The NACC: A Story of Separation, Independence, and Faithfulness

The separation of Independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ from the Disciples of Christ did not emerge from a sudden quarrel, but rather from a long struggle over Scripture, mission, church authority, and the meaning of Restoration Movement unity. Issues such as theological liberalism, open membership, denominational cooperation, centralized agencies, and ministerial education were among the driving factors.

When concerns about these issues were raised by conservative attendees during the 1926 International Convention of the Disciples of Christ in Memphis, Tennessee, they were effectively dismissed. This divide led to the formation of the North American Christian Convention, which held its first meeting in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1927, giving Independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ a gathering place for preaching, fellowship, mission, and identity without denominational constraints.

The Friction Beneath the Split

The issues that led to this separation were not merely organizational. They were theological, biblical, educational, and missional.

At the surface, the controversy often focused on agencies and conventions. Beneath that surface lay deeper questions: Is Scripture authoritative over the church, or may the church revise apostolic teaching to fit modern thought? Is baptism by immersion of believers essential to the New Testament pattern, or may membership be extended apart from it? Is the Restoration plea a call to unity on the apostolic gospel, or a steppingstone toward denominational acceptance? Should mission agencies serve congregations, or may they set policy beyond congregational control? What happens when schools training preachers no longer teach what the churches believe?

They were not small questions then and they are not small questions now.

Modernism, Rationalism, and the Authority of Scripture

Modernism, or theological liberalism, had been spreading through American Protestantism by the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was influenced by biblical higher criticism, confidence in human progress, and a tendency to reinterpret Christian doctrine in light of modern academic and cultural assumptions.

The issue was not whether Christians should think carefully. The Restoration Movement had always valued reason, study, and the right of every believer to examine Scripture. The problem came when human reason was treated not as a servant under Scripture but as a judge over Scripture.

Modernist theology questioned the reliability of biblical miracles, the historicity of parts of Scripture, the necessity of apostolic doctrine, and sometimes even the uniqueness of Christ. As these views entered pulpits, publications, mission boards, and schools, conservative Disciples saw more than a disagreement over academic method. They saw a direct threat to the authority of God’s Word.

For independent churches, the question became basic: Will the church be corrected by Scripture, or will Scripture be corrected by the spirit of the age?

Open Membership and the Meaning of Baptism

One of the most divisive issues at this time was the issue of open membership. In the Restoration Movement, baptism by immersion of repentant believers was not treated as a denominational preference. It was understood as part of the apostolic response to the gospel: faith, repentance, confession, and baptism into Christ.

Open membership allowed persons who had not been immersed as believers—often those sprinkled as infants in other traditions—to be received as full members. Advocates often framed this as charitable and ecumenical. Opponents believed it surrendered a clear New Testament teaching and blurred the Restoration plea.

Open membership raised a question that still presses on churches today: Can we preserve unity by minimizing what Scripture teaches? The Restoration answer was no. Christian unity must be unity in truth, not unity purchased by silence where Scripture has spoken.

Denominationalism and the Ecumenical Movement

By the early twentieth century, Disciples leaders were increasingly involved in wider Protestant ecumenical efforts, including the Federal Council of Churches. Some saw this as an opportunity to pursue unity. Others believed it required the Disciples to act as one denomination among many, which seemed to contradict the movement’s original plea.

The concern was not cooperation itself. Independent churches have often cooperated with other believers in community service, evangelism, and mission. The concern was identity. If the Restoration Movement simply became another denomination with its own agencies, conventions, boards, and official policies, then it would no longer be pleading for the unity of Christians on the basis of apostolic Christianity. It would be managing its own denominational machinery.

That fear grew stronger as centralized agencies gained influence.

The United Christian Missionary Society and the Question of Control

The formation of the United Christian Missionary Society in 1920 brought several missionary and benevolent agencies into one large organization. Supporters saw efficiency and coordination. Conservative believers saw danger.

When the UCMS became associated with open membership on the mission field and with comity agreements that divided mission territory among denominations, many conservatives believed the agency had gone beyond service and into policy-making. The issue came to a head when Leslie Wolfe, a missionary in the Philippines, resisted the implications of such mission policies and lost UCMS support.

For many conservatives, the Wolfe case confirmed their concerns. A centralized agency supported by churches could make decisions those churches did not approve, and ordinary congregations had little power to correct it. Money given for missions could support practices the churches believed contradicted Scripture.

That realization helped produce the independent mission model. Instead of one official agency, churches began supporting missionaries directly. It was not always tidy. It required trust, communication, and discernment. But it reflected a conviction: mission belongs to Christ and his church, not to a denominational board.

What the Schools Were Teaching

Schools played a major role in the separation. When institutions that trained ministers began embracing modernist assumptions, conservatives understood that the future of the churches was at stake.

The conflict surrounding the College of the Bible in Lexington, Kentucky, became a symbol of a larger concern. Conservatives believed that theological drift in ministerial education would reshape congregations from within. When they failed to recover older institutions, they established new Bible colleges and seminaries committed to New Testament Christianity.

That decision has borne great fruit. Bible colleges and Christian colleges associated with independent churches have trained generations of preachers, missionaries, professors, elders, and church leaders. Yet the question remains: Will our schools form servants of the Word, or will they merely mirror the academic fashions of the day?

Memphis in 1926: A Turning Point

Conservative Disciples came to Memphis hoping their concerns would be heard. Leslie Wolfe’s case represented more than one missionary’s funding. It represented the question of whether the churches could hold their agencies accountable to Scripture and to the convictions of the congregations that supported them.

