What is the structure of the assembly?

[aron]

Peter D. posted this question: "After we do the heavy lifting of finally letting go of the one-city-one-church doctrine, should there not be a follow-up question with the same level of scrutiny?" I thought it deserved its own thread, and I wanted to place it on the "David Canfield" section because I see this as a potential counterpoint to the Canfield/Lee one-city-one-church paradigm. I admit I only read an excerpt of Canfield's argument, but that was enough for me -- "If you would just honestly and humbly consider my selected verses, you would agree that this paradigm is right." I am not interested in having a lengthy discussion with someone who approaches me thus, so I will just post some thoughts here as an alternative to the Canfield/Lee universe.

What is the fixed structure of the assembly? (Please note, that I see "assembly" as both what we would call a "meeting" or "service", i.e. a temporary gathering together in one place at one time, as well as the "standing body", i.e. what we would call "the church". The NT term for both seems to be the same: "ekklesia").

1. You must be born again. This, I would argue, is a prerequisite. Those who come to the assembly, who have not yet believed into and received the Lord Jesus, should be presented with the gospel, the good news, and given the opportunity to be saved.

2. Those who attempt to continue to openly practice gross sin (theft, drunkenness, fornication, witchcraft, debauchery, fighting and/or violence) should be respectfully asked to re-consider their path, if they want to continue being gathered together with the assembly.

3. I take Matthew 18 as the opposite of what the LSM teaches. They say that there is a difference between 2 and 3 gathered in the name of the Lord Jesus, and "the church". I say no. Jesus goes from the particular (a sinning brother in v. 15) to the universal (vv. 19, 20); he equates the power of these 2 or 3, in agreement, with the very powers of heaven. So to me, the minimum quorum, or structural requirement, for Jesus' assembly is 2 or 3 gathered in His name (nothing in Matt. 18 on affiliation with a ministry, or "local ground"). You will have, perforce, multiple assemblies in any large metropolitan area. The LSM one-church-one-city paradigm dodges this bullet by re-labelling, and calling these as "meetings". My own interpretation of Matthew 18's "tell it to the church..." allows for "tell it to the other assemblies (of 2 or 3, or more, etc)..." Note the possibility of plural assemblies, varied in size.

4. Okay, now to the "heavy lifting" -- who is in charge? We can all say "Jesus is in charge", or "The Holy Spirit leads us", but how is that to play out in the meeting? First off, I categorically reject the LSM mantra that "we are all just small potatoes here". The LSM "small potato" mantra was code for "Lee is the big potato." I think that this is an affront to our Head, Christ. So we need a different way to sort ourselves out.

There clearly is differentiation in the Bible, both in heaven and on earth. Paul gives a great example in 1 Corinthians 15:41. Different heavenly bodies give varied light. We cannot say that the stars are undifferentiated. Nor can we say that the christian polity is just "small potatoes". No, that is Maoist theology: the drab, nameless and faceless proletariat, with a despot or supreme council overseeing all assemblies on behalf of "the Body".

So if we reject that model, what to replace it with? I propose the words of Jesus: "If you want to be great in the kingdom, be the least". He deliberately and specifically spoke those words to the disciples when they were arguing about which one of them was the greatest. That is my proposed structure in the assembly. If you go to the meeting, and someone has an 'Alexander Haig' moment, and declares, "I am in charge here", that person has disqualified themselves. We can just smile and say, "Thank you, brother/sister, for your opinion", and continue with our business.

Our meeting is about Jesus. It is not about local ground, or affiliation with someone's ministry. It is about Jesus Christ, who came to earth and made it out alive. And unlike Enoch or Elijah, when Jesus made it out alive He became the doorway for us all. Because Jesus of Nazareth went through death for us. The power of death has now been broken. We should no longer fear death. We no longer need to build death-avoidance mechanisms, all of which fail. One of the death-avoidance schemes is to attempt to be "great", and to gather around oneself a kingdom of material wealth, and/or servants, and/or influence. We must be clear that the assembly of Jesus can be corrupted by this kind of mechanism. I argue that the one-church-one-city model ultimately became a vehicle for such corruption, and should be rejected. It stands neither upon the scriptures nor upon hard human experience. Its history of schisms and spin-off sects, called variously "rebellions" and "quarantines", should be proof enough. "The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash." ~ Matt. 7:27