A Few Problems With the Way We Do Church
The Church in America today is operating completely wrong. I believe that this has lead to spiritual deadness and almost a complete lack of the Lord's blessing. Here are a few places that I think we're going wrong:
1. Denominational-ism. Splitting and dividing the body of Christ are acts of flesh and do not demonstrate the following of the Spirit (Galatians 5:20). We ought to have a unified body of believers whose separate assemblies are separated only because we live in separate locations.
2. Separation of clergy and laity. We are a royal priesthood of believers (1 Peter 2:9). The separation of some believers as having special access to God and others as being dependent on them is a horribly offensive practice that came into the Church from paganism through Rome. Many protestants have removed the belief in a separate priesthood but continue to have the practices associated with it.
3. One pastor (or a "head pastor") per church. This practice is related to the separating of clergy and laity and also comes from the Roman ordination of priests. Nowhere in scripture is this practice taught or condoned. The gift of teaching is bestowed on many brothers, all of whom should be acting on it. (1 Corinthians 12:28,29)
4. The replacement of the rite of baptism. Baptism is a symbol of a believer dying in his flesh and being raised with Christ in the Spirit (Romans 6:3,4, Colossians 2:12) and is to be done immediately upon faith in Christ (Acts 8:37-39) so the new believer can be saved out of the world (Mark 16:16) This is replaced in different ways in different "churches". Those of Presbyterian sects have replaced baptism with the sprinkling of infants at the point of entrance into the physical assembly, while those of Baptist and similar non-denominational sects have replaced it with altar calls as the immediate profession of faith.
5. The wrong practicing of the rite of the Lord's table. When eating and drinking in remembrance of the Lord Jesus' death there ought to be one loaf (1 Corinthians 10:17) and one cup (1 Corinthians 10:16) containing wine (1 Corinthians 11:21) that is shared by all the participating believers. The wafers and shots of grape juice used by most protestant sects today come mostly as a result of more residual Romanism combined with old puritanical teetotalism.
6. The lack of church discipline. There are specific instructions laid out in scripture as to how to deal with immoral brothers (Matthew 18:15-17, 1 Corinthians 5:9-12) These are all but ignored by most of the Church in America today.
7. The lack of participation by the brethren due to the outrageous size of assemblies. The correction of this will make easier the correction of numbers 2, 5, and 6. In the book of Acts we see the example set of churches meeting in small, local assemblies, often simply from house to house. The delivering of a message by a single man to a large gathering was associated with the work of the apostles, not the weekly gathering of the churches.
8. The ignoring of the Holy Spirit. As the Body of Christ we are to be being led by the Spirit both through His outpouring of gifts, miraculous and otherwise (1 Corinthians 14:1), and in our daily living (Galatians 5:25). I believe that most of what is done in our Church today is the following of human flesh rather than the Holy Spirit. This is, I believe, the most important failure that we have, because it is primarily what has lead to all the rest (Galatians 5:16).
I left the text of the verses out on purpose. Please look them up in your own Bible and prayerfully evaluate the way our Church is operating. If the Spirit shows you that you are, in fact operating in an un-biblical manner, please then ask Him what you can do to help remedy the situation.
1. Denominational-ism. Splitting and dividing the body of Christ are acts of flesh and do not demonstrate the following of the Spirit (Galatians 5:20). We ought to have a unified body of believers whose separate assemblies are separated only because we live in separate locations.
2. Separation of clergy and laity. We are a royal priesthood of believers (1 Peter 2:9). The separation of some believers as having special access to God and others as being dependent on them is a horribly offensive practice that came into the Church from paganism through Rome. Many protestants have removed the belief in a separate priesthood but continue to have the practices associated with it.
3. One pastor (or a "head pastor") per church. This practice is related to the separating of clergy and laity and also comes from the Roman ordination of priests. Nowhere in scripture is this practice taught or condoned. The gift of teaching is bestowed on many brothers, all of whom should be acting on it. (1 Corinthians 12:28,29)
4. The replacement of the rite of baptism. Baptism is a symbol of a believer dying in his flesh and being raised with Christ in the Spirit (Romans 6:3,4, Colossians 2:12) and is to be done immediately upon faith in Christ (Acts 8:37-39) so the new believer can be saved out of the world (Mark 16:16) This is replaced in different ways in different "churches". Those of Presbyterian sects have replaced baptism with the sprinkling of infants at the point of entrance into the physical assembly, while those of Baptist and similar non-denominational sects have replaced it with altar calls as the immediate profession of faith.
5. The wrong practicing of the rite of the Lord's table. When eating and drinking in remembrance of the Lord Jesus' death there ought to be one loaf (1 Corinthians 10:17) and one cup (1 Corinthians 10:16) containing wine (1 Corinthians 11:21) that is shared by all the participating believers. The wafers and shots of grape juice used by most protestant sects today come mostly as a result of more residual Romanism combined with old puritanical teetotalism.
6. The lack of church discipline. There are specific instructions laid out in scripture as to how to deal with immoral brothers (Matthew 18:15-17, 1 Corinthians 5:9-12) These are all but ignored by most of the Church in America today.
7. The lack of participation by the brethren due to the outrageous size of assemblies. The correction of this will make easier the correction of numbers 2, 5, and 6. In the book of Acts we see the example set of churches meeting in small, local assemblies, often simply from house to house. The delivering of a message by a single man to a large gathering was associated with the work of the apostles, not the weekly gathering of the churches.
8. The ignoring of the Holy Spirit. As the Body of Christ we are to be being led by the Spirit both through His outpouring of gifts, miraculous and otherwise (1 Corinthians 14:1), and in our daily living (Galatians 5:25). I believe that most of what is done in our Church today is the following of human flesh rather than the Holy Spirit. This is, I believe, the most important failure that we have, because it is primarily what has lead to all the rest (Galatians 5:16).
I left the text of the verses out on purpose. Please look them up in your own Bible and prayerfully evaluate the way our Church is operating. If the Spirit shows you that you are, in fact operating in an un-biblical manner, please then ask Him what you can do to help remedy the situation.