The confusion concerns why are there two divisions of Christianity and mini-divisions (denominations) numbering in the hundreds.  This posting will answer that question.  Ask any church person if he is a Christian and one will hear some derivation of: “Yes, I am a member of the _______” (fill in the blank with the name of a church).  I was once asked what faith I belonged to as if there was more than one.  Not only have those who call themselves God’s children divided themselves into hundreds of groups, they have traditionally had nothing to do with each other.  Some time ago (before COVID-19) an article appeared in the local newspaper in which the author used numerous superlatives to describe a modern day miracle.  A meeting had taken place which brought together people from the area’s different religious organizations.  Amazingly, they had come together in the same room, had talked to one another and, I assume, touched one another.  Words such as “heavenly,” “wonderful” and “amazing” were used to characterize what had gone on in that most holy place.  The writer proclaimed that “Heaven came down” on that gathering.  I assume that it was like the Day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came down on the 120 in the upper room.  I’m equally certain that the Holy Spirit did not attend the meeting.  I doubt that anyone in the local meeting spoke in tongues.

Admittedly, I was surprised that people from “those denominations” would physically come in contact with people from “the church.”  Having grown up in an area and era in which one’s religious affiliation was instrumental in determining one’s social identity, I was shocked that the “good Christians” would meet with “those people.”  Having been one of “the only people who will go to heaven,” I know the mindset of the various groups who make up the two-headed, multi-bodied, competing, conflicting, contradicting, condemning, convoluted quagmire known globally as “the church.”  Having been converted by God and removed as far as east is from west from that religious entity, I am the spiritual black sheep of the family.

Another part of the confusion issue involves the disparity of beliefs and customs within what is called Christianity?  Two questions come to mind when contemplating this conundrum: 1) What does the One Who is supposedly the Head of “the church” (singular) have to say about the matter?  And just as importantly, 2) do His Words on the subject matter to those involved in the widly varying religious organizations known as “the church?”  Let us begin with a few statements from the One Who has THE answers.

First, we must remember that “ALL SCRIPTURE IS INSPIRED BY GOD … and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness ….” which, as the Apostle Paul told the Evangelist Timothy, was necessary for his salvation (2 Tim. 3:14-17).  Paul, who received his gospel directly from Jesus Christ, tells us that God Himself dictated the Holy Bible to men through His Holy Spirit.  Those men then spoke what He had told them and recorded His Words for us.  This Truth is brought out in Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth (10:11) where he stated that the Old Testament was preserved for the sole purpose of teaching God’s ways to the end-time church whom he identified as: “those upon whom the ends of the world have come.”  The Apostle Peter spoke to this Truth when he wrote that: “Holy men of old spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.”  They or their scribes then recorded what they had spoken.  The same One who spoke to the prophets and talked face-to-face with Adam, Eve, Moses, Abraham, etc. later came to earth as Jesus of Nazareth.  During His brief ministry He taught His Father’s unchanging Truths to His apostles who spoke those Truths to the world of that day and recorded them in the form of letters/epistles to the churches.  Those letters, combined with the writings of the prophets, became known as the Bible–God’s spiritual map which leads to His soon-coming Kingdom on earth for those who know, believe and follow its directions (commandments).  See Jesus of Nazareth: God, Man or God-man? for proof that the Word (Jn. 1:1-4,14), the Rock Who was with the church in the wilderness of Sinai (Acts 7:38/ 1 Cor. 10:4) was the One Who came to earth as Jesus of Nazareth.  With that background established, let us go to God’s written Truth (Word–Jn. 17:17) to see what He has to say about specifically about the groups into which religious man has divided himself.

The Apostle Paul addressed the subject head on in 1 Corinthians 1:10 when he wrote to the Corinthian church and to all churches then and now: “I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you ALL SPEAK THE SAME THING (doctrine), and that there be NO DIVISIONS (DENOMINATIONS) AMONG YOU, so that YOU BE PERFECTLY JOINED TOGETHER in the SAME MIND and in the SAME JUDGMENT.”  Paul chastised the church for following after various men, which became the foundation upon which the entire denominational structure now stands.  Come let us reason together, if the people of that day were not to choose among such spiritual giants as Paul, Apollos, Peter and Jesus, why does modern man think he should follow people outside of that group?  Paul’s question– “Is Christ divided?”–cuts to the Biblical quick.  Christ–the singular Head of His singular Body (church)–is not divided into various bodies.  A body must have a head.  If there is more than one body, then Christ has more than one head.  Unable to explain the many bodies–one head theology, some proclaim that, “Though we are all different, we are all one body with Christ as our singular head.”  If this is so, why does each of those “bodies” call itself by a different name and have a different set of  “truths?”  It is those different “truths” that create the different bodies.

