DOCSLIB.ORG

Martin Luther and the Concept of the Reformation of a True Church

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Martin Luther and the Concept of the Reformation of a True Church Journal of Religious Comparative Studies DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1992/jrcs.v1i1.3720 Martin Luther and The Concept of The Reformation of a True Church (An Analytical Study and Phenomenon On The Denominations Of Church) Syamsul Hadi Untung* Universitas Darussalam (UNIDA) Gontor Email:[email protected] Khoirunisa* Universitas Darussalam (UNIDA) Gontor Email: [email protected] Abstract Church reforms carried out by Martin Luther centered on Christians who wanted to be saved from the teachings of the deviant Catholic church. One of Martin Luther’s thoughts in reforming the church is his unique understanding of the problem of sin and his acceptance of God’s presence. This research uses the library research method which is sourced from the works of Martin Luther and the text of the Holy Bible. The approach used by the author is the historical-historical approach (analysis-history), with this approach the writer can arrange and conceptually arrange the course of the history of the Catholic Church and Martin Luther. The purpose of this writing is to read the events that Martin Luther has done in reforming the church, he has a different influence on Christianity today. Their forms of belief differ from the way in which the Scriptures are conveyed. So the author can conclude that the ideas of Martin Luther appeared to submit 95 theses of criticism for the teachings of the church which according to him to deviate and after the success of Martin Luther in reforming the church. The church denomination was created after reforming the Catholic church. So some Christians feel worried about the denominations of the church around them that will only make them divided and united until now. Keywords: Reformation, Martin Luther, Church, Denominations, Teachings. *Dean of the Faculty of Usuluddin, Darussalam University of Gontor, Jl. Raya Siman Km. 06, Ponorogo, Tel. 0352-483762. Fax: 0352-488182. *Student of the Faculty of Usuluddin Darussalam University Gontor Campus 5 Kandangan, Kediri Vol. 1 No. 1, November 2019 2 Syamsul Hadi Untung, Khoirunisa Abstrak Reformasi gereja yang dilakukan oleh Martin Luther berpusat pada orang-orang Kristen yang ingin diselamatkan dari ajaran gereja Katolik yang menyimpang. Salah satu pemikiran Martin Luther dalam mereformasi gereja, adalah pemahaman unik tentang masalah dosa dan penerimaannya ke hadirat Allah. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode library research yang bersumberkan dari karya-karya Martin Luther dan teks Kitab suci gereja Katholik. Adapun pendekata yang digunakan oleh penulis yakni pendekatan analisis- sejarah (analysis-history), dengan pendekatan tersebut penulis dapat merangkai dan menyusun secara konsepsi jalannya sejarah gereja Katholik dan tokoh Martin Luther. Adapun tujuan penulisan ini untuk membaca peristiwa yang telah dilakukan Martin Luther dalam mereformasi gereja, ia memiliki pengaruh yang berbeda terhadap kekristenan dewasa ini. Bentuk-bentuk kepercayaan mereka berbeda dengan cara di mana Kitab Suci disampaikan. Sehingga penulis dapat menyimpulkan bahwa gagasan Martin Luther muncul untuk mengajukan 95 tesis kritik untuk ajaran-ajaran gereja yang menurutnya menyimpang serta setelah keberhasilan Martin Luther dalam mereformasi gereja. Adapun denominasi gereja diciptakan setelah mereformasi gereja Katolik. Sehingga beberapa orang Kristen merasa cemas tentang denominasi gereja di sekitar mereka yang hanya akan membuat mereka terpecah dan tidak bersatu sampai sekarang. Kata kunci: Reformasi, Martin Luther, Gereja, Denominasi-denominasi, Ajaran-ajaran. INTRODUCTION he term “Reformation” directly gives the impression that something, namely Western European Christianity, is being Trenewed. The fact shows that the term “reform” is generally accepted as an appropriate designation for this movement because this movement is associated with the recognition of the need for a thorough examination of institutions, practices, and understandings of the Western church. The term really helps to show that there are social and intellectual dimensions of the movement.1 After the emergence of The Renaissance that made civilization in science, but has not been able to overcome the pain of society from the confines of the church, there emerged a movement that fiercely opposed the deviant church dogmas, namely the reformation movement of the church. Dissatisfaction with the Catholic Church grew in the 15th century and reached its peak in 1517 when Martin Luther (1483-1546), 1Alister E. McGrath, Sejarah Pemikiran Reformasi, (Jakarta: BPK Gunung Mulia, 8th edition, 2016), 2. Journal