The Only Ones? (Part 1 of 4) by David McClister
Reprinted from The Palmetto Reminder http://www.palmettochurchofchrist.org/
"You people in the Church of Christ think that you
are the only people who are going to heaven, and that everyone
else is going to hell."
Have you ever heard anyone say such things about the Church of
Christ? In short, it is a charge of intolerance, narrow- and/or
closed-mindedness, and even spiritual bigotry. It is, to be sure,
a very serious complaint and warrants equally serious attention
and answer.
Let's begin with the simple response: it just isn't true. I personally
do not know anyone in the Church of Christ who believes this (although
there may be some who do - more about these folks later). That
is, the only people who say such things are straw men constructed
by opponents. I do know many people in the Lord's church who are
very zealous for the truth, who are always ready to defend the
truth against attacks, and who are brave enough to call something
a false doctrine when it contradicts what they understand the
Scriptures to teach. However, the same general attributes can
be found among people in many other churches. Zeal for the truth
and a willingness to defend it does not necessarily mean that
such people think they are the only ones going to heaven. All
it means is that they are concerned about being right. And I do
not know anyone who would object to that.
Yet, in spite of the fact that every denominational church has
people who are just as zealous about their beliefs, the charge
of spiritual bigotry seems to be leveled mainly against those
of us in the Church of Christ. I have come to believe that the
only reason people make such a charge in the first place is that
they do not understand Christianity themselves, that they have
some fundamental misunderstandings about the Lord's church, and
they further assume that we share in their misunderstanding. In
other words, there are several flaws and false assumptions that
lie behind the charge leveled against us. Let's note them one
by one:
1. The charge assumes that salvation is a matter of church membership,
and that we in the Lord's church think that way too.
I have learned, through experience, that when I sit down with
someone to study the Bible with them, one of the most important
subjects to clarify is what the Bible teaches about the church.
Yet I am always somewhat reluctant to address that subject, because
salvation is a matter of being in a right relationship with the
Lord Jesus, not a matter of joining the right church. I just do
not like to talk too much about the church in home Bible studies,
because what is important is that a person learns to give his/her
life to Christ first. I do not ever want people to think that
they can be baptized, "join the church," and then they
are saved.
However, there is a certain logic that many people possess
that says that salvation is a matter of being in the right church.
That is, you are saved because you belong to the right church.
This idea is common enough in the denominational world, but I
have even heard some of my brethren argue this way. I think that
what happened is that somewhere someone tried to beat our denominational
friends at their own game, as it were, using their own logic against
them. Since our denominational friends were saying that the saved
are in the church, some of my brethren, it seems, conceded that
premise but added the idea that there is only one true (right)
church. If we were to put it in the form of a syllogism, this
much-heard argument would go like this:
1. The saved will go to heaven.
2. The saved are in the church.
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Conclusion: the church will go to heaven, or, in order to go to
heaven one must be in the (true, or right) church.
The fact of the matter is that no one is, or will be, saved because
they belong to the right church. The above line of reasoning is
invalid; it comes to a conclusion that is not warranted by the
premises of the argument. Specifically, this argument assumes,
without warrant, that everyone in the church will go to heaven,
that the church is composed entirely of saved people. But Jesus,
in the parables of the dragnet and the tares (for example), says
that this simply is not true (read Matt 13:24-30, 47-50). The
argument properly goes:
1. The saved will go to heaven.
2. The saved are in the church.
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Conclusion: the saved ones in the church will go to heaven.
The fact is that while the saved are in the church, not everyone
in the church will be saved or go to heaven. There are some of
God's spiritual children who, because of their unfaithfulness
to God, will not spend eternity with their heavenly Father. They
are members of the Lord's body, but they will not be saved (cf.
Heb 6:4-8; 2 Pet 2:20-22; 1 Tim 1:19; etc.).
The distinction I am trying to make here is more important than
it might appear to be at first. This idea that "I belong
to the church, and so I will be saved" has only encouraged
some people to think that they have no obligations other than
church membership. It only encourages people to be content with
their membership and to sit back and do nothing for the Lord with
their lives. The fact is that we are to be committed to Christ;
we are His disciples, and we must live, speak, and act as He did
(see 1 Pet 2:21ff). There is much more to being a Christian than
claiming membership in the Lord's church.
So what does all this have to do with the charge that is often
leveled against us? Simply this: salvation is not simply a matter
of being a member of the right church. There are many, I fear,
who belong to the right church but who will not be saved in the
end. Why? Because our salvation is determined first by our obedience
to the Lord's will. Note Acts 2:47 - ". . . And the Lord
was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved."
It says that they were saved first, by their obedience to the
gospel (see the context, vv 37ff), and then the Lord added them
to the church. That is, they were added to the church because
they were saved; they were not saved because they were added to
the church! Since one's salvation is not simply a matter of what
church one belongs to, the idea that we think that only members
of the Church of Christ will be saved is false.
Asking Too Much From Life by Jim Jonas (jjbogator@aol.com)
"I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice,
and to do good in their lives, and also that every man should
eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor - it is the
gift of God" (Ecclesiastes 3:12-13)
In Ecclesiastes Koheleth, or the Preacher, is sharing his observations
on life. He is not expressing divine insight per se; rather,
he is giving his assessment from the standpoint of human experience.
He says, "I set my heart to seek and search out by wisdom
concerning all that is done under heaven ... I applied my heart
to know wisdom and to see the business that is done on earth,
even though one sees no sleep day or night" (Ecc 1:13; 8:16).
The Preacher examines various human endeavors to discover happiness:
sensuality, materialism, longevity, beauty, strength, posterity,
wisdom and other endowments of earthly life, which man reveres.
His analysis: true fulfillment is not to be found in the human
experience. "All is vanity and grasping for the wind"
(cf. Ecc 1:2, 14, 17; 2:11, 17, 26; etc.).
Life is too arbitrary and unpredictable to provide genuine
happiness (cf. Ecc 7:15; 8:14). Our ignorance combined with God's
unfathomable providence makes us unable to effectively determine
our own course (cf. Ecc 3:11; 6:12; 7:13-14; 7:23-24; 8:17).
All will eventually die, our possessions will be left to others
and we will be forgotten (Ecc 2:14-16; 2:20-23; 3:18-20; 9:5-6).
This is not pessimism; it is simply the way things are.
It was never intended that we find our ultimate happiness upon
the earth. The Preacher affirms that, for all the evil and misfortune
that befalls us in this life, God has provided a sufficient supply
of goodness, satisfaction and enjoyment. Thus his repeated exhortation:
"Here is what I have seen: It is good and fitting for one
to eat and drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor in which
he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives
him; for it is his heritage" (Ecc 5:18; cf. 2:24-25; 3:12-13;
8:15).
Let's stop asking more out of earthly life than it can deliver.
It is so constructed by God to be a place of testing, a time
of growth, a span of both joy and hardship. Learn to appreciate
the simple things of today and stop pretending that true happiness
is just around the next bend. When considered properly, life
presents reasonable happiness but whets our appetite for heaven.
FINAL THOUGHTS (Selected from The Beacon)
"Trust in yourself and you are doomed to disappointment. Trust in money and you may have it taken from you. But trust in God, and you will never be confounded in time or eternity."
"You can't do much about your ancestors, but you can influence your descendants enormously."
"The strongest evidence of love is sacrifice; the first duty of love is to listen."
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MONTHLY BIBLE READING: Genesis 11-35; Job
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