These are two must reads that are for Pastor's:
One is from my friend Bobby Lepinay:
http://bobbylepinay.typepad.com/bobby_lepinay/2008/01/the-house-churc.html
This is from Tony Morgan and takes Bobby's concern further by naming names, the book and expresses his concerns:
http://www.tonymorganlive.com/tony_morgan_one_of_the_si/2008/01/pagan-christian.html
Barna is losing credibility with me! Any comments?
2 comments:
Having lived on both sides of this Organized church vs Home church argument I can say that real and very human abuses exist on both sides.
And that is because humans don't behave any differently than they usually do, that is like sheep, in either Home or Organized churches.
Ezekiel 34, holds true for both.
The authors of this book being railed against are correct in stating that the modern Church, which began in the Middle Ages, leaving the first century church not more than a nostalgic memory, borrowed it's practices and customs from pagan religions.
Why? Because they worked.
Israel, by Divine intervention in human affairs, was the sole repository for the accurate knowledge of Jehovah for thousands and thousands of years.
The rest of mankind had only their conscience and Creation to teach them about Jehovah, besides being able to 'witness' Israel's incredible history in it's making.
Religions developed, then, as a way to control the population of a nation, by giving them something tangible to worship as well as the ways and means of doing so.
Control the people's god (or gods) and you control the people.
And over those thousands of years of practice, they got really good at it.
So, it's not surprising to me, knowing that human beings are like sheep, that there would arise shepards from among the sheep who would incorporate these tried and true methods into the organization of the now 'Official' Church, as it gained acceptance across Europe for Constantine declaring Christianity to be the religion of his now Holy Roman Empire.
Such that by the time of the Reformers the population was well under the control of the Christian Church.
And as my history teacher once remarked about this time in Church history, the Holy Roman Empire was neither Holy nor Roman, nor was it an Empire.
So when King James, fed up with being told what to do by the Pope, decided to do something about it, he hit on the perfect way to break up the power of the Church.
Give the people the Bible in a language they can understand and let them read for themselves what it really says.
Of course what he meant by that was what he wanted it to really say.
It took a lot of revision over the next hundred or so years of reworking the 1611 translation before it came somewhat close to saying what the Bible really says, but that is another story.
Still the reformers only reformed everything enough to transfer some of that control to themselves by giving the people a new orthodoxy to occupy themselves with, theology.
And so it's been with the Modern Medieval Church till this day, on both Catholic and Protestant sides.
With all the attendant abuses that are not new under the sun for what sheep are want to do when given power over other sheep.
Still, through it all, Jehovah has been finding all those lost sheep in the fold of Israel first and also of the fold of the Gentiles, with the message that His Son has accomplished the forgivness of sins.
You know, the ones who hear him voicing his unique call and follow him for knowing that he is their One and only Shepard.
But is it any better in Home Churches?
Of course not.
Sheep are sheep.
The only real difference is that the Official Church has a lot of history that can be declared against it.
With a lot of good as well to say for it.
While the history of the Home Church is being picked up again where it was let go of in 313 A.D. with the Edict of Milan.
So what I bring all this down to is that good hearts lead good humans whether they meet in an official church building or in someone's home.
And good hearts have always been in short supply.
Be good. It's what you were created to be.
Eleutheros
>eleuhteros- thanks for your comments- you put some thoughts in it- we are to love, reach the world, make disciples- need to keep focus!
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