Charges of heresy.  Accusations of cultism.  Renegades are rampant in the Church.  Loose cannons rock the boat.  The powers-that-be must take steps to reign in this terror.  Truth is being compromised!  Excommunicate them before they pull more poor souls down the slippery slope to perdition!  God must reign once again!

           Sound familiar?  Often in a near-panicked state, such exaggerations become the cries of self-proclaimed bellwethers of righteousness.  Crying wolf has become a favorite sport of the company men in the house of God, while heresy-hunters surround unique and innovative ideas in the church with all the fervor of the media frenzy surrounding a passing movie star in handcuffs.

           Of course we need to identify the truth and put falsehood far from us.  Of course we should speak out boldly against truly false doctrines and blasphemy of every kind.  Of course we ought to take every precaution to assure that the sheep are not led astray.  But when we attack each other simply because another person’s idea does not fit our preconceptions, when we label as heresy something merely because we do not try to understand it, or when, without really thinking, we fire a shoot-from-the-hip retort against another’s creative solution because it just isn’t the way we have always done things, we risk more than we know.  After all, we are told—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

           Too many times the challenges to our carved-in-stone methods and seemingly immutable habits turn out to be a real rebuke from the Lord.  Ideas that take on the status quo may be considered “new,” but may actually be a return to something from a previous time which was replaced, but now needs to be reinstated.  There are times when a radical restructuring needs to be undertaken.  Sometimes a practice has outlived its usefulness, and the time has long since passed to discard it and move on, reluctant though we may be to do that.  Other times the status quo is just plain wrong.  In any case, there are still many who would dare to look at the things of God without wearing tradition-colored glasses.  Church history reveals a long litany of those who proposed significant reforms, but were met with suspicion, derision, or occasionally much more harsh reactions from the prevailing institutional church body.

           Let me offer some well-known examples.

Martin Luther

           At a time in Europe when the prevalent religious system of thought was dictated from Rome, one devout man had some questions about the way his church was doing things.  As a young monk, and then later as a parish priest, Martin Luther at first saw no apparent conflict between serving his God and following the directives of the Catholic leadership.  But due to his intelligence and training (he held five university degrees), he arrived at the idea that the best source for any study of theology was the Scripture itself.

           Predictably, it didn’t take long for him to discover certain disparities in what he was seeing in the Word and what he saw the church doing.  Even with that, his aim was not to rock the boat, but merely to ask some questions and seek explanations from his leaders as to why these things were so.  To this end, on October 31, 1517, he did something that for his day was not uncommon—he posted 95 statements which he wished to debate (called “theses”) on the door to his church building as a way of airing his concerns and seeking discussion.  A quick look at these will show that Luther’s primary purpose in writing them was merely to investigate the scriptural basis for the practice of the selling of indulgences.  But by the time the storm had fully brewed a few years later, several more serious problems in Catholic doctrine had surfaced to his observation, including some fundamental ideas concerning sacraments, the priesthood, and papal authority.

           Luther originally had not intended to start a denomination, much less a new movement.  He simply felt that there were areas that needed reform, and hoped initially that some theologians or learned men could enlighten him about why the Scriptures did not appear to support so many of their practices, but yet these practices persisted.  He also knew that there were others who saw the same problems and shared the same concerns as he did.  But instead of substantive exchange, what he encountered from the church’s leadership was an impersonal, preconceived, and rigid way of marginalizing any challenge by means of whatever avoidance tactic seemed to fit the moment.

           Convinced by the Scriptures that he was on to something, Luther eventually grew more assertive in his challenges to Rome.  His influence locally grew strong, as those within his sphere of persuasion also became convinced that he had a comprehension of the Scriptures which could not be ignored.  When a formal discussion was finally held in the German city of Worms (such a discussion is called a “diet”) in 1521, Luther was given a chance to recant or face excommunication.  He saw the choice as an easy one: the revealed Word of God versus “the suits.”  He reportedly said to his opponents at the debate, “here I stand; I can do no other,” and the rest is the history of Protestantism.

John Wesley

           At a time in England when the prevalent religious system of thought was dictated by the Crown, one devout man had some questions about the way his church was reaching out to the people.  Even with that, his aim was not to rock the boat, but merely to restore a sense of piety and of mission to a system which had neglected much of its responsibility to the populace.  Not only had the Anglican Church been lacking in the promotion of personal holiness, but also the rigors of following the rubrics of The Book of Common Prayer had replaced the spirit of the church’s evangelistic and pastoral efforts.

