Restoration Movement - Key Principles

Key Principles

The Restoration Movement was characterized by several key principles:

  • Christianity should not be divided, Christ intended the creation of one church.
  • Creeds divide, but Christians should be able to find agreement by standing on the Bible itself (from which they believe all creeds are but human expansions or constrictions).
  • Ecclesiastical traditions divide, but Christians should be able to find common ground by following the practice (as best as it can be determined) of the early church.
  • Names of human origin divide, but Christians should be able to find common ground by using biblical names for the church (i.e., "Christian Church", "Church of God" or "Church of Christ" as opposed to "Methodist" or "Lutheran", etc.).

A number of slogans have been used in the Restoration Movement, which are intended to express some of the distinctive themes of the Movement. These include:

  • "Where the Scriptures speak, we speak; where the Scriptures are silent, we are silent."
  • "The church of Jesus Christ on earth is essentially, intentionally, and constitutionally one."
  • "We are Christians only, but not the only Christians."
  • "In essentials, unity; in opinions, liberty; in all things love."
  • "No creed but Christ, no book but the Bible, no law but love, no name but the divine."
  • "Call Bible things by Bible names."

All of the three major U.S. branches of the Movement share the following characteristics:

  • A high view, compared to other Christian traditions, of the office of the elder; and
  • A "commitment to the priesthood of all believers".

Read more about this topic:  Restoration Movement

Famous quotes containing the words key and/or principles:

    “The hypothesis I wish to advance is that ... the language of morality is in ... grave disorder.... What we possess, if this is true, are the fragments of a conceptual scheme, parts of which now lack those contexts from which their significance derived. We possess indeed simulacra of morality, we continue to use many of the key expressions. But we have—very largely if not entirely—lost our comprehension, both theoretical and practical, of morality.”
    —Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre (b. 1929)

    “That, upon the whole, we may conclude that the Christian religion not only was at first attended with miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasonable person without one. Mere reason is insufficient to convince us of its veracity: And whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it, is conscious of a continued miracle in his own person, which subverts all the principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience.”
    —David Hume (1711–1776)