Back to the Bible

Posted: October 23rd, 2005 | Author: stauffer | Filed under: Articles

Hardly anyone would deny that religious beliefs and practices of the twenty-first century are radically different from those of the days of Jesus and the apostles. Few people find a problem with this. Most would likely say it is a good thing – that man, society, and religion must change with the times.

What is assumed in all of this is that as the material surroundings of man change through scientific discoveries and inventions by man there is also a change in man and his needs. The fact is that both the body and soul of man need what they have always needed. We know about the body’s need for food, shelter, clothing, and safety; that’s as it has always been. But what is not as well known are the needs of the soul. Here things get complicated. Only God who created man knows the soul and can determine its needs. He himself tells us: “I know that the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man that walks to direct his own steps” (Jeremiah 10:23).

For this reason God has left man a revelation of his mind in the Bible to direct him in ways he calls “righteousness.” One of Jesus’ apostles said of man’s attitude toward God: “He that fears him and works righteousness is acceptable to him” (Acts 10:34). “Righteousness” is simply doing what is “right,” and it is God who determines that. What is good for the soul, according to God, is what’s right. That’s why God has given his word in the Bible. There man can learn what is right. The parents of John the Baptist were said to be “righteous before God” because they walked “in all his commandments and ordinances” (Luke 1:6).

This is why it is the goal of the Kirkwood Church of Christ to go back to the Bible for all our beliefs and practices. We seek to learn what the Bible says about how to be saved and then teach it and follow it. From the Bible we learn how the first-century church worshipped; we can then imitate that in our assemblies each first day of the week. We study the Bible to find out how the church Jesus built was organized on a local level, what kind of work they did as a body, and what name they carried and honored.

What we have found is that to be saved sinners believed in Jesus as God’s Son, reject and repudiated sin by repentance, confessed their faith, and were baptized into Christ and his death (John 20:30-31; Acts 2:38; Romans 10:9-10; Galatians 3:26-27; Romans 6:3-4). When they assembled to worship on the first day of the week they observed the Lord’s Supper, sang hymns and made melody in their hearts without the accompaniment of mechanical instruments of music, prayed, studied and edified one another, and gave as they were prospered (Acts 20:7; Acts 2:42; Ephesians 5:19; 1 Corinthians 14; 1 Corinthians 16:1-2).

To oversee this work they appointed elders in every church who were known as bishops and pastors (Acts 14:23; Acts 20:28; 1 Peter 5:1-3). Their oversight was limited to that local church and they led the church in the works of evangelism, edification, benevolence, and discipline of its members (Matthew 28:18-20; Ephesians 4:11-16; Acts 6:1-6; 2 Thessalonians 3:6-15). In all of this they wore and bore the name of Christ (Acts 11:26; Romans 16:16).

In this way we can restore and duplicate today the church Jesus built in the first century. Yes, it is simple and uncomplicated, but it meets the demands of the soul that God created in his own image (see Genesis 1:26-27).