Schism and the Redeemed Zoomer (Part 3): The Prophets and Institutional Faithfulness

by on August 19, 2026 | Comment

Continuing our discussion on the recent debates over schism, we now turn to what the Old Testament has to say. Redeemed Zoomer’s (RZ) case against Protestant separation rests heavily on the Old Testament. In a debate with Douglas Wilson hosted by Reformation Red Pill (June 22, 2026) he argued, “In Scripture, the National Church of Ancient Israel was frequently hijacked by pagan demon worshipers who sacrificed babies, but nobody ever established a parallel church on the grounds of apostasy in the mainstream one. Instead, the prophets were loyal and reformed the church many times.”

Setting aside the question of mainline and denominations when looking at the Old Testament, the argument has considerable rhetorical force. It is true that Israel repeatedly descended into idolatry, injustice, false prophecy, and even child sacrifice. Nevertheless, Elijah did not establish the “Reformed Church of Israel.” Jeremiah did not leave Jerusalem to found a purer covenant nation. The faithful prophets remained among the people, confronted their sins, and called them back to God.

From this RZ derives a principle for the present: Christians must remain within the historic religious institution possessing jurisdiction over them, regardless of its corruption, unless the institution formally expels them. The prophets stayed in Israel. Therefore, conservatives should remain within the old mainline denominations. Leaving the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) (PCUSA) for the Orthodox Presbyterian Church or Presbyterian Church in America supposedly repeats the sin of Korah by constructing a rival ecclesiastical structure.1 There were prophets who were kicked out of the nation. Amos was ordered to flee the northern kingdom and return to Judah (Amos 7:12–13), and Jeremiah was repeatedly arrested, beaten, and even placed in a cistern (Jer 38)! Yet none of these prophets established a second covenant nation, because God had constituted only one Israel and tied his redemptive promises to it.

Before we take a look at the claim, with which I disagree, there is an important biblical warning here. Christians should not leave churches casually. Pride, impatience, personality conflicts, political preferences, or the desire for a congregation tailored to one’s tastes do not justify division. The prophets’ patience with the people of God should rebuke our consumerism. But RZ’s conclusion does not follow from the biblical evidence. It confuses ancient Israel with a modern denomination, remaining among the covenant people with submitting to every corrupt religious authority, and the absence of a rival Israel with the absence of all faithful separation. The Old Testament does not teach unconditional institutional loyalty. After all, God would destroy the temple—twice.

Corruption, Correction, and Apostasy

Before considering Israel directly, we need to make an important distinction. The presence of grave corruption does not immediately mean that a church is no church. God’s people have often suffered from false teaching, immoral leaders, compromised worship, and defective discipline. Scripture ordinarily calls the faithful to seek repentance and reform before separation becomes necessary.

But neither does Scripture teach that an institution’s claim to be God’s church is indestructible. There is a difference between sin existing within the church and the church identifying itself with that sin against the Word of God. A body may be seriously diseased while still acknowledging the authority of God’s Word and remaining capable of correction. A more serious condition arises when its authorized teachers and courts protect the error, condemn biblical correction, and discipline those who seek faithfulness. At that point the institution is no longer merely failing to remove evil. It has begun to use its authority on behalf of evil.

The alternatives are therefore not immediate separation at the first appearance of error or indefinite submission until formal expulsion. Scripture presents corrupt communities being warned, corrected, disciplined, judged, and sometimes abandoned by God. The question is not simply whether corruption exists. The question is whether God’s Word continues to govern.

Israel Was Not a Presbyterian Denomination

The first challenge to RZ’s analogy is that Israel was not the Old Testament equivalent of the PCUSA, the Church of England, or any other denomination. Israel was a covenant nation established directly by God. Its identity included a promised land, an appointed priesthood, a sacrificial system, a central sanctuary, a civil order, and a royal line. Israelites ordinarily entered that community through birth and circumcision, not by selecting among several churches within the same territory.

God had also tied his redemptive promises to Israel. The Messiah would come from Abraham, Judah, and David. To abandon Israel altogether was not comparable to transferring from one Presbyterian denomination to another. It meant abandoning the covenant people through whom God had promised to bring salvation to the nations.

That uniqueness must be understood in light of its fulfillment in Christ. The church under the old covenant and the church under the new are one people of God, gathered by the same promise and saved by the same Messiah. But this continuity does not mean that every old covenant institution continues unchanged. Israel’s land, priesthood, sacrifices, and temple were types and shadows fulfilled in Christ. He is the true temple raised after three days, the final high priest, and the once-for-all sacrifice through whom God’s people draw near. Jew and Gentile are now built together in him as a holy temple and dwelling place for God.

