The Danger of Christian "Restoration" Movements

Restoration movements are a big part of modern day Christianity. As the literal word illustrates, "restoration" is about restoring something to its original state. In Christianity, beginning in the early 19th century, various members from different Christian groups and denominations decided they had drifted away from the basics of Christianity.

It's the Christian version of "make America great again"

 

Restoration is about "making Christianity great again"...That's how all these "movements" and "revivals" come into being in the first place.

And these "movements" are almost always dangerous.

These movements all start the same way: individuals abandon their formal denominations with hopes of establishing a church based solely on the Christianity taught in the New Testament. With their belief in Jesus as the only model and the Bible as the only sacred book, they endeavor to “restore” the church to its original focus during the time of the apostles.

 

Restoration and fundamentalism go hand in hand. When you talk about restoring a system to its fundamental premise, that can only be achieved through splitting apart churches and implementing absolutist, black and white practices.

In this case, the original focus restoration leaders want to return to are the first century church in the new testament of the bible, starting in the book of Acts. 

There is a saying that goes, "speak where the bible speaks, and be silent where the bible is silent". This is a fundamentalist approach, which in practice is virtually impossible.

Why? Because the bible doesn't cover every life situation. It wasn't even written in modern times. So no movement can exist where church leaders are not filling in the gaps.

Here's an example: dating. Dating did not exist in bible times, but it does today. The bible is undeniably silent on this topic. So how do you navigate dating according to the bible without "speaking where the bible is silent?"

You don't. You can't.

Charismatic individuals decide that the church they are part of isn't holding to the bible in some way and they fall out with the leaders of the congregation over this issue. [Or issues]. The cult leader in the making wants the church to adopt their point of view and when that doesn't happen, the person accuses the church members of being archaic and stuck in their ways. Next, said person persuades a percentage of the same church to accept their ideology and it leads to a split in the congregation. Half the church follows the dissenter while the rest remain steadfast with the traditional ministry. The lone leader has now formed a new "movement".

Now this new "movement" is built on the personality of the leader. (hence the term, "cult of personality". This new leader is like the founder of a new silicon valley startup. They create a "brand" for this movement, which is their new 'baby'.  This, like any business venture, has a logo, a slogan, and a mission statement.

Let's not leave out the founding team/staff.  As the founder of a new mission, there is a mix of excitement and fear, just like any for-profit startup: 

Can we do this? they ask themselves. The leader with the big vision says, "Yes, we can!" 

This makes the founder the hero and positions him/her as a legendary, magical figure that future followers will one day speak of with awe.

Psychology of a Cult movement leader

Leaders of movements typically are "nobodies" who are inwardly seeking to be somebody special one day. [Think of the Joker from Batman].

They, for the first time in their life, are someone important, a person of significance. These new "movement" leaders are the star of the show. Everything the movement stands for is decided by the leader. Then the leader. just like Jesus, recruits his/her elite group of 'disciples' or lieutenants.

This gives the person so much power that it consumes them. Narcissism swallows them whole.

This elite squad of high-ranking lieutenants are cronies of the leader. They've bought into the rhetoric. They may even believe in the leader's vision. Or they are just power-hungry glory-seekers. Either way, they are now the enforcers to the rest of the group while being the 'underlings' to the leader.

This small band of believers devoted to "the cause" are just like the startup team at a future fortune 500 company. [Think the first 20 people at Amazon].

These are the folks who lay the foundation. They devote blood, sweat and tears to growing the organization. They have monetary equity and sweat equity. They know where all the bodies are buried. They determine the culture of the movement. Their values and biases become the movement's values. These values are baked into the institutional structure of the movement as it grows so big that new recruits don't even know who these top leaders are, aside from the origin story they're told as folklore.

Think of the Amazon story of Jeff Bezos in his parent's garage. Or how the megachurch, World Changers International, started with meetings held in a school cafeteria.

The movement I was recruited into for 11 years, the International Church of Christ, or ICOC, was said to have started in the basement of one of the member's homes.

Then at some point, after getting tipsy off their newfound power, the new leader makes a sharp left...

Remember, the leader is like the person who is lost in the desert without water. The visual mirages of water begin blurring the lines between fantasy and reality. The cult leader in the making starts talking crazy. The 'disciples' around him either ignore it or act as "yes men", further feeding into his delusions of grandeur.