of Religious Comparative Studies Martin Luther and The Concept of The Reformation of a True Church 3 a monk from the Society of Augustine who worked in Wittenburg, Germany, hung 95 “theses” at the door of the palace church in the city that. He criticized the Catholic Church for selling indulgences to increase funds to be used to rebuild St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.2 Luther was excommunicated in 1521. Luther rejected many religious doctrines and practices which did not prove to have a biblical basis. The reforms were ignited in the 16th century by Martin Luther in Germany and by John Calvin and Ulrich Zwingli elsewhere in Europe.3 Martin Luther began to inch his way toward his distinctive understanding of how sinners can enter into the presence of a righteous God, classically expressed in the doctrine of justification by faith. While the relationship between the emergence of Luther’s theological distinctive and the historical origins of the Reformation as a whole is more complex.4 From the many thoughts of Martin Luther about a reformation of the church, he had a unique understanding of the problem of sin and its acceptance into the presence of God. Luther wrote of books to the archbishop of Mainz in 1517. The archbishop was selling indulgences to raise money for the new cathedral. Luther wrote in his letter that people were getting the wrong impression. They were buying indulgences to pay for their sins and thought this would make sure they went to heaven after they died. Some even thought they did not need to be sorry for their sins and that no sin was too great. Luther said no priest or bishop could guarantee that a person would be saved. Only Christ could do that. He said it was much better for people to do good works than to buy indulgences. In the same year, Luther made lists of all the things that were bothering him about the indulgences and called it the 95 theses. He nailed this list to the door of the Wittenberg Church.5 The way Martin Luther dealt with the problem of the sins of Christians by writing a warning letter to the archbishop (to) not to sell indulgences to pay for the sins of Christians. This received special attention from Luther because Christians get the wrong 2What is meant here is to give a guarantee to someone to be able to go straight to heaven after death when making a contribution to the Church. 3Michael Keene, Kristianitas, (Yogyakarta: Kanisius, 2006), 68. 4Alister E. McGrath, Luther’s Theology of the Cross, (United Kingdom: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 1985), 17. 5Martin Luther, Reformation and Enlightenment 1500-1800, (United States: McDougal Littell, 2002), 32-33. Vol. 1 No. 1, November 2019 4 Syamsul Hadi Untung, Khoirunisa impression and assume that if they have bought indulgences, then the person will go to heaven. From this statement, Martin Luther’s idea emerged to put up 95 theses of criticism for the teachings of the church which he thought were devoted. After the success of Martin Luther in reforming the church. A new case arises, namely church of denominations created after the reformation of the Catholic church. A denomination is potentially one of God’s good gifts to the church. A denomination is a form in which Christians can live out varying understandings of faith in Jesus Christ and of what that faith requires in terms of the right belief and right practice. Denomination provides a form in which new insights into the faith, or new applications of old insights to changing contexts and circumstances, can be tested by being lived out.6 Some Christians feel anxious about the church denominations around them which will only make them divide and not unite until now. And that is the reason, the writer wants to discuss these issues more deeply. The Concept of Christian Reformers on Reformation of Church John Calvin was a leader of the church reform movement in Switzerland. He was the second generation in the ranks of pioneers and leaders of the 16th-century church reform movement, but his role was very large in reformist churches. Churches that follow the teachings and governance of the church outlined by Calvin are spread throughout the world. The churches are named after the Calvinist church.7 Calvin was the best theologian and exegete among the Reformers. He never abused reason, like Luther, but assigned it the office of an indispensable handmaid of revelation. Philip Schaff constructed with his logical genius the severest system of Protestant orthodoxy which shaped French, Dutch, English, and American theology, and fortified it against Rationalism as well as against Romanism.8 Out of the Lutheran church arose another, which was called the reformed, and which was founded by Ulrich Zuinglius, a native of 6Paul M. Collins and Barry Ensign-George, Denomination: Assessing an Ecclesiological Category, (London: T&T Clark International, 2011), 14. 