insisted that the essentials be the fewest possible, without surrendering any truth.

 

            That qualifier is necessary to the equation. Unity in Truth! was also a motto. We can never compromise truth for the sake of unity. But precisely what truth is necessary? All truths are equally true, but not all truths are equally important. Some truths are crucial and therefore essential to unity and fellowship. Others are not.

 

            In an attempt to reduce the essentials to the lowest possible denominator, our pioneers expressed it in different ways. Our earliest founding document. Cardinal Principles of the Christian Church (1794), created by the Republican Methodists who became “Christians only,” Christlikeness was made “the only test for church membership and fellowship.” They meant, of course, a desire and a resolve to be like Christ, not necessarily its attainment. The church should require of one no more than that, the only essential.

 

            Two generations later Isaac Errett made the same plea – Christlikeness the only basis for Christian unity and fellowship. While Barton Stone put it in terms of loyalty to Christ, Alexander Campbell said he would accept all believers “so long as they hold fast to the Head who is Christ.”

 

            Our pioneers generally, and Campbell in particular, saw the essentials in terms of “the seven facts of Eph. 4” – one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God. This is Paul’s list of essentials for “the unity of the faith,” and no more should be required. Not opinions or theology about these seven ones, just the seven ones themselves. And they often reduced the seven to three – “one Lord, one faith, one baptism” – as the essence. That’s it, the lowest possible denominator.

 

            It is apparent how our unity movement got sidetracked, by multiplying the essentials. Other leaders came along – I’ve called them “Editor Bishops” – who made certain methods, such as instrumental music and societies, and certain doctrines, such as concern the millennium, essentials and tests of fellowship. Some count as many as 70 to 80 essentials that have been added, creating sects and sub-sects.

 

            It is noteworthy that “In all things, charity or love” was part of the equation. Charity or love gives substance to both the numerator and denominator. Love for both God and our sisters/ brothers should lead us to require for acceptance no more than God himself has required. And does not charity demand that we graciously allow others the same personal liberty – the widest possible freedom – that we desire for ourselves, without compromising or surrendering any truth. We might have to surrender some opinion, or at least to hold it as only opinion. But nothing in the equation calls for the surrender of any truth.

 

            So, it may be reducible to math after all: the greatest possible liberty (numerator) and the fewest possible essentials (denominator). Not bad for pioneers on a frontier! Are we as wise? – Leroy

 

 

 

            It was an honest, hearty plea for Christian union. It affirmed for all the children of God the right to differ, but not to divide. The Disciples have always contended for the greatest possible numerator with the least possible denominator; or the greatest possible individual liberty with the least possible divisive element. In other words, they have made much of Christ Himself as the basis of unity, but have made little of opinions and creeds.– William T. Moore (1809)

 

 

 

CALLED TO CHRISTLIKENESS

 

        For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son – Rom. 8:29.

 

            Foreknowledge and predestination may be obscure doctrines, but there is at least one point of clarity: God has decreed that those who heed the call of Christ are to be conformed to the image of his Son.

 

            Christlikeness can thus be named as the end in view of the Christian faith. All else is the means to that end – our faith, our prayers, our works. And 2 Cor. 3: 18 indicates that this conformation to Christ’s likeness is ongoing, always evolving – “we are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” This likeness includes bodily similitude as well as spiritual, as we shall see.

 

            This may imply eternal evolution in that we will forever become more and more like Christ, a perfection that we will never realize as finite beings. Even in heaven we will be finite, right? The finite can never fully embrace the infinite.

 

            So Christlikeness is God’s ultimate purpose. In Rom. 8:29 the apostle gives the reason why – “that Christ might be the firstborn among many brethren.” Jesus Christ is so glorious and wonderful that God wills that there should be many others like him. He’s the eldest of many siblings!

 

            Not only is this decreed and predestined, it is also a living promise. The apostle could hardly make it more dynamic than he does in 1 Cor. 15:49: “As we have born the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man.”