While the Jerusalem temple still stood, Hebrews declared the old covenant obsolete, taught that Christ had removed the first order to establish the second, and said that Christians possess an altar from which those who continue serving the tent have no right to eat. The continuity is found in Christ and his catholic church; the discontinuity is found in the passing away of Israel’s national and ceremonial form.

No modern denomination possesses this status. God did not promise that one American religious corporation would continue until the return of Christ. No denomination has received a divinely appointed territory, capital city, priesthood, or civil constitution. The PCUSA does not possess an exclusive covenantal jurisdiction over American Presbyterians.

This difference does not make denominational allegiance meaningless. Christians have genuine obligations to their congregations, elders, presbyteries, and fellow members. They should not treat ecclesiastical vows as disposable. But neither may a denomination borrow Israel’s unique covenantal identity in order to make its own institutional claims absolute. The prophets did not establish another Israel because there could not be another Israel. This alone tells us very little about whether Christians may leave a denomination that has rejected its confession and protected opposition to the gospel.

The Faithful Rejected Jeroboam’s Religious Order

Even within Israel’s unique covenantal structure, the faithful did not submit indiscriminately to whatever religious establishment controlled their territory. When the kingdom divided, Jeroboam feared that continued worship in Jerusalem would undermine his political power. He therefore established golden calves at Bethel and Dan, appointed unauthorized priests, and created his own religious festivals. Scripture describes this not as an imperfect expression of the same legitimate worship but as a system that “became a sin” (1 Kgs 12:30) and caused Israel to depart from the Lord (see vv. 25–33).

The priests and Levites left the northern kingdom: “For the Levites left their common lands and their holdings and came to Judah and Jerusalem, because Jeroboam and his sons cast them out from serving as priests of the Lord” (2 Chron 11:14).

This particular example must be handled carefully. Jeroboam did remove the Levites from their lawful service, so RZ might classify them as expelled rather than voluntarily separated. But the passage does not stop with the Levites: “Those who had set their hearts to seek the Lord God of Israel came after them from all the tribes of Israel to Jerusalem to sacrifice to the Lord, the God of their fathers” (2 Chron 11:16).

These ordinary Israelites were not all formally tried and excommunicated. They crossed the political and religious boundaries of the northern kingdom because they desired to worship God according to his command. They did not establish a second Israel. They did not invent a new priesthood or construct another temple. They separated themselves from Jeroboam’s corrupted religious establishment in order to join themselves to lawful worship.

The conclusion should be stated carefully. This passage does not prove that every corrupt church should immediately be abandoned. It does prove that religious jurisdiction did not possess an unconditional claim on the worship of God’s people. The fact that a ruler or institution controlled a territory did not require the faithful to participate in its corruption.

Israelites Continued to Cross Institutional Boundaries

The same pattern appears later. During Asa’s reforms, people came to Judah from Ephraim, Manasseh, and Simeon “when they saw that the Lord his God was with him” (2 Chron 15:9). Under Hezekiah, messengers traveled throughout the northern tribes, calling the remnant to come to Jerusalem for the Passover. Many mocked them, but “some men of Asher, of Manasseh, and of Zebulun humbled themselves and came to Jerusalem” (2 Chron 30:10–11). These passages do not necessarily describe permanent relocation or the formal creation of a new ecclesiastical body. They should not be forced to prove more than they say.

What they do is establish that faithfulness sometimes required rejecting the corrupted worship maintained by the authorities under whom one lived and gathering elsewhere for lawful worship. The believing remnant did not reason that leaving the altars at Bethel and Dan would be schismatic because those altars represented the established religion of their region. Their highest allegiance was not to institutional continuity. It was to the Lord.

Korah Proves That Not All Separation Is the Same

RZ frequently appeals to Korah’s rebellion as the biblical pattern for schism. Korah rejected the authority God had established through Moses and Aaron and attempted to seize a ministry God had not given him. His rebellion was wicked and brought severe judgment. But the account cannot support the notion that all separation is sinful.

God told Moses and Aaron, “Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment” (Num 16:21).

Moses then warned Israel, “Depart, please, from the tents of these wicked men, and touch nothing of theirs, lest you be swept away with all their sins” (Num 16:26).

