Some Churches That Are Leading The Way. . .

WHAT MUST THE CHURCH OF CHRIST
DO TO BE SAVED? (20)

In this last installment on what the Church of Christ must do to be saved I want to tell you about some congregations that are saving themselves. Their example could lead to the salvation of other congregations if they will have the courage to go and do likewise, each according to its gifts and calling.

Dallas

It is noteworthy that some of these churches are in Dallas, long considered a bastion of Church of Christ orthodoxy where any significant change would be unlikely. It was hardly predictable, for example, that the Preston Road Church of Christ, the sponsor of the once hard-line Preston Road School of Preaching, would open its facilities for a workshop on change, as it recently did, as recounted in our last installment. Or that the Skillman Ave. Church of Christ, always to the right of center, would in 1992 sponsor Restoration Forum X that hosted Christian Church leaders across the land, treating them as equals in the Lord.

And it is in Dallas, not in California (the farther west the more liberal!), that a Church of Christ has “An Ecumenical Fellowship” on its sign out front. The Central Church of Christ in Irving, not far from where the Cowboys play, is almost alone among our churches in having speakers from other denominations in its pulpit. It cooperates with other churches in numerous works of mercy.

Then there is the Richardson East Church of Christ that shares in special services with other churches. In one instance a number of their members went across town to worship with a small black Baptist church. This congregation has attracted city-wide attention, being written up in the press, for its outreach to the disenfranchised, including AIDS patients.

If I named but one church that exemplifies the changes I’ve pled for in this series, it might be the Lake Highlands Church of Christ in Dallas, particularly in terms of its Sunday worship service. It has made impressive strides toward the kind of Body life that the Scriptures call for, such as creating an environment where people are free to share.

They have a sharing time of some 10-15 minutes where people move about the congregation praying, confessing, and praising God together. One can see small huddles of people, circled arm in arm, all across the auditorium that seats about 600, which, by the way, they are filling. The minister explains to the visitors that this is not a time for small talk or Cowboy talk, but a time for spiritual fellowship.

A “praise team” made up of two men and two women lead the singing while the congregation stands. An overhead is used rather than hymnals. There is a choir and solos by both men and women. Testimonials by both men and women are often deeply moving. One sister told how she had a child out of wedlock when a teenager, how the Lord had rescued her, and how she could now serve meaningfully in a church that accepted and loved her. She touched the hearts of all present when she went on to tell how she had contacted her illegitimate child, who was raised in a Christian home, and received assurance from her that she had done the right thing in allowing her to be adopted. Another woman confessed her unfaithfulness to her husband, thanking God for forgiving her.

Prompted by the sad news that one of his children was getting a divorce, a longtime prominent Church of Christ preacher, one of 18 former ministers in that church who are burned out and now doing other things, got up and confessed that he had been an absentee-father and had failed his family. It was one more emotional moment for a congregation that is learning to be a confessing church, one that is learning to be compassionate. Our churches must cultivate this kind of Body life if we are to be saved.

Lake Highlands is able to move in these new directions because it has leaders who are shepherd-like and have learned to pray together. The elders gather an hour beforehand to pray for the service they will be leading. The church takes time with its rather long prayer list, with an elder leading the prayers. The church sees its elders, not as business men who are running the church or like a corporate board that hands down decisions, but as spiritual leaders. The minister, who teaches more than preaches, goes through the Bible, a book at a time, relating what it says to present-day needs. Aware of the great diversity in his congregation, he avoids controversial “issues,” allowing the Bible itself to speak to the people.

Their position on instrumental music is that acappella singing, which they do very well, is their tradition, one to be prized, but not a biblical injunction, and they do not make it an issue. In fact they use instruments in special praise services, as well as instrumental recordings with solos.

They are breaking through the male-domination that afflicts virtually all our churches. Not only do women take part in the assembly, but some of them teach mixed adult classes. One woman, who conducts seminars for other churches, is so gifted that the elders consider themselves blessed to sit in her class.

Lake Highlands is an outreach church, with many involved in Navigators and an “Overcomers” support groups. Due to a large contingency of Cambodians in Dallas, it supports a separate church for these people. They have a “children’s church” during their main assembly. They encourage their people to come up with their own ministries with the church helping out. One sister, a former airline attendant, came up with the idea of persuading American Airlines to send one of their out-of-service planes to Croatia full of food. It was done, with the church filling the plane with food! They joined two neighboring churches, Episcopalian and Disciples, in a Thanksgiving service.

A child in the church thought it would be a good idea to give gloves to homeless children in Dallas. They soon had 700 pairs to distribute! Much of the church’s solidarity comes through their more intimate home gatherings, cell groups, which they have two Sunday evenings a month. They are trying to get away from their building more in their ministry and outreach.

While they do all this, they do not want their congregation to be “a neat church” where Church of Christ folk can go who are bored with where they are. They are not interested in entertaining the dissatisfied. They want to be the church, serving, witnessing, meeting people’s needs, including those beyond their four walls.

El Paso and Brookline

What shall I say of other churches across the land? A few churches stand almost alone in the changes they have made. The Downtown Church of Christ in El Paso, for example, is the only Church of Christ that I know of that has adopted instrumental music in its assembly that is still a Church of Christ. Women also minister from the pulpit. It is half Anglo, half Hispanic, and they minister to the poor on both sides of the Rio Grande. It has the distinction of being a non-instrument Church of Christ, with an ACU-educated minister, that has an instrument!

Then there is the Brookline Church of Christ in Massachusetts, near Harvard and M.I.T., that published a statement a few years back that it had resolved, after much study and prayer, that it would allow gifts to determine ministry, not sex. Women do all that the men do, including the pulpit ministry and serving as elders, except that the church has a steering committee instead of elders, two of which are women. Women graduate students have served as ministers.

