Jezebel -- why we should know who she is.

[Drake]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Once again, just as your question with Jezebel which initiated this thread, this question will initiate another thread. There are many reasons to meet together, I will enumerate them when I get a chance, doubt I can give a comprehensive list.

Okay. I'll start the list.

The Body of Christ is built up through the proper assembling of ourselves together according to His design.

Drake

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Drake

Okay. I'll start the list.

The Body of Christ is built up through the proper assembling of ourselves together according to His design.

Drake

I could make a stronger case that the body of Christ is built up by all the members obedient to the Head and abiding in Him.

WL put way too much emphasis on assembling. I'm not diminishing the benefits on the corporate side, but he was an extremist on this matter.

[Drake]

Ohio) "I could make a stronger case that the body of Christ is built up by all the members obedient to the Head and abiding in Him."

Ohio,

Therfore, you could make the strongest case that the Body of Christ is built up by all the members obedient to the Head and abiding in Him without ever meeting together.

And your basic assumption in that proposal is that obedience to the Head and abiding in Him does not include assembling together.

Since the Christians in Acts met daily they probably put too much emphasis on meeting and were extremists too?

Drake

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Drake

Ohio) "I could make a stronger case that the body of Christ is built up by all the members obedient to the Head and abiding in Him."

Ohio,

Therfore, you could make the strongest case that the Body of Christ is built up by all the members obedient to the Head and abiding in Him without ever meeting together.

And your basic assumption in that proposal is that obedience to the Head and abiding in Him does not include assembling together.

Since the Christians in Acts met daily they probably put too much emphasis on meeting and were extremists too?

Drake

I never drew your conclusions.

Did you read my post?

I never diminished the benefits of assembling.

Repeat after me, "I never diminished the benefits of assembling."

Again. "I never diminished the benefits of assembling."


"But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit." Jude 20

[Drake]

Originally Posted by Ohio

I never drew your conclusions.

Did you read my post?

I never diminished the benefits of assembling.

Repeat after me, "I never diminished the benefits of assembling."

Again. "I never diminished the benefits of assembling."


"But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit." Jude 20

But you did diminish it even though you claimed you weren't.

The way you did it was to say someone who pays a lot of attention to the biblical way to meet was an extremist. You front ended that with an argument that you could make a stronger case that the building of the Body of Christ could be accomplished as opposed to a meeting that was according to God's design.

Yes, you diminished the position and place of the meeting that is according to God's design.

Drake

[Drake]

ZNP) "Jezebel set up a governing principle that short circuited God out of the equation. In her reign God was not "over all". Jesus was not Lord. If you wanted an entrance into her kingdom you kowtowed to her request to stone Naboth. They did not meet in spirit and in truth, they met in malice and deceit."

ZNP,

Jezebel was Gentile prostitute. You talk about her as though she held some legitimate position in God's administration. Jezebel represents all that is opposed to God. She was Satanic and represents that still today. Don't misapply who she is and what she represents else you will miss the point. The book of Revelation provides that insight.

Drake

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Drake

ZNP) "Jezebel set up a governing principle that short circuited God out of the equation. In her reign God was not "over all". Jesus was not Lord. If you wanted an entrance into her kingdom you kowtowed to her request to stone Naboth. They did not meet in spirit and in truth, they met in malice and deceit."

ZNP,

Jezebel was Gentile prostitute. You talk about her as though she held some legitimate position in God's administration. Jezebel represents all that is opposed to God. She was Satanic and represents that still today. Don't misapply who she is and what she represents else you will miss the point. The book of Revelation provides that insight.

Drake

Jezebel refers to a Queen in Israel who had a major influence on her husband, the king of Israel.

We see that she sent letters to have people stoned to death, that people obeyed her, that she seized their land, that she employed 850 "prophets" of Baal and Asharoth, that she sought to have prophets of God cut off and even killed.