7F. D. Wellem, Riwayat Hidup Singkat Tokoh-Tokoh Dalam Sejarah Gereja, (Jakarta: BPK Gunung Mulia, 2002), 49-50. 8Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Volume VII. Modern Christianity. The German Reformation, (Grand Rapids: Christian CLassics Ethereal Library, 1882), 27. Journal of Religious Comparative Studies Martin Luther and The Concept of The Reformation of a True Church 5 Switzerland. Zuinglius began a successful opposition to indulgences and to the whole fabric of papacy in Switzerland, about the time that Luther began in Saxony. The Swiss reformer differed widely from Luther in many articles and was much more evangelical and consistent in his views of the eucharist, and other matters both of faith and practice.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Person of Christ in the Seventh–Day Adventism: Doctrine–Building and E
    Middlesex University Research Repository An open access repository of Middlesex University research http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk Butoiu, Nicolae (2018) The person of Christ in the Seventh–day Adventism: doctrine–building and E. J. Wagonner’s potential in developing christological dialogue with eastern Christianity. PhD thesis, Middlesex University / Oxford Centre for Mission Studies. [Thesis] Final accepted version (with author’s formatting) This version is available at: https://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/24350/ Copyright: Middlesex University Research Repository makes the University’s research available electronically. Copyright and moral rights to this work are retained by the author and/or other copyright owners unless otherwise stated. The work is supplied on the understanding that any use for commercial gain is strictly forbidden. A copy may be downloaded for personal, non-commercial, research or study without prior permission and without charge. Works, including theses and research projects, may not be reproduced in any format or medium, or extensive quotations taken from them, or their content changed in any way, without first obtaining permission in writing from the copyright holder(s). They may not be sold or exploited commercially in any format or medium without the prior written permission of the copyright holder(s). Full bibliographic details must be given when referring to, or quoting from full items including the author’s name, the title of the work, publication details where relevant (place, publisher, date), pag- ination, and for theses or dissertations the awarding institution, the degree type awarded, and the date of the award. If you believe that any material held in the repository infringes copyright law, please contact the Repository Team at Middlesex University via the following email address: [email protected] The item will be removed from the repository while any claim is being investigated.
    [Show full text]
  • Seventh-Day Adventism, Doctrinal Statements, and Unity
    Journal of the Adventist Theological Society, 27/1-2 (2016): 98-116. Article copyright © 2016 by Michael W. Campbell. Seventh-day Adventism, Doctrinal Statements, and Unity Michael W. Campbell Adventist International Institute of Advanced Studies Cavite, Philippines 1. Introduction “All Christians engage in confessional synthesis,” wrote theologian Carl R. Trueman.1 Some religious groups adhere to a public confession of faith as subject to public scrutiny whereas others are immune to such scrutiny. Early Seventh-day Adventists, with strong ties to the Christian Connexion, feared lest the creation of a statement of beliefs so that some at some point may disagree with that statement may at some point be excluded.2 Another danger was that statements of belief might be used to present making new discoveries from Scripture, or afterward a new truth might be stifled by appealing to the authority of an already established creed. From the perspective of early Sabbatarian Adventists, some remembered the time when during the Millerite revival that statements of belief were used to exclude them from church fellowship.3 These fears were aptly expressed during the earliest organizational developments in 1861 of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. According to denominational co-founder, James White: “making a creed is setting the stakes, and barring up the way to all future advancement. The Bible is 1 Carl R. Trueman, The Creedal Imperative (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 21. 2 Bert B. Haloviak, “Heritage of Freedom,” unpublished manuscript, 2. 3 George R. Knight, A Search for Identity: The Development of Seventh-day Adventist Beliefs (Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald, 2000), 21-24.
