Can you interpret that? The Reformed churches grew out of John Calvin’s teachings during the Reformation and, like most other churches of the period, quickly divided along national lines. When Dutch Reformed immigrants came to America they established an independent denomination, making them the American Dutch Reformed church. In the late nineteenth century, this body sent missionaries to China and, according to a paper I recently heard at the meeting of the Southern Historical Association in St, Louis, the converts were known as the American Dutch Reformed Chinese. Absurd? Of course.<\/p>\n
The chief absurdity of this is the folly of being anything but a Christian. The religious designations added by men are endless, destructive, and schismatic. Whatever I believe, I would never consent to calling myself anything more or less than a Christian. “Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God on this behalf<\/em>” (I Peter 4:16).<\/p>\n Ah, but says someone, I know you are more than just a Christian, you are a conservative Disciples of Christ, Church of Christ, anti, restoration movement Campbellite Christian. But that is not what I am. Such terms may, or may not, tell something about where I came from, but they do not tell what I am. There is nothing wrong with having Dutch origins, or being American, or sending missionaries to China. But woe be to the man who comes out of that an American Dutch Reformed Chinese.<\/p>\n The villain of this pattern of thinking is institutional loyalty. What we call ourselves says much about our loyalties (see I Corinthians 1:10-15). Religious denominationalism begins in doctrinal debate but it survives by building powerful institutions. Each denomination becomes a self-serving domain replete with offices, money, pastoral jobs, money, boards, money, honors, money, committees, money, and money. Each denomination sells its own brand of nationalistic, ear-tickling orthodoxy in order to survive. Churches of Christ can become denominationalized and institutionalized – and have. But the church of Christ cannot and will not.<\/p>\n I am only a Christian and relate only to a church of Christ. I am nothing more, not an American Christian, not an anti Christian, or a restoration Christian. There is much more to do and say, but such an understanding must be the place to begin.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Ed Harrell Vanguard (Volume 5 No. 6), March 22, 1979, p. 339 Can you interpret that? The Reformed churches grew out of John Calvin’s teachings during the Reformation and, like most other churches of the period, quickly divided along national lines. When Dutch Reformed immigrants came to America they established an independent denomination, making…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27],"tags":[300,889],"class_list":["post-34040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-denominations","tag-reformed-church"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":38562,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-is-arminianism\/","url_meta":{"origin":34040,"position":0},"title":"What is Arminianism?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 10, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Good morning Jeffrey, I'm having an issue understand something. A lot of the denominational world is under the assumption that if a person is not a Calvinist, then they are an Arminian. What is an Arminian? I've thoroughly studied Calvinism and its faults, but I can't seem to find\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8196,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/does-god-already-know-everything-that-will-ever-happen\/","url_meta":{"origin":34040,"position":1},"title":"Does God Already Know Everything that Will Ever Happen?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 24, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"by Ken Green A Reformed (Calvinist) scholar wrote: \u201cThe Scriptures clearly teach that long before we pray, God already knows everything and that He has already determined what He is going to do.\u201d It\u2019s true that God is omniscient and absolutely sovereign over all things. To think that we can\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":27232,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-united-church-of-christ-is-not-of-christ\/","url_meta":{"origin":34040,"position":2},"title":"The United Church of Christ Is Not of Christ","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 10, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"by Kent Heaton The prophet Jeremiah wrote, \"But thou shall say unto them, This is a nation that obeys not the voice of the Lord their God, nor receives correction: truth is perished, and is cut off from their mouth\" (Jeremiah 7:28). The news unfolds daily how a nation once\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":53774,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/a-tale-of-two-gods\/","url_meta":{"origin":34040,"position":3},"title":"A Tale of Two Gods","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 2, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"How Calvinism's God and the Bible's God are Two Very Different God's by Ben Giselbach One very popular denominational preacher and writer, John Piper, is famous for saying that \"all things\" - even down to the subatomic level - \"are ordained, guided, and governed\" by God.\u00a0[1]\u00a0The idea that God determines\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":56426,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/give-me-that-good-odd-religion\/","url_meta":{"origin":34040,"position":4},"title":"Give Me that Good ODD Religion!","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 30, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"by Steve Klein Churches of Christ are typically viewed as \"odd\" by denominational folk. Two of the main reasons for this view are that churches of Christ don't use instruments of music in worship and they don't celebrate December 25th as the birth of Christ. While these things seem odd\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4650,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/pre-campbell-christianity\/","url_meta":{"origin":34040,"position":5},"title":"Pre-Campbell Christianity","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 23, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"by Ken Chumbley via\u00a0Gospel Gazette, Vol. 2, No. 8, p. 18, August 2000 The following is an excerpt from an article by Carroll Sites that has been found in a number of bulletins over the last few years: Many people identify churches of Christ as owing their roots to Alexander\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34040"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34040\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}