One day at a meeting at one of the member's homes, the leader says they're Jesus Christ incarnated. Or they say they're God's messenger to the world. Or they start shouting and jumping on couches. Or they punch one of the lieutenants in the stomach and use a bible scripture to justify this behavior.

Someone lets it slide. They may be taken off guard and try to mentally make it make sense to ease their own cognitive dissonance. That's how the movement becomes the tyrannical beast. The leader starts acting crazy and no one stops him. Their fear of the leader's wrath locks them into silence. 

Others in the early days of a movement may also be narcissists seeking power or weak-minded individuals seeking validation. Like the leader, they, too, want to be 'somebody'. They want to feel important and do important things. They want to make a mark on the world with their name on it. The newly developed cult leader has the vision for how to make these inner desires to make a difference and be significant come true.

Many of these high-ranking officials are cowards. Just like in a fortune 500 company, the starting founders benefit from getting in at the very beginning. In a church restoration movement, these early 'founders' get high-ranking positions, high salaries, and comfy lifestyles in what is known in the secular world as fortune and fame. 

The founder of the movement's vision becomes larger than life as the church becomes more and more fundamentalist. In fact, these offshoot movements end up being the same rigid group the leaader accused the original church they split from of being. 

Think of it like this: One restoration offshoot is Burger King. The traditional church is McDonalds. Both sell the same product but served up a different way. Burger King's burgers are flame-broiled; McDonald's are not. 

One movement believes in discipling and another movement doesn't. The initial movement splits over this. While both movements have the same doctrine and beliefs, one christian 'movement' institutes the discipling chain and the other does not. 

It's like sports teams. The Mets and the Yankees. Both are major league teams. Both are based in New York city. But they are rivals. Church movements function the same.

Why the rivalry? Well, just like sports teams, churches are in competition for converts, funding, and both claim to be the ones with the "Truth".  Movements are about growth and the only growth that matters is the growth one can see visually: numbers. How many members does one movement have? Are people being added to their numbers daily like in the book of Acts? 

Just like a brand with a new product or service, a new christian movement causes a disruption in the current industry. The movement's radicalized adherence to biblical doctrine make it interesting and controversial. People are drawn to such moving and shaking. Restoration can appear exciting and revolutionary. With a leader who is passionate, confident, and charismatic, it attracts young people and those yearning for something new, fresh, alive. Movements and revivals feel exciting and offer individuals hope and a sense of significance. They can make a difference in the world by joining this movement. 

The crowds and the increased numbers of followers increase the fervor and zeal. This often is marketed as an indicator of God's favor. Obviously, the leaders propagate, if our movement is spreading to other cities, countries and merging with and taking over other "stale" traditional ministries and rebranding it with the movement's ideology, then they must be doing the will of God. Nevermind their own doctrine's warning about the road to destruction being wide while the road to salvation being narrow. 

The ideology of the group eventually carries more weight than the so-called authority of the bible- which is ironic, considering that the movement was started to restore Christianity back to what they think the bible really says  in the first place.  

The ideology comes from the mind of the founder of the movement, with his biased interpretation of the bible. This view tightly winds itself up into a knot with dogmatic beliefs of exclusivity, such as "this movement is the "very movement of God".  YIKES.  Translation: no other movement or church is the VERY movement of God in comparison.  

This crazy ideology gets affirmed and reproduced over and over in new believers. Eventually, these biased beliefs become "truth". The movement doesn't restore anything but fear, prejudice, cult practices, and groupthink. These create an environment ripe for spiritual abuse and trauma to take place with zero accountability.

But back to this idea of restoration movements "speaking where the bible speaks and being silent where the bible is silent". This never works. 

Again, using the modern-day practice of dating, no one dated in bible times so now it's up to the movement leaders to determine what "godly dating" is. In other words, speaking where the bible is dead silent. That's how crazy unspoken rules are born. It's how you end up with a movement that forbids its members to date or marry anyone outside the group. 

This "movement" is now a full blown cult. 

Which is why these restoration Christian movements are dangerous. No movement is 'new under the sun'. Especially when you base your mission on "making Christianity great again" based one of the oldest books ever written.  

If someone tries to get you to join a movement, beware. investigate. Run.