Re: There is a Solution2

[OBW]

Originally Posted by tasteslikegold

I never thought that arguing that Christ and the church are the essential factors of the kingdom was "compartmentalizing." Please explain.

First, it is the assumption that “Christ and the church” are “the” essential factors of the Kingdom that is the problem. If you had just said “Christ” then there would have been no argument.

But while “Christ and the church” sounds so noble, it is the experience of what that means that makes it “compartmentalized.” It is almost entirely about the gathering of believers (and more importantly, the gathering of the believers that follow the way of the LC). It is not really about how life is lived outside the walls of the “tent of meeting” whatever form that takes. The whole “Christ and the church” theology is built upon a compartmentalizing of Paul’s writings in such a manner that righteousness becomes more about being spiritual together than righteous in all ways.

When I viewed the early believers, I saw people who had their lives changed. It was not that instead of being at the bar they were at church. It was that they were different in everything that they did. It was a change in their talk, in their actions toward others, in the cessation of excessive drink (if they had been marked by such), etc. It may not always be that they were suddenly more outwardly different as it was that their very attitude about everything was changed.

But once they retreat to their little group of believers, the Kingdom is no longer displayed to the world. That does not mean that it does not exist. But it is a different aspect of the Kingdom. Yet this is in essence the whole of the Kingdom in the LC’s mind. The Kingdom is about becoming more spiritual; more connected to God and each other. And that is happening in the meeting and not out in the world.

But it should be. Back to how I “see” the early church. They lived their lives much as they had, but with a difference. They no longer cheater their customers. They no longer treated the rich better than the poor. They no longer despised slaves and deferred to slave owners. They no longer refused to serve those of different cultures. They were very different. But they lived their lives in simplicity and humility. And they gathered to worship the One that had made it so and to learn more about Him and His ways. They did not treat their Christian community as the “Kingdom” and the rest of their lives as something to get through. (And I am not saying that the LC entirely does this. But while there are statements, such as in the messages Priestly Scribe has posted since, the practice was already different before those messages were given.)

You make the above-quoted statement immediately after I said “The Kingdom is the restoration. It is the whole enchilada. It is not "simply" Christ and the church. That compartmentalizes your Kingdom into "church" which is Kingdom, and everything else which is not. And the LC as a group is failing at the rest.” But your response, above, while not addressing what I actually said, does not disagree with it, but seems to ask why I should think that it should not be exactly as I said. And in that, you seem to establish my point of compartmentalization.

While I wanted to do the following in a different post, it does circle back to the compartmentalization a little, so here goes.

Originally Posted by tasteslikegold

If Christ announced the coming of the kingdom of God as Matthew testified in His Gospel then surely He is the herald of the kingdom. If Christ is the herald of the kingdom then surely He must be the primary constituent of the kingdom. If the kingdom people (the believers in Christ) were brought into the kingdom through Christ then surely they are likewise constituents of the kingdom. Finally, if the kingdom people are a new creation, the one new man, the Body of Christ, etc., and "citizens of the heavenlies," then surely the church is the kingdom. As far as the church is concerned, it is the kingdom, because Christ announced it, Christ died to institute it, God set Him as ruler over it (as well as the rest of the kingdom of God - all created things), and the church is it's expression.

So the messenger is the primary constituent? I am not arguing that Christ is not the primary constituent of the Kingdom. I’m arguing that saying it is because He is the messenger that he is the primary constituent is ridiculous. Kings send messengers. Lawyers hire couriers. The messenger is generally not the constituent at all. In the case of the Kingdom, it was the declaration of the Kingdom that was significant. The only reason to make a statement like “If Christ is the herald of the kingdom then surely He must be the primary constituent” is to follow that with something that otherwise would not make sense. But saying “surely” does not give it any weight. It is not “surely so.” It happens to be so. But it absolutely is not because Christ was the herald. If we take that kind of thought, then what was John the Baptist? I guess he was the primary constituent of Christ since he was the herald of the coming of Christ.

Constituents of the Kingdom. Yes we are. Very much so. All of those who believe are, even the pathetic whore of Babylon ones that find themselves in the modern Thyatira.

