Nothing is quite so easy to learn as error. One can easily pick up bad habits in nearly any athletic endeavor, but one will find it very difficult to get rid of them. Mistakes are easily learned, but correct procedures are not. If you doubt this, ask any golfer who slices.<\/p>\n
In the religious realm, Satan is constantly trying to indoctrinate people with error. He wants people confounded and confused: This is evident when one considers that the Devil wants people tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine (Ephesians 4:14), so that their hearts are deceived from the truth. What is disturbing to me is that too many people who are apparently devoted to the truth lend their hearts and minds to the Devil’s work (perhaps inadvertently). This is especially true in regard to the “name of the church.”<\/p>\n
Let me begin with the truth: God has never given the church a name. I don’t know how else to state it. There is simply no name given in Scripture for the church of our Lord. The only name given to God’s people in His word is “Christian.” (Acts 11:26; 26:28; I Peter 4:16). This term describes individuals, not collectivities.<\/p>\n
However, some are convinced that the proper name for the church is “Church of Christ.” This in spite of the fact that the term never appears in the word of God, not once, nada. The closest you can come to the term is the “churches of Christ salute you<\/em>” of Romans 16. This error has been so successfully disseminated that most Christians do not readily recognize scriptural terminology when they see it or hear it. For instance, if you were to ask the typical Christian, “When was the last time you worshipped with a church of God?” you would be quickly informed that he had never done so! Are we so ignorant that we don’t recognize scriptural terminology when we hear it? Any faithful group of Christians is a church of God (cf. Acts 20:28; I Corinthians 1:1-2; II Corinthians 1:1-2, et. al.). We have become victims of our own success. We have successfully inculcated error to the point that brethren do not recognize the truth!<\/p>\n Furthermore, the almost scriptural “church of Christ” has become the denominational “Church of Christ. ” In fact, so much of what we write and teach is so misleading concerning the nature of the church that it could have been written by almost any denominational preacher. We are inadvertently (I hope) making the Lord’s church into a denomination beginning with its denominational nomenclature. When non-Christians read much of what we say, they will be led to believe that the Church of Christ is as much a denomination as any other. (The non-denominational denomination, perhaps, but a denomination nevertheless.) Brethren, we should stop using terminology that is misleading, and we especially should stop denominationalizing the term “church of Christ.”<\/p>\n This point was recently brought home to me when I saw a brochure from the American Bible Society. In their program to send Bibles to others, they seek contributions from willing participants. When responding, the contributor is to fill out a questionnaire. As you examine the survey, you find that the Church of Christ is listed with Assembly of God, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Baptist, Roman Catholic, and “other” denominations. Now, brethren, you can blame the error on the ABS if you want, but the truth of the matter is that so much of what we teach about the church and its name is incorrect, and those who read what we write will be in error in their conclusions. We often present ourselves denominationally; therefore, it is no wonder that those around us conclude that we are a denomination.<\/p>\n We are victims of our own success.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Floyd Chappelear via\u00a0Sentry Magazine, Vol. 21, No. 1, March 1995 Nothing is quite so easy to learn as error. One can easily pick up bad habits in nearly any athletic endeavor, but one will find it very difficult to get rid of them. Mistakes are easily learned, but correct procedures are not. If you…<\/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,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27],"tags":[1277],"class_list":["post-95390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-denominationalism"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":87311,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-do-people-change-the-teachings-of-christ\/","url_meta":{"origin":95390,"position":0},"title":"Why do people change the teachings of Christ?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 29, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello there! My primary question is this: How can \"Christians\" claim to love the Lord and accept the Bible as truth, block out, look over, or misconceptualize truths in the Bible that cover their salvation and how to worship? The best thing I can think of is: It's so\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":64278,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/am-i-become-your-enemy\/","url_meta":{"origin":95390,"position":1},"title":"Am I Become Your Enemy?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 28, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"by Robert F. Turner Paul had done some straight talking to the Galatian churches. He had said, \"I am afraid of (for) you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain\" (Galatians 4:11). Then, in Galatians 4:16, \"Am I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?\"\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":96374,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-to-see-eye-to-eye-religiously\/","url_meta":{"origin":95390,"position":2},"title":"How to See \u201cEye to Eye\u201d Religiously","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 1, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by Mark M. White via Seeking Things Above, Vol. No. 4, July 2026 Why do some people not see religious things the way we see them? Why is there so much difference between what we teach and what the denominations profess? Do we not all have the same Bible? Are\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":60642,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/we-are-a-different-people\/","url_meta":{"origin":95390,"position":3},"title":"We Are a Different People","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 1, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"by Eugene W. Clevenger via The Preceptor, Vol. 1, No. 6, April 1952 One of the greatest factors within the church today that is hindering the cause of Christ is a morbid fear on the part of being different. God's people in every dispensation have been different people, and members\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":40367,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-paul-have-been-embarrassed\/","url_meta":{"origin":95390,"position":4},"title":"Should Paul Have Been Embarrassed?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 22, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry W. Benton Matthew wrote a book that aired the \"dirty laundry\", so to speak, of his Jewish nation, just as the earlier prophets had done before, only now it was worse because God's great \"blessing to all nations\" was now being rejected as a \"troubler\" in Israel. Matthew\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":84565,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/your-preaching-is-offensive-to-me\/","url_meta":{"origin":95390,"position":5},"title":"Your Preaching Is Offensive to Me","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 14, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Tom M. Roberts via Truth Magazine, Vol 43, 1999 \"Then His disciples came and said to Him, 'Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?'\" (Matthew 15:12). The history of speaking \"the oracles of God\" (I Peter 4:11) is a history of controversy. There\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\/95390","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=95390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95390\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}