self driven revelations

This was shared with Matt McGaw and inspired him to come to Canberra, Australia.

"The church in Canberra is in need of genuine fellowship"

However, his report is that after speaking with two or three local churches he gave up and decided to develop his own congregation.

Why?  Because those he spoke with did not want to take up the revelation

What happened when others who did support him approached him?  He told them he was not interested in working with them.

Unfortunately this is sometimes the way when God speaks to those willing to hear him, not all are willing or capable of pursuing things his way.  They come with agendas and therefore filter the world and the people in it.  

It is difficult to understand in situations such as this how people can claim to desire genuine authentic fellowship but feel rejected by those who do not want it and reject those who do.

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gender specific messages

introduction
The use of terms referring to gender occur throughout the bible (e.g. mother, father, son, daughter, wife, husband).  Some apply to specific people.  Others provide information about a principle.  For instance:

• Characteristics of a wife … (Ps 31)
• How women should behave in church meetings … (1Co 14:34-35)
• Definition of a widow … (1Tim 5)
• How fathers need to treat their children … (Eph 6)

But how does reading Galatians 3:26-28 affect matters?

You are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus.  And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes.  There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.

In other words, being part of God’s family means the divisions of heritage, social status, and gender are no longer relevant.  Does this mean you stop being a male or female?  No.  You still have the physical parts and the associated functions such as pregnancy and beard growing.  Then there are differences in hormones, emotions, etc.  So what exactly, does it mean for gender to be no longer relevant?

what does the bible say?

The starting point is to consider yourself in just one category: a child of God.  Do a word search of the bible using the keywords child and God.  How many of them refer to a gender?  What is common among them?

• General information (Mt 5:9; Lk 20:36; Heb 12:7-8)
• Connection to Jesus (Jn 1:12; Gal 3:7; Gal 3:26; Heb 2:14; 1Jn 5:1)
• Where they come from (Jn 11:52; Rom 9:8).
• Connection to God’s Spirit (Rom 8:14)
• What God gives them (Rom 8:17-23; Gal 3:29; Eph 3:6)
• How to recognise them (Mt 5:9; Phil 2:15; 1Pe 1:14; 1Jn 2:28; 1Jn 3:9-10; 1Jn 5:18-19)

fathers and their children

Choose one of the passages from the introduction, for example Ephesians 6: Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger by the way you treat them. Rather, bring them up with the discipline and instruction that comes from the Lord.

If gender is relevant to this passage then it’s request only applies to men who are fathers.  Everyone else, including mothers, could be considered exempt and may therefore provoke children and not be responsible for the discipline of children. Such a world would make the efforts of a father impossible, so why even ask it of him.

If at the very least mothers also need to discipline their children and treat them in such a way that they are not provoked, then we must re-examine how God views things.

widows

Now read 1 Timothy 5: a widow who is put on the list for support must be a woman who is at least sixty years old and was faithful to her husband…continue reading.

Why does God repeatedly associate widows with orphans and strangers in his word?  Could it be they are each a group of vulnerable people in the community?  If gender is relevant to this passage then it’s request only applies to widowed women.  Vulnerable elderly men could be considered exempt and we may therefore ignore their needs.

But read the passage in context.  Why were female widows even brought to attention?  Was there a cultural context? Do we simply transfer the action word for word, or do we need to look at the intent between the lines?

conclusion

Whenever you read something in the bible or are given advice, look at the underlying truths.  If God treats his children equally, then we need to live that way too.  Matters of character, principle, ethics, justice, love apply to everyone.  Equally.

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danger of false teachers

“Listen! The Lord is coming with countless thousands of his holy ones to execute judgment on the people of the world. He will convict everyone of all the ungodly things they have done and for all the insults that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” (Enoch as quoted by Jude)

In the church there are people who will try to convince you that God allows us to live immoral lives.  Their argument is since God is all loving and forgiving, he will not allow anyone to perish.

Yet, according to the writings of Jude 1, these people deny Jesus Christ. How?
On the one hand they claim to know God by the revelations they talk about. While on the other hand, they

• live immorally, defy authority, and scoff at things they don't understand
• grumble and complain
• brag about themselves
• flatter others to get what they want
• live only to satisfy their own desires

It is through this contradictory lifestyle they try to convince you. "I call myself a Christian, a church-goer, but am not prepared to live as a child of God."

remember

• Jesus rescued Israel from Egypt, but later destroyed people who didn't remain faithful
• The angels who didn't stay within the limits of the authority God gave were imprisoned
• Sodom and Gomorrah and their neighboring towns were destroyed for their immoral living as a warning of the eternal fire of God’s judgment

beware
When someone claims to know God but lives for themselves they will not only bring destruction upon themselves.  To merely be around them, even at a church worship service could, if you are not vigilant cause you too to stumble.

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relational responsibity

Whose responsibility is it?

A woman is sitting on her own.  She is new to town and knows no one.  She does not even have family with her.

Whose responsibility is it to initiate an interaction.  Is it hers to introduce herself or for others to approach her?  Assuming she has a level of courage in this scenario, relationships could form even if no one approached her because she can make the first move.

But what if this lady has been experiencing some trauma in her life or something else that is causing her to hold back, to not make the first move? What if she is has a bad reputation or is physically unattractive?  What if her personality is different?  What if she has low self-esteem?  What if she finds it hard to trust people due to how she has been treated in the past?

Is it fair to suggest it was her responsibility if no interaction occurred?

What if this lady was you?

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in or out?

It has come to my attention that some Christians filter who may and may not gather with them during such times as a home group or bible study. The reason  is the new person would change the dynamics (e,g, learning stlye, maturity, gender, age, personality, denominational background, etc) of the group or not cope with the existing dynamics.  Therefore their presence would be considered disruptive.

