The shared center — held across the tradition
You are not baptised into Christ unless you were baptised as a disciple.
The doctrine that defined the movement and separated it from its parent: a valid baptism requires that the person already be a disciple who has counted the cost, which meant almost every previous baptism was void. Converts from other churches, including from the Churches of Christ, were routinely rebaptised.
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Contested within — affirmed by some schools, refused by others
Nobody grows alone — so everyone is discipled by someone.
Every member was paired with a discipler to whom they confessed and from whom they took direction on evangelism, money, relationships and time. The movement taught this as the New Testament pattern; former members describe it as the mechanism through which control ran, and the movement's own leaders apologised for how it was used.
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