(Isa 55:8-9 KJV) For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are
your ways my ways, saith the LORD. {9} For as the heavens are higher than
the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your
thoughts.
For many years I had pondered the situation which seems to be prevalent
only in Protestant Christianity and that is the multitude of denominations
and independent churches. I had always believed that it was only a question
of doctrinal beliefs which seems to divide the denominations. You will have
Presbyterians which believe in Predestination while you have Methodists
which believe in free will. Baptists that believe in believer’s baptism and
Reformed churches which baptize babies. You have Holiness churches which
stress Christians Perfection and churches which teach that one can never be
perfect on this side of Heaven. You have Free Presbyterian Churches and Free
Methodist Churches. The reality is that if you find two churches, they will
differ from each other even in several ways.
Why does it seem that if you place one Bible in the center of the room
and ask representatives of four denominations to explain a single passage,
you will get four different explanations? These things did not just happen
but I believe they were planned in the wisdom of God for the preservation
and perpetuation of truth. Now that sounds almost antithetical, having one
truth and so many denominations and independent churches. That is the wisdom
of God so the Gospel would not be locked up and thus prevented from being
propagated.
The Locked up Gospel
What I mean by the locked up gospel is that the Gospel is made subject
to the rules, regulations, and whims of the central leadership of a
denomination and all interpretations are to be derived from those in charge.
This situation normally happens in a world wide organization. When one looks
at an organization like the Roman Catholic Church, their theology and belief
systems are subject to the Pope and the Cardinals. If you attend an RC
church in the United States, then Brazil, then Spain, you will notice that
the mass is all the same except for the language. The Gospel is locked up
and shrouded in the confines of a false system. Everything in this
organization is determined by the central headquarters in Rome. Let’s look
at the Mormon Church. It is basically set up the same way. All of the
individual churches must adopt the teachings which come out of Salt Lake
City because that is where their apostles are. They use the Bible plus the
Book of Mormon and the result is that the true Gospel is locked up and
shrouded under their system. They hold the Book of Mormon on even par with
the Bible and in reality that means the Book of Mormon has more authority.
If you attend their individual churches including the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter Day Saints, you will find that their services and their teachings
are all derived from the headquarters in Salt lake City. You have the same
situation with the Jehovah’s Witnesses in that everything comes from the
headquarters in Brooklyn, NY. The services and teachings in their Kingdom
Halls are all derived from the headquarters and are the same no matter where
you attend. They too have locked up the Gospel, whatever light they had, and
quashed it under their belief system so the interpretations supersede the
actual Bible. When we look at these centralized systems, we see that the
Gospel is made subject to a central authority and this is an impediment to
disseminating the truth.
Dangers of a single world church
In allowing the Protestant Church to multiply denominations and
independent churches, God’s wisdom shines through. As we saw in the previous
section, a centralized system will tend to stifle the true Gospel and make
it subject to a very few while enslaving millions to a certain belief
determined by that very few. While God ‘s plan was for a worldwide church,
it was not to be a worldwide church in the form of a single organization.
The central leaders are totally out of touch with the people in other parts
of the world rendering the assembly useless if it cannot be adapted to the
needs of the people in the areas where the church is located. When one looks
at the churches in the New Testament, they each had different problems and
challenges. The church at Galatia had problems with those who wanted the
Christians to follow the law along with grace. The church at Corinth had
trouble with the abuse of speaking in tongues. Two different problems which
meant two different solutions. A single man-made liturgical dogma would not
help because two types of problems require two types of approaches. If one
had to adhere to a single set of rules and regulations as defined by a
central leadership, there will be no way that they could be applied to
multiple situations. If the individual assembly deviates in any way, then
the local superintendent or Bishop, can remove the leadership in the church
and replace them with those who will strictly adhere to central leadership
dogma. If you study Roman Catholicism, you will find no salvation plan and
therefore those who adhere to that system are doomed to eternal damnation
but that has never motivated the central leaders in Rome to do anything
about it for hundreds of years.
Why Multiple Denominations and Independent Churches?
We have seen the danger of the centralized religions and how this
approach is a total failure and allows only a few men at the top to control
the beliefs of literally millions. In comparison to the single government
religions, the multiplicity of denominations and independent churches in
Protestantism may seem like it is out of control and it is anything but
that. In the 1400’s, denominations began to form, the Moravian church was
the first one and after the Reformation began in 1517, then more
denominations began to form. The Presbyterians, the Anglican Church, The
Methodists, the Baptists, etc. Each of these denominations began to start
placing individual churches in different areas. In fact, the Pilgrims had
broken away from the Church of England because they saw corruption and other
problems which they could not fix. So they went to Holland and eventually
they came to America. One can say that the founding of America was due to a
church split. The Pilgrims came to America and it was for the purpose of
“Advancing the Christian Faith” as written in the Mayflower Compact. So here
we see that 100 people left the Church of England for the purpose of
advancing the Christian faith and what happened was the founding of the
greatest missionary sending and supporting country in history and that is
still true today as the Gospel is sent out over the Internet, Shortwave,
Literature, by Missionaries, etc.
Now that is one positive example of what a church split can do. The
reason that God allows these splits is for one major aim and that is the
perpetuation of truth. As time went on, denominations continued to
degenerate in their beliefs, especially after 1859 when many clergy began to
accept evolution and started questioning the reality of Genesis 1-3. When
this situation occurred, many started to leave churches and find churches
that were biblically based. The Independent church movement dates back
hundreds of years and these started to show up as Christians chose not to
identify with denominations which were going heretical.
Let us bring this up to today. If one looks at the denominations which
were founded hundreds of years ago, you will find that many of them have
gone apostate and Christians have left for the purpose of finding a church
which does not attack or question God’s Word. So as one church becomes
apostate, there will always be Christians who will leave to find or start
another church. Before I stated that the reason God allows these church
splits is for the perpetuation of truth. What I mean by that is if you walk
into any newly formed, non-apostate church and ask the way of salvation, you
will be told that Christ is the way of salvation. If you were a member of
the Catholic Church and went to another parish and asked the way of
salvation, you would get church dogma and rhetoric leading you to the same
thing you had in the previous church.
Summary
I want to summarize this article by stating that as one church goes
apostate, another one forms from its ashes. The reason it looks like
Protestantism seems out of control with so many churches, is that as one
becomes apostate and loses members to another or new church, the apostate
church remains as long as there are some who want to remain there. So now
you have two churches and if the new church goes apostate, then members from
it will form a new one and this is the reason that God had allowed
Protestant Christianity to perpetuate itself with so many churches because
some are apostate and out of those comes the formation of new churches. So
it is not out of control, but under the total control of God as true
Christians continue to follow truth and reject the false gospel. By allowing
churches to regenerate without a central government or having to obtain
somebody’s permission, allows the Gospel to flow freely throughout the
world, which means it will never be locked up by a few men who have rule
over thousands.