What Does the Bible Say About Christ's Church or Men's Churches #7?

Arnie, Fred and Glenn continue their discussion of the apostacy or falling away from the New Testament pattern that occurred and, in this episode, continue to look at its history. We reviewed some of the departures we noted last week, in baptism and the Lord's Supper. Some began to worship men and women in the Catholic church, and we note that. Priests in the Catholic church also began hearing people confess their sins to them and we look at what this meant. We also discuss what was added to all the Bibles for a time. There were rules set up regulate what was eaten on certain days and, whether an individual ought to fast and even if priests and nuns could be married. We discuss these. Popes took upon themselves new titles and authorities that we note as well. All of these changes ended up causing a split between the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern, Greek Orthodox Church. We complete this episode by beginning to discuss some of the individuals, such as John Wycliff, John Hus, Martin Luther, who began to question the changes that were made which resulted in what is called the Protestant Reformation. Take about 30-minutes to listen in on our discussion. Have your Bible handy so you can verify what we are saying. A transcript of this Buzzsprout episode is provided for your convenience.

Transcript

Fred Gosnell: 0:00

This is a presentation of the Woodland church of Christ, meeting at 3370 Broad Street in Sumter, South Carolina. We meet for worship on Sunday at ten thirty am and five thirty pm we meet for bible study at nine thirty am on Sunday and seven pm on Wednesday. If you have questions or comments on this lesson, you may email them to Fred Gosnell at fgosnell@ftc-i.net or to Arnie Granke at agranke440718@twc.com or to Glenn Landrum at scbamaboy2003@yahoo.com.

Arnie: 0:35

This is what does the Bible say? I'm Arne Granke with scbamaboy2003@yahoo.com. the church of Christ at Woodland in Sumter, South Carolina. Glenn Landrum and and Fred Gosnell are, are with me, and we want to be talking a little bit about Christ's Church. That's been a discussion that we've had for the last couple of times that we've met. And I think Glenn, you had some thoughts you wanted to express on that.

Glenn: 1:14

Yeah, and I think going into the the remainder of this lesson, I think it's, it's of utmost importance that we understand the point from which we're teaching. We've covered scriptures that prove that Christ's Church was the one that he built. It was the one that he established. And it's in it there's the one that he is the foundation of. We studied and learned so far that that church began on the first Pentecost after Christ ascended to heaven. Generally, that's said to be about AD 33, some would say it's AD 30. But either way, it's the first Pentecost after Christ ascended to heaven to sit on the right hand of God ruling over his kingdom, the church. This is the church, His Church that still exists. Anything else began as a departure or an apostasy from that church. Therefore they are not the same and cannot be that church that Jesus built. We showed by Scripture that there is only one church that Jesus authorized and built, and it is the church which God expects his followers to be associated with. I'd like to invite you to read a few passages when you have the opportunity. And we've read these passages in this in this study so far. The first one is John 17. Read the entire chapter because it talks about unity, where Christ is praying for for unity. Read First Corinthians, 1, 10 through 13. Read Galatians, one, six through 10, and I really read Ephesians, four, three through six. All of those are talking about unity and being the same and saying the same things. We cannot be united as a body when we believe and teach different things. We showed again by scripture that God does not allow us to add to or subtract anything from his word. Proverbs, 14, 12, says, There is a way which seemeth right unto man, but in the end thereof are the ways of death. I hope and pray that it is your desire to do what God says and not what we have come up with ourselves. Remember what Christ said in John, 14, 16, I am the Way, the Truth, the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by Me, Jesus was saying, He is the one true way. The scriptures are his words to us, we must follow his words and not depart from them.

Fred Gosnell: 4:12

And of course, we've been talking about some of the changes that were made. Paul warned the elders in Acts chapter 20, that after he left, there would be among the eldership there would get people to follow after them. And so the changes started. And one of the changes that we know about in about AD 430 This is several 100 years after all the apostles left and that they started to worship Mary. And of course, Jesus said, God is the spirit. They that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. You know that we don't. We don't worship people part of the pattern Is to worship God. And then they they started to worship various saints. Of course they would a person in that situation, that that religion, primarily the Catholic religion, wasn't a saint until he died, and then they declared him to be a saint. And then they started to worship them. They made images and certain relics that they worshiped. So and of course, we didn't, I haven't found any passages in the Bible that say that we ought to do those things., Arnie.

