Posted by Bigfish69 on 2:02 pm | Categories: 4walls, church, church health, churchianity, dysfunction, membership
adapted from Churchianity Today by Chip Brogden
To
truly come out of organised religion requires more than deciding to
meet in homes or resolving to do away with the external trappings of
Churchianity. Many claim to have escaped because they no longer attend
church services. But the reality is they are still living an
institutional lifestyle. They have only exchanged one form of religious
bondage for another.
Freedom
cannot merely be reacting to the obvious wrongs perpetuated in the name
of God by organised religion. It is quite possible to be out of the
system but still be bound by it, still chained by bitterness and fixated
with all that is wrong with the body.
Our
whole goal should be to look beyond the external characteristics of how
and where people worship. The only way to do this is to have an
all-consuming revelation of Christ and the ecclesia, the Body, his
church. Once we see that, we will understand that the external
accessories of organised religion can neither help nor truly hurt.
Perhaps
the fear is that once we are escaped from Churchianity we may be
deceived again. Not so with the one who has seen Christ and his church.
Anyone who attempts to lord over, corral, enclose, intimidate,
manipulate, unlawfully influence, or exert their spiritual whims upon us
will be rebuffed with a calm, quiet spirit. Knowing the truth means
seeing through the false.
Do you know something is wrong, but are unable to express what it is?
Rejoice!
This is alright. God is not silent when something is said or done in
his name that he doesn't support (e.g. a televangelist begging for more
money, pastors who treat people with contempt, or prophets who speak out
of personal imagination).
Are
you a member of a local church and accept all that goes on there
without being troubled? Are you able to shrug it off or lightly dismiss
it?
Sorry,
you are far gone. Your heart is hard. Your ears are dull. You are
blind like the Pharisees. Your christianity may be nominal at best.
Even if you are part of a perfect local church, sorry. The fact the
church is isolated from all the others indicates a level of dysfunction.
Are
you troubled by all that is proclaimed, confessed, bought and sold,
taught, prophesied, promoted, and prayed about these days in Jesus’
name?
The
Lord does not take it all in stride, or shrug it off. The responses of
Jesus to the organised religionists of his day were many and varied. We
find him ...
- Driving the merchants out of the Temple with a scourge of cords
- Engaging in public rejections of the Pharisees, holding them up as shining examples of what not to do
- Being silent, hiding or departing