Every denomination was formed by a man who claimed to have a better insight into “Bible truth” than the One Who created Bible Truth.  This man, feeling the need to “interpret” God’s perfect Word, took it upon himself to edit (correct) what God had spoken, therefore formulating “Bible truths” that differed from God’s Truth.  This is what Peter was referring to when he wrote in his second epistle that unclean and unstable men were “wresting” (twisting) God’s Words to make them mean what they wanted them to mean to their own destruction (3:16).  The Apostle Jude addressed the interpretation/wresting problem in verse 4 of his epistle where he stated that ungodly, condemned men in the church were turning the grace of God into a license to sin.  One of those sins was to bring about division within the Body of Christ.     Only God can determine spiritual Truth.  He strictly forbids man to interpret His Word in 2 Peter 1:20,21: “Knowing this FIRST OF ALL, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any PRIVATE (PERSONAL) INTERPRETATION.”  By taking that power unto themselves, the founders of the various denominations committed idolatry–they became gods.  This was Adam and Eve’s primary sin.  They believed Satan who assured them that they had the power to create truths outside of and in contrast to God’s stated Truth.  The fact that we have literally hundreds of denominations (cults, sects, faiths, orders, etc.) proves that nothing has changed since Eden.  RELIGIOUS MAN STILL WANTS TO BE GOD.  Every denomination was founded by a man in search of a following.  Why else would someone edit God’s Word and convince others to believe him instead of the Author of that Word, the same Word Jesus called “Truth” (Jn. 17:17).  If Jesus called the Scriptures “Truth,” who gave man the power correct that Truth?  The answer is, of course, Satan.  EACH DENOMINATION IS A CREATION OF SATAN AND IS AN ABOMINATION TO GOD.  

Challenging the Lord’s Truth is as old as man himself.  Satan’s first attempt to improve God’s Word was a total success.  At that time he succeeded in convincing the entirety of humankind to accept his new and improved version of God’s Truth.  This happened in the Garden of Eden.  The acceptance of the devil’s improved model was at that time and still is his “gateway sin” that continues to lead mankind to wander farther and farther away from God as more and more of His Words fail to make it through religious man’s Truth filter and are thrown away.  Paul wrote about this in Romans 3:3,4 where he notes that though some people in the church do not believe God’s Word, His Truth is not affected.  He told the people in the Rome church to: “let God be true, but every (doubting) man a liar … so that You (God) will be justified in Your sayings and OVERCOME (THE DOUBTERS) WHEN YOU ARE JUDGED BY THEM.”  Man was still judging God’s Law (Words) and finding them wanting some 25 years after Jesus had come to earth to “magnify the Law (Word) and make it honorable” (Isa. 42:21).  One of the main things both Father and Son stressed through their messengers was the absolute necessity for unity and oneness within the church.

Their command for oneness and spiritual unity was brought forth in Christ’s prayer to His Father when He asked Him to “… MAKE THEM (THE APOSTLES) ONE AS WE ARE ONE” (Jn. 17:11,22,23).  By asking His Father to make the apostles one Jesus was also referring to those who would believe their message and become one with them and each other.  Jesus repeatedly confessed that He did nothing on His own, that even the Words He spoke had been given to Him by the Father.  If this was so with Christ and God, should not the same be true with Their church–THEIR BODY?  Jesus said in John 12:44-50 that to be God’s child one had to believe what He said.  He called what He said “light” which God seekers must hear and believe.  He warned that those who reject His words will be judged by those Words on the Day of Judgment.  Jesus went on to say that EVERYTHING He spoke and did was commanded by His Father.  In this way He and God were “one.”  God’s people speak and do what they “hear” and “see” the Father speak and do as recorded in His Holy Bible which is MAN’S ONLY TRUE SOURCE OF SPIRITUAL DIRECTION.  In this way, and only in this way, can man be one with the Father and the Son and one with all saints.

In Romans 12:5 we find the Lord, speaking through His apostle, condemning the compartmentalization of the church: “So we, being many (people, not churches, faiths, etc.), are (spiritually) one body in Christ, and every one members of one another.”  He speaks through Paul again in Ephesians 4:4-6: “There is ONE BODY, and one Spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your (singular) calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, Who is above all and through all and in you all.”  How is the Lord’s command for total, indivisible oneness possible when there is more than one church?  IT IS NOT POSSIBLE.

Satan convinced Adam and Eve that there is nothing wrong with embracing a slightly different version of God’s commands/Law/Words/Truth.  Their religious descendants (Catholics and Protestants) have embraced their rebellious mind-set.  Note that Satan brought about religious man’s destruction by changing only one word–“not.”  God told Adam and Eve that if they so much as touched the forbidden tree they would die.  Satan told them that they would “NOT” die.”  One word became the gateway sin that changed the history of mankind and the world.  This was voiced by a local woman who said: “God doesn’t like sin, but He will NOT” do anything about it.”  God warns man that not one Word of His Law can be changed, that not so much as a jot or tittle could be added to it or taken from it.  Satan changed one word, Adam and Eve believed him, and the rest is history.  GOD REMAINS STATIC.  HE  IS THE SAME YESTERDAY, TODAY AND FOREVER.  HE IS THE LORD, HE CHANGES NOT.  THERE IS IN HIM NO SHADOW OF TURNING.  THIS INCLUDES HIS WORD.

GOD’S WORD STANDS