Arnie: 5:35

Well, and you're exactly right on that. In fact, I think last the last time that we were talking about this, last last Lord's day, we had, we had looked at the fact that even pagans had been granted church membership. They didn't, didn't believe a thing that they that the gospel teaches and and yet, during pagan, during Constantine's time, pagans were granted this this membership and and the result was that a number of doctrines and practices that that were taught by the by Christ and the apostles had been changed. These you can read about in the Bible, but different things had come into had come into use. Baptism was, was one of the the things, and we had mentioned the fact that that at at that particular point, even baptism, even baptism of infants, had been advocated around AD 150. Nothing in the Bible says anything about that. You have to be a believer in order to be baptized. When the Ethiopian eunuch for example, wanted to know what would hinder him from being baptized, and he declared himself that he believed that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, And so he was baptized. But infants can't do can't tell you things like that. The Lord's supper even had been changed. It had become mass, what they called mass, and that the doctrine of what they what they spoke of as Transubstantiation, was, was adopted. Transubstantiation meant that that the bread used in the Lord's Supper supposedly became part of Jesus body that you were actually eating Jesus when you were taking the Lord's Supper. Well, the Bible doesn't say anything like that. So I think people today would be well advised to be very, very careful about the things that their priests or their preachers or, you know, whoever it is that that is teaching them, tells them about and if they can't show a book, chapter and verse in the Bible that substantiates it, we would be better off not to associate ourselves with with that group. Churches of Christ generally, are very biblical. If you have a congregation in your community that goes by that that name, go visit them, but keep your Bible close by and and ask ask questions and make sure that what they say there also is substantiated by words from Scripture.

Glenn: 9:08

You know what Arnie just mentioned about keeping your Bible close by. That's one of the prerequisites that we have in order to go along even with the title of this, this program, what does the Bible say? Well, we are not going to know what is, what is right and wrong if we don't know what the Bible says.

Arnie: 9:34

That's right!

Glenn: 9:35

For we have to study it, and we have to learn. Most of these things we just, just covered a few in the past few minutes, are ones we covered last week. We also talked about the laity, the general population of the church, being deprived of partaking of the the fruit of the vine on during the Lord's Supper, about mass being recited. In Latin, and only in Latin, and starting in AD 1546, it's since changed back. And then instrumental music was adopted in AD 670 in the Catholic Church. And then later on, it became prevalent around the 17th Century in in Protestant churches. So also we would find that the worship of Mary, which Fred just spoke on spoke about, was adopted, the worship of saints and images; holy water was something that was added to, to the to the agenda. Now they the the Catholic Church developed or said a certain water was holy, and it was used to sprinkle on on people or on things to bless it. Rosary beads were used during prayers. None of these things we find anything mentioned about in the Bible. The the Apocrypha was added to the Catholic Bible. And there's, there are good reasons why the Apocrypha has been excluded from being an inspired document, and therefore we, it has generally been excluded from the Bible and not used.

Fred Gosnell: 11:26

Well, you know, did you mention the confessing to priests yet?

Glenn: 11:33

No, I didn't.

Fred Gosnell: 11:34

Well in about 1215, the this is primarily in the Catholic Church. The members of the church would confess their sins to to one of the priests. And of course, again, there's no passage for that. A matter of fact, let's just go and all the warnings for us are in the Bible. Paul said in First Corinthians, four, six. He says these things, brother and I have a figure transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes that you might learn not to think above that which is written that no one of you be puffed up for one against the other. So if it's not written, Paul says, Don't, don't use it basically. So so then, then, then later on, in 1265, the priests were then given the authority by the Church, of absolution. Of course, absolution, all that means, is to to forgive sins. And and one of the things people do, they, they, they take something that's not scriptural, then they'll, they'll, they'll construct a different name for it. So, so that so, so absolution. Somebody says, Oh yeah, well, I'm going to give you absolution. And then most people don't know what that means. I had to look it up, wasn't sure. So they were given the authority, quote, unquote, by the church, to forgive people's sins. And so, again, if you're not familiar with what the Bible says, And if you're not understanding that the Bible is God's word, and we're not to go beyond what is written. And so then men, uninspired men, end up changing things and instituting various religious things in various denominational churches that are are not biblical, and God has no, God does not, does not accept those things.