The leaders are uneasy when there are visitors from the South and a woman is in the pulpit, for they do not want to shock people. But sometimes the visitors surprise them, even those presumed to be hardliners. One such visitor, after hearing a woman preach, commented on how uplifting the service was. The leaders there say that we all lose much in not allowing women to lead prayers, for they often pray with more urgency and about things that do not concern men. Some say that we do not really know what worship is until women have a part.

The church follows the church year in its readings and celebration of such holy days as Christmas and Easter, and they have union services with other churches. While they are acappella in their congregational singing, they use instruments on special occasions. Baptism by immersion is taught and practiced, but they do not have a membership directory as such and immersion is not required for acceptance. Names are added to their list of “Members and Friends” as people become regular in attendance. Some decide to be immersed long after being a part of the congregation, others may never. This is closely kin to “open membership,” openly rare among Churches of Christ but de facto not all that uncommon.

We are all indebted to Brookline, long a haven for our graduate students, including Ouida and me when I was at Harvard, for coming to grips with our tradition rather than leaving it, and it is easier to leave, as many do, than to deal with it. They have dealt with it and have remained a Church of Christ, in unity with all the rest of us in things that really matter. They say in their bulletin that they are part of the Restoration Movement.

Tulsa

Then there is the minister who recently applied for a job at the Southern Hills Church of Christ in Tulsa and brought a “Position Paper” along with him, which he passed out to the congregation. In it he stated that he favored acappella singing, but he would not be preaching against instrumental music if hired, that “It is not a biblical subject and certainly not a matter of fellowship.” There were also disclaimers to a legalistic position on baptism, the ministry of women, and the Holy Spirit. He also said that he was not “a Church of Christ preacher” and stated that he was open to fellowship with other churches. He said he is proud of his Restoration roots and wants to stay with Churches of Christ, but not controlled by them. He wants to help lead our people out of “the paralysis of sectarianism.” I tell you all this to tell you the big news. He was hired!

Lubbock

I’ve saved the best for the last, or at least the most unusual. Hold on to your seat for this one. The Quaker Avenue Church of Christ in Lubbock, a non-Sunday School congregation, sent the following letter to the Broadway Church of Christ, the largest and most influential Sunday School church in the same city:

We, the elders of the Quaker Avenue Church of Christ, have for some time been grieved over the separations within the Body of Christ. While there have been steps taken in recent years to move away from the animosities of the past, there are still settled divisions among us. We, for instance, from those churches which do not favor or employ Sunday Schools, have not had much fellowship with those who do. We have frequently been regarded as “anti” brethren, and sometimes scorned as being backward and legalistic for a position we take on the basis of genuine concern for scripture. It is true that we differ in this respect from many other brethren, but we do not feel that such difference should keep us from brotherly relations in the numerous areas where we hold mutual ground.

They went on in the letter to refer to the debates of the past and all the ugly divisions. They did not want to judge on who was responsible for the divisions, but that they felt responsible “to bring about greater unity in our day.” They stated that while they had not caused the divisions they had helped to maintain them. “We repent of that and seek the forgiveness of God and all our brethren,” they went on to say. While they regretted all the grief that some of their people had caused in the past, they were thankful for their heritage and all the good things handed down to them.

They said that while they sought closer association “with brethren who differ with us on the Sunday School, we do not renounce our fathers in the faith.” They went on to make a statement that should be heralded among all our churches, one that beautifully reflects what the Stone-Campbell movement was all about:

From this time forth we want to be known as a people who love all the brethren. We believe that honest difference need not divide us, that we can enjoy sweet fellowship in all that we mutually hold dear while allowing for some diversity in interpretation and practice. Our plea for reconciliation is not by any means a repudiation of our position on Sunday Schools, but a recognition that such issues are less important than the blood of Jesus that made us one.

They went on to ask for “the right hand of fellowship” from the Broadway church, and added, “May our rich heritage in the Restoration Movement, which began as an attempt to unite all Christians, be rekindled today in new demonstration of the noble principles of our past. More importantly, let us fulfill the prayer of our Lord, who wanted us all to be one in order that the world might believe.”

I understand that the Broadway elders were delightfully surprised to receive such a letter and responded in kind. The two churches will be looking for things they can do together, but what is important is that they have accepted each other as equals in the Lord in spite of differences, which happens to be the only way to accept each other in the Lord!

I consider this one of the most significant documents of our Movement’s recent history. I hope either the Quaker Ave. church or the Broadway church will put it in pamphlet form and distribute it far and wide. It will serve to heal the wounds of our fragmented people. Let each faction among us have the spirit of Quaker Ave. Each division among us could and should write the same letter, and in place of “Sunday School” insert the “issue” that is the cause of rupture, whether instrumental music, Herald of Truth, premillennialism, plurality of cups, etc.

Conclusion

These are but a few of the changing churches among us. What does all this mean? It means that we can all change for the better if we have the will. It also means that the Churches of Christ are a beautiful people with lots of creative diversity. It means that we should recognize our diversity and accept the liberating truth that oneness does not mean sameness.

We can have churches that have Sunday School and those that do not; those that support Herald of Truth and those that do not; those that have instrumental music and those that do not; those that use plurality of cups and those that do not; churches that are premillennial and those that are not, etc., etc., and yet be united in the essentials of the faith, and doing at least some things together. And no one has to compromise any truth or violate his or her conscience!

If we are to be saved as a people and recapture our heritage as a unity movement, we have no choice but to get with it.—the Editor

(For the sake of the record this was my final article for Bible Talk/Restoration Review, 1952-1992, concluded on Nov. 18, 1992 -Leroy Garrett, Editor)