 

            We now bear Adam’s likeness, in body and spirit. In heaven we will bear Christ’s likeness, in body and spirit. That Paul includes bodily likeness is made clear in Philip. 3:21: “Christ will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body.”

 

            This makes it clear that our Lord now has a body in heaven, a glorious, resurrected human body. The promise is that our lowly (earthly) bodies will be conformed/transformed into the likeness of his spiritual (heavenly) body. In 2 Cor. 5:2 the apostle refers to this as “clothed with our habitation which is from heaven,” and in the same context he describes it as “a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”

 

            As Christians we can therefore believe that there is that “true self’ within us that is potentially Christlike, a kind of “until Christ is formed in you,” as Gal. 4: 19 has it. Over against this are many false selves, competing for dominance, such as selfish pride. Other false selves seek preeminence over others, fame and fortune, power and position. False selves are forever steeped in self-deceit, always avoiding self-examination.

 

            Our true self seeks growth into Christlikeness but the false selves of pride and conceit are always there to obstruct any progress. We can think of the Christ formation within us as the needle of a compass that points the right way if the obstructions are not too great. But too much baggage around a compass, such as a box of rusty nails, can disturb the needle and misdirect it. Just so the rusty nails of exaggerated self-importance can distract the work of the compass within us.

 

            This makes Shakespeare’s “To thine own self be true” applicable to the task before us. The needle of the moral compass within us will always point us to the way of Christ, but it is fragile and vulnerable in a world like ours. It must be protected from the false selves, which are also within us. Just as our Lord warned “Beware of men!,” he could also warn “Beware of self or selfishness.

 

            The good news is that we have a Helper in the struggle. Gal. 5: 19 describes it as a kind of tug-of-war: “The flesh (carnal self) lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.” We are in a crucial warfare with our carnal selves but we have help on our side. The Spirit is pulling on our side of the tug-of-war!

 

            Paul pinpoints the victory in Rom. 6: 14: “Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.” It is not a question as to whether the old carnal self will be present, for it will; it is a question of which dominates, the Christ self or the false selves.

 

            The sobering truth in all this is the importance of our own initiative. While “the Spirit helps us in our weaknesses,” as Rom. 8:26 assures us, we too are to do some pulling in that tug-of-war. Paul’s hypothetical If in Rom. 8: 13 says it well: “If by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you shall live.”

 

            So, whether Christ be formed within us, however much it is God’s purpose, depends in part upon what we really desire deep within us – and what sacrifices we are willing to make. Crucifixion with Christ, which is our only victory over selfish pride, is not without its trauma.

 

            But if we are crucified with him, we are also raised with him – and destined to bear his likeness forever. Wow! – Leroy

 

 

 

Between Us . . .

 

            There will be “The Great Gathering of 2001” at Cane Ridge, Ky., near Paris, to celebrate the Great Revival that occurred there 200 years ago and ushered in the beginning of the Stone-Campbell Movement. There will be nine days of celebration, from Aug. 4-12. There will be gospel music, a handbell choir, prominent speakers from all wings of the Movement (including Fred Craddock), history seminars, the Peter Ainslie Lecture (Mike Armour), catered meals, exhibits, an overnight camp out on the historic grounds, and a “Gideon’s Army” prayer vigil. The latter, held from Aug. 8-10, will be led by Jim Bevis, and it will call for “Revival to come to churches of the Campbell-Stone Movement” and “Healing of the wounds and genuine reconciliation to come among and between churches of Christ. Christian Churches and Disciples of Christ.” This part of the celebration is especially significant and we urge your attendance. Space is limited because of the size of the Cane Ridge Meeting House. so pre-registration is necessary. Write to Cane Ridge 2001, Box 1555, Florence, Al. 35631 or call 256-740-8288. For info on other days of the celebration write to Cane Ridge. Box 26. Paris, Ky. 40262 or call 859-987-53500 or email: CANERDGMTG@aol.com.