           Wesley originally did not intend to start a new denomination, merely a new group of societies within his own denomination.  He simply felt that he had identified areas in the church’s mission that could use improvement, because so many persons were being overlooked.  Because even though many of the blue-collar workers living in the English countryside were considered church members, most had not been incorporated into the normal life of the church.  To remedy this, Wesley initiated two ideas which would target their needs; the lay-preacher, whose circuit riding travels brought the Gospel from village to village, and the class meeting, which gave its members an opportunity to see to the spiritual needs of each other on a week-to-week basis.

           Convinced by the Scriptures that he was on to something, Wesley continued to build up the Methodist societies in England and America.  But later, with the American Revolution and the subsequent separation of the colonies from England, Wesley felt that he shouldn’t abandon the Methodist societies in the New World as had the Anglicans when they forced the Episcopalian Churches to form in America as a separate entity.  So in 1784, he acted in the role of bishop and ordained men in America to carry on with the work of the societies despite the severe disapproval of the Anglican hierarchy.  The formal parting of ways did not occur until after Wesley’s death, but many historians recognize the inevitability of the break.  Wesley’s successors determined to continue on in their founder’s footsteps and fulfill for the common man the role which the more established churches had long since abandoned, and the rest became the history of the Holiness movement and its role in the Second Great Awakening.

The Pentecostals

           At a time in America when the prevalent religious system of thought was dictated by the status quo majority of a democratic nation, a group of devout men had some questions about the way the churches were worshipping.  There seemed to them to be a lack of attention to the role of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church, particularly in the area of certain spiritual gifts that they had read about in the book of First Corinthians.  Even with that, their aim was not to rock the boat, but merely to restore these certain gifts to the life of the Church’s worship which had previously been esteemed as having passed away because they were no longer necessary.  Spurred on by findings from a study at Bethel Bible College in Topeka, Kansas, students began to receive what was being called the “baptism in the Holy Spirit,” marked by the evidence of what was known as “speaking in tongues.”  After a strong early period of preaching at the Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles led by African-American preacher William J. Seymour beginning in 1906, this fresh wind began to blow first across America, then around the world.

           None of those in leadership among the Pentecostals originally intended to start a new movement, much less several new denominations.  They simply felt that there were certain elements of the Church’s life that were missing and needed to be restored.  Yet the mainstream churches met the idea of such restoration with such deep suspicion that it led to violence on more than one occasion.  Historian Vinson Synan reports that many of the rumors circulated about the early Pentecostal worship services contained charges of “everything odd and erroneous,” including magic powders and sexual promiscuity, and followers were labeled “holy rollers” and said to have lost their minds.  Of course, a few eccentrics stood upon the fringes of the movement and practiced such things as snake handling, but the rank-and-file Pentecostal believers maintained their adherence to the teachings in I Corinthians 12 and 14.

           Convinced by the Scriptures that they were on to something, these faithful men and women endured floggings, false arrests, vandalism and torching of their homes, and worse.  Being forced from their original churches, they formed their own; and as these new churches developed and became part of the American religious landscape, many scholars in the older mainline churches decided to take a look into their own theologies of the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  Many leaders then embraced Pentecostal ideas while remaining in their respective churches, and from there they spawned several renewal movements across the spectrum of denominations.  Thus the idea of the “baptism in the Holy Spirit” was released from its narrow sectarian confines, and the rest is the history of the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement.

Rebelling against what?

           Now seen as pioneers, reformers, heroes, and important figures in the history of the Church, the above-named examples of leadership were, in their own time, cursed, debunked, lambasted, persecuted, and condemned; not by the truth, but by the pillars of the status quo.  Each refused to see the Bible through the various colored lenses of their respective traditions; but without prejudice they received a clear picture of some needed changes.  And contrary to what their detractors were saying at the time, their reforms took the faith a step closer to Biblical fidelity rather than away from it.

           But are we doing their accomplishments a disservice by referring to them as rebels?  Are they not merely men of conviction who held to their beliefs and finally won out?  The difference lies in what, or who, they were rebelling against.  If the authorities in question are guilty of neglect, heresy, selfish ambition, or some other sins, then even though they cease to be legitimate, they remain as authorities within their respective institutional systems.  In such cases, the brand “rebel” loses its negative connotations and becomes a noble thing.  And as we see these leaders refusing to back down in the face of strong confrontation, it becomes more and more difficult to come up with a better name for them.