But the Kingdom is not just the constituents any more than the economy of God is just dispensing. The Kingdom is the expression of God’s righteousness through its constituents during this life and on this planet. It is not just the constituents nor is it merely a foretaste of a future thing. While the church is part of the kingdom, it is not the kingdom.

I know that there is the thought (underpinned by verses that I cannot immediately quote or find) that indicates that we are to shine for the world to see. But that shining is not because we are figuratively a collective cathedral of people who gather together and worship God better than anyone else worships their god (even the true God). It is because those people are among all others and their lives shine with the gospel of Christ. And I’m not just talking about preaching the verbal gospel, although that is part of it. I’m talking about the testimony of the good news. The change in the life due to an encounter with Christ is good news. It is good news to their neighbors, their coworkers, those who they meet in stores and on streets. That is where the Kingdom shines. It does not shine to the world in a meeting. That is for God. And it is not unimportant. But it is not the whole of the Kingdom.

The assembly is not the Kingdom. We are the Kingdom. In everything we do. If you are willing to expand your definition of “church” to encompass every aspect of every life of every believer in every interaction with all the world, then the church is the Kingdom. But while in a universal sense this is true, experience shows that LC usage is not so broad. “Church” is about the “Local Churches” and is about how they meet, what they believe, and what they do not believe. It is more about the assembly and less about the life. You can’t dispute this because I was there for many years.

[tasteslikegold]

Mike.

I'll wait until you're finished with each portion before I rebut. It'll help things to run more smoothly, I think. Sufficed to say for now, however is the fact that I can, and will likely, dispute many things in your responses, as I have also been in the Lord's Recovery for many years. So whatever respective responses each of us offer, let's just put the whole "well I know better than you because I was there longer" nonsense behind us. Years "behind the mast" so to speak does not qualify one or the other of us as a respective authority on particular matters.

[OBW]

I said “In saying that, I do not deny an importance to the regular assembly of the called-out ones. But the meeting of the called-out ones is not the Kingdom.” (I “note” that I fixed a typo that you evidently were not affected by anyway.) You responded with:

Originally Posted by tasteslikegold

Not the meeting. The church itself. The meeting is a practical expression of the kingdom. In much the same way that the "gathering together" of a king's township would be the expression of his kingdom during the Feudal period of England's history.

If when you say “not the meeting, but the church itself” you simply mean the very existence of the constituents of the church throughout their daily lives in all things and in every way, then I agree. You start by saying that the meeting is “a” practical expression.

But in the next sentence, your example, you say that the gathering together is “the” expression of a feudal King’s kingdom. I would disagree. A kingdom is not expressed by the gathering of its constituents together. It is expressed by the power and authority of the king being exerted throughout the kingdom and through its interactions with surrounding kingdoms. The first only happens when the constituents are filling the environs of all the kingdom. And the second might still happen, but not successfully, if the constituents are huddled within the gates of the city while the surrounding kingdoms attack. (If the “gates of Hell” are not to prevail, then we have to be taking the battle to them, not hiding within our own gates.)

In this life, on this planet, we are, on one hand, sojourners in a foreign land awaiting a better land. But in a different way, we are the rightful constituents of this land rather than the “heathen” that seem to run roughshod over it. Remember, “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof. The world and they that dwell therein.” (Great Psalm with a great tune. I still sing that one.) The heathen are actually sojourners within our lands. Our righteous treatment of them is a public display of the righteous God that would grant them full pardon and the gift of His Son. If our kingdom is instead restricted to the assembly/corporate aspects of the church (accepting and agreeing that the church is the believers and not just the gathering) then we have a limited kingdom. I have intentionally used the lower case “k” here because I do not believe that this is the proper understanding of the Kingdom.

But no matter what kind of things you say to agree that the things outside the meetings are also the kingdom, you must combat the mountain of evidence that the whole of the LC existence is about the private transformation of its members into more spiritual people. And that transformation is focused on inward aspects of the Christian life (also referred to as the inner life) and on the corporate, meeting aspects.

