The Church is the pillar and foundation of truth (1 Tim 3:15). But which church has the truth? Which church was founded by Jesus and which ones weren’t? Jesus’ Church can be proven through multiple dimensions of truth. There are 9 dimensions of truth that will be discussed to prove which church Jesus founded. They are: Scripture, Tradition, History, Apostolic Succession, Unchanging Truth, Time, The Miraculous, The Target of Satan’s Followers, and Logic. Take a few minutes to consider the following.
Tradition and History
I am going to lump these two together
because one flows from the other. Tradition is the means in which God’s word
has been transmitted from Jesus to the apostles and on to their successors (the
bishops) throughout the centuries. This takes two forms: The written tradition
which is the sacred scriptures and the oral tradition which is the faith that
the apostles taught orally. If you read the letters of St Paul you will see a
few patterns. One is that to each place he sent a letter to the faith was
already taught either by him or someone else who had the authority of the
apostles and was sent to teach. Paul was often correcting problems in his
letters that were going on in the particular area. So now you have to think are
these letters that were meant to correct problems sufficient to teach the
entirety of the faith? Tradition is often thought of as a bad word but Paul
tells the Thessalonians to keep the traditions of the apostles.
2 Thess 2:15 So then, brethren, stand firm
and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth
or by letter.
So the question is now how can you tell
the difference between traditions of men from the traditions of the apostles.
That is simple. Jesus founded one church and those traditions that were taught
by the apostles were also taught by the Christians in the first centuries of
Christianity. An example of a tradition of men which is a doctrine held by many
if not all protestant denominations is Sola Scripture which means the bible
alone is a sole sufficient rule of faith. Sorry but there is not a single verse
in the bible that supports this doctrine. Another example is that baptism is
only symbolic. These are a few examples doctrines that were first taught to
people in the 16th century.
All it takes is reading the writings of
the early church to prove it. This is where history comes in. A look at history
can easily show at what point in time any given doctrine first appeared. If a
doctrine magically appears out of no where in the 16th century or later it can
automatically go under the category of tradition of men for it is an idea
completely foreign to the church in its earliest years. If you take the time to
read the early church fathers you will see every Catholic doctrine being taught
in the first 4 centuries of Christianity.
He is one example from St Ignatius of
Antioch. He was a disciple of John the apostle and he writes not 10 years after
the death of John in 107 ad and in his writings he calls the church Catholic as
if it is common knowledge.
Ignatius of Antioch [50-117 AD] Epistle to
the Smyraeans
See that ye all follow the bishop, even as
Jesus Christ does the Father, and the presbytery as ye would the apostles; and
reverence the deacons, as being the institution of God. Let no man do anything
connected with the Church without the bishop. Let that be deemed a proper
Eucharist, which is [administered] either by the bishop, or by one to whom he
has entrusted it. Wherever the bishop shall appear, there let the multitude [of
the people] also be; even as, wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic
Church...
For 255 pages of Quotes from the Early
Church Fathers go here:
More specifically about history is that of
the history of the bible and how we got it as we have it today. A look at
history shows that by the early 4th century there still was not a defined
cannon of new testament scripture. There were books that are in the bible that
were disputed by some people as to not being inspired and there were some books
that are not in the bible were disputed by some people as being inspired. Now
this is quite a dilemma especially for someone who holds the view of Sola
Scriptura because how can one go by the bible alone unless someone with
authority first tells you what the bible is. It is also clear that the first
300 years of Christianity operated without a defined cannon of scripture which
shows that they relied on an authoritative church to teach the faith orally. So
how did they decide what books were inspired scripture and what weren’t? It was
the Catholic Church with the authority that Jesus gave to his Church as shown
in (Mt 16:16-19) the authority to bind things on earth that would also be bound
in heaven. They decided the books in 4 church councils the first in Rome 382
ad, Hippo 392, Carthage 397, Carthage 419. To read more about how we got the
bible go here:
Apostolic Succession
Apostolic origin is claimed my many groups
but the Catholic Church is the only one that can prove it. Every Catholic
Bishop was ordained by a Catholic bishop that goes clear back to the first
Catholic bishops that is to say the apostles. It is no secret to those who take
the time to read the writings of the early church that the apostles where
Catholic Bishops. The apostles ordained bishops by the laying on of hands. The
authority that Jesus gave the apostles in Mt 18:18 and Jn 20:21-23 for example
was passed on to the next generation in this way. St Paul tells Timothy in 1
Tim 4:14 and 1 Tim 5:22 to not neglect the gift that he received from the
presbytery through the laying on of hands and to not be hasty in laying on
hands on others. In order for someone to go and preach the gospel they had to
receive authority and be sent (Rom 10:15). If someone did not get the authority
through laying on of hands and started teaching things on there own and
ordaining people the link is then broken. They have no authority of Jesus to be
preaching and throughout history the people who did this fell into heresy. The
Bishop of Rome for example that is to say the Pope can trace his office of
Bishop back to the first pope that is to say St Peter. For a list of every one
of the 266 popes and the years that they were pope go here:
Scripture
Some of things that the Catholic Church
gets accused of for not following the scriptures are the Papacy, Infant
Baptism, Confession, Salvation by faith and works, praying to Mary, etc. These
things are found in the bible. In fact every Catholic Doctrine is found in the
bible either explicitly or implicitly. For a brief explanation of each of these
doctrines and where they are found in the bible go here: http://practicalapologetics.blogspot.com/2009/04/basic-apologetics-that-every-catholic.html
Unchanging Truth
Jesus’ Church is unable to change truth.
