“In spiritual matters restoration is the return to the ideal state that Christ desires of His church. Of course, this assumes that there is an ideal state, that there has been a movement away from that ideal into error, and that there is a mandate to return to that ideal. The need for restoration becomes necessary because repentance from error is necessary (Revelation 2:14-16). The notion that one may acceptably remain in error indefinitely is never considered in the New Testament (2 John 9; Revelation 2:20-21). The American Restoration Movement sought to return to the ancient order of things. The Restorationists believed that Christians ought to ‘speak where the Bible speaks’ and to ‘remain silent where the Bible is silent’. They wanted to cast aside all human names, creeds, and practices and go back to the Bible. They wanted to do Biblical things in Biblical ways. They believed that the movement away from the Bible brought error and division, that it was a curse upon Christianity, and that it ought to be abandoned. As a result, they began an intensive study of the Scriptures to see what God desired from the early church. They believed that if they went back to the forms and patterns found in the New Testament church, that they would please God and stand in His favor” (Adrift: Postmodernism in the Church, Phil Sanders, p. 95).
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