Look at the entire collection of Lee’s writings. They are available online now. I have read some of them in the past, and others online. I have also perused many more to gain an appreciation for the nature and topics covered. It is virtually all about what goes on inside the believer and how the church must be patterned in thus and so a way and its meetings must be of a certain general type. And avoid having a name (but don’t forget who is the one with The New Testament Ministry, you know, God’s Oracle).

Yes there are practical things, like service groups so that the toilets get cleaned and the lawn gets mowed. The manner in which this is done is exemplary. But once the practical goes outside the boundaries of the property that the meeting sits upon, it is only about the breaking of bread from house to house. It is not about bridling the tongue or demonstrating your holiness through holy, righteous living. That is said to be just “works” and is to be avoided.

Unfortunately, more of what Jesus taught and said was about what you do and who you are than what you believe or how good your meetings are (actually, nothing on the latter). He never suggested that scripture was a treasure trove of doctrines. He said that you were to obey. And he upped the ante, so to speak. You don’t just have to engage in sex with another’s wife to commit adultery. You just have to think about it. Yes, He does provide the way to actually do it all. And, to use LC terminology, that “thing” provided is Himself. (I will return to this in another post if I can remember it.) But He did not make that provision so that we would look within to find Him, but that we would have the way to actually do what the OT saints had to fail at and kill yet another animal to cover.

Obedience is the primary admonition of Jesus. Yes, he also says “eat” and “drink” and “believe.” But if you aren’t obeying, then there is a serious question mark on those more “spiritual” activities. I am not suggesting that the LC is just a hollow sham that is only putting on a show of false spirituality. But it is so completely off balance in that it openly mocks those who actually obey in caring for the needy. If the outpouring of the spirituality should be obedience, and if the LC’s version of how to be spiritual is as superior as they claim it is, then they should be the most active at the homeless shelters and orphanages. They should be bending over backwards to be in full fellowship with every believer that meets with any group that does not entirely agree with them. But instead, they are a group that makes statements like “the purpose of the church is to preach the gospel, not take care of the needy.” Please be sure to repeat that one more time when your life is placed on display on “that day.” The sound of “depart from me…” might be heard a lot more than anyone in the LC could imagine.

And the worst part is that the majority of the members are just doing as they are taught. That is why Paul charged the builders to be careful what materials they use to build. I’m afraid that the uber-spiritual but practically useless teachings that Lee and his followers pushed on us qualifies as wood, hay, and stubble. As for the members, I’m not sure what it means for them/us because we didn’t built it. We were built into it by Lee and the others. I don’t know who you are, but I start with the presumption that you are just one of the ones who got built into a house of straw by a teacher not rightly dividing the word of truth.

In closing (on this one) look at the so-called “Great Commission.” Notice the parameters. What is it about? It is about discipling (causing to follow), baptizing, and teaching to obey. “Believe” is not in that list. I do not suggest that we have no need to believe. But that is actually not the primary thing about salvation. Salvation is ultimately a change in your life. It begins with a belief that provides the way. Then it is followed by acting according to that way because you have received the way.

Last, in response to your brief note about "I was there for many years," I did not mean that as an attempt to silence you but to make clear that I am not speaking from "book learning" about the LC or hearsay. Further, that connection is not entirely gone due to family ties, so I keep getting reminders about many things. And I also went for almost 17 years without even trying to rethink the basic teachings of the LC. It was only through the reading of scripture that I started out trying to read in the old LC way that I realized that it did not fit. I suddenly saw Lee's teaching without his Lee-D glasses reinterpreting everything. And one of the first things that I discovered in this way was his misuse of 1 Cor 3. Lee put the onus of those verses onto us, the ones he was teaching. Paul did not put them on the Corinthians. He put them on himself and the other teachers that the Corinthians were so busy lining up behind. (Don’t believe me? Look at it. Who is the worker and who is the field? Who is the builder and who is the building? The builders build the building. It does not build itself. And in context, Paul is clearly talking about himself, Peter, Apollos, etc. as the workers, not the Corinthians.)

But I have a history with the LC that has taught me a lot about it. There are too often responses that "it's just not like that" or something like that. While I'm sure that experiences of each of us creates a different perspective, no one can say "it is just like this" or "it's just not like that." But we can speak from observation of more than just the landscape of our own minds because we did observe.