ANOTHER LOYAL CHURCH FOR MY HOMETOWN

Denton has been our home for eight years now, and it is a pleasant little city, lying 35 miles north of Dallas-Ft. Worth. While it is unique in being the home of two state universities, it is rather typical in reference to its representation of congregations of the Restoration Movement. Our Pioneer preachers made their way to Denton a century ago, and while that famous Texas bandit, Sam Bass, was robbing banks and trains in these parts, they were immersing converts and planting churches. So the Christian Church and Churches of Christ have a long and respectable history for this youthful section of our country.

Back in the 1870’s our Movement in this part of Texas was united, as it was all the way back to Virginia and Kentucky where it began. But the ugly story of division came to Denton as well as to every other city, so that today we witness to the same factional pattern that is evident everywhere our people are known. The First Christian Church (Disciples) and the Boliver St. Church of Christ are the oldest of our congregations, and their history goes back well into last century. We also have a non-class congregation, a premillennial congregation, a non-cooperative (anti-Herald of Truth) congregation, and two other mainline Churches of Christ.

Now however the premill group should be removed from the list, for their number grew gradually smaller, and they at last sold out to the non-cooperative group. The switch seemed strange: it was still a Church of Christ, same building, and some of the same folk kept coming even after it was under new management. One Sunday it was premill, with all the implications that has, and the next Sunday it was antiHearld of Truth with all the implications that has! One brother, who is premill but still sitting in his same pew as before, was explaining to me how the signing of a contract transformed the place into a different kind of Church of Christ. “They don’t believe in orphanages,” he had gathered from what he had been hearing!

There is of course more involved than that, but men who struggle all week to make a living had just as soon that their world on Sunday be kept uncomplicated. It is too bad that their Sundays cannot be truly heartwarming, soulgrowing experiences. But many of them learn to their sorrow that the gravest issue in our divided state is to establish and preserve our parties. And that is seldom edifying to the soul.

It is needless to say that these congregations have nothing to do with each other, except for token recognition between the mainliners. Each party is the loyal one, and insofar as it is concerned, it is the only Church of Christ in Denton. It is unfair to include the premills in this, for during their years in Denton they made several overtures toward the others, even to conducting a unity meeting one year. Nor does the First Christian Church practice exclusivism, though like most Disciples they make no special effort to communicate with their fellow heirs of the Restoration Movement.

But within our own Church of Christ ranks the divisions are bitter and deep. One prominent “anti” minister was once with the Boliver Street congregation, at which time he was greatly loved and appreciated. He returned recently to condua meetings for the new “anti” group, and, despite notices in the press of his presence, only two old sisters from the big church he once ministered to came out to hear him. In visiting with him at that time and since it was evident to me that he was a terribly grieved and disturbed man, his life’s work shattered by strife. He told me that the death of loved ones in his immediate family had not effected him as the loveless experiences he had been through. He was a sad spectacle to behold, and yet all he had done stemmed from a sincere heart, a burnconviction that he was right and the others wrong.

Another of our ministers here in Denton told me of how he tried to approach another preacher who had branded him and his group as factious. Calling at his home in an effort to be brotherly, he could not get the preacher to answer the doorbell. “He knew it was me,” he insisted, with a trace of glee of being able to tell such a damaging tale.

These accounts indicate that I manage to keep lines of communication open with all these groups in Denton. I am the only one in town that I know of who can and does circulate among them all and acknowledge all as my brothers. I consider none only half-brothers. Nor do I think in terms of “full fellowship” or “partial fellowship.” I disagree with them all but love them nonetheless. And they can talk with me though not with each other!

After telling all this it would appear unreal to tell of still another loyal church coming to my hometown. But there is one prominent wing of our Movement that I did not include in the account above, and I was well aware of their absence in Denton, but now they have moved in and swelled our list of true churches. I refer to the Independent Christian Church.

