I'm preparing an apologetics talk on the topic of Christian denominations for our youth group this coming Wednesday night, and it occurs to me that perhaps the best way to organize the information is by going to Acts 15 and Galatians 2 in the New Testament.
Here we have what is referred to as "the circumcision party" - hardly the most fun-sounding shindig, you have to admit. And what was distinctive about this group was that it arose among Jews in the early church who were concerned that Gentile converts to Christianity were not following the law of Moses, particularly with regards to circumcision.
We read in the text that "Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them," and then the Jerusalem Council was convened to discuss the matter fully. The Apostle Peter weighed in there, as did Paul and Barnabas. And then the half-brother of Jesus, James "the Just" said his peace that Gentile Christians should not be burdened with something which neither the Jewish Christians nor any of their fathers had been able to keep - that is, the Law.
Paul for his part would go on to write to the Galatians that before all this he had opposed Peter to his face at Antioch for being a hypocrite and undermining the gospel, and that even Barnabas had been swayed by the Judaizers for a time.
Paul also records somewhat cryptically in the same telling of the events that "certain men came from James," at least insinuating that "the circumcision party" represented James after a fashion prior to the Council of Jerusalem. Though admittedly there is no small amount of debate about how to interpret and understand this.
Suffice to say, not everyone was on the same page. Some held that Gentile believers needed to keep the Law while others were adamant against that position. Still others were certainly undecided, otherwise there would have been no need nor place for persuasive points and the whole lot falling silent at the Council of Jerusalem.
This, ladies and gentlemen, is precisely how most church splits happen. And in our day, were this not a settled question, the losing segment would likely just go across town and start up a new congregation centered on their separate doctrinal distinctives. They might even build up a network of like-minded churches, with a unified central authority above them all. And then we would call them a denomination.
On the other hand, just a few verses down in Acts 15, we see Paul and Barnabas disagreeing about whether John Mark should accompany them on a new missionary journey. Paul strongly objects, citing the last time John Mark was brought along and abandoned them. Barnabas meanwhile is insistent.
So what do Paul and Barnabas do? The text records "There arose a sharp disagreement, so that they separated from each other." Barnabas took John Mark with him to Cyprus and Paul took Silas through Syria and Cilicia.
And this is the other way denominations come into being. An important and genuine disagreement as to some personal or strategic decision leads to a parting of the ways. This does not have to mean that only one or the other party is correct or a Christian, or that there is no longer unity between the separating parties.
If both parties remain in Christ, they can go and serve him in separate directions and different ways, maintaining a unity of purpose without uniformity and complete agreement on every secondary or tertiary point.
At the same time, such examples can prove that a secondary and tertiary issue is important even when not critical.
Does any or all of this undermine the validity of the Christian faith? It might if we had been promised that genuine Christians will always agree and stay together on everything. And it might if we had been promised that there will never arise false teachers or false teaching which muddies the waters. We're not promised either of these, however. Quite the opposite.