Arnie: 13:28

Well, there were even whole new chapters that were, that were added to the scriptures and and still, still is, as far as I know, included in in Catholic, Catholic Bibles. It's called the apocrypha. It's not canonical. It's not it wasn't written by any apostles or or any one like that. AD 1546, was the time when, when that was began to be included in all the English Bibles. And so there are a number of a number of books scattered. When I say books, of course, we're talking about books like Genesis being a book, Exodus being a book so forth of that sort. So there were a number of those that are scattered throughout the Old Testament that have absolutely no biblical backing at all. They weren't what you would call canonical. They hadn't been given by Christ, they hadn't been approved by any of the apostles or or anyone like that. And that continued, by the way, until during the 1800s in 18, I think, 1827 was, was when it stopped being included in all the English language Bible, but, but it, none of those had anything to do with Christ, nothing to do with with the apostles of the church or or anything. They were just stories about events that supposedly happened and and maybe there was some actual truth to that, and I'm not sure anybody's really certain of that at this point.

Glenn: 15:38

To this point, we've probably primarily been talking about the apostasy or departures from the truth that were instituted by the Catholic Church. And I'm going to mention a few more here, and then I'll read a couple of scriptures to support why those are not or should not be included. Fish Friday or or eating fish on Friday and fasting from basically red meats was a, was a something that was adopted in AD 998. Cela, celibacy of priests and nuns was enforced starting in AD 1123. The absolute authority of the Pope was instituted in 1198 to 1216.That's where the pope declared himself to be the vicar of God and Christ. In other words, he had the same authority as God and Christ. Now as Paul the third in AD 1546 affirmed exclusive papal authority to interpret scriptures. Pius the four, the ninth in AD 1870 dis, declared Papal Infallibility. In other words, the pope could not be wrong. So now a couple of scriptures to support those things not being right. One is First In First Timothy, four, one through six. Now the Spirit speaketh expressly that in latter times, some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, the doctrine of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving, of them which believe and know the truth. For every creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shall be a good minister of Jesus Christ nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained. So in this passage, it specifically mentions the thing that there be people that came along and say that you're not supposed to eat certain meats. Well under the old law, the law of Moses, that was the case, but not under Christ's law. All all foods are were accepted, and as it says here, that they are accepted by by God, and God says He has blessed those those foods. Also it mentions here the people who would say that people should not get married. And we know that in the Catholic Church, they forbid the the priest and the nuns not to Mary. So these are a couple of examples. Then in second, Thessalonians, two, one through four says, Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our gathering unto him that we be not soon shaken in mind or be troubled neither by spirit nor by word nor by letter, as from us as that day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come except, except there come a falling away first, and that the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposed the exalt and exalted himself above all that is called God, or that is worship, so that he, as God, sits in the temple of God, showing themselves that He is God. Remember ye not that when I was yet with you, I told you these things. Paul from the the. Holy Spirit is saying that there are going to be people that come along and try to deceive you in these ways and try to teach you things that are not true. You saw this. Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day it shall not come except there be a falling away first, there's going to be a falling away. There has been a falling away starting in the first century, and it has been continuing even unto day.

Fred Gosnell: 20:32

And of course, as as these changes were, were implemented among the Catholic, primarily, the Catholic Church. And then, of course, that ended up causing the those people at that time to have problems and to divide. So the course, it was primarily the Western Church was the Catholic Church, and the Eastern Church was was the Greek Orthodox. And of course, they had a big split in about 1054, one of the things that they split over was on on instrumental music. The Greek Orthodox, to this day does not use instruments to my the way I understand it. And of course, then you had, you had a number of people did start to look at these things and have some, some doubts about the things that were being doing, being done. And primarily we understand that to be what's called the Protestant Reformation. So, so there were, there were people. John Wycliffe was one of the, one of those, that is, he's well known. And in 1375 he he defied the Roman church. And at that time, the Bible was only translated into Latin for the people being Catholics. So Wycliffe translated the Bible into English, and that, of course, he was excommunicated by those people, and he died in 1384. And they hated him to such a degree that they exhumed his body in 1428, they burned the body, and then they threw the ashes into the river Swift. So, so, Uh, people were understanding that these changes that had been done were not good. And of course, the people in in power, the religious powers, did not want the Bible translated to wherever everybody could read it. And that's one of the reasons why Wycliffe did it. He wanted the farmer to be able to read the scriptures.

Arnie: 22:38

Not very godly conduct, was it? The what we think of as being the Reformation had a number of sort of steps as certain denominations began to break away from the Catholic Church. In 1415, John Hus who, who was in he was a Czech he was in Czechoslovakia, taught that the pope should be allowed only as far as command, the commandments that he gave agreed with with the Bible. If they didn't have didn't agree with the Bible, then they should be disregarded. So the result of that, the Pope's didn't like that very well. They they wanted what they had to say to be considered to be the law of God, and so Hus was deemed as a heretic, and being a heretic was dangerous business. He was excommunicated and then executed, burned at the stake as as a matter of fact. What a sad thing for an individual who wants things to be done by by God's word, and those that don't really stand for God's word are violent in their in their response to that.