    [Show full text]
  • Denominations Andministries
    THE ESSENTIAL HANDBOOK OF DENOMINATIONS AND MINISTRIES GEORGE THOMAS KURIAN AND SARAH CLAUDINE DAY, EDITORS C George Thomas Kurian and Sarah Claudine Day, eds., The Essential Handbook of Denominations and Ministries Baker Books, a division of Baker Publishing Group, © 2017. Used by permission. _Kurian-Day_BakerHandbook_JK_bb.indd 3 11/18/16 11:16 AM These websites are hyperlinked. www.bakerpublishinggroup.com www.bakeracademic.com © 2017 by George Thomas Kurian www.brazospress.com Published by Baker Books www.chosenbooks.com a division of Baker Publishing Group P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287 www.revellbooks.com http://www.bakerbooks.com www.bethanyhouse.com Printed in the United States of America All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Kurian, George Thomas, editor. Title: The essential handbook of denominations and ministries / George Thomas Kurian and Sarah Claudine Day, editors. Description: Grand Rapids : Baker Books, 2017. Identifiers: LCCN 2016012033 | ISBN 9780801013249 (cloth) Subjects: LCSH: Christian sects. Classification: LCC BR157 .E87 2017 | DDC 280.0973—dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016012033 Scripture quotations labeled ASV are from the American Standard Version of the Bible. Scripture quotations labeled KJV are from the King James Version of the Bible. Scripture quotations labeled NASB are from the New American Standard Bible®, copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.
    [Show full text]
  • The Origins of Millerite Separatism
    The Origins of Millerite Separatism By Andrew Taylor (BA in History, Aurora University and MA in History, University of Rhode Island) CHAPTER 1 HISTORIANS AND MILLERITE SEPARATISM ===================================== Early in 1841, Truman Hendryx moved to Bradford, Pennsylvania, where he quickly grew alienated from his local church. Upon settling down in his new home, Hendryx attended several services in his new community’s Baptist church. After only a handful of visits, though, he became convinced that the church did not believe in what he referred to as “Bible religion.” Its “impiety” led him to lament, “I sometimes almost feel to use the language [of] the Prophecy ‘Lord, they have killed thy prophets and digged [sic] down thine [sic] altars and I only am left alone and they seek my life.”’1 His opposition to the church left him isolated in his community, but his fear of “degeneracy in the churches and ministers” was greater than his loneliness. Self-righteously believing that his beliefs were the “Bible truth,” he resolved to remain apart from the Baptist church rather than attend and be corrupted by its “sinful” influence.2 The “sinful” church from which Hendryx separated himself was characteristic of mainstream antebellum evangelicalism. The tumultuous first decades of the nineteenth century had transformed the theological and institutional foundations of mainstream American Protestantism. During the colonial era, American Protestantism had been dominated by the Congregational, Presbyterian, and Anglican churches, which, for the most part, had remained committed to the theology of John Calvin. In Calvinism, God was envisioned as all-powerful, having predetermined both the course of history and the eternal destiny of all humans.
