The Denominational Nature of the First Century Church of Christ

The "true church" of the first century *was* divided into different branches over opinion.

The two broadest divisions were the Circumcision Church (the thousands of Jewish believers who still kept the laws of Moses, including Paul - Acts 21:20ff) and the Uncircumcision Church (the Gentile believers, who Paul taught should not be influenced to keep the law of Moses). The Holy Spirit deemed this two-fold division as "good" (Acts 15:28), provided that both divisions remained eager to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, being one body, having been united when Jesus tore down the divisive wall of "rules-keeping" (Eph 4, 2).

Smaller divisions occurred in Corinth. These divisions were not acceptable to the Holy Spirit, not because they were the result of different opinions, but because they distracted loyalties from Jesus onto other rabbis. Still, even though this type of division was condemned, Paul referred to these various "denominations" collectively as the church of God, as saints, as sanctified, and as being part of all believers calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, both theirs and ours (1 Cor 1, esp v 2).

As specifically to division over opinions, Paul says in several places (cf Rom 14 & Col 2:16ff) to let every one have their own beliefs about gray areas, such as which day we should keep holy, or which foods/drinks we can consume, etc. These are not kingdom matters. Kingdom matters are the internals, not the externals.

Jesus allows for much more variety in how we express the externals than many of us seem to allow. The very first church of Christ praised God daily in an environment where musical instruments were used and animal sacrifices were made and incense was offered up, making Nazirite vows requiring purification rituals and animal and burnt-hair sacrifices, where a healed man was free to jump and holler within the assembly as he praised God, with no one feeling the need to speak against or remove themselves from any of this. The later churches of Christ, being more Gentile and removed from the central hub of Jewishness, looked far less Jewish. We have modeled ourselves after these later churches, and then try to re-erect that wall of rules-keeping that Jesus died for to tear down, only we turn the rules around to match our understandings.

Dividing from other believers because they don't see things "our way" does not honor Jesus; it dishonors him.

Originally published at:
https://kentwest.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-true-church-of-first-century-was.html