Quote:
Originally Posted by aron
I liked it because of the "assembly" he cited, which is the reality of the concept you have been discussing.
There were 40 young men in an Air Force training platoon. One of them lost his brother and 3 friends in a car accident. 18 of these young men joined hands and prayed, one by one, to ask the Father for grace for this young man, that he could find the strength to go on. Brad, who came from a local church background, felt God's 'parousiea', His presence, so strongly during the asssembly that he later testified about it in a local church meeting.
His testimony was panned; they were busy at that time flogging the "rainbow booklets".
18 young men, from across the country, seemingly with nothing in common except that they are Air Force recruits, praying together for one of their own. They besought the heavenly Father, based on their faith of the saving name of Jesus. It is very rare to hear of meetings in the name of Jesus that are apart from the corrupting influence of some christian organization. So I am always happy to hear that such assemblies of God's called-out ones can, in fact, occur.
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I appreciate the follow-up aron.
That brother is clearly and understandably bitter and he uses a lot of hurt words in getting his point across, but, it in its essence, it was a good testimony of the manifestation of God in His assembly outside the confines of the Local Church and it is not surprising that it was put down. Particulary for a brother who had "a name" within the group, a statement of his meeting God OUTSIDE the group was problematic.
As a footnote, I can tell you that I heard something similar about the rainbow booklets even before this time and although I faithfully carried one around in the top pocket of my regulation button-down shirt for nearly all of college, no one ever asked me about it. I eventually took to merely abandoning them at phone booths and bus stations like any other Christianity tract in the world.
"We have the Gold Bar! We have the Rainbow Booklets!" We were so excited to have these riches. True, it was good, high stuff but honestly? Nobody really cared very much at all, not other believers and not unbelievers.
Go take a look the response Paul got from the Aereopagites in Acts 17...