    [Show full text]
  • A Thus Saith the Lord
    Edition 07 - September 2020 “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” John 17:17 A Thus Saith the Lord “In this time of persecution the faith of the Lord’s servants will be tried. They have faithfully given the warning, looking to God and to his Word alone. God’s Spirit, moving upon their hearts, has con- strained them to speak. Stimulated with holy zeal, and with the divine impulse strong upon them, they entered upon the performance of their duties without coldly calculating the consequences of speaking to the people the word which the Lord had given them. They have not consulted their temporal interests, or sought to preserve their reputation or their lives. Yet when the storm of op- position and reproach bursts upon them, some, overwhelmed with consternation, will be ready to exclaim, “Had we foreseen the consequences of our words, we would have held our peace.” They are hedged in with difficulties. Satan assails them with fierce temptations. The work which they have undertaken seems far beyond their ability to accomplish. They are threatened with destruction. The enthusiasm which animated them is gone; yet they cannot turn back. Then, feeling their utter helplessness, they flee to the Mighty One for strength. They remember that the words which they have spoken were not theirs, but His who bade them give the warning. God put the truth into their hearts, and they could not forbear to proclaim it.” GC88, 608.2 “The same trials have been experienced by men of God in ages past. Wycliffe, Huss, Luther, Tyn- dale, Baxter, Wesley, urged that all doctrines be brought to the test of the Bible, and declared that they would renounce everything which it condemned.
    [Show full text]
  • Adventist by Bill Crews Six Present-Day Denominations Exist As the Fruit Or Consequences of the “Adventist Movement” Inaugurated by William Miller
    Adventist by Bill Crews Six present-day denominations exist as the fruit or consequences of the “Adventist Movement” inaugurated by William Miller. The two largest are “The Seventh-Day Adventist Church" and “The Advent Christian Church." William Miller was born in 1782 and died in 1849. As a result of his highly speculative and mistaken interpretations of some Bible prophecies, he predicted the end of the world between March 21, 1843 and March 21, 1844. When the expected return of Christ did not materialize, Miller and his associates set another date, October 22, 1844. Afterward, various advocates in the Adventist Movement set other dates: 1847, 1850, 1852, 1854, 1855, 1863, 1866, 1867, 1868, 1877, et. al. As the dates came and went, many disciples of Adventism deserted the ranks, but explanations were always forthcoming, loopholes were found, and some doggedly embraced its principles and followed its leaders. William Miller and others were, and some still are, considered prophets of God. In spite of the failures of Miller’s predictions, a sizable group met in Albany, New York in 1845 and formed the “American Millerite Association.” Some afterward formed the “Evangelical Adventist,” a group that has dwindled away. In 1861, under the leadership of Jonathan Cummings, the “Advent Christian Church” was organized. James White and Ellen G. Harmon, who became Mrs. James White, found a way to patch up Miller’s predictions by transferring the fulfillment from earth (where it clearly did not occur) to heaven (where they could claim that it did). They and others championed the idea of observing the Sabbath of the Old Testament.
    [Show full text]
  • Origin and History of Seventh-Day Adventists, Vol. 1
    Origin and History of Seventh-day Adventists FRONTISPIECE PAINTING BY HARRY ANDERSON © 1949, BY REVIEW AND HERALD As the disciples watched their Master slowly disappear into heaven, they were solemnly reminded of His promise to come again, and of His commission to herald this good news to all the world. Origin and History of Seventh-day Adventists VOLUME ONE by Arthur Whitefield Spalding REVIEW AND HERALD PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION WASHINGTON, D.C. COPYRIGHT © 1961 BY THE REVIEW AND HERALD PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION WASHINGTON, D.C. OFFSET IN THE U.S.A. AUTHOR'S FOREWORD TO FIRST EDITION THIS history, frankly, is written for "believers." The reader is assumed to have not only an interest but a communion. A writer on the history of any cause or group should have suffi- cient objectivity to relate his subject to its environment with- out distortion; but if he is to give life to it, he must be a con- frere. The general public, standing afar off, may desire more detachment in its author; but if it gets this, it gets it at the expense of vision, warmth, and life. There can be, indeed, no absolute objectivity in an expository historian. The painter and interpreter of any great movement must be in sympathy with the spirit and aim of that movement; it must be his cause. What he loses in equipoise he gains in momentum, and bal- ance is more a matter of drive than of teetering. This history of Seventh-day Adventists is written by one who is an Adventist, who believes in the message and mission of Adventists, and who would have everyone to be an Advent- ist.
