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The priesthood of believers is not for other believers
The Protestant Reformation partially restored the New Covenant realization that all believers were considered part of the new Royal Priesthood (1 Pet 2:9) in contrast to the Catholic dominated clergy system. But as Frank Viola pointed out, the Protestant Reformers only restored the theological understanding of the priesthood of all believers, but not the ecclesiastical practice. So all Protestant denominations make the theological declaration but continue the clergy-laity ecclessiology. It is the assumption that house church gatherings are exercising the priesthood of all believers in their open-participatory format. But as I have meditated on the idea, I think the house church advocates are missing it, too. Read the rest of this entry →
I had made reference to the economic situation in Iceland in the 3 posts, beginning with “The Elephant in the Room” , followed by, “Integrity Amidst Corporate Evil“, then again with “Ethics or Morals“. I never felt that I have done justice to the reason for mentioning Iceland in all those posts.
So, in this post, I want to share where I got my information so you can read on this further. The main point, is that the 14 trillion dollar American debt is a fraud forced on the American people that does not belong to the American people and should not be paid. Some of the debt is legitimate, but most is not. The people of Iceland refused to pay a similar fraud foisted upon them, as well.
I first came across this story in an article by R.D Bradshaw who has been writing a series called, “The Goldsmiths” for the Gold Seek website. Mr. Bradshaw has been explaining the actions of the banking cabal throughout this series. The discussion on Iceland is found in his post # CXXXVII. After reading so much about the banking/corporate control of nations through the economy that was discouraging, I found this lengthy post to be hopeful. Read the rest of this entry →
I read Neil Cole’s book, “Organic Church” when I first left the professional clergy system. It was and still is a great book. I like Neil’s writing style. He used many stories to illustrate the organic church experience. That was 5 years ago. I do not consider a gathering of believers as the organic church anymore. Neither in a house church setting nor at Starbucks. Organic church is not an activity. It is not a mission. It is simply all who are grafted into the life of Jesus Christ through the new birth regardless of what they do or where they are.
The organic church is not directed by people. It is the life of God Himself flowing through all His children. This understanding of the organic church is shared by Frank Viola, Neil Cole, Wayne Jacobsen and many others. Each of these authors have different priorities in understanding this concept. For Frank Viola it is to see Christ glorified as head of the church in gatherings. For Wayne Jacobsen, it is helping individuals live by the leading of the Spirit. For Neil Cole it is in organic church planting and mentoring. Read the rest of this entry →
There is no difference between the meanings of the two words, ethics and morality from an etymological view. They are from two different languages: ethics being a Greek word, and morality being a Latin word, which means manner and customs of people. Ethics, however, carries the additional connotation of internal standards because of Aristotles’s philosophical treaties on ethics, “Nicomachean Ethics“. Morals, on the other hand, tends to lean in meaning towards the mores of a people or the outward manners and customs of a people just as the word customs is the root to the word costume.
The technical distinctions aside, words have a predominant meaning by the current usage. In deed, most words are used by people without regard to the etymological meaning. For example, the word “blessed” has moved beyond Christian usage and is used by people of all faiths to mean privileged and favored, with happy circumstances. The etymology of blessed is uniquely Christian, however, because it literally means “blood-covered” (bled-sion) and comes from Medieval Catholicism. To be covered in the blood means to be in covenant with God through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Consequently, such a covenant brings favor and privilege in happy circumstances. But the word is used without any regard to its origin.
Likewise, I wish to elaborate on the deeper differences between our subconscious usage of the words “ethics” and “morality” which merit having two different words from two different languages grafted into English usage. Ethics, in my opinion, leans more towards decisions of the conscience, whereas morals leans towards accepted public opinions and customs. As such, ethics are expressions of God’s will, and morals are the expression of man’s will. Read the rest of this entry →
Making our job disconnected from the aftermath of the industry does not make us innocent.
Just Doing My Job
When I posted the last blog on the unethical monetary system that the government has forced upon us by federal law, I knew I was not finished on the topic. I addressed the theft of the Federal Reserve banking system of “loaning” money that they did not have and charging interest on non existent funds. My point was that we, the American people, do not owe this 14 trillion dollar debt, and that we should deny it and refuse to pay it. What I need to finish is our individual responsibility towards God to live ethically and not to participate in an unethical system, even though we are compelled by “law” to do so.
In a recent broadcast of the Katherine Albrecht show, Dr Marc Edwards shared how he had exposed the cover up of lead in the water of the Washington DC water supply by the CDC and EPA. Dr. Albrecht asked him how they could try cover up the contamination of the water which poisons the people of DC? His answer showed great compassion. These bureaucracies are staffed with people whose jobs are compartmentalized and separated from one another. Each person was just doing their job which did not reveal to them the big picture of the consequences of their job. His answer made me realize that atrocities over the world occur because of the multitude of people who are “just doing their jobs” without knowing what the ultimate consequence of their jobs are causing.
