Quote:
Originally Posted by Ohio
It seems my prior post, quoted above, has upset certain folks. I never intended this, but I still provided my observations to MacDuff, and encouraged him to read the New Testament again. What could be wrong with that suggestion?
MacDuff said that, "there is a distinction between the ekklesia portrayed in the Bible and the Churches of Christianity. They are two entirely different things." I disagree with this. I have heard this numerous times before. I say they are the same, because we have the same Lord, same life, same Father, same Spirit, etc. All the shortcomings, pitfalls, and failures I have witnessed in contemporary Christianity all existed in the record of the New Testament. The same miraculous and supernatural events of the early church have also happened in our era.
Macduff further adds, "In the gatherings of the ekklesia, no human ruling authority would be necessary. Only the supernatural ruling authority of the living Jesus Christ as Lord through the indwelling Spirit within the community, within each individual who is in Christ." I disagree with this too. Yes, we "have an anointing, and have no need for any man to teach us," and, yes, God has given the church teachers and leaders. The Bible says to walk by the Spirit, and it also says to submit to one another and to leaders. The Bible records a balanced perspective, pleasing to God, honoring His Son, and necessary for fallen man.
MacDuff's views here are lopsided and, in my mind, a fairy tale view, one that I have heard before. Perhaps he disagrees. That's fine with me. Let's discuss it. Perhaps others disagree. Same as above. One thing is certain, there is no perfect church, and that was certainly true of the numerous churches recorded in the New Testament. They had lots of problems, and needed the leadership of wise and mature men of God.
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I am pretty sure that the vast majority of Christians would agree that Macduff's statement "in the gatherings of the ekklesia, no human ruling authority would be necessary." is on the surface "an extreme view" as Igzy pointed out and perhaps even a "fairy tale" as you have characterized it. But although I don't pretend to have read through all of Macduff's posts I am pretty sure that Macduff said he hasn't met anyone else that shares his view or something like that. So even Macduff agrees with the vast majority of Christians that his view is "extreme".
The first issue I had as a casual observer from cheap seats is the argument by Igzy "If you don't care what others think don't expect them to give a darn about what you think". To my opinion if you call his post "a fairy tale" then you don't care what he thinks. Perhaps I missed something, but it seems to me that "if you don't care what others think" really meant if you don't toe the line of the consensus of what this forum thinks.
The second issue I had was I agreed with Macduff that this should have been handled in a PM. If Igzy had sent a PM, instead of posting, saying that the post was considered rude and insulting, then I think Macduff would have apologized since he did anyway. Then this would have been a win win situation for everyone. But now that it is posted it changes the equation.
Now what Igzy said was "It is simply ignorance to claim that if someone doesn't hold to your extreme view of the "Spirit's leading" then they don't truly believe in the Spirit's power. It's worse than ignorance. It's intellectually dishonest and baiting. I can't believe you really even believe it yourself." The problem was when I read the quote that this was apparently referring to I couldn't see where Macduff said this. The closest I could come was where Macduff said "You saying that your motto is “with God all things are possible” seems less than sincere, less than genuine, when considered together with what you said in this post." Now I did not understand this in the way Igzy did. I didn't see him claiming that Ohio didn't believe in the Spirit's power. Rather I saw that he was pointing out the irony that "with God all things are possible" seems to support his view even though in that Post Ohio is calling it a "fairy tale". I think the sentence was worded poorly and he apologized for that, and if Igzy had left his post with the idea that he found the post rude and insulting then I think it still would have been a non issue, the apology to Ohio would have sufficed. Adding the threat of censorship would have been much better had it been done in a PM.
But the best part, the part that really made me laugh and be thankful that I had stopped by today is where Igzy said "If you are smart enough to know I should be trying to help you then you are smart enough to know that's what I've been doing." You have to admit, this couldn't have been said better by RK, a BB or even WL himself.
Again, I haven't read all the posts by Macduff but from what I have read it is very hard to understand why you guys get so riled up just because someone has an admittedly extreme view. (I don't know Macduff, but he has mentioned being in Eldon hall and he used the expression "bet your sweet bippy". Based on that I feel he is about 60 years old. It is very unlikely you are going to "help" him change his mind.)