THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST AT THE WORLD’S FAIR

Our folk in the East Tennessee area are to be commended for moving in where the action is. From an ample booth in a popular pavilion the message of the Churches of Christ has been heard, seen, and read by many thousands who visited the 1982 World’s Fair in Knoxville. Featuring the theme “Energy for Life: God’s Love. . .Person to Person,” the Church of Christ exhibit provides for a video tape and computer terminal for those interested in Bible questions and answers, along with numerous pieces of literature, such as a book entitled Introducing the Churches of Christ, a pamphlet called The Churches of Christ. . . Who Are These People?,” and such magazines as 20th Century Christian and Up Reach, the latter being a publication of the Herald of Truth radio and television ministry.

Housed in the only island exhibit at the Fair, the Technology and Lifestyle Pavilion, the church’s exhibit also allows the visitor to enroll in a Bible correspondence course, to receive a daily Bible reading guide, or to request special prayers. Some visits become personal and some are being baptized.

Some folk only talk about doing something when great opportunities come along, while others do them. We commend the brethren that are responsible for doing something significant. With the cost running around a million dollars we all know this was no easy task.

Along with my commendation, for whatever that may be worth, I want to raise some questions about the literature that was passed out, which was a significant part of the ministry. If the world is asked to judge us by what we print, we should be willing to scrutinize ourselves.

Our exhibit at the Fair reminds me once more how church-oriented we are rather than grace-oriented, gospel-oriented, or Christ-oriented.

The visitor might see an attractive logo and an impressive motto that points to God’s power or energy, but even a superficial look will reveal that our exhibit is a church thing. We are advertising a particular denomination, one that many folk know little or nothing about. So we are informing them of our church. That may well be one’s first impression. Perhaps this is all right, if indeed we are in the denominationalizing business. And perhaps we are. But I suggest that we not play games with ourselves as to what we are really doing.

Could we have raised a million dollars for such an exhibit if it had featured only Jesus Christ and him crucified, in some colorful and creative ways of course, and with no reference to Churches of Christ? Perhaps so. Most of our rank and file folk want to be non-sectarian; they only need non-sectarian leaders. Many of the leaders also desire to be non-sectarian, but they fear each other.

A “mere Christian” exhibit, to quote C. S. Lewis, would really impress the Fair visitors. Many would inquire as to the identity of the sponsors, of course, but our loving response would be: We are simply Christians who want to tell the world about Jesus. That would really blow people’s minds and it would drive all sectarians at the Fair right up the wall!

But the Churches of Christ could hardly do that, for we are not simply Christians. We are Church of Christ-Christians, just as others are Baptist-Christians or Presbyterian-Christians. We are a denomination right along with the others, and we are making that clear by our format at the World’s Fair. If we are not a denomination, which simply means to be named or denominated so as to be set apart from others, why is everything at the Fair marked Church of Christ?

Not only do we feature a denominational name but a party line as well. The literature is replete with Church of Christisms that preserve the old cliches that have long since grown threadbare. Joe R. Barnett prepared a booklet especially for the Fair, The Churches of Christ. . . Who Are These People? Joe can be excused for misrepresenting the size of Churches of Christ to the Fair visitors, though he should know that there are only about 1,206,700 of us in 12,706 congregations instead of 2 1/2 to 3 million in 20,000 congregations as he reported. And that includes all Churches of Christ, including those that have no fellowship with those who sponsored the exhibit.

If Joe gave the correct figures for the “mainline” Church of Christ, he could name only 965,439 in 10,165 churches. So those who sponsored the exhibit are barely one-third as numerous as their literature represents. But, as I say, this is excusable in that the research that reveals our declining membership is of recent date. Like all denominations with shrinking numbers, we are reluctant to accept the facts that have been clearly revealed in our leading papers. All denominations have a penchant for inflating figures, one device being never to drop anyone from the roles.

It is less excusable when we are sectarian in what we pass out to inquirers of the Christian faith.

This booklet especially prepared for the World’s Fair preserves such illusions as the five items of worship, the virtues of acappella singing, and the claim that the Church of Christ is not a denomination. With an opportunity to witness to the world of our faith, we talk about acappella music!

The booklet reads: “The five items of worship observed by the first-century church were singing, praying, preaching, giving, and eating the Lord’s Supper.”

