And, we see in the New Testament that Jesus will frequently use parables, and He will talk about growing things. He will talk about the fact that the Word of God is the seed, and when the seed is properly planted—for example the parable of the sower/the parable of the seed there in Matthew, chapter 13—that when that seed is planted in fertile ground, then what is it going to produce? Well, it’s going to produce the same thing time, and time, and time again. It will produce in the 21^st Century exactly what it produced in the 1^st Century. And so, if the Word of God was being preached, was being taught, by faithful men, and it was being received into fertile hearts, it was producing Christians. If the Word of God is preached today, faithfully presented, and is received in fertile hearts, what does it produce? It produces Christians, just like it did in the 1^st Century, and just like it does in the 21^st Century.

And, the same thing is true of the church. The church was established, the church was planted, the church grows in accordance with the Word of God. And so, if you plant that seed in the 1^st Century, you get the church that belongs to Christ. When you plant that seed in the 21^st Century, you get the church that belongs to Christ. Or, as we are talking about here during this Restoration Movement in the latter part of the 18^th Century and the 19^th Century, when you plant that seed, you get the churchthat belongs to Christ. And, that’s what these men sought. That’s what they were attempting to do—this principle that God set forth in creation—the identification of His Word being seed, and that seed producing after its kind. Why would anybody believe that what God has ordained to be so [to be the same] in every other area of His creation—that is, one thing producing after its kind—would be any different with His Word, which is the seed?

Well, we see that around the end of the 18^th Century and the beginning of the 19^th Century, a group of men widely separated geographically came to recognize this principle as it related to the problem of religious division. I’ve read of some Restoration activity going on in Europe, specifically in England, in the latter part of the 17^th Century and into the 18^th Century. And so, these things were going on. The ground was fertile for these things to happen. We see that men were looking; they were searching. They saw the fruits of division and recognized that they were not in keeping with the seed that should be sown in the hearts of men.

By the way, if you want to read some of the best information that’s available on this particular subject—maybe some of you have read it; maybe some of you have the books of Earl West in your library called The Search for the Ancient Order. No finer work has been done on this subject than what Brother West has done.

But, we see that there is another principle at work here, as well, and that is what Jesus spoke about in Matthew, the 9^th chapter, about it being foolhardy to attempt to put a new patch on an old garment. And, perhaps, that’s what some of these men were seeing, as well—that it would not work. As we have seen, men like Luther and Wesley, and others, were disturbed about the direction things were going, about the things that were going on, about the way the church had been perverted, about the fact that the Bible was not being followed, and they were concerned about all of these things, and they made attempts, NOT at restoration, but they made attempts at reformation—in effect putting a new patch on an old garment. Well, it just will not work, as they found out.