The origins of the churches of Christ is a primarily historical discussion. I'm well aware of where church of Christ members believe their church came from since I've lived in Oklahoma my whole life and attended a church of Christ congregation every Sunday for almost a year with a girl I used to date. Here everyone knows what Baptists believe even if they aren't one because they often have family that are, and the same goes for the church of Christ here as well.
From what you have not know about the church of Christ like when you were surprised I did not advocate OSAS, whatever church of Christ you were attending was not doing it's job in teaching. I preach for a living, so I travel alot, I have preached in many congregations of different areas, and none have ever taught osas, that is a basic fundamental teaching of the church of Christ(really the teaching of the bIble) that osas if false. And when you spoke of one that used instruments in worship, while this seems to be getting more and more popular among some of our liberal brethren, the amount of congregation actually doing this is very small, and defiantly not what the majority does.
Somewhat of a false ultimatum since we don't operate with the same views of scriptural authority. Heck, we don't even operate with the same Bible. Any discussions like this I generally try to avoid since it means if I quote Maccabees someone will surely reply "Well that's not scripture".
I struggle with trying to understand the exact role of God in the canonization of scripture, yet if you were to use it with me, I would probably not give much merit to whatever conclusion was drawn from it. Just a curious question: What do you think about the book of Enoch?
Good answer, I asked because one of my high school buddies is a Catholic missionary in a very poor part of Ghana, and the Catholic mission there isn't very far from a church of Christ mission. What he told me was the biggest problem is that the church of Christ missionaries will come and plant a church, stay for a while, and then just leave them to fend for themselves with a native pastor. The problem was they are cut off from a wide network of support and they just can't hack it alone and often this leads to the church failing and the members going back to some form of African shamanism or Islam.
Actually I know a couple of missionaries that work in Ghana and there doing great been there along time. I know some of the story's you are speaking of and that is very sad.
I am sure things like that happen due to lack of funds, people willing to stay or whatever. But that cant reflect the entire mission efforts of the church of Christ, it is an isolated incident you heard about, and there are many isolated incidents we hear about the Catholic church, yet I do not allow them to effect my view on the entire church.
Like I said above the knowledge I have isn't entirely secondhand. The historical knowledge is but I prefer to learn the history of an organization from someone who is objective. That's why when I read books on church history I read secular authors and not Catholic ones.
Yea, that is probably a good idea, but remember there are always two sides to a coin, and you might be surprised what you didn't know.