    [Show full text]
  • October Charleston Boulevard Seventh-Day Adventist Church
    1 Volume 5 Number 10 October Charleston Boulevard Seventh-day Adventist Church Last Sabbath our Jewish brothers and sisters worshiping at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pitts- burgh experienced the situation that most believers in congregations worldwide fear, an active shoot- er. The shooter doesn’t deserve more attention so I only mention it to say that its worth considering what believers through history have had to face for the simple act of worshiping. As I reflect on the Pittsburgh event it seems as if there is a certain lack of surprise, for these shoot- er situations are becoming so prevalent. Furthermore, this act of cowardice reminds me of the challeng- es early Jewish Christians faced as they were persecuted for being both Jew and Christ followers. For the first century, Hebrew believer it was hard to be a serious committed Christian living in an unpredictable world of persecution, which came from both Jews and Romans. It was certainly not politically correct to be a Jewish Christian in the first century. How about today, is it becoming easier to stay the course be- lieving in the creator God openly without fear of intolerance, animus, angst, ostracism, or even violent reactions? How you answer will depend greatly on your perception of perseverance. The principle of perseverance is pervasive in Biblical book titled Hebrews, which is an address to Jews experiencing persecution for believing in Christ. The author of this book understands the plight of the Jewish Christian has tempted them to give up and go back to traditional practices associated with Jewish temple theology.
    [Show full text]
  • CHURCHES of the NOT-SO-STANDING ORDER by Peter J
    CHURCHES OF THE NOT-SO-STANDING ORDER By Peter J. Gomes Pilgrim Society Note, Series One, Number 18, 1966 When confronted with the mass of material relating to Plymouth’s religious life in the last century a vast amount of editing and defining must be done. The task is a difficult one, for it is quite easy to be caught up in the intricacies of memorabilia and artifacts, genealogy and antiquarianism in so broad a topic that the necessary scope and vision become obscured in a welter of details. The details are meant only as illustration of the broader pattern and are of little worth in themselves, to us anyway. Let me define our area for consideration by telling you what I do not intend to deal with: I shall avoid a discussion of Lutheranism and Catholicism, not out of some capricious whim, but because I am convinced that these religions can only be seen adequately within the context of the European immigration movements of which they were so important a part. I shall further avoid a discussion of the peculiar particulars of the much-discussed and little understood "Unitarian Controversy" of 1801 except as a necessary prelude to greater developments in the Plymouth religious scene. And finally, the various destinies of the daughters and stepdaughters of the Pilgrim Church are also not the proper subject of this paper. It would take a major dissertation merely to consider the schisms, personal and theological, which sprinkled Congregational churches all over the Plymouth landscape. In order to have anything at all left to say, I concern myself with what I would call "Churches of the Not-So-Standing Order" or perhaps subtitled "Churches Not Seen from Clark’s Island." I am devoting myself to the evangelical, minority sects, the pent-up harvest of the first "Great Awakening" of the 1740s, which made their initial presence felt in this ancient Pilgrim town from the coming of the Baptists in 1809 to the celebrated Negro Camp meetings of the AME Church at Morton Park in 1866.
