Christian Unity (the book) - The Maranatha Community

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• Separation from other believers’ fellowships was not required for aperson to be received into the communion of a Brethren assembly. ManyBrethren assemblies, even those nominally not tied to the ExclusiveBrethren system, went away from this principle, but it is truly an ‘open’principle.• Fellowship with other believers in their own places of worship was to beenjoyed, provided one’s conscience allowed it.So what do these principles mean for us today as we try to dig out theembedded church around us? It means that differences of belief and practiceneed not, and should not, hinder Christians who share the same divine life ofChrist from worshipping and witnessing together openly. Until this is donewholeheartedly and regularly and becomes widespread in the Church, thevaluable lessons that the early Brethren taught the Church in the early yearsof the 19 th Century will be lost and the Church will be the poorer.WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM THE OPEN BRETHRENThis complete openness by some of the early Brethren to receive fellowChristians was not just limited to receiving fellow Protestants. Lang quotes anearly Brethren writer who was even open to receiving an Eastern Orthodox orRoman Catholic believer in his fellowship. Lang found a tract of 1838 by aBrethren writer who wrote:‘Though the fullest devotedness and separation from the world areenjoined as a privilege and duty, yet gladly would we have admitted thelate Emperor of Russia before he died (a member, of course, of the GreekOrthodox Church), as we would the Archbishop Fenelon (a French RomanCatholic but a true Christian), without obliging or calling upon either togive up their thrones. The only ground of communion is real faith inJesus.’ 107I remember hearing that Professor F F Bruce, formerly John Rylands Professorof Biblical Exegesis at Manchester University, and a lifelong member of theOpen Brethren, when asked whether he would be happy to receive the Popeand the strongly Protestant Dr Ian Paisley at the Breaking of Bread in his107Lang, G H, Anthony Norris Groves, saint and pioneer, Thynne and Co, London 1939, p140.Page 135
assembly, without much hesitation replied, ‘Yes, but not on the sameoccasion!’From as early as 1834, Groves saw clearly that in considering the wholequestion of fellowship with Christians of other denominations there should betwo guidelines. The first is the duty we have to ourselves to meet with afellowship of Christians which we feel honours the Lord and his Word; thesecond is that we must have liberty to worship with any congregation whereChrist’s presence is. He wrote:‘Consider the church at Jerusalem; consider the church at Corinth, howmuch to be questioned, how much to be condemned, yet the apostles borewith and reproved, but separated not. Indeed the more my soul searchesinto this matter, the more I feel I cannot formally separate, or openlydenounce them whom I do not feel are separated from Christ, anddenounced by him as his enemies. If I were to give up this principle, Iknow of none to guide me, but that which I have always seen fail, andwhich engenders a spirit more hurtful than could arise from a readiness toendure contradiction to your own views: this looks more like crucifixion ofself, than casting out as evil, those who, with whatever faults, we cannotbut believe are children of the kingdom.’ 108Again, in 1837, he continues the thought of not separating from otherChristians simply because they own things we disapprove of:‘I also daily more and more desire to see raised up for God discriminatingwitnesses, discerning between things that differ; enduring the evil for thesake of the good, rather than fleeing from the good for fear of the evil. Iam so fixed in this principle, that I could never give it up, even were those Imost love to oppose me in it. It is, to my conscience, the breath of God;the image of God’s acting and mind.What a blessing it is that the Lord’s heart is so large, that he can helpwhenever he sees some good thing; whereas man withdraws, because hesees some evil thing, which is generally found to mean something that108Lang, G H, Anthony Norris Groves, saint and pioneer, Thynne and Co, London 1939, p145.Page 136
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Can Christian Unity be expressed ac
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‘In the Trinity the three are one
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Protestants, equally, have to be ab
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When John Wesley said that Christia
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(Geneva) Agreed Statement was issue
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While organised Christian endeavour
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Christian Unity consist?’ We shal
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CHAPTER 1CHRISTIAN UNITY IN THE EAR
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Almost all the heresies in the Earl
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interpreted as being against the la
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was raised by the Novatian schism.