I had always wondered how a “Christian” nation such as Germany could allow the holocaust and World War II to devastate Europe. There were notable exceptions, of course, such as the family of Anne Frank and Raoul Wallenberg, who defied the laws of the land by harboring and safeguarding Jews from the Nazi’s. But the majority of Germans who called themselves Christians obeyed the “laws” of the land. They may have objected to the atrocities that they knew about, but did nothing to resist it because they were not directly responsible for those atrocities. Instead, they were good tax paying Germans who only were doing their jobs. And from their point of view, their jobs were not harming anyone. Read the rest of this entry →
No one seems to notice. Or few seem to care. It has been there for so long, it seems like it should be here, shouldn’t it? After all, everyone uses it, so it must be the normal thing to use. Why bring it up? We have room. We’ll just walk around it.
The purpose of this blog and website is to bring information to the body of Christ that will help believers truly walk in the freedom that Christ has given us all. But sadly, we all walk in different kinds of bondage even though we have been given total freedom by the Lord. Some forms of bondage are self imposed due to either ignorance or due to a root cause that is too deep in the heart to be understood by anyone but the Lord Himself. Other types of bondage are forced upon us by other people and we do not have the ability to break those bonds in our own strength. Then there are bonds that are forced upon us and have been on us so long that we forget that we are in bondage and are ignorant of the bondage. This is the bondage I am addressing here. This is the elephant in every American living room that is accepted and ignored as simply part of the furniture. The elephant is the Federal Reserve banking system that is both unethical and unconstitutional that forces us to use their willfully inflationary monetary system through government decree. Read the rest of this entry →
A child of God is immature, but sons are responsible and inherit the kingdom.
Why There is Evil
“If God is good, why is there evil in the world?” Frankly, I have never heard a good answer. But the answer is basic and foundational to our lives in Christ. First, let me reaffirm that God does not create evil, nor does He do any evil (James 1:13). Yet He takes full responsibility for the existence of evil. He fulfilled His responsibility for allowing evil into His creation on Calvary.
Evil was a calculated consequence of giving life free will, and specifically mankind. He counted the cost (Luke 14:28) of this calculation which is why He was slain from the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8).
Evil can be summed up in one word: selfishness. The essence of godly love (agape) is selflessness: i.e., other centered. Whereas the essence of worldly love is self centered; i.e., what’s in it for me?
This won’t last long because it is embedded. They may take this offline. But this video shows how much of a formula is used to conduct a church service. Does this bring you to God, or are people simply being manipulated in their feelings?
Business by Kingdom rules is for the King, not our selves
The Lord’s Business
I own a Christian gymnastics school. The Lord moved me in this direction four years ago. In that time I have done much meditation on both how to run a business and keeping my priorities right according to the Kingdom of God. From the outset I understood that business is a worldly affair. That does not mean Christians do not own businesses, but it does mean our priorities will be different.
As a citizen of the Kingdom, my responsibility is to build His kingdom, not my own. The natural tendency in owning a business is to see it as your business and make every effort to build your business into your own kingdom. But that is not the way of the King. Everything belongs to Him. He gives us stewardship over some things, but those things still are His.
It is noteworthy that in the parable of the talents (Matt 25), the rich ruler gave his servants the talents. The servants did not take the talents from the rich ruler. If we are engaged in a business that the Lord is not directing us into, we are stealing from the Lord and those to whom He intended to give that business. Adam and Eve were guilty of the same crime. All the fruit belonged to God, yet they were given the right to eat freely from all the fruit except from one tree. When they ate that fruit, they stole it from God. So, as believers, we are not to engage in just any business activity. We are to pursue only that business that the Spirit has led us into. Read the rest of this entry →
Too many people do not trust their own senses. Too many believers rely on the law instead of the leading of the Spirit in their lives. We have been encouraged to not trust ourselves which results in rootlessness. The political government encourages us to rely on them not ourselves. The church government does the same. The book of Judges is considered to be a time of anarchy by most in the Church. The famous line that is quoted is,
In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes. (Judges 17:6 KJV)
which is also repeated in Judges 21:25. As I began my journey away from organized religion and began to question the role of governments both in the Church and politically, I wondered if we had misunderstood the book of Judges. In 2008 I wrote my first blog on the topic . No one responded to the topic, so I let it go.
However, the Lord has brought this back to my mind and I have been meditating upon it again. I must confess at the outset that I am so influenced by the general negative opinion of the verse that it still seems like a negative statement. But the facts of Scripture speak against that feeling which shows how we are so easily influenced by other people’s opinions that it blinds us to the plain facts.
The influence of the world permeates every area of our thinking. Christians think that more laws are the cure for society’s ills. Recently I heard Jerry Tuma make a similar statement in his radio broadcast. He recognized that the problem is government, and broadcast the soundbite of Reagan’s famous saying:
“Government is not a solution to our problem, government is the problem.” — Ronald Reagan Read the rest of this entry →
