[CS-FSLUG] Don't Tread on Me?

[Ed Hurst]

I'm not reacting you specifically Jon, just using your comments as a  
springboard.

On Sat, 14 Aug 2010 09:15:32 -0500, Jon Glass <jonglass at usa.net> wrote:

> Comparisons cannot stand too much scrutiny, nor should too much be
> read into them. To be honest, I was merely trying to sort of keep some
> "on topic" sense to my point.

Agreed. The folksy expression is "You can't make a parable walk on all  
fours."

> Sorry, but I saw that as a tautology, since that is the supposed and
> stated goal of all "church" organizations, is it not? The question is,
> which allows Christ and the Holy Spirit the most freedom to work -- or
> put this way, which is the biblical of the various options? That is
> rather stark, but, I really don't think people want to read the long
> version of why I think this way....

I'll offer a summary of where I take this. I distinguish between Law and  
Grace. Grace covers the spiritual realities which so easily escape words  
and intellectual consideration. The mind was given by God to serve the  
spirit He brings to life in us; the spirit rules when we walk by His  
Spirit. The mind then organizes how the flesh carries out the demands of  
the Spirit-spirit communion. The Law helps us discern what it looks like  
in a broad sense, and was never designed to be an absolute rule, since God  
of all Persons knew it could not cover every case. It is not only proper,  
but required of us to abstract the Law.

How we organize our churches comes under Law, as it were. I'm sure few  
would agree with me, but as I read the New Testament, each church was  
modeled on the Hebrew household-clan structure. Not a matter of DNA, of  
course, because even under the Old Testament, anyone who embraced the  
Covenant fully was a Child of the Law, and any born Hebrew who rejected  
the Law was treated as a Gentile. The identity is in the covenant. Every  
church is a covenant family, and should be organized and operated like a  
Hebrew household.

You can probably extrapolate where I take it from there. Bring on the  
cheers and jeers, because I don't take myself that seriously. ;-)

-- 
Ed Hurst
------------
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Applied Bible - http://soulkiln.org/
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