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ebb tide, there is a remnant amongst protestants that holds true to the Reformation, that is, the correction of errors that men of that time saw in the Roman Catholic Church.

This remnant recognizes the authority and infallibility of Scripture, which is God-breathed, and therefore looks to Scripture on all matters of faith and practice. Where Scripture is silent, there is liberty, where a single verse is unclear to the Christian, they should look to related verses that are numerous and more clear, thus shedding light on the verse that we are not so sure of. We realize that some things remain a mystery to man, who can not fully know the mind of God (as Scripture says).

We see other Christians as brothers in Christ - even if our denomination can not be in communion with their denomination. Our reading of Scripture makes us of the mind that though a denomination may have erroneous teaching, there may well be individuals belonging to it that are saved, despite the errors of their church’s leadership, but this is difficult due to the erroneous teaching.

1) some offshoot denominations along the lines of what would be called “evangelicals” or “dispensationalists” have lost the New Testament teaching that the New Testament Church is the new Jerusalem that is written of in the Bible. Those denominations are all sadly mislead, and have turned away from the eschatology that was commonly understood from the beginnings of the Church until about the 1700’s. The Bible clearly speaks of an optimistic eschatology, from Genesis to Revelation, of gradual dominion of Christ over the world in time and history, i.e., the advancement of Christ’s Kingdom on earth, and that his second coming (singular, one-time event) will be the ultimate victory of his dominion, or conquering of the world, which until then is an ongoing process. The early members of the cults of the 1800’s in America were not Christians that were knowledgeable of the Bible and regularly attended Churches that had solid preaching of sound doctrine. The early members of these “cult” sects where basically ignorant of the Bible, so they were easily lead astray by heretical preaching. The Reformed denominations allowed heretical doctrine to enter into their seminaries in the 1800’s, often on what would seem to be points that were rather abstract to the unbeliever or professing Christian ignorant of Scripture. These heresies caused denominations to split, as individual congregations were either led astray with the heresy or recoiled in shock and were forced to break ties with the heretical congregations. Thus we have only a small remnant today that still holds on to the understanding gained hundreds of years ago, which cost so many dearly, and was even the reason for much of the beginnings of the United States.

2) The Reformed denominations which remain for the most part true to the Reformation, patiently work towards and await on the Lord in that all Christians will come to know the truth of God’s Word; the various denominations will eventually either correct their own errors or recede. The Word is the two-edged sword that proceeds from Christ’s mouth, it’s the sword which divides those who believe and those who reject the Word of God (which, in essence, is Christ, if you remember from John 1:14, “the Word was made flesh”), the Word - the Bible - is the sword with which Christ advances his Kingdom.

3) The essence of the Reformation was getting back to Scripture. For example, in Church government, Reformed Christians take the Bible for what is says, that Christ is the head of the Church, which is called the Bride of Christ. No man can place himself at the head of Christ’s Church; such a man is guilty of attempting to take the very place of Christ as “husband” to the Church. Such a Church, one with a man as its earthly head, thereby suggests the Biblical references to adultery or whoredom, as it as a body professes allegiance to two: the man as well as Christ. The only correction needed for that is to simply rule the Roman Catholic Church with its top leadership as an assembly, which would certainly be workable. This may seem shocking to some Roman Catholics because they have been told for centuries that they need to be blindly obedient to a single man, the Pope. Of course, all that need happen then is for Popes to gradually work towards this change.

4) The largest Protestant denominations have become completely corrupted and have been apostasizing for arguably two centuries. They pretty much either ignore the Bible or make up their own doctrine in a complete twisting of the Bible’s teaching. I think many of their heresies are actually very old heresies that came back since the people of say 150 years ago through today were not aware of the heresies and resolution of them in the old history of the Church. Since these heresies don’t even pass the “common sense” test, I don’t study them very much. How most people tend to think is that once they think a preacher of some kind has convinced them of something, or some books they’ve read about the Bible have convinced them of something, they simply refuse to give up their wrong ideas - even if one takes them through Scripture step by step and explains everything.

5) It’s essential truth, that is, essential to realize, that men can and do make mistakes, but Scripture is God-breathed, thus it has Divine authority. Scripture ITSELF tells us that Scripture - and Scripture ALONE - is to be the believer’s rule and guide. To gain perspective, i.e., to take into account the WHOLE COUNSEL OF GOD, that is, Biblical teaching in its totality, we must always review the Old Testament as well as the New Testament. Just think about the picture painted by the Old Testament regarding the concept of the ancient Israelites, God’s chosen people, which are the archetype of the New Testament Church, adding or taking away from Scripture. It was explicity forbidden, this prohibition was commonly known, there are consistent examples of God’s curse and chastisement when this was done, and there are consistent examples of God’s blessing when Scripture was followed precisely - VERY precisely. Even to the example of King Saul who gave a sacrifice, something ordinarily well-pleasing to God. He even did it out of concern for the nation of Israel. He had the best of intentions. But he did not do exactly as God’s prophet had instructed him, he did not wait for God’s prophet to come and do the sacrifice. God, speaking through his prophet, had given instructions which Saul did not follow because Saul’s faith failed him. The whole of the Old Testament reveals a very lengthy, very complex yet elegant, perfectly beautiful picture of what God wants us to do and refrain from doing, and if we use our God-given reasoning power to honestly study it, we will be moving towards an understanding of God’s instructions; we will be gaining wisdom, knowledge and truth.

I know that it is very difficult to go against one’s own background and history. I was raised a Methodist and never went to Church after high school, and I just converted a few years ago. Giving up the unscriptural Christmas tradition is one example of a tough hurdle for me. Well, tough until I realized that there are 52 holy days every year - the Lord’s Day, the Christian Sabbath. And I was celebrating a man-devised feast day, even while I was completely ignoring and rejecting and dishonoring what God actually does command of believers in Scripture. I had decades of dishonoring the Sabbath. I was breaking a commandment every week, and turning around once a year and feigning that I was a follower of Christ, by eating a big feast, putting up a tree and buying and receiving gifts - all of which Christ NEVER commanded. Was I celebrating Christmas then for Christ’s sake ? That’s impossible, because the Bible commands us directly to NOT ADD anything to God’s Word, and Christ commands our obedience to God’s Word.