Identity Crisis

See www.christianchronicle.org for the article on "Identity Crisis".

Excerpt (in part):
Features - Churches face ‘identity crisis’
By Bobby Ross Jr.The Christian Chronicle

Big Macs. Chicken McNuggets. Filet-O-Fish Sandwiches. Walk into most any McDonald’s and you have a good idea what’s on the menu.

In a manner of speaking, Churches of Christ used to be that picca.“We were a franchise church,” said Steve Sandifer, pastoral care minister at the Southwest Central church in Houston. “If someone said song 728b, you knew what that meant. The order of worship was very similar. We had our own unwritten liturgy that showed up in prayers.

Even many of the buildings came from the same plans.”Visit one of the nation’s nearly 13,000 a cappella congregations today, though, and you might not know if the church sings from shaped notes in a hymnal or words flashed on a big screen.

Men only might pass the communion trays, or women might join them. The King James Bible might be preferred, or Scripture could be read from The Message.

In the past, Churches of Christ were distinguished by belief in church autonomy, baptism for forgiveness of sins, weekly Lord’s Supper on Sunday, public male leadership, plurality of elders and a cappella singing, said David Duncan, pulpit minister at the Memorial church in Houston. “Now, some congregations have given up most, if not almost all, these distinctive characteristics,” Duncan said.

Comment:
Mack Lyon, televangelist, In Search of the Lord’s Way television ministry, Edmond, Okla.: Why yes! There is an identity crisis among us! Of course there is! Even our own people don’t know who we are and — well, we don’t stand for anything.

We seem to be afraid to preach and teach about baptism or divorce or a cappella music. There are deacons (will-be elders) who have never heard one sermon about why we don’t sing with instrumental accompaniment in our worship.

Elders are no longer feeding the flock of God as they are charged. And they will give account to God on judgment day for that! In the absence of biblical teaching, apostasy is certain! Calling a church a “Church of Christ” doesn’t make it so. We are a Christian as far as we measure up to what Christianity was in the New Testament. And, a church is a “church of Christ” only as far as it measures up to the one described in the New Testament.

Per Mack Lyon's comments, this is pretty much where I stand!