The Christadelphian March 1948, John Carter

“Fellowship and Withdrawal”

Faith in His promises has been made a condition of the bestowal of His favour by God. This is both right and appropriate, but why this is so is not our immediate concern. What is now emphasized is that a knowledge of God’s revelation is essential to salvation. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God, and this demands humility, teachableness and obedience. Since these qualities are not native to fallen man, the discipline involved is not readily accepted. On the contrary men prefer to follow their own devices. This preference is seen in all human history from the days of Cain to the present. Cain devised a worship that gratified his desire to recognize God but failed to acknowledge the conditions upon which God wills men shall approach Him. God’s way became so corrupted in ten generations that the world was destroyed by the flood in the days of Noah. This lesson was not long remembered, and the choice of Abraham as the progenitor of a nation marked the next step in God’s arrangements for the preservation of His truth. By making Israel the custodians of His oracles God ensured that the record of His revelation should be available for any who would seek Him. Although the law which God gave to His nation included penalties for apostacy, yet Israel was unfaithful, the law was not kept, and the ministry of the prophets was a sustained witness against declension and a call to reform. At last God gave over the nation to judgment, the people were scattered and the land became desolate. The rulers had taken away the key of knowledge as Jesus declared, and the nation was faithless.

A new dispensation was inaugurated with Pentecost, the forty years from that event to the overthrow of Jerusalem being an overlapping period of the Mosaic and Christian ages. The keys of the kingdom were used by Peter in making known the way of salvation to Jew and Gentile, and throughout the Roman world, in all the principal towns, ecclesias were established. The foundation of ecclesial association was the apostles’ doctrine, belief of which introduced believers into the apostles’ fellowship. The preservation of the gospel in Gentile times became the responsibility of the individuals and communities who had heard the good news. Human nature being what it is, it might be expected that false teachers would arise, reviving the old flesh-pleasing ideas of previous apostasies, and proclaiming a message which contradicted the word of God. That such would happen the apostles continually foretold. Such a course being foreseen, was any provision made in the apostles’ doctrine for dealing with false teachers? The answer is clear. “Faithful men able to teach others” to whom the “good deposit” had been placed in trust, had by sound doctrine to correct error, to contend for the faith, and when men persisted in teaching error they had to be excluded from the assemblies of true believers. The commandments are clear; those who caused divisions had to be “marked” and “avoided” (Rom. 16: 17); a heretic had to be rejected after the first and second admonition (Tit. 3: 10); men of perverse and corrupt minds, destitute of the truth, had to be withdrawn from (1 Tim. 6 : 3–5); while one who brought not the true doctrine had not to be received (2 John 10 : 11).

In the case of immorality at Corinth it would appear that we have the formal language of the resolution of withdrawal which Paul enjoined should be adopted by the ecclesia (1 Cor. 5 : 4, 5). With the modern revival of the truth and the organization of believers into ecclesias, a responsibility for maintaining the truth has been recognized and the method of dealing with teachers of error as set forth in the epistles followed. The members of any worldly organization have the right to draw up conditions of membership, but the communities of believers are founded upon the gospel of God revealed in His word, and the conditions of membership are laid down in the teaching of the apostles. In an endeavour faithfully to interpret these commandments, the Constitution of the Central ecclesia, which is generally followed in all ecclesias in Central fellowship, sets forth the condition of fellowship in Rules 2 and 3, which read:

That we accept and profess the doctrines and precepts of Christ, as taught in the apostolic writings, and defined (positively and negatively) in the annexed Statement of Faith and Epitome of the Commandments of Christ.

That we recognize as brethren, and welcome to our fellowship, all who have been immersed (by whomsoever) after their acceptance of the same doctrines and precepts.

This positive declaration has its counterpart in Rule 30:

That any brother departing from any element of the One Faith, as defined by us in our Statement of Faith appended, shall, on proof of the fact being given to the satisfaction of the arranging brethren, cease to be in fellowship, without a formal vote of withdrawal, on the fact being announced to the ecclesia.

These rules set out the positive and negative aspects of the basis of fellowship. Individual recognition and acceptance of these rules is implied in retaining association with ecclesias who subscribe to the Constitution.

The brethren of the Central fellowship believe that obedience to the commandments of God require that they impose these conditions upon themselves. The conditions were accepted before the first of the major divisions occurred. Wise men have always recognized that the first duty is to instruct, and if possible reclaim any in error; only when efforts to do this have failed is the sorrowful duty of withdrawal to be performed.

When the Inspiration Division had taken place, while the Temperance Hall fellowship retained the same rules for fellowship, the brethren who formed what is now the Suffolk Street fellowship altered them, and adopted a different procedure. This different procedure is still defined in the Rules of the Suffolk Street ecclesia. We quote from the 1930 edition the rules of the Suffolk Street ecclesia corresponding to the fellowship clauses which have been quoted above from the Central ecclesia’s Constitution:

That no brother shall be eligible for appointment to office in the ecclesia who is not prepared to uphold the teaching of the articles of the Ecclesial Statement of Faith.

That the vote of a majority of the ecclesia may at any time remove a brother from office, and a special meeting of the ecclesia may declare an office vacant if the holder of it is proved to have departed from the Faith in any of its vital elements.

That any brother acting contrary to the teaching of Christ by joining the Military Forces, or engaging in Party Politics, shall be ineligible to hold any ecclesial office, and suitable action shall be taken by the managing brethren.

In setting out these rules of the Suffolk Street ecclesia, we are not questioning the sincerity of those who subscribe to them. We do not doubt the sincerity of the man who believes in the immortality of the soul; what we question is the correctness of his understanding of the teaching of the Bible. So, in the attitude to fellowship as set forth, we do not think the rules meet the requirements of the commands of the Scriptures. If a brother departing from an element of the faith retains membership, either he accepts an imposed silence which is doubtfully justifiable; or, there is diversity of teaching. Since, however, all members of an ecclesia are preachers of the word, diversity would seem to be inevitable. But the apostle enjoins that all speak the same things that there be no division among the brethren (1 Cor. 1:10).

Endeavouring to avoid all bitterness, we must recognize the differences that exist. There are other aspects of the subject to which we may return.