[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Peter Debelak

1) Churches "operated" just fine without the Spirit. See Galatians. Just because they embraced a doctrine contrary to the New Covenant, does not mean there wasn't "order" or at least an appearance of "order." In fact, I would argue, it is easier to manufacture an "orderly assembly" than it is to follow the Spirit. A corollary to this is what appears to be "confusion" may in fact be God's wisdom that is bigger than ours. A lack of human order requires faith and prayer. A rigorous human order does not necessarily require faith. This is not an argument for confusion, but an argument about entailment.

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

If you define the church as our corporate experience of Christ, then your statement that the "churches operated just fine without the Spirit" is contradicted by your statement that "our corporate experience must be individually entered into based on an individual relationship with Him."

Brother ZNP, I'm not quite sure why you are being argumentative here. PeterD's post (quoted above) placed the word "operated" in quotes indicating he was being facetious about the proper "operation" of the church. Church history is replete with the "church" of Rome which "operated" with impunity for centuries just fine without the Spirit. Peter's point was plainly obvious.

You then quoted him by changing the punctuation marks to "churches operated just fine without the Spirit," and then pointed out his contradiction. Even a cursory reader like me can spot an unnecessary argumentative attitude.