1. Only one church / faith in the New Testament. Eph. 4:4 (1:22ff); Mt. 16:16-18; Acts 2:38,41,47; 1 Cor. 4:17

2. Apostasy prophesied in the New Testament - Acts 20:28-30; 1 Tim. 4:1-3

3. Some fulfilled in New Testament times - 2 Tim. 2:17-18; 3 John 9-10; Rev. 2:20ff

HISTORY OF OTHER DEPARTURES

1. Early change in organization of church

• Bishop over elders

• Bishop's area enlarged to several churches (then called that a diocese)

• Bishops hold meetings, called synods, to make rules for universal church

• cp. Acts 14:23; Tit. 1:3-5; 1 Pet. 5:1-3; Acts 20:28

2. Priesthood - developed by end of 2nd century.

3. Holy Water - 120 ad

• was a way to tell who was properly baptized

1. Penance - 157 ad

• to pay for sins by physical harm, to inflict punishment for 1) expiation of sins 2) evidence of pardon.

5. Infant baptism (by immersion) - 2nd / 3rd century.

6. Human Creeds - 325 council of Nicea

• Nicene Creed, official creed of Rom. Cath., Gr. Orth, and some denominations

7. Apostolic succession - 3rd century

8. Latin Mass, - 394

• (Note, latin not 'universal' until after fall of Rome, hence NOT from apostles!

9. Extreme unction - 588

10. purgatory - 593

• place to be 'purged from sins', many ways to do so, even pay $ - note 1 John 1:7 for truth.

11. Pope = 606, Bonafice 3rd, bishop of Rome

• NOTE: Council of Chalcedon, 451 ad, bishop of Constantinople tried to have himself appointed 'universal bishop'. Was OPPOSED by Gregory, the bishop of Rome...who said that to ASSUME the title of universal Bishop or to seek to be the head of the church on earth was "the spirit of the antichrist."

12. instrumental music - 658 - 666

13. transubstantiation - 1000ad

14. celibacy of priesthood - 1015

15. sale of indulgences - 1109, a further development of the purgatory idea.

16. auricular confessions - 1215ad

17. Sprinkling for baptism, 1311 adopted by the council of Ravenna

18. Infallibility of the Pope, 1870

• Even this was bitterly contested within the Catholic church, as was the idea of Pope.