Glenn: 24:18

Know, one of the things I think is important to point out, and we're we're presenting these, these Protestant reformers, so to speak. And Arnie talked about this reformation. What the Reformation was. It was a reforming of the Catholic Church. And one thing we need to keep in mind, and many people will tell you different is that Christ's Church, the Church that we've talked about in the beginning of this this lesson, existed all through this time. So it's not, it's not a thing that the Catholic Church was only in existence from about the third century through the 14th or 15th. Christ's Church continued to exist. So these, all that we're talking about are departures from the Lord's church. So John Wycliffe, of course, you know it was a great thing that he translated this, know, the scriptures in into English that gave us all, particularly English speaking people, a great opportunity to be able to read the scriptures. John Hus what he, what he taught, was really, it was, it was a good thing too, that that the Pope was not always right in everything, and he understood that that was a that was a that was a good teaching. Although it was not necessarily staying with the Lord's church. Well, then came Martin Luther. And most all of us know of Martin Luther. Martin Luther, he taught justification by faith based on Romans, 3, 28. Romans 3, 28, reads, Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. And so he he was teaching that it's it's faith only, and there's nothing else to be be included with it. He opposed the sale of indulgence. Indulgences. He posted 95 theses on the door of the the Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31, 1517. These were 95 things that he disagreed with the Catholic Church on Well, he was excommunicated in AD 1520 when he translated the New Testament into German and completed it in 1522. He translated the Old Testament and completed that in 1534 and he died a natural death in AD 1546 Well, you know, those are, those are some good things that he did, but he was not speaking of the Lord's church. Luthers friend Philip Melanchthon, wrote the Augsburg confession in AD 1530, many of us have heard the Augsburg, Augsburg confession. Well, guess what? We don't find the Augsburg confession anywhere in the scriptures, but it then declares the Lutheran doctrines, and the Lutheran church resulted from this,

Fred Gosnell: 27:41

Yeah. And if you can get a hold of a translation of the New Testament by Martin Luther, and you will find that in Romans 3, 28, he added the word only that we're justified by faith only, and which

Arnie: 27:57

Wasn't exactly right either, was it?

Fred Gosnell: 27:58

No. So then, of course, the King of England ended up having a problem with the with the Pope in Rome and King Henry the Eighth. He split from the Roman Catholic Church when he was refused by the Pope the authority to divorce Catherine of Aragon and to marry Anne Boleyn. So, so what he did, he got the parliament to pack, pass the Act of Supremacy in AD 1534, and making him, the king of England, the supreme head of the church. Of course, the Church of England. And of course, then you had the American church, the American Episcopal Church, then separated from the Church of England because of those kinds of problems after the American Revolution. So what we find out is that when, of course, Paul criticized the church at Corinth in First Corinthians, chapter one, verse 10 of their divisions, and said that, let there be no divisions among you. And of course, there began to be divisions. And of course that led led to more divisions. And what is it? What's the saying, A house divided cannot stand. And of course, the divisions continued and continued. And then, of course, they continue to this day, Arnie.

Glenn: 29:29

I've got something real quick.

Arnie: 29:30

Go ahead,

Glenn: 29:31

Something I think that's really interesting, and a lot of people don't, don't pay attention to it. The only place in the Scriptures,

Fred Gosnell: 29:40

Yeah,

Glenn: 29:40

Where faith only is used. Listen to this. And this is James 2, 24, You see then how that by works a man is justified and not by faith only.

Arnie: 29:55

So it's mentioned.

Glenn: 29:59

Yeah. Faith only is mentioned, but Not faith only.

Arnie: 30:04

Sounds like somebody didn't, didn't read his Bible far enough. Well, of course, you know, we're chuckling about this, but you know, it's really not a a laughing matter, because people

Glenn: 30:17

No, it's not.

Arnie: 30:17

Believe false doctrine and and wind up with with a

Glenn: 30:21

No, religion that's contrary to to what God has has authorized and

Arnie: 30:25

We're about out of time here. So next Lord's day, we what he has has instituted. We're about out of out of time. Did you have something else? hope that you'll tune us in again, and we might be able to continue a few extra thoughts here along this line. We hope that this will be beneficial to you, and that you'll test us and make sure that the things we say are what the Bible says, and not as these that we've been speaking about, misreading and misinterpreting what God has has said. Lord willing, we'll be with you again next Lord's Day. Have a good week.