 

            The most impressive and effective mission effort among Churches of Christ may well be the World Bible Translation Center (Box 820648, Ft. Worth, Tx 76182), which Ouida and I support with enthusiasm. It translates, publishes, and distributes the Scriptures in many languages. Among its recent efforts: a Spanish New Testament (over a million copies distributed in Mexico City alone), and 100,000 copies in Cuba (legally); hundreds of thousands of the New Testament and the entire Bible in Chinese are being distributed in China (by way of underground church. not easy); one million copies of the Center’s Easy-to-Read English Bible will be distributed to English speaking people of Africa. If you want high mileage for your tithing dollar call these remarkable people at 817-595-1664. (Are you aware that an estimated 25,000 people a day in China confess Christ? And many more in Russia, Africa, India, etc. They need Bibles.)

 

            Ouida is suspicious that we may be getting too old for it. but we still dare to travel somewhat. If the Lord wills, April 29 will find us with the Pecan Grove Church in Greenville, Tx, and May 11-13 we will be with the Church of Christ in Calico Rock, Ar. May 18-19 we will do “Board” at the Disciples of Christ Historical Society in Nashville, and on May 20 with the Forest Mill Church of Christ in Manchester, Tn. We hope to vacation a few days in East Tennessee, and then on May 25-26 we will be with the Oakwood Hills Church in DeFuniak Springs, Fl. (call Dallas Burdette at 334-288-3186 for info). June 1-3 we will be with the Tucker St Church in Dyersburg. Tn.

 

            Sometimes Ouida chooses to stay home, as she did for my trip to Louisville, Ky. where I did a series for the Kentuckiana Consortium of Restoration Colleges. This consists of three small colleges: Louisville Bible College, College of the Scriptures, School of Biblical Studies. The meetings were held at the Southeast Church of Christ. While there I also spoke at Southeast Christian Church where Don Kastens ministers and at the historic Portland Church of Christ, R.H. Boll’s old church where Alex Wilson is the minister. I also did my “Raccoon” dramatization for the kids of Portland Christian School. The principal said it got their attention! Trips to Louisville are always special in that they allow for fellowship with our premillennial brethren, especially when I can stay in the home of Alex/Ruth Wilson, as I did this time.

 

            For our table reading Ouida and are now doing Peter Gomes’ The Good Book, which is a very different kind of book about the Bible – ”Reading the Bible with Mind and Heart” is the subtitle. It boldly deals with interpretation, women, homosexuality, race, evil, science, wealth, and on and on. You will not always agree, but it is a book that invites you to do some hard thinking. A bestseller. $14 postpaid.

 

            We still have copies of Dallas Willard’s The Divine Conspiracy, which we highly recommend as engaging and challenging. $23 postpaid.

 

            A new title, The Psalms: An Introduction by James L. Crenshaw, a Duke Old Testament scholar, invites one to an exciting study of the Psalms. After a general introduction, which presents different approaches to the Psalms, the author gives an in-depth study of four psalms where he finds weighty truths, Ps. 73,115,71,24. $16 postpaid.

 

            That it is a tad controversial among our folk makes The Crux of the Matter: Crisis, Tradition, and the Future of Churches of Christ (ACU Press) something of a bestseller. Some take exception to what the authors say about all three – crisis, tradition, future. But an honest reader must admit that it is a book that deserves a hearing. $14 postpaid.

 

            That the foregoing study rates The Stone-Campbell Movement: The Story of the American Restoration Movement by Leroy Garrett as “The best one-volume telling of the story of the Stone-Campbell Movement available” is one more reason why you should consider reading it. We will send you a copy at a bargain price, $25 postpaid.

 

            We are disposing of the remaining copies of Restoration Review at radically reduced prices while they last. These are loose copies dating from 1957-1992, but not in complete years and none of some years. 15 different issues selected at random, $5 postpaid, or all issues on hand, upward of 100, $15 postpaid.

 

            We still have copies of Carl Ketcherside’s The Twisted Scriptures, which we believe to be some of his best writing. This will likely soon be out of print, so you will be wise to get your copy, which we will send you at $13 postpaid.