In the New Testament we see her exercising an evil influence on the church in Thyatira. There is no Biblical record that she was a prostitute. I have already quoted verses from the OT that show she was a gentile. The closest connection the Bible makes to saying she was a prostitute was that she used make up at a time that this might have been unusual for your average Israelite (I am not familiar with the archaelogical records) but we know that make up was used in Egypt prior to this time.

The allegation that she was a prostitute is based on the association of her name with "evil and adulterous" in the church in Thyatira, however, that expression is very likely allegorical referring to spiritual adultery. There is a parallel that can be made based on the prophet Hosea referring to Jezreel and because of that he is to take a wife of whoredoms. But it is directly tied to Jeroboam, rather than Jezebel. Yes, they are both related to Jezreel, so that can be a very stretched allegorical connection. There is a very clear case made that her behavior was evil and adulterous from a spiritual perspective. That is clear. However, her name means chaste and it is likely that she cloaked herself in the "holier than thou" type rhetoric we have commonly seen in evil and adulterous politicians and religious leaders.

You have a very vague use of this expression "legitimate position in God's administration". The record in both the Old and New Testaments relate her being very much involved in the administration of the church in Thyatira, and the administration of the kingdom of Israel. We do not know anything of her position in the church other than she "called herself a prophetess" while in the OT she clearly had the position of Queen as well as someone who ran a stable of 850 prophets. Any body reading the Bible today would see very clearly that her position was not legitimate, based on the judgement of God and the judgement of Jesus. But during her lifetime you also see there were very few who actually stood up to oppose her. Perhaps Antipas, who was martyred did. Elijah did. But who else? I consider it deceptive to ignore the fact that the vast majority of those affected by her tolerated her, allowed her to operate, or at the very least did not openly oppose her.

The idea is to learn from history so that we don't repeat it. There were elders who did her bidding, there were those like Naboth who suffered her abuse, there were captains who followed her orders, and there was one prophet being fed by ravens who stood up to her.

I have not missed the point that she was Satanic, what people don't realize is that she was "deceitfully wicked". I am more focused on seeing through the deceit. I feel her deceit has permeated all government and all religion. I feel that only someone who has a very clear vision and strong faith, like Elijah or Antipas is going to see through her, expose her, stand up to her, and perhaps live to tell the tale.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Drake

Okay. I'll start the list.

The Body of Christ is built up through the proper assembling of ourselves together according to His design.

Drake

Then you can also see that this building up of the Body will result in the church as the family of God, Temple of God, Kingdom of God, Bride of Christ, one New Man, and the Warrior.

No individual Christian could ever represent or express any of these entities on their own.

Likewise you could never express any of these entities unless you are meeting in the name of Jesus and He is in your midst. He will only be in your midst if you are meeting in spirit and truth. What does that mean? You have one God and Father who is over all, one Lord, one faith, one Spirit, one baptism.

If you claim you have one Lord yet do not obey his command then you are not meeting in spirit or truth of Jesus being the one Lord. If you claim you have one God and Father who is over all, and then allow something else to act as a trump card to over rule our God and Father then you are not meeting in spirit and truth. If you claim you have one faith and then add something to that one faith or remove something from that one faith, then you are not meeting in spirit and truth. If you claim you have one baptism as an entrance into this kingdom and then you require something else for Christians to "enter" or else do not recognize their legitimacy based solely on this one baptism, then that is not meeting in spirit and in truth.

This is not an inferred teaching of the NT, it is the black and white teaching that is reiterated in many different ways by every apostle and writer of the NT.

Jezebel set up a governing principle that short circuited God out of the equation. In her reign God was not "over all". Jesus was not Lord. If you wanted an entrance into her kingdom you kowtowed to her request to stone Naboth. They did not meet in spirit and in truth, they met in malice and deceit.

[Drake]

ZNP)"Then you can also see that this building up of the Body will result in the church as the family of God, Temple of God, Kingdom of God, Bride of Christ, one New Man, and the Warrior.

No individual Christian could ever represent or express any of these entities on their own.

