[OBW]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

From the Bible I can easily show there is one city per church (has already been discussed at length). You cannot provide me one example of a denomination.

Therefore the score is:

one city per church: 1
hundreds of denominations: 0

You have a funny way of keeping score. There is nothing making one church per city a rule. That is an overlay that requires that it be accepted before considering all the evidence so that the contradictory evidence can be simply dismissed by declaring that "it can't mean that."

You have established that references to Christians within a city, or possibly even also in the nearby environs, being identified by reference to the city in which they resided. It does not establish that they were simply meeting together, or that their elders were a single unit that agreed on all things. It does not find that there is anywhere that suggests that churches (assemblies) are required to be a single unit based on the limits of the city within which they are found or that if multiple assemblies are allowed (even required?) that they must share a single bank account, or have the same elders overseeing the entire collection of assemblies. There is not even a suggestion as to what kind of context it was that Timothy was left in Ephesus for the purpose of appointing elders. It is nothing short of assumption to think that it simply means appointing elders for a single assembly that covered the whole city. Nothing stands for or against that proposition, therefore it is not of doctrinal significance.

So, based on the need for real analysis of scripture, I have moved the score to 0 - 0.

As for denominations, if I need to prove that they are allowed, then I cannot change the score. If I simply need to prove that they are not disallowed, then I think I can succeed.

First, there appear to be two primary teachings used to discredit normal, orthodox Christianity by exclusivist groups. One is to look at Revelation and declare that "Nicolaitans" has to be a reference to clergy-laity. But that is completely speculative. The determination that a term must be referring to specific understandings of the root Greek words being used is purely presumptive. It only holds as much water as you can put in an idea. Sort of like the Emperor's clothes. The understanding of the fineness of the fabric was said to observed only by the truly noble. But it was a hoax. It completely ignores the idea that so many references to groups of people who are "ans" with respect to much of anything are often people following certain people. Like a Nicolas. Those that were following he pagan teachings of a Nicolas would be Nicolaitans. And in this case you have the clear possibility that this is the meaning. And to readers today who have no idea what the error behind the term is, not matter how you want to parse it, it is clear that there is a problem of accepting teachings that are contrary to what the true apostles were teaching.

And no matter how you want there to be no leadership, Jesus did not reject leaders. He didn't even reject the Levites simply because they were leaders. He rejected them for being "lord it over" leaders rather than servant leaders. So having leaders was not the problem. Just consider the first church. Several thousand in just a few days. And they went to the Temple for their teaching. The didn't just get it from their own quiet time or from PSRPing the latest HWFMW. They went to sit in the Temple and listen to the apostles teaching. Just like virtually every church in the world today. And it was evident at different times that there were different ones among the apostles and elders who were in the lead among the church's leaders. Early on it was clearly Peter. Later it seems to have been James.

Took too much time on that one.

The other discredit, heavily used by Lee, is to declare that the problem in Corinth that was addressed in the first 3-1/2 chapters of 1 Corinthians was names. But that cannot be what it was about. Besides, do you actually think that saying that you are of Christ is a problem if your intent is not to lay claim to a superior position? In other words, it wasn't that they were differing on which teachers to primarily hear. It was that they were fighting about it and even excluding each other over it.

Even saying that they were "of Christ" was a means of rejecting all the other teachers. Let's see how that fares. You won't listen to any other teacher but Christ. So who are you listening to since there is not yet a New Testament with his words in it. Just you and you indigestion? No!. The problem was not that some were "of Christ" and others were not. It was that they were fighting about it. They are all "of Christ" (or they are not Christian). Just not in the way that the arguments made it out to be.

In any case, I can assure you that the Lutherans are less about Luther than the LRC is about Lee. Same for the Calvinists (none of which really throw that name around so much). All these different groups disagree about less and agree about more. Meanwhile, you disagree with all of them for not agreeing with you and declare that they are the verboten "denominations" and you are not.

Yet the LRC does have a name. They sue to get it. They sue other Christians using that name. And they very clearly follow a single man more than any of the so-called denominations. (I say so-called not because they are not denominations, but because it does not mean what you think it means.) They go to great lengths to deny that they have a name or follow any man. But just try to start talking about what you appreciated from something John Piper, Chaplain Mike, Scot McKnight, Billy Graham, Matt Chandler, or any other preacher or Christian leader said in a sermon, book or blog and you will find out how much you follow a man. They will sugar coat the message. It is that they have come to appreciate that anything Lee said was always right. And they don't need to refer to anyone else. Or something like that.

And while I could buy that as a remote possibility, it becomes the evidence required to suggest that you will be incapable of understanding scripture in any way other than how Lee taught it. He could have been a snake in the grass, but because you are certain that he was right, you will not even read the words for your self and analyze whether they mean anything like what you claim they mean.

So at this point, it is either 0 - 1 or still 0 - 0.

And I am not adverse to leaving it at 0 - 0. Not because I can agree that denominations are simply wrong (as Lee declares from a serious misreading of the scripture). But because the idea is not to prove you wrong about what you hold to that is not essential in the faith, but to admit that we are not going to agree about everything. And that is not the end of Christian unity. Instead it should be the proof of our oneness that we don't see everything the same yet are not antagonistic with each other or declaring that the other is pagan, heathen, or only marginally Christian.

You have simply said that you showed how one church per city, defined by the legal boundary, and headed by a single unit of elders that agree on everything is in the Bible. But you have not. You have insisted that vague implications about very little can be stretched to include even more and that based on that you can withhold your unity from those who disagree.

So Igzy really said it right.

I've concluded that there is no worse divisiveness than divisiveness in the name of so-called oneness.