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Some good brethren have become aware that their congregation, though once strong for the Truth, now practices the errors it once opposed and vice versa. However, brethren sometimes offer the following excuse for not leaving: “I don’t agree with what I hear preached and what is being practiced in this congregation, but where can I go?”
This is a perplexing problem to many who live in small towns where the only congregation has been captured by error. First, it is worth driving several miles to be able to worship and work with a clear conscience. Second, a new congregation where Truth and righteousness are exalted can be started. This is what brethren in hundreds of places did a century ago when the instruments of music and the missionary society were forced into the congregations. Brethren left for sake of conscience and Truth, some sacrificing almost a lifetime of effort and money contributed.
They understood the spiritual application of Solomon’s words: “Better is a little with righteousness than great revenue without right” (Pro. 16:8). Some of these devout brethren had to “start from scratch” with no more than a faithful spouse and their innocent children, but they had no choice if they were to be faithful to God. The time has come again when such grit and character must be demonstrated in those who would maintain a good conscience toward God (Heb. 13:18). When the foregoing innovations invaded the church, these elements were concrete and undeniable, observable by all. The innovations and departures of the current wave of apostasy are often more subtle than those graphic signs of the past, but they are just as surely departures. They represent the same kind of rebellion against New Testament authority as that demonstrated by their predecessors. If one continues under the spell woven by their advocates, he is likely to be lulled into a spiritual stupor from which he will not be awakened even when they roll the organ in.
Good brethren who live in cities where steadfast, loyal congregations exist have no excuse for remaining in digressive congregations. They cannot sincerely ask, “Where can I go?” When such continue to complain about the liberalism where they are but refuse to leave and become part of a nearby congregation that is “set for the defense of the gospel” (Phi. 1:17), they simply advertise their insincerity. The Lord’s injunction is: “Come forth, my people, out of her, that ye have no fellowship with her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues” (Rev. 18:4).
[Note: I wrote this article for and it was published in The Edifier, weekly bulletin of Pearl Street Church of Christ, Denton, TX, June 28, 1990 of which I was editor.]
Attribution: From thescripturecache.com; Dub McClish, owner and administrator.
