It's been a while...

It's been almost a year since last I posted - and much has transpired in that time. I have spent the last 11 months pouring over scripture, the four Gospels and Acts to be specific. I have focused intently on the words and actions of Christ in context to really understand what His heart was as far as His followers and then the founding and inception of the first Church in Jerusalem - you know, the one Jesus He would build based on faith like unto that which Peter displayed when he proclaimed Jesus as the Messiah and the Son of God. THAT Church. I believe I now have a greater understanding of why God did some of the things He did - mainly because they accomplished His purpose and not necessarily the desires of man.

Man's desire is to be in control. Unfortunately, we are not qualified to effectively take on this role and do it in a manner that honors God. God is, however, well qualified and has a great deal of experience at being in control as He created all that is and holds all things together. Truth is, God did not create man to be in control, but rather to bring glory to Him. But, just as Satan managed to deceive 1/3 of the angels in heaven to rebel against God and deceived Adam and Eve into rebelling against God, he has also managed to deceive mankind that the church is an institutional organization that one must obtain membership into and be voted upon to gain "member status". I do not find this in scripture anywhere! How could the church have gotten so far off track? How have we, who call ourselves His children allowed this farce to propagate as long as it has? It is past time to give control of the church back to God and allow Him to reform, transform and make it uniform so that the Bride of Christ may present herself pure before Him when he returns for the Marriage Feast. It is time for the body to return to the commonism that created community in the first church which resulted in thousands upon thousands being added to the church - the body of Christ - on a daily basis.

Can the institution be reformed? I do not know. Jesus dealt with much the same situation in His day with the Jewish religion. It had disintegrated into a mere image of ehat God intended and become corrupt to the point that they plotted and carried out the assassination of their founder - Jesus. (I am pretty sure that was nowhere in the law of Moses!) The religious leaders saw their livelyhood threatened by the teachings of Jesus and went to extremes to make certain (they mistakenly thought) that the threat was neutralized. Will the institution of today see this movement to rebirth the church as the same threat? If so, what extremes will it go to to see this "threat" neutralized? For years I have waited for the persecution of the church to start from the government. What if the persecution we read about in the Word is not from the government but from organized religions that see "The Way" as a threat to the power and financial security of their system? Yes, there are governments out there on the other side of the world that are persecuting christians, inprisoning them and even taking their lives for their stand for Christ. And while this persecuted church may worship in secret merely to preserve their lives and those of their families, the governments would not be killing them if they were denouncing Jesus under pressure. They willingly go to their deaths holding to the name of Jesus. If given a choice between dying because I am an employee of ABC Company or quitting my job with ABC Company and having my life spared - what do you think I am going to do? My life is certainly more important than my position in the company - right? Exactly! I am going to bale, denouncing any affiliation with ABC Company so that my life would be spared. That position is not one i am willing to die for. OK, in the same light, will a member of a church institution under threat of certain death due to that affiliation be more likely to die for that affiliation or will they more likely than not renounce that membership in order to live? In that same light, would a bride sacrifice her life for that of her Husband that she truly loved? Absolutely! She would, of course, do this because her Husband set the example - He laid down His life to ensure the bride would be saved!

I think it is safe to say that it is relationships, not memberships, that bring people together and bind us in unity together. My hope, prayer and goal is to see the Church, the Bride of Christ, the Body of Christ come together in the unity of this relationship, forged in the blood of Christ and become what God intended us to be.

There is a movement of the Spirit already among the true church. That Spirit lives in me and is moving me - and I cannot and will not fight this move. May God be honored in my life as we begin this journey.

Let me begin by saying, "I am NOT down on church". Just the institution masquerading as the church in our world today. I am not just referring to the many denominations out there selling forgiveness for works, ordaining people to the ministry who are actively involved in a sinful lifestyle and those who blatantly disrespect the scripture by considering it as not being 100% inspired and infallible. I refer to the political agenda, not unlike that of the pharisees and saducees in the first century, that have turned the church, the living bride of Christ, in to a business, social club and spineless machine filled with self-centered egomaniacs and a self-serving membership who desire nothing more than for others to see "what a good christian person" they are. To be fair to the 5% that are not included in this group, there are some genuine christians out there seeking to find God's perfect will for their life and doing the best they can to live in a manner that honors and exhalts the name of Jesus. I cannot and will not believe that what we have in place today is what Jesus had in mind when He told Peter, "and upon this rock (the faith which Peter had in Jesus as the Christ) I will build My church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it". If we are in the last days (and I believe we are), we are going to see a persecution come upon the true church that the religious political machine will escape unscathed. When this persecution comes, there will be no doubt as to who is genuine and who is playing the game.

In the Beginning...

Yet another reason I get to sit in front of the computer for hours on end...

Thirty eight years ago, I walked down an aisle to become a member of a church because I wanted to eat crackers and drink a minute amount of grape juice once a quarter like the grownups did. Funny how no one even explained what I was signing up for to me. Looking back, I don't believe THEY really knew. Thirty years ago I walked the aisle yet again, not because I had "slipped" and become a bad person, but because a friend (a charismatic Methodist - I know - IRONIC!) introduced me to something not taught in my conservative baptist community - the gifts of the Holy Spirit, or the gift of tongues, in particular. Yet something else I wanted for me. For eleven more years I played a charade in the church institution, fooling everyone, myself included, that I was something that I was not. I

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  sang in the choir


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  taught Sunday School


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  led music in church


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  served as a youth minister


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  served on numerous church committees


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  witnessed to numerous people, leading them to the Lord


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  played the game well.

Then, on August 28, 1988 I fell to my knees before a sovereign God and finally turned over control of my life to HIM. This marker stone was inscribed with Galatians 2:20: "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me." No more games with God, trying to be "good" enough to win His favor. On this date, I became a legitimate child of God.

All this just to set a foundation for where I am going with this blog. I know who I am in Christ. I am a part of His bride, waiting His return or my departure to meet Him - whichever comes first. Although my actual marriage to the Lamb was just over 20 years ago, my "church" experience goes back 42 years when my father first started taking us every time the doors were opened. I have extensive church experience, from both sides of the pulpit. It is this vantage point that allows me to see that something is not right. Something - OK, a great deal of things, are not right within the institution called "the church" operating in this world and more specifically this country. I read clearly in God's word what the Church was founded to do, created to be and even how it achieved success in the early days of it's inception. I also read the Apostle Paul's dire warnings to steer clear of those who would pervert the church to make it self-serving and corrupt God's creation just as the sin of Adam and Eve corrupted the original creation. Somewhere along the line, someone did not listen and today we experience the result of a broken, monster church.

In this blog, I want to explore where we went wrong. Troubleshoot the church, if you will, by biblical standards - not the opinions of men. I am inviting others, more knowledgeable than myself, to offer their perspective on this issue. It is my hope, that in doing this, eyes will be opened (including mine) to the truth of what we have become, create dissatisfaction with this lesser, counterfeit creation we call church and offer up legitimate options as to what we can do as born again believers to, not fix the broken institution, but to rediscover God's original design for the church and begin to live within the context of the marriage agreement with the Lamb in a manner that pleases Him.