Wolfe was allowed to speak only briefly, and conservative concerns were largely brushed aside. For many, that moment confirmed what they had feared: the official convention machinery could be managed in such a way that serious doctrinal and missionary concerns would not receive a fair hearing.

Out of the frustration at Memphis came separate meetings and a Committee for Future Action. P.H. Welshimer of First Christian Church in Canton, Ohio, served as chairman. Others named with that committee included Mark Collins, W.E. Sweeney, W.R. Walker, Robert F. Tuck, O.A. Trinkle, and F.S. Dowdy.

These men were not trying to create a new denomination. They were standing for biblical authority, congregational freedom, New Testament Christianity, faithful mission, and the right of churches and individuals to gather without surrendering control to official agencies. They believed the Restoration plea could not be preserved by handing its future to structures that tolerated what they believed Scripture did not permit.

The Birth of the North American Christian Convention

The following year, October 12-16, 1927, the first North American Christian Convention met in Indianapolis, Indiana. That gathering gave independent churches a new rallying point.

The NACC was intentionally designed as a convention of individuals, not a convention of churches. That distinction was vital. It did not claim legislative authority. It did not make binding policy for congregations. It did not function as a denominational headquarters. It was a gathering for preaching, teaching, fellowship, mission, and encouragement.

That was the new course set in Indianapolis. Independent churches would cooperate, but they would not centralize authority. They would gather, but not legislate. They would support missions, but not through a mandatory denominational structure. They would maintain identity, but not by creating a creed-bound institution above the local church.

In time, the NACC became one of the most important gathering places for Christian Churches and Churches of Christ. It helped provide cohesion for a fellowship that had no headquarters, no denominational office, and no official hierarchy. For decades, it served churches through preaching, workshops, exhibits, missionary emphasis, Bible teaching, and fellowship.

Where Independent Churches Have Prevailed

Independent churches have preserved the authority of the local congregation under Christ. There is no denominational board that can seize a building, appoint a minister, rewrite a congregation’s doctrine, or force a church into a national policy. That is no small inheritance.

The movement has preserved a strong baptismal witness. In an age when many churches treat baptism as optional symbolism or a later public testimony, independent churches continue to call people to the New Testament pattern of faith, repentance, confession, and baptism.

The movement has preserved weekly Communion. The Lord’s Supper remains central in the worship of Christian Churches and Churches of Christ. This quiet faithfulness forms congregations around the cross week after week.

Independent churches have excelled in mission and church planting. The direct-support model has sent thousands to the mission field. It has not been perfect, but it has often been personal, sacrificial, and effective.

The movement has maintained a generous but convictional spirit toward Christian unity. At its best, it refuses sectarian pride while still insisting that unity must be grounded in apostolic truth.

Where Independent Churches Must Be Watchful

The next 100 years will not simply repeat the last 100. The old questions remain, but new pressures have arisen.

We face a renewed crisis of biblical authority. The pressure today may not always come through old-fashioned modernism, but it comes through expressive individualism, sexual revolution, political ideology, therapeutic religion, digital formation, and the assumption that human desire is more trustworthy than divine revelation.

We face a crisis of discipleship. Many churches know how to gather crowds but struggle to form mature Christians. Attendance, branding, and programming cannot replace obedience, holiness, prayer, Scripture, evangelism, and cross-bearing.

We face a crisis of leadership. Elders must be more than board members. Preachers must be more than communicators. Ministry staff must be more than managers of religious programs. The church needs shepherds who know the Word, love the flock, guard doctrine, and model godliness.

We face a crisis in education. Our schools must prepare students not only for ministry jobs but for faithfulness in a confused age. They must resist both anti-intellectual shallowness and academic drift. The movement needs scholarship under Scripture, not scholarship over Scripture.

We face a crisis of unity. Independent churches must recover the difference between biblical conviction and tribal suspicion. The plea for Christian unity was never a call to doctrinal minimalism, but neither was it permission for constant fragmentation. We must be convictional without becoming quarrelsome, cooperative without becoming careless, and independent without becoming isolated.

The Next 100 Years

Those who gathered in Memphis and Indianapolis were not perfect. The churches they represented were not perfect. The movement that came from their convictions has never been perfect. But they saw something clearly: when Scripture, baptism, mission, and congregational authority are treated as negotiable, the church’s future is at risk.

We should not remember 1926 and 1927 merely to win old arguments. We should remember them to ask present questions.

Do we still believe Scripture is the final authority for the church?

Do we still believe the gospel calls sinners to faith, repentance, confession, and baptism?

Do we still believe the local congregation is not a branch office of a denomination but a body under the lordship of Christ?

Do we still believe Christian unity must be unity in truth?

Do we still believe mission is worth sacrifice?

Do we still believe our schools, camps, publications, missions, and conventions exist to serve churches rather than replace them?

If the answer is yes, then the next century will require more than nostalgia. It will require courage, repentance, teaching, evangelism, prayer, and renewed confidence in the Word of God.

The independent churches were not formed merely to be independent. They were formed to be faithful. Independence was a means, not the mission. The mission remains what it has always been: to restore New Testament Christianity in doctrine, ordinance, spirit, and fruit; to make disciples of Jesus Christ; and to plead for the unity of all believers on the foundation of the apostolic gospel.

The next 100 years will test whether we still believe that plea. By God’s grace, may we not only preserve it, but live it.

Author: Christian Standard

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