Evangelical,
Igzy just said some very profound things. Some of them are worthy of restatement. These are from the previous post, though I have separated parts to make them stand out, and left some out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Igzy
You say God would never lead someone out of fellowship with a genuine local church. But you don't define "fellowship."
More importantly you don't define a "genuine local church," and you can't because the Bible never differentiates between local and other kinds of churches, nor does it differentiate between "genuine" or "false" churches.
We do not know if there is such thing as a "false" church, since the Bible never defines or cites such a thing.
We can look at the extreme example of "Babylon," but we really don't know what Babylon is for sure. LCers believe it is the RCC. But it may just represent a generally corrupt and worldly religious view. When the Bible doesn't clearly define a idea, it is probably teaching us about a general principle, rather than an actual thing. I agree that the city churches in the Bible show us that unity is important. I disagree that they show us that churches must be organized around the borders of a city. If the Bible wanted us to believe that as bad as you do it would have told us to.
So "genuine local church" sounds good, but it is really a useless and probably destructive term. The Bible doesn't give you enough information to genuinely (ahem) and confidently define it. You cannot know for sure if any church is really such a thing. It's just words and puffery. This is why your posts on the subject have the ring of arrogance and condescension. If you were really confident in your beliefs you could afford to be gracious and generous about them. Since you don't you exhibit hardness.
. . . .
There are so many things much more important than that. Jesus said so in Matthew 23:23, if you care to read it. The local ground as espoused by you is not about justice, mercy and faithfulness. It's about mint, dill and cumin. It's about focusing on gnats while ignoring the camel dung piling up around you.
Jesus asks us to do something that is very much against our nature. He asks us to even (sometimes) not act like we are right even when we think we are. This is what really bring loves and unity. Most times when we think we are standing up for the truth we are really standing up for ourselves. It's a delicate thing. It's very easy to condemn others, but hard to be honest with ourselves. If you cheat the man in the mirror you've gained nothing.
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In the midst of this he made the following statement.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Igzy
You can't be a church God approves of based on an obscure Biblical technicality.
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I know what he means, but I think that he was more than generous to you in it. I do not believe that there is any obscure technicality. Rather there is an obscure statement that if its meaning is among the more unlikely candidates it would be a technicality. Because it is not clearly stated, and not even a front-runner among understandings of what was said, it cannot be declared to be a technicality, therefore not "Biblical" because that term should only be used in reference to things that are so clearly stated and understood that it is the general consensus that it is true. Any other use of the term Biblical is merely packaging to attempt to stop any discussion that it might not be correct.