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ArianismArianism was the most impor
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the Person of Christ. This was the
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Nicaea (325 AD), which asserted, ag
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He wrote:‘The ancient doctrines o
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agreement into the terms and ethics
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authority of the local bishop; Cypr
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Protestants. He was born in Tagaste
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guide the affairs of men: the Papac
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The distinction between laity and c
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ule. Christians were allowed to be
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fallen corruption and mortality but
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During the 1917 Communist Revolutio
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his repentance and restoration. The
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just before death, they might recei
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In both the East and the West heres
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The Waldensians were so named after
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CHAPTER 4THE SECOND GREAT SPLIT: WE
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Far more serious criticisms of the
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and the sacraments. He was tried by
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and his discovering that the Script
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denominational allegiances: confess
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aptism and substituting for it bapt
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Vincent de Lérins’ threefold bas
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Charles de Guise, Cardinal of Lorra
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CHAPTER 5QUOTATIONS ON THE THEME OF
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Dr Charles Malik - 20 th Century:
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Nicholas Zernov - 20 th Century:‘
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The restoration of the universal Ch
Page 89 and 90: Timothy Ware - 20 th Century:‘It
Page 91 and 92: Basilea Schlink - 20 th Century:‘
Page 93 and 94: Cardinal Basil Hume - 20 th Century
Page 95 and 96: Keith A Fournier - 20 th Century:
Page 97 and 98: concept of a contract between a rul
Page 99 and 100: harmoniously ordered society of pea
Page 101 and 102: interesting to note that the disput
Page 103 and 104: • In the Eucharist, Komensky main
Page 105 and 106: The Conference opened with much pom
Page 107 and 108: a growing unity among Christians at
Page 109 and 110: We cannot leave the 17 th Century w
Page 111 and 112: CHAPTER 7CHRISTIAN UNITY AND THE EV
Page 113 and 114: In Dr Woodward’s account of the r
Page 115 and 116: for Whitefield’s work in America,
Page 117 and 118: the West, the North and the South.
Page 119 and 120: ‘John Wesley, displeased at not b
Page 121 and 122: formally, though it may have helped
Page 123 and 124: In view of all this, Charles Wesley
Page 125 and 126: Some of the refugees were persuaded
Page 127 and 128: Isaac Watts (1647-1748), the pionee
Page 129 and 130: CHAPTER 8VISIONS OF CHRISTIAN UNITY
Page 131 and 132: hymns and Eastern orthodox spiritua
Page 133 and 134: eplied with a series of Eirenicons
Page 135 and 136: positively wrote on grace and love
Page 137 and 138: hand that pours out sorrow’ and t
Page 139: He died in England in 1853 an ‘ec
Page 143 and 144: ‘Loving all whom Christ loves bec
Page 145 and 146: says, the Broad Church was ‘a moo
Page 147 and 148: far greater part for the laity in t
Page 149 and 150: ehind some of the criticism of the
Page 151 and 152: came together with the clear purpos
Page 153 and 154: In subsequent missionary conference
Page 155 and 156: university formed by a federation o
Page 157 and 158: credo-baptists to accept the provis
Page 159 and 160: Horton Davies 137 points out in his
Page 161 and 162: However, since New Delhi, the WCC s
Page 163 and 164: (b) The Church of Christ in China (
Page 165 and 166: the Scriptures as the supreme autho
Page 167 and 168: In 1970 a similar scheme to that of
Page 169 and 170: indulgences, were all confirmed str
Page 171 and 172: however, at a lower level, manifest
Page 173 and 174: In her study of the Evolution of th
Page 175 and 176: Even within the Reformed Protestant
Page 177 and 178: the publisher’s foreword to Gee
Page 179 and 180: and so I have some golden opportuni
Page 181 and 182: CHAPTER 10 THESE BRIDGES CAN’T BE
Page 183 and 184: ‘Only he - only Christ - was able
Page 185 and 186: c) Justification by Faith and Works
Page 187 and 188: However, in the Credo of the People
Page 189 and 190: f) Purgatory‘Purgatory’ is a na
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The Catechism of the Catholic Churc
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who love and trust the Lord Jesus C
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However, there is a growing awarene
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encouraged to receive a blessing al
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c) Traduction Œcumenique de la Bib
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witness. There is one such Sisterho
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Practically all para-church groups
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s) Missions and CampaignsMissions a
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My Protestant friends say to me tha
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Most Christians, in all three tradi
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of God may be complete, equipped fo
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CHAPTER 12NOW WHAT?This book began
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c) For some Protestants ecumenism m
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The church at Corinth was full of C
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) It has become clear that, realist
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Christians who believe a Catholic d
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There are three confessions that ha
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‘The solution to the ecumenical i
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k) Christ has left us an example -
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day’, the Niceno-Constantinopolit
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APPENDIX 2FOUR BIBLICAL TEXTS ON TH
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of the common good, and when one’
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eaten, as idols did not exist anywa
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14. That to continue in any known s
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What all three traditions have in c
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Calvin held that the Gospel of Jesu
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Relations between Protestantism, Ca
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Brandreth, Henry, R T, The Oecumeni
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Hopko, Thomas, All the Fullness of
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Rupp, E G and Drewery, Benjamin, Ma
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INDEXAAct of Uniformity, 114aggiorn
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Frame, John M, 91, 187Francis of As
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Richardson, Paul, 239Roman Catholic
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