Whether or not this sounds reasonable, is it acceptable?

Does God treat people this way? Did Jesus when on earth? What if you did this happened to your children?

Imagine saying to someone "Sorry, you cannot come pray and seek God with us because we are concerned you presence will disrupt the established group. We are doing things you may not be able to understand and we don't want to make the effort to change how we operate."

How you would respond if someone told you that?

May our doors be open to anyone willing to seek Him. Regardless of denominational or ideological background. Regardless of age, gender, socio-econics, or level of spiritual maturity.

May our minds and heart be open to Him so that we do not consider ourselves more important than others.

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God is all about relationships?

Today, the church often preaches about how God is all about relationships and as such so must the church.  We therefore have become accustomed to filtering what we do through the lens of relationships.  For instance, we only have the right to speak into another persons life once we have a relationship with them.  This is despite the fact that our very presence can be enough to affect another person's life, without have ever spoken a word to them let alone having met them.

We have also made our theology of God all about relationship.  God is the father, son, and spirit in continual relationship.  Occasionally, some believers will take the bold step and suggest people are invited into this relationship.

Now don't get me wrong, I am not opposing the importance of relationships.

But what I am pointing out is two things.  First, treating relationship this way is like the story of the elephant, where different people describe the elephant according to which part they were looking at: a leg, a trunk, an ear etc.  And as such they each spoke of the elephant in terms of the piece they could see.  Alternatively, what if the elephant is up a tree?  What if what we are describing looks like what we would expect a certain part of the elephant to look like, but we our expectations keep us distracted from looking up?

If we are doing this with God in terms of relationships, then what are we making the cornerstone of our faith and why?

Thus, the second point.  Could it be because our culture and society lack genuine relationship causing it to be the cry of our collective heart?  Could there be something more than what we experience through individualism?  Irony, in a desire to overcome individualism, we segment God into parts, father, son, spirit and then resolve this in terms of relationship, where we relate to one or more as our needs determine.

Again, not disregarding or diminishing relationship, trinity, or God's attributes. Just wanting to prompt us to consider what we doing and why.

Oneness

Jesus prayed that we be one like he and the father are one.  Is there distinction?  We are called to mature so we may be as the full stature of Christ.  We are to be in him and he in us... etc

This is like describing the colour green.  Yes we know and can show that yellow and blue are the component parts, and in a sense when we interact with green, we interact with mixed parts of yellow and blue.  But the truth is when you look at a frog or a leaf, you don't think or behave like that.  You only treat it as green.  We are not even contemplating how the bits work together.

Again, it is like when we send a christmas card to a household or a wedding gift.  Though we recognise each person involved, our focus os on the family, the couple.  Our love is for them as a whole.  Indeed, you may even sign off using your own family's surname.

The mystery that is God, the Church, etc...  Breaking him/us down while not 'bad', misses something.  And if we are doing this because of something we are missing in ourselves, communally or individually, then hmmm.

I pray that we are resolved in ourselves on this matter so that we may be one with one another and one with God.  And as such, just One.

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god healed the divide

If God desires there be no division between his people, where do denominational groupings within the church fit? What about those who are called believers and unbelievers

Paul appealed people to live in harmony with each other, without divisions in the church. To be of one mind, united in thought and purpose... Some claimed to be a follower of Paul, others Apollos, others Peter, or only Christ. But Christ is not divided into factions. Nor Paul crucified for you? (1 Corinthians 1:10-13)

After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. It’s not important who did what, but rather that God makes the seed grow. (1 Corinthians 3:5-16)

How does this apply when people say “I am a Baptist,” “I am Catholic", or “I adhere to no set denomination”, etc?

Was your minister, pastor, priest, mentor crucified for you?

If Christ is not divided into different groups, what are we doing?

If Jesus ended division by terminating the system of law with its commandments and regulations, then are the requirements we expect of people to belong relevant? If not, what do they do? How?

What are we to make of the promise of Christ in that there is nothing a person needs to do for God to forgive and embrace them? For all people? For all time?

Does placing requirements on people to belong create barriers to what God wants to do?

What are the commandments and regulations the church imposes today to belong? 
Consider things such as attendance of services, how we speak, what we wear, who we interact with, permitted activities, etc. Consider things such as how to pray, worship styles, or what it means to become saved.

What are the alternatives?

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YWAM

Youth With A Mission (YWAM)

To whom it may concern,

I hope this letter finds you and yours well.

The following information is something I believe I heard for the people of YWAM.

The request was for us to please read Paul’s letter to the church of Ephesus.  And as such, it was my understanding that the foundations of the ministry, which is YWAM, have shifted.  The need to equip remains.  But the apostolicness is to increase.

What does this mean?  Basically my understanding is YWAM is (or was in 2005) primarily acts as a ministry which invites people from afar to come and learn how to be missionaries or add to their ‘tool kit’ of being a missionary.  However what I am hearing is a call to, for example, increase

• from being a ministry of teachers to one of empowering a missional community
• from inviting students to a centralised base to going out to where people are
• from teaching those with a call to empowering those who have been called, even before they themselves know they have been

It is not my intent to suggest that you are not already doing these things.  Not at all.  Simply to encourage you to continue seeking God in all manners relating to Him and His Kingdom.

If you would like to question me on any of what was shared here, I would be more than happy to make myself available for you: benfam@gmail.com

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community

God is birthing a community, uniting the Body of Christ and installing the Church into its intended position within the world.

No longer will there be a distinction between us (Church) and them (Community)

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