    [Show full text]
  • Creeds and Statements of Belief in Early Adventist Thought
    Andrews University Seminary Studies, Vol. 47, No. 1, 101-116. Copyright © 2009 Andrews University Press. CREEDS AND STATEMENTS OF BELIEF IN EARLY ADVENTIST THOUGHT S. JO S EPH KIDDER Andrews University Introduction The founders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church exhibited a strongly hostile attitude toward creeds, affirming the Bible alone as their creed. However, an examination of their literature shows a gradual development of statements of belief. This leads to two questions: What is the difference between creeds and statements of belief? Why did the early Adventists feel comfortable with statements of belief, while vigorously denouncing creeds? The scope of this research has been limited to the period of Seventh- day Adventist thought between the years of 1840 and 1931. During this time, two major Seventh-day Adventist statements of belief were drafted—one in 1872 and the other in 1931. My research has been largely drawn from primary sources found in church publications such as the Review and Herald, Signs of the Times, and the writings of Ellen G. White. Roman Catholic and Protestant Creeds Creeds, E. Glenn Hinson argues, have played important and varying roles in Christian history. They were employed in the presentation of articles of faith; in the instruction of baptismal candidates; in the hymns, prayers, and sermons of common worship; in healing and exorcism; in resistance to persecutors; and for differentiating between heresy and orthodoxy. Used in these ways, creeds may be seen as the church’s attempt to articulate an intelligible expression of its understanding of the Christian faith.1 The authority ascribed to various confessional statements has varied with time and circumstance and is largely dependent upon the theological persuasion of the Christian group that adheres to them.
    [Show full text]
  • ( See "Joshua V. Himes" Lest We Forget, Vol. 2, No
    Some Highlights of the Life of Joshua Himes (1805-1895) (www.APLib.org) See "Joshua V. Himes" Lest We Forget, Vol. 2, No. 4, pp. 4-6 Date Age Event 1805/5/19 0 Born in Wickford, Rhode Island 1821 16 Apprenticeship until 1825 to William Knights, a Unitarian cabinetmaker [Attended church with Knights in New Bedford, Massachusetts, but could not accept the Unitarian beliefs which negated the teachings of Jesus and His disciples. Then attended the First Christian Church.] 1823 18 Baptized and licensed as an exhorter in the First Christian Church 1825 20 Massachusetts Conference of the Christian Church in New Bedford commissioned him as a self-supporting missionary 1826/11 21 Married Miss Mary Thompson Handy; eventually had nine boys 1827 22 Ordained 1828 23 Moved to Plymouth, Massachusetts 1829 24 Moved to Fall River, Massachusetts 1830 25 Called to the Boston, Massachusetts First Christian Church [Starting with seven families, Himes had the chapel filled in two years. He was a reformer, espousing causes such as abolitionism, pacifism, education, and temperance. Was too radical for some who wanted him to leave.] 1837 32 Established Chardon Street Christian Church [A number of the members of the First Christian Church went with him. They purchased property and built the Chardon Street church that would hold 500. It was soon filled, and became famous as the site of some of the most radical reform conventions of the times.] 1839/12/18 34 Miller begins lectures at Chardon Street (Himes met him earlier in Exeter, NH) [These were Miller's first lectures in a major city, given twice a day.
    [Show full text]
  • The Complete Guide to Christian Denominations
    Copyrighted material Complete Guide to Christian Denominations.indd 1 11/18/14 9:12 AM Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by the International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. Verses marked nkjv are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Verses marked nasb are taken from the New American Standard Bible®, © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org) All italicized emphasis in Scripture quotations is added by the author. Cover by Dugan Design Group, Minneapolis, Minnesota Cover illustration @ Michael Brown / Fotolia THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO CHRISTIAN DENOMINATIONS Copyright © 2005/2015 Ron Rhodes Published by Harvest House Publishers Eugene, Oregon 97402 www.harvesthousepublishers.com ISBN 978-0-7369-5291-0 (pbk.) ISBN 978-0-7369-5292-7 (eBook) The Library of Congress has cataloged the edition as follows: Rhodes, Ron. The complete guide to Christian denominations / Ron Rhodes. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-7369-1289-4 (pbk.) 1. Protestant churches—United States. 2. Protestant churches—Doctrines. I. Title. BR516.5.R47 2005 280'.4—dc22 2004017507 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval sys- tem, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior per- mission of the publisher.
    [Show full text]