“A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire;
He rages against all wise judgment.”
(Prov 18:1, NKJV)
Denomination is not a Godly initiative – it is born from human division and often fed by selfishness and rebellion. From the last teaching it is clear that dogma divides believers, who all believe their tenets are the truth. On some level all of us are disappointed with the church, feeling that it is not what it should be. We have sown much, and reaped very little.
Although reverends and pastors may sing another tune, it is very clear that the various local faith communities in an area often exist in a state of armed peace. There is a mutual understanding that each keeps to his own flock, and that sheep are not circulated between churches. Obviously the church also needs means to support its workings – the reverends and pastors, the sexton and the gardener, the organist and the church manager all need to be paid. The church building and community hall have large mortgages that need to be covered, even though the space is optimally used only 3% of the month, the other 97% of the time standing empty while thousands of people in the area are homeless. We have no retort to this if Christ’s words are at all considered (Matt 25:35-46). For financial reasons sheep and their tithes are well protected, so that the books always balance. It is considered good financial planning – after all, we do have a budget we need to make up, and the parsonage needs new carpets! It’s no wonder the seminaries present courses teaching churches how to run the local church as a business – the market’s rife with competition and to gain a foothold it is imperative that we strengthen our market value.
I’m not trying to be sarcastic or patronisingly criticize the way fellow believers choose to act – that would also be isolation, as the Scripture quoted above spells out.
But we have grown so used to the wrong system that we will risk our lives in defending it being right – we are zealous followers of the teachings of our fathers (Gal 1:14), without examining the Scriptures to find out if perhaps in the process we have not, with all respect, thrown out the baby with the bath water, raising the afterbirth instead. Prov 18:1 in the King James translation illuminates it clearly: “Through desire a man, having separated himself, seeketh and intermeddleth with all wisdom.”
In the last teaching Jude 1:18 stated that carnal (=natural) man brings division, thus through personal desire or lust he is separated from the body of Christ, (in the original Hebrew) “disjointed of the Body”. He breaks out in contention against wisdom, which 1 Cor 1:24 considers as the personified Christ! Thus denominations are in reality a carnal break away from the Body of Christ. This is cause for grave concern.
- Sela: What does Scripture say about denominations? Figure out Eph 4:5-6.
- Read: 2 Kings 8; Jer 9; 1 Cor 8
- Memorise: 1 Cor 8:3
- For a deeper understanding: Examine John 17 in the light of this teaching.
