FAQ 119
The Roots of the
New Covenant Church of God
NCW 12, September-October 1994
Q. We are very impressed by New Covenant Church and feel strongly called to be a part of you. We would, however, like to know more about your origins. What are your roots? How did you start? How is it that you seem to have points of commonality with many diverse denominations and yet are so completely different?
We have had this, and similar, questions asked us many times. It seems to be a natural human tendency to "label" and "categorize" Christian groups so that they can better understand them. The problem is we don't fit into any of the accepted or known categories and this has led people to arbitrarily and erroneously classify us. The fact of the matter is that the New Covenant Christian Church is a completely new Christian movement without roots in any other modern or ancient Christian tradition.
Some people have tried to classify us on the basis of the former religious allegiances of our members. This is both unwise and unfortunate. We have therefore been called Mormons, Catholics, Baptists, Pentecostals, Orthodox, and many, many, others! But we are none of these. For us, to say that we are anything else than "New Covenant Christian" is meaningless and pointless and almost as fruitful in asking one's racial origin. For if one looks into race, it will be seen that we are a mixture of all kinds of racial strands. Though I am myself "English", I have French, German, Irish and Norwegian roots, with probably many others. A survey in the USA revealed that 60-70% of whites in that country have negro blood somewhere in their ancestry!
The world must stop the craze of wanting to classify everything and everyone. We are what we are inside. New Covenant Christians are what we believe, and what we believe is highly complex, because belief is the sum of the collective experience of a people. What we want to tell people is how Christ has entered and changed our lives -- we do not want to advertise a religious doctrine for itself, nor cover it with identifying labels, if that can be done. Our identity is our belonging to each other and to Christ through our shared experience. Ours is a family experience. We invite people to come and share in that family.
This page was created on 24 April 1998
Last updated on 24 April 1998
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