I first read of the move into Denton in one of the Independent papers, that a certain brother who was evangelizing in Texas was to plant a faithful congregation in Denton. Then I read of it in the local paper and received personal invitations to its opening service, which was to be in the form of a regional rally, with folk coming from far and near. The city auditorium was rented for the grand opening and the state evangelist was to preach. So I was on hand to welcome to my hometown still another loyal church. I was resigned to the fact that one more probaHy wouldn’t hurt anything. More importantly they too are my brothers and I wanted to be with them.

But I was disappointed in what I saw and heard that night, and I feel constrained to offer my protest to the Independents that read this journal.

It was undoubtedly the most disgraceful display of sectarian bigotry that I have witnessed in many a day. I was ashamed of them as my brothers and regretted that such a manifestation of self-righteous pharisaism should be associated with the Restoration Movement.

There is consolation in the fact that many Independents are not as sectarian as was the preacher on this occasion, and some of them that I know personally would have objected as much as I did.

By listening to what was said one would suppose that Denton, Texas had all this time been destitute of the gospel, that no gospel ministers reside here, and that we were bereft of both Christians and Christian churches. By replacing some remote village in Afghanistan for “Denton” in what was said, it might have passed as a rahrah speech in behalf of foreign missions. But the speaker made it unmistakably clear that to him Denton was a destitute field in need of evangelization, as much as Macedonia ever was to the apostle Paul.

Despite our factious ways I was hardly prepared for what I heard. The Lord wants a church in Denton!, the students in this city need a church where they can worship in truth!, we must sacrifice to establish the Lord’s cause in Denton!, a city with two universities should not be without a church! On and on it went. The “Denton Christian Church” became a reality that night, and, from what had been said, one could conclude that at that moment Denton became a part of the history of Christianity.

I listened carefully for it, but there was not the slightest reference to any of the six congregations of the Restoration Movement already in Denton, some of them planted by gospel preachers who had gone on to their reward long before the speaker was born. It was indeed a momentous occasion at municipal auditorium. The gospel had at last reached Denton!

It was a bitter experience listening to all that, but my resentment was eased by memories of my own youthful “zeal without knowledge,” and I left the place feeling sorry for all of us, including myself. In fairness to the facts, however, I must add that the speaker that night cannot be excused on the grounds of youth.

But I must say the same thing about myself, if not now then certainly in earlier years. I have pitched tent in many a town with no doubt whatever that my first sermon under the canvass was the first the people had heard of the gospel. And now I wonder if even I on such occasions really proclaimed the gospel or was it an effort to add one more party to those already there? What a miserable job we have done in “uniting the Christians in all the sects,” which was the stated purpose of our pioneers.

My complaint is not that the Independents have come to town, for they have as much right here as the rest of us, and it may well be that they can make an important contribution to the Christian cause. But why cannot the coming be more irenic and with an appreciation of what has already been done for Christ? It ought to be enough for the Independents to believe that they have a significant contribution to make, that they have emphases to bear witness to that may be neglected by existing congregations? Must it all be so earthshaking that both wisdom and the gospel will perish if they do not make their entrance?

It would have been gracious if the speaker could have said: “We are well aware that the gospel was brought to Denton a century ago by our pioneers, and that their work has been carried on through the years, so that now we have some six congregations of our Movement in this city. We rejoice in all the good that these our brethren have done and are doing. We are sorry that the work has to be done in such a divisive state, but this is the case everywhere. Why do we now come, adding one more name to the roster of Restoration churches? We believe we have a witness to make to this city. We believe that our wing of the brotherhood has preserved some of the truths that are being neglected by others. We want to emphasize some things that others are minimizing. We believe God wants us here to do this, within a context of love and cooperation with all our brethren in this city who love and honor the Christ as we do.

In fairness to the Independents it must be admitted that all of our parries carry out their missions in about the same way as they came to Denton. In fact this is the second “loyal” church that I have helped welcome to town since I’ve been here! But our several wrongs do not add up to a right. We just must stop our devisive ways. Stopping starts in the heart, in the way we feel toward each other. The Christ will help us, if we really want to give up our sectarianism. And that’s the question. Do we really want to give up our party religion?

In view of what is said here about the attitude on the parr of some Independents, the following statement from an Independent preacher might be especially appropriate.—the Editor