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Churches of Christ Scholar on Restoration From
The
“…
restoration involves the attempt to recover some important belief or
practice from the time of pure beginnings that believers are
convinced has been lost, defiles, or corrupted. (p. x) “… restorationists seek to apprehend some particular dimension of the founding age, unmediated through subsequent understandings. (p. xi) "...
it is far more productive to use primitivism and restorationism as
roughtly synonymous and there interchangeable terms ... one might
well describe Mormons and pentecostals as experiential primitivists,
chiefly concerned with replicating a presumed spiritual dimension of
the first age; Holiness advocates and sixteenth-century Anabaptists
as ethical primitivists, mainly concerned with conforming themselves
to ethical norms found mainly concerned with conforming themselves
to ethical norms found in the teaching of Jesus and elsewhere in the
New Testament, and the
American-born Chjrches of Christ as ecclesiastical
primitivists, chiefly concerned with repreoducing the forms ans
structures they think charaterized the most ancient churches. (p.
xii) “…
restorationists clearly differ on those aspects of the first age
they find important and normative. Some focus on theology and
doctrine, some focus on issues of lifestyle and thics, some focus on
early Christ experience, while still others seek to recover the
forms and structures they think characterized the ancient church.
(p. xi) “
… all the traditions represented in this book began their careers
with a strong restorationist emphasis, but virtually all have now
abandoned their restorationist moorings for a modern project that
renders the restoration vision essentially powerless. (p. xiii) “
… it is crucial to remember that many restorationists in American
history have descended from that very same Reformed tradition. One
thinks here of the Separatist Puritans, of the Separate Baptists, or
of people like Barton W. Stone in the early nineteenth century. In
each of these instances, Reformed Christians despaired when society
failed to conform to the sovereign will of God. When that happened,
they often focused their energies not on the construction of the
kingdom of God for a future age but on a restoration of the ancient
order in their own time and place. (p. xvii) “Today,
restorationist movements continue to emerge, but the vitality of
this tradition is found neither in the so-called mainline nor in the
older restorationist movements that now have made their peace with
the modern world. (p. xvii)” Return to Homepage |
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