In a message on Witness Lee and the local church, given recently at Melodyland, the speaker made several references to “Historic Christianity.” He said concerning the members of the local churches, “Our responsibility as Christians is to reprove them, rebuke them, and exhort them that they may turn...back again to Historic Christianity, because they are not in it now.” I fully agree that the local churches are not in what he calls “Historic Christianity.” In this brief essay I will try explain why.
The speaker did not give us his definition of “Historic Christianity.” Since he relied so heavily for his material upon The Mindbenders by Jack Sparks and recommended it so highly, I assume he agrees with its basic premise. “The Historic Christian Church,” says Sparks, is the “Church [of] the past”; the Church of “those who have gone before”; the Church of “the creeds, confessions, and writings of the saints”; and the Church which uses the creeds and councils as “ancient landmarks” to interpret the Bible and “the faith.” This kind of mentality can say, “Today, all orthodox Christendom holds to the Nicene Creed. Anyone who does not, embraces heterodoxy.” The truth concerning “the Historic Christian Church” is that she is essentially a conglomeration of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy, and takes as the standard of faith and practice the creeds and councils of the first five centuries. This “church,” if such she can be called, is a church which relies fully on the past. Instead of relying solely upon the Bible as the only “yardstick for truth,” she mingles the Bible with the ancient creeds, and if a choice is necessary between the two, takes her stand with the creeds, not the Word.
The same council which composed the Nicene Creed also decreed in Canon III that the clergy should not marry. This was in fulfillment of 1 Timothy 4:1-3: “In latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and teachings of demons...forbidding to marry” (Gk.). How, then, could such a council be considered reliable in interpreting the Word of God? When Martin Luther was required to appear before the Diet of Worms, he was told he had “no right to call into question the most holy orthodox faith...confirmed by the sacred councils, [and] defined by the Church.” To this he replied:
Unless I am convicted by Scripture and plain reason-I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other-my conscience is captive to the Word of God.
If Luther had been limited by “the Historic Christian Church,” there would have been no Reformation; the truth and experience of justification by faith would not have been recovered; the Bible would not have been liberated from its Latin prison; and we would all still be in the Dark Ages.
The creeds and councils do not equal the Bible. For example, the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds say practically nothing about the Holy Spirit. It is clear that when the Council of Nicea met in A.D. 325, the truth regarding the seven Spirits in Revelation was still not recognized. But today we are in the age of Revelation, and while in substance and existence the Spirit is one, for God’s move upon the earth in this period of division and degradation, the Spirit is intensified sevenfold (Rev. 1:4). Surely, this is the up-to-date revelation concerning the Spirit. Are we then to be limited to the dim light men had when the Nicene Creed was written?
Today, on many matters, the light is shining brightly. In A.D. 325 the Nicene Creed was like a small pair of shoes tailored to fit the small feet of the church in that day. But the church’s feet have grown. We can no longer get our large feet into those small shoes. Even in the sixteenth century, Luther’s spiritual feet had far outgrown those small shoes of the councils and the creeds. If he could not wear the shoes of “Historic Christianity” four hundred years ago, how much more have we outgrown them today! Only the revelation of the entire Bible can afford a pair of shoes adequate to fit the church in the Lord’s recovery.
Again quoting from the book which the Melodyland speaker so highly recommends, the author says:
The [historic] Church has failed...miserably; it has moved an embarrassingly great distance away from its original foundations; [and its condition is referred to as] this apostasy. In the Protestant Reformation, [he says] justification by faith in Christ and a renewed emphasis on Holy Scripture were gained. [But] we have never fully regained worship. Authority in the Church has not been reclaimed. And whatever happened to our oneness as a body?
Surely, any church which has failed miserably, has moved from its original foundations, is in apostasy, is short of adequate worship and authority, and has lost the oneness of the Body, is in a divided, degraded condition. What is needed is a recovery of the “original foundations,” a recovery from “this apostasy,” a recovery of the reality of worship, a recovery of “authority in the Church,” and a recovery of the oneness of the Body in its expression. When the speaker says we in the local churches are not in “Historic Christianity,” we agree with him. Historic Christianity is in exactly the poor condition Jack Sparks says it is, and we have no desire to either be in it or return to it.
I myself am not without some experience in “Historic Christianity.” I was ordained to the priesthood of the Episcopal Church and am presently listed in her clerical directory as a priest in good standing. I have lived and breathed the atmosphere of the Book of Common Prayer. The tradition of the “church” and the ecumenical creeds are quite familiar to me. But what I finally came to realize was that what is called the church of history, from the first century until now, has always been composed of two widely different classes of people: those who are merely nominal, traditional, and formal and those who are real, vital, and living. There have been in every age those who represented a real, vital, and living reaction to the nominal, traditional, and formal kind of Christianity. In the sixteenth century Luther and others were the living alternative to dead, traditional Christianity. There is also an alternative today.
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