Introduction
1. IT BEGAN IN SCOTLAND
   
2. THOMAS CAMPBELL WRITES HIS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
   
3. THE SPIRIT OF THE "DECLARATION AND ADDRESS"
   
4. PRINCIPLES OF THE DOCUMENT
   
5. HISTORIC NOTES ON OUR FIRST CHURCH
   
6. "LET CHRISTIAN UNITY BE OUR POLAR STAR"
   
7. THE NOBLEST ACT IN BARTON STONE'S LIFE
   
8. LEARNING FROM A BACKWOODS PREACHER
   
9. CHRISTIANS IN BABYLON
   
10. WHAT IS THE GOSPEL?
    
11. THE ESSENCE OF THE CAMPBELL PLEA
    
12. THE DEATH OF A DREAM
    
13. THE SAND CREEK ADDRESS
    
14. A MUDDLED MOVEMENT
    
15. THE AUTHORITY TOTEM
    
16. THE PARTY SPIRIT
    
17. THE BED OF PROCRUSTES
    
18. OUR COSTLIEST SIN: EXCLUSIVISM
    
19. RESTORATION OR REFORMATION
    
20. A BOY LEARNS THE MEANING OF BROTHERHOOD
    
21. THE BUTTING BRETHREN
    
22. ANALYSIS OF LEGALISM
    
23. THE ESSENCE OF CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP
    
24. THOUGHTS ON FELLOWSHIP
    
25. ON THE ROCKS
    
26. WITHDRAWING FROM THE DISORDERLY
    
27. CAUSING DIVISIONS
    
28. TWO GREAT ERRORS
    
29. UNION IN TRUTH
    
30. ONE BODY IN CHRIST
    
31. UNITY AND IDENTITY
    
32. UNITY IN DIVERSITY
    
33. IS DOCTRINE IMPORTANT?
    
34. THE WEIGHTIER MATTERS
    
35. MUST WE GIVE UP OUR OPINIONS?
    
36. WHAT DIFFERENCES DO DIFFERENCES MAKE?
    
37. THE "ONE BAPTISM" AND FELLOWSHIP
    
38. ARE WE TO FELLOWSHIP THE UNIMMERSED?
    
39. OUR FATHERS ON "WHO IS A CHRISTIAN?"
    
40. "OUR BROTHERS IN THE DENOMINATIONS"
    
41. WHAT IS "OUR FELLOWSHIP"?
    
42. ARE WE TO FELLOWSHIP THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH?
    
43. I WOULD ABDICATE
    
44. A BASIC FALLACY TO OVERCOME
    
45. CAN WE BE UNITED AND NOT KNOW IT?
    
46. SEPARATED BUT NOT DIVIDED
    
47. THE ONE CHURCH INDIVISIBLE
    
48. UNITY WILL COME, BUT
    
49. IF NOT BROTHERHOOD, THEN CO-EXISTENCE
    
50. THIS IS OUR GLORY!
    
51. THE UNIFYING POWER OF THE CROSS
    

RESTORATION OR REFORMATION

For years we have been calling this series restoration history, but it may be time to question the integrity of that term. The more I study our history the more convinced I am of the inappropriateness of the term restoration, which means I may eventually change the name not only of this feature of the journal but the name of the journal itself. I will explain what I mean.

There is in history a restoration movement, or several of them, but the movement launched by O'Kelly­Stone­Campbell was not one of them. Theirs was a reformation, which is what they called it (and themselves reformers), which is a concept quite different from restoration. Restorationism is a doctrine about the church that presumes that (1) the true church went out of existence; (2) the existing churches are false churches; (3) the primitive church as the ideal church is revealed in the New Testament on a "fixed pattern" basis; and (4) we are to "restore" that church and thus have the one true church.

There have been more than 400 restorationist groups, all claiming to be the true church. These all go back to the days of the Reformation under Luther and Calvin when some of their followers believed they were wrong in trying to reform the Roman Catholic Church. It cannot be reformed, their critics claimed, so they broke with the Reformation and started what has come to be known as "the radical reformation." These were the Anabaptists, but they soon divided into Mennonites, the Amish, etc. The Plymouth Brethren have their roots here, and they are today divided six or eight different ways. Restorationist groups always divide again and again and again, for restorationism by its very nature is divisive.

Reformation is entirely different. It accepts a less­than­perfect church as still the church, and it believes the church has always existed, just as Jesus said it would. But it has always been in need of reform, even from the beginning. No primitive church was perfect, and they all needed reformation, more or less. In his letters to the churches Paul was a reformer, not a restorationist. He did not want to junk the Corinthian church, believing it to be a false church. It was rather the Body of Christ, and he called it that and recognized it as such, even though it needed reformation. He did not tell the faithful to leave and start "a loyal church."

No congregation is perfect. If there was such, it would no longer be once you and I found out about it and joined it. No church in history has ever been all it should be, just as no person has ever been. Just as we are always to be reforming our lives, which is what repentance means, we are also to be reforming the church, which is always erroneous and imperfect to some degree. That is reformation. The restorationist, on the other hand, believes that he has restored the one true church, and this from the pattern set forth in scripture. All others have to be wrong. There can be no error or "brothers in error." And so such ones continually divide, for when some new "truth" is found in the pattern a "loyal church" starts for those who want all the truth. They usually debate each other as to whether the new interpretation is indeed "according to the pattern," or whether an "innovation" that has been introduced is authorized by the pattern.