In the light of Scripture this statement is without foundation, and in terms of biblical scholarship completely indefensible. The New Testament does not once refer to an “item of worship” and not one of the five things listed is ever referred to as worship. What the booklet is really saying is that Churches of Christ interpret the New Testament in this way, and in a very selective way it must be admitted, for others would find fasting, love-feasting, tongues, foot washing, confessions, praising, sharing, etc. as “items” of worship. We are told that preaching is an item of worship. How about studying to preach, or translating the Bible to be studied, or publishing the Bible? Are these also not worship? How about visiting the sick, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked? Items of worship, indeed. Such talk is the language of a sect. And the world as well as the church universal are not likely to take it very seriously.

What does a thirsting soul at the World’s Fair care about whether we sing acappella or “items of worship” or the lame claim that we are not a denomination?

We are a people of bold claims, that’s for sure. The booklet dares to number the members of the undenominational church of Christ in Nashville: 40,000 members in 135 congregations. Inflated figures or not, this is the number of Christians in Nashville, for the booklet makes it clear that “the saved” and “the church of Christ” are the same. Now if the booklet is referring to a distinct group of Christians in Nashville known as Churches of Christ, and not to the whole of the church in Nashville, then the numbering is acceptable. I take it that Joe Barnett is giving us statistics on a denomination in Nashville known as Churches of Christ, while denying it to be a denomination.

It must impress other churches as odd that we make such a claim. All churches are denominations except us! Barnett says we are not a denomination because we wear Christ’s name and that “church of Christ” is not used as a denominational designation. It would be interesting for him to tell us how we would have to use “church of Christ” so as to give it denominational designation, if we are not now doing so.

It is a strange logic. The Church of God wears a biblical name, but we consider them a denomination. Even the Christian Churches, who are “Christians only,” are a denomination. All churches are except Churches of Christ! It must be so. That is the message at the World’s Fair.

Another handout, also prepared for the Fair, is The Church: God’s Loving Family. As I have said, our message in Knoxville is church. This attractive, colorful brochure of eight pages refers to the church no less than 60 times. But, after all, the church is God’s family, and the brochure could be most appropriate, emphasizing as it does “the church as God’s loving family.” But if that conjures up any ecumenical expectations in you Church of Christ folk that have come to see the beauty of the church catholic, you can forget it insofar as our exhibit at the World’s Fair is concerned.

The booklet makes it clear who “God’s Loving Family” is. “The church is important,” it tells the reader, “provided it is the church that existed 1,900 years ago.” It goes on to say that Churches of Christ are “seeking to restore the New Testament church in purpose, doctrine, worship, organization, life, and joy” (I wasn’t expecting that last word — a digression!!) The booklet makes it clear that the Church of Christ is that restored church, God’s loving family, for it is “Like the New Testament church,” it worships and is organized “according to the New Testament pattern.”

Restorationism, patternism, and primitivism are fallacies that are slow dying, but slowly the light will break that the Church of Christ cannot be formed after “the New Testament pattern” for the simple reason that there is no such pattern. The workers at the Fair must be careful lest some visitor ask, “Which of the several different Churches of Christ is it that is restored after the New Testament pattern, for they all make that claim and they have no fellowship with each other?” They might also ask, “Which church is it in the New Testament that you are using for a pattern?”

A more basic question could be even more embarrassing: If the New Testament is the pattern, how is it that the church of Jesus Christ was a living reality for a full generation before the pattern was ever written?

Well, I have complained enough. I intend to be helpful. I want us to think and stop our game-playing and cease presuming that other Christians are not our equals. The equality and acceptance of all God’s family is my plea, and I am sick and tired of our moronic assumption that we and only we are that family. Long enough have we numbered the Christians in a given city. Only God knows those that are his. Even John on the isle of Patmos looking into heaven could not number the Church of Christ in heaven (Rev. 7:9). Dare we try to number the Church of God on earth or to determine its parameters, for it is made up of multitudes “from every nation and all tribes and peoples, and tongues.”

Those of us who belong to that part of the church universal known as Churches of Christ and Christian Churches have much to offer. We have a great heritage in Jesus Christ and the Scriptures. And I suggest we start by cooperating with other believers in an exhibit at the next World’s Fair that will give glory to Jesus Christ as the Light of the world. A truly non-sectarian exhibit that would advertise no church but would point in a glorious way to him whom God made both Lord and Christ. It would be a challenge for our artists, poets, and playwrights.

Our dark, suffering world would take notice. -the Editor

The world’s greatest mission field is not India or China, but the modern church.—Elton Trueblood