What describes a thing, where it began, in what year, what name it wears, and who was present when it began will satisfy the honest heart about which church to belong!!
All of us use this as a means of recognizing persons, countries, and societies making sure those societies are not clandestine. If I wanted to verify the genuineness of any product, person, or thing I would use these criteria, would I not? That being true, these criteria will identify the ONE true church Jesus Christ brought into existence and eliminates all those begun by man!!
As stated last week, the Church of Christ is the only church prophesied in the scriptures. This may seem cultish to some, egotistic to others, and ridiculous to even more, YET, the proof of such a statement will satisfy any truth-seeking soul. Isaiah 2:2, Micah 4:2, Luke 24:47-49, Acts 1:4-6 all teach this fact. Zion in the scriptures is the hill country around Jerusalem. The church started in Zion (to prove this to yourself, read the cited scriptures. Any church that did not start in Jerusalem then, is NOT the Bride of Christ, which He named the Church of Christ!! Not only did she start in Jerusalem as prophesied, she came in the right century!! Jesus stated: “there are some of you that stand here, that shall not taste of death until you have seen the kingdom come with power.” Mark 9:1 The church Christ started had to have started in the lifetime of the apostles!! This truth is inescapable. The fact is that all of the apostles were alive when the church came down from God out Heaven except Judas who had killed himself when his plot to stop Jesus from dieing was foiled. All the apostles belonged to the Church of Christ; NONE belonged to any of today’s denominations!! Fact: no denomination existed while the apostles were on the earth, the Roman Catholic under the emporer Constantine did come into existence until 313 AD. It is 200 years too late to be the church Christ started!! All the apostles were alive, except Judas, on the day of Pentecost, AD33, at 9:00am that Sunday morning!! Constantine had not even been born, Martin Luther (Lutheranism) was not the figment of anyone’s imagination, Charles Wesley (Methodism), John Smythe’s (Baptist) great-great-great-great grandparents were still 229 generations away from arriving on the planet, so the same with Ellen White (7th Day Adventist), Charles Russell (Jehovah’s Witness), John Knox (Presbyterian), peeping Joe Smith (Morons,sic, or Later Day Saints) and you can go on to name the others!!
Since none of the church originators were alive when the apostles were on the earth and NONE of their denominations existed, how could anyone take them seriously, follow their doctrines, and belong to them INSTEAD of the church that actually began in the first century, the sad thing is denominationalism DOES NOT EVEN CLAIM to have begun in the first century!! (The Baptist may claim John the Baptist started their denomination, but they lie about a lot of things!!) History verifies the existence of the Church of Christ in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and on, show us ONE place it mentions the originators of any denomination in the 1st century!! “In vain, do they worship Me teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” Matthew 15:9 “Beware, lest any man spoil you through philosophy and after vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and NOT AFTER CHRIST.” Colossians 2:8
In order to have a different church one must have a different doctrine they teach!! Every denomination has that DIFFERENT doctrine, NO it is not found in the Bible; they have to write their own Bible or creed book to support their damnable lies. In this, they compete with the Lord Jesus for the souls of men!! They are fools!!