Recent research by Prof. George Williams of Harvard reveals much about the character of these sub­groups of the Reformation, who rejected the Reformation and became restorationists, believing that they had restored the true church. The historians call this "the restoration motif" or primitivism, and Prof. Williams says, "So widespread was restorationism (restitutionism) as the sixteenth­century version of primitivism that it may be said to be one of the marks of the Radical Reformation." He turned up books written on the restoration movement, the titles bearing that name.

Our pioneers did not believe that the church had apostatized to the point that it no longer existed, nor did they believe that their mission was to "restore" the true church. Their mission was rather to unite the Christians in all the sects. Those sects were not the church, to be sure, but God's people were in those sects and they were the church. As reformers they sought to restore to the church (to be distinguished from restoring the church itself) the ancient order of things, including unity.

Here are a few examples of how they referred to their work as reformers.

Reformers

When Robert Richardson wrote Memoirs of Alexander Campbell, a sub­title read: "A view of the Origin, Progress, and Principles of the Religious Reformation which he advocated."

Barton W. Stone wrote about Alexander Campbell: "I am constrained, and willingly constrained to acknowledge him the greatest promoter of this reformation of any man living. The Lord reward him!" (Biography of Barton W. Stone, p. 76).

Concerning Walter Scott: "It is our melancholy task to record the death of one of the pioneers of the current Reformation." (Christian Pioneer, 1861, p. 43).

On the mission of the pioneers: "The essential work of the current Reformation has been to uncover from the sectarian rubbish of ages this 'precious corner stone' (Jesus Christ)" (Christian Pioneer, 1861). Concerning the Brush Run church: "The oldest and most favored church in the Reformation" (Mill. Harb.,1856, p. 57).

Isaac Errett in Mill. Harb. (1861) wrote a series of nine articles on the work they were doing, entitled "A Plea for Reformation," in which he constantly described the work as "the reformation which we plead."

Robert Richardson also did a series entitled "Reformation" that ran for 19 installments, detailing the plea of the pioneers. They start in the 1847 Millennial Harbinger.

Alexander Campbell also wrote a series on "Anecdotes, Incidents, and Facts Connected with the Origin and Progress of the Current Reformation." (Mill. Harb., 1848, p. 279).

Hundreds of letters appear in the Millennial Harbinger from preachers in the field, always under the title of "Progress of Reform." T. M. Allen of Missouri wrote to Campbell more than any other, in almost every issue of the paper for 30 years. He would often refer to how he was "contending for Reformation."

T. P. Haley in The Christian Church in Missouri (1888, p. 91) says: "It is proposed to record in this volume such incidents in the lives of the pioneer preachers of the current reformation in Missouri and the early history of the Church of Christ."

Alexander Campbell writing Ovid Butler: "Your opinions are of deep import, involving much of the moral character and future destiny of this Reformation." (Mill. Harb., 1851, p. 431).

These are but a few of the thousands of references that could be given, showing that our pioneers thought in terms of reformation. They almost never used the word restoration, though it did occasionally appear. At least once Campbell used "reformation or restoration" as if they were synonyms to him, but this can hardly be deduced since he used the latter term so rarely. He used both terms in the title of the book: The Christian System "in reference to the union of Christians, and a restoration of primitive Christianity, as plead in the current reformation."

He might speak of restoring primitive Christianity or "the ancient order" but never of restoring the church, for there is a vast difference, as we have seen. After mud and water injured the art museums of Florence, Italy, they might have referred to restoring pristine beauty to a Rembrandt, but not of restoring a Rembrandt (as if it did not exist).

It is significant that the heirs of the Stone­Campbell reformation movement almost never call it anything except the Restoration Movement. When we do this we place ourselves in the tradition of the Anabaptists and the radicals who suppose that they and they alone are the true church, and not within the reformed tradition where our pioneers placed themselves.

Reformers have less reason to divide just as they have more reason to be inclusivistic, for they accept the church's fallibility even while they endeavor to make it perfect. They do not buy the fallacy that the scriptures provide a fixed pattern that provides the details for the work, worship and organization of the church. They see that even the New Testament churches were different from each other, and that if you sought to "restore the primitive church," you would have to decide which church to restore. They rather see the scriptures as providing that norm for the church that enables us to do for our time what they did for theirs. They tolerate error and imperfection in that they realize that they have always been and always will be, but they labor to minimize the things that are wrong.

Restorationism, on the other hand, is the cause of all our divisions, for by its very nature it is exclusivistic. The Mormons are a good example of restorationists, being "the restored church of the latter day saints." One verse in "the pattern" refers to being baptized for the dead. This is inflated into a major doctrine, and unless you accept their interpretation you cannot be a Mormon. There have been hundreds of such sects.

Its seeds are in every church. Prof. Williams says it was in the Reformation itself, especially in Calvin, and to the extent it gained dominance divisions came. It was in the Stone­Campbell Movement, but strong reformation leaders kept it at bay for generations, though it always troubled the Movement. Following the death of those leaders who insisted that we can have varying opinions and still be united, a new leadership emerged that was restorationist and exclusivistic. This led to a separate group by the 1890's known as "the Churches of Christ."

As a restorationist church, the Church of Christ has always been divisive, dividing once every ten years since its existence. It will continue to divide unless it surrenders its exclusivistic­restorationist view of the church and accepts the reformation view of its earliest pioneers, who never had the notion that they and they alone were the one true church. Since restorationists will have nothing to do with other churches, they can never be a unity people. As reformers we can reach out to others and make unity our business. We reform the church by building bridges of love and fellowship between all God's children.

(Restoration Review: Vol. 22, No. 4; April 1980)