Likewise you could never express any of these entities unless you are meeting in the name of Jesus and He is in your midst. He will only be in your midst if you are meeting in spirit and truth. What does that mean? You have one God and Father who is over all, one Lord, one faith, one Spirit, one baptism.

If you claim you have one Lord yet do not obey his command then you are not meeting in spirit or truth of Jesus being the one Lord. If you claim you have one God and Father who is over all, and then allow something else to act as a trump card to over rule our God and Father then you are not meeting in spirit and truth. If you claim you have one faith and then add something to that one faith or remove something from that one faith, then you are not meeting in spirit and truth. If you claim you have one baptism as an entrance into this kingdom and then you require something else for Christians to "enter" or else do not recognize their legitimacy based solely on this one baptism, then that is not meeting in spirit and in truth.

This is not an inferred teaching of the NT, it is the black and white teaching that is reiterated in many different ways by every apostle and writer of the NT."

ZNP,

The part above I mostly agree with. I say "mostly" because it is one side of the truth but not the whole truth. There is the practice also. On the one hand we are, according to Ephesians, seated with Christ in the heavenlies. However, we also live on the earth in space and time and in Corinth or some other physical locale. Both are equally relevant. Yet, in your argument you conflate the two in the wrong way. You argue that the physical interferes with the spiritual when actually there is a symbiotic relationship between them. For instance, to experience the reality of the ones in Ephesians you cannot do this in a closet. You must have a practical way to experience the ones because though you have the position in Christ in Ephesians you need the experience while living in Corinth. On the other side, if you do not have the spiritual reality then the physical will be vanity. The building of the Body of Christ requires both the spiritual reality and the physical practice.

It is not as you, Igzy, and Ohio similarly argue that the physical is not needed or that the Body of Christ can be built without the assembling of ourselves together, or that just any old way of meeting will suffice.

Drake

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Drake

ZNP,

The part above I mostly agree with. I say "mostly" because it is one side of the truth but not the whole truth. There is the practice also. On the one hand we are, according to Ephesians, seated with Christ in the heavenlies. However, we also live on the earth in space and time and in Corinth or some other physical locale. Both are equally relevant. Yet, in your argument you conflate the two in the wrong way. You argue that the physical interferes with the spiritual when actually there is a symbiotic relationship between them.

I'm sorry where did I do that?

Originally Posted by Drake

For instance, to experience the reality of the ones in Ephesians you cannot do this in a closet. You must have a practical way to experience the ones because though you have the position in Christ in Ephesians you need the experience while living in Corinth. On the other side, if you do not have the spiritual reality then the physical will be vanity. The building of the Body of Christ requires both the spiritual reality and the physical practice.

It is not as you, Igzy, and Ohio similarly argue that the physical is not needed or that the Body of Christ can be built without the assembling of ourselves together, or that just any old way of meeting will suffice.

Drake

When did I argue that the physical was not needed. I just said, and you just quoted, that you cannot have an expression of the temple of God, Kingdom of God, etc. without a corporate expression which is the church, a gathering of called out ones. That is physical, temporal, etc.

What I have been arguing is that you have created requirements that are not in the NT, and then you use these bogus requirements to disqualify 99.9% of all Christians. Igzy is the one who has focused on how arrogant and blind it is to assume that you alone are right and 99.9999% of Christians are wrong, not just today but for the last 2,000 years.

Neither Ohio, Igzy or myself have argued that the physical is not needed, nor have we argued that both spiritual and physical are not needed. If we thought that we wouldn't even be in the discussion. Our discussion demonstrates that we do care about both.

What we have noticed is that the so called "ground of the oneness" taught by Witness Lee does absolutely nothing to protect or keep the oneness and is actually used in practice as a tool to condemn and divide Christians. We have pointed out that it is an inferred teaching, there is no black and white teaching, no Apostle's fellowship as a doctrine, no prescription in the NT to keep this important teaching and therefore even if you think it is correct you should not hold to it, should not insist on it, should not use it as a tool to create your own sect. That is divisive and causes Witness Lee's sect to be a damnable heresy.