Jesus promised that the gates of hell would not prevail against his church (Mt
16:18) so if truth changed then the gates of hell would have prevailed. So any
church that has changed concerning truth is not Jesus’ church. A few examples
are the seven books in the old testament that protestants call apocrypha. These
seven books were considered inspired before the time of Jesus, at the time of Jesus
and all of Christian history afterward. Protestants reject these books as
uninspired writings. These books cannot be inspired for 2000 years and then all
of the sudden in the 19th century they are not inspired when they quit putting
these books in the bible. So this would be an example of truth being changed to
read more about these books and why they should be included in the bible go
here:
http://catholicevangelism.blogspot.com/2009/06/how-we-got-bible-history-often-taken.html
Another example is contraception. Before
the Anglican Lambeth conference in 1930 all Christian denominations taught that
contraception is a grave moral evil. Now the Catholic Church is the only one
that still teaches that. To read more about this go here:
Time
From its beginning in the first century
the Catholic Church has been a rock throughout the centuries. It has survived
and thrived for 2000 years. No institution in history has been able to come
close to that. Only an institution that was started by God and maintained by
God can be able to do this. If you look at Protestantism it started in the 16th
century with 2 schisms and has split into 33000 schisms. Even current
Calvinists don’t follow what Calvin taught completely.
The Miraculous
Heb 2:3-5 how shall we escape if we ignore
such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord,
was confirmed to us by those who heard him. 4God also testified to it by signs,
wonders and various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed
according to his will.
God continues to do miracles through his
church. Throughout history many miracles have been preformed through Jesus’
church. From the early years of Christianity during the persecutions it
manifested itself in the inability of his saints to be burned at the stake or
the unwillingness of the lions to tear apart his saints. The witness of God’s
power through his saints made Christianity grow stronger despite the fact that
they would be killed for it. As the years moved past the days of persecutions
the miracles changed in form. Saints who were so close to Jesus who died did
not corrupt. After the fall of Adam and Eve death was the result and from dust
we were created to dust we return. It is these saints who to this day after
centuries of being dead still look as if they are sleeping. It was by a special
grace that these people who were so close to God and far from sin who now
remain incorruptible. Stigmata is another unique miracle. It is the 5 wounds
that Christ bore that holy people receive. To better love Jesus they share in
his sufferings in also bearing these wounds. These wounds do not heal and cause
suffering. Eucharistic Miracles are miracles pertaining to Jesus’ real presence
under the appearance of bread and wine in communion. These miracles have ranged
from not only the changing of the substance of bread into Jesus but also the
physical and visible attributes of bread change into real human flesh.
Consecrated wine has changed into real blood which was lab tested for proof of
its substance. Consecrated hosts have bled and hovered over people. People have
survived by living only on Jesus in the Eucharist for as long as 13 years. All
of these things have only happened in the Catholic. That is not to say that
someone in a protestant church cannot be miraculously healed I am saying that
these things are powerful and unique to the Catholic Church. To read more about
these miracles and others go here:
The Target of Satan’s Followers
If you were Satan how would you set up
worship of yourself that would be the most offensive against God? The answer is
to take what God has revealed and do the opposite of it. Satanists have black
masses. Their primary focus of the black mass is to profane Jesus in the
Eucharist which was stolen from a Catholic Church. A real witch can tell the
difference between a consecrated host (that is Jesus under the appearance of
bread) amongst a thousand of unconsecrated host. To read more go here: http://practicalapologetics.blogspot.com/2009/05/even-satanist-know-which-church-is-one.html
Logic
The last dimension of truth is logic
because it builds on all of the previous dimensions. There are many protestant
doctrines that people hold to and believe that if these particular doctrines are
not believed the person is not saved. However, if those beliefs were not taught
in the early church or before 16th century then for these doctrines to be right
that would mean that the very generation that was taught by the apostles messed
the faith up so badly that there was no salvation between the 2nd and the 16th
centuries. Does that make any sense at all? Or does it make more sense that
Jesus came to earth and established a means of salvation and loves his people
so much that he established a church to guard his truth so that people couldn’t
corrupt it to the point of all loss of salvation. Jesus promised that the gates
of hell would not prevail against his church (Mt 16:18). It would make Jesus a
liar to say that successors of the apostles formally taught error that lasted
for over a millennium..
Doesn’t it make sense that if the early
church was called catholic, taught all of the current catholic doctrines, has a
continuous link of authority from the apostles, has not changed truth, defined
what the bible was, has manifested miracles that can only come from the power
of God, and is the primary target of Satan’s followers end up being the only
possibility as to being the Church that Jesus founded?