The faithful separated from the separatists. Korah’s sin was not merely that he stood apart from someone else. It was that he rebelled against God’s appointed order and drew people after himself. The congregation’s withdrawal from Korah, by contrast, was an act of obedience.

Numbers 16 therefore does not provide a complete doctrine of denominational separation. It does establish an indispensable principle: The moral character of separation depends on what one is leaving and what one is seeking. There is a sinful separation from lawful authority. There is also an obedient separation from rebellion and corruption. Calling both actions schism merely because they involve visible distance empties the biblical category of its actual meaning.

The Prophets Did Not Teach Institutional Loyalty at Any Cost

RZ is correct that the prophets did not establish a new Israel whenever the nation fell into sin. But the prophets also rejected the idea that God’s presence was permanently guaranteed by institutional possession. Jeremiah stood at the gate of the temple and warned the people, “Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord’” (Jer 7:4).

The people treated possession of the temple as a guarantee that God remained with them despite their idolatry, oppression, and bloodshed. Jeremiah answered by pointing to Shiloh, the place where God had formerly caused his name to dwell. Shiloh’s history demonstrated that God could judge and abandon a place once identified with his worship. Jeremiah’s immediate message was not that every faithful Israelite should leave Jerusalem and create another sanctuary. His point was more fundamental: Institutional continuity did not guarantee divine approval.

Ezekiel’s visions make the same point more dramatically. He saw that abominations were practiced within the temple itself. He then watched the glory of the Lord depart from the threshold, move to the east gate, and finally leave the city (Ezek 10:18–19; 11:22–23). God’s glory departed before the religious establishment acknowledged that it had been abandoned.

Elijah likewise refused to recognize Baal worship as a legitimate expression of Israel’s religious life. He called the people to stop limping between two opinions and choose whom they would serve (1 Kings 18:21). He repaired the altar of the Lord and confronted the prophets protected by the royal house. The prophets remained Israelites, but they did not submit to apostasy for the sake of institutional peace. They distinguished Israel according to the flesh from those who truly sought the Lord. They warned that historical privilege without covenant faithfulness would bring greater judgment, not perpetual protection.

What the Old Testament Does—and Does Not—Prove

It is true that the Old Testament does not give impatient Christians permission to leave whenever reform becomes difficult. The prophets suffered, pleaded, warned, prayed, and waited. Their example condemns the tendency to confuse discomfort with apostasy. Nor does the Old Testament authorize individuals to establish rival churches merely because they believe themselves purer than everyone else. Jeroboam’s unauthorized worship and Korah’s rebellion remain solemn warnings against self-appointed religious structures.

But the Old Testament also does not teach that believers must submit indefinitely to whichever religious institution claims historical jurisdiction over them. Israel was unique and could not be replaced by another covenant nation. Yet faithful Israelites refused corrupted worship, crossed political and religious boundaries to seek lawful worship, separated from rebels, and rejected the claim that institutional possession guaranteed the presence of God.

The prophets did not teach that an institution remained faithful merely because it retained its ancient name, buildings, officers, and legal continuity. They proclaimed that the Lord dwells with those who hear his Word. This is the point RZ’s analogy overlooks. The PCUSA is not Israel. Its corporate history cannot guarantee its ecclesiastical character. The question is not whether faithful Christians should casually abandon an imperfect church. They should not.

The question is what faithfulness requires when an institution no longer merely contains error but officially protects it, refuses correction, and turns its authority against those who uphold the Word of God. The Old Testament does not answer that question with the rule “Stay until they formally expel you.” It answers with a more searching command: Seek the Lord, reject false worship, obey his Word, and never mistake possession of an institution for possession of God.

Note

  1. As has been pointed out to RZ, his argument proves too much. Even when excommunicated (cast out of the land), Old Testament prophets never started a new church. Many adherents of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy see the contradiction in RZ’s position and are constantly calling him “home.”

©Everett Henes. All Rights Reserved.

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    Post authored by:

  • Everett Henes
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    Everett Henes (MDiv, ThM, DMin) is pastor of Hillsdale Orthodox Presbyterian Church, where he has served since 2008. He is husband to Kimberly and father of five children and grandfather of five (and counting!). He teaches US History and Philosophy of History for Jackson College in Michigan. He is currently working towards a PhD in Humanities with a focus in US Religious History from Faulkner University. In his spare time, he enjoys competing in powerlifting and strongman and teaching homeschoolers Taekwondo.

    More by Everett Henes ›

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