Your Religious Chains

This post is maybe not what you think it is. It's about the Body of Christ and how we relate to each other. How we perceive each other ...

First of all, there should not be anything in the "church" that brings a divide between us, where some people are elevated to some sort of special status over another while the rest of the people are just common folk. (clergy laity divide is apparently the religious term) Where some people can do some sort of service, which others cannot do.

Yes, there is a very real divide that is built in the church, but this divide is not sent from Jesus Christ. This is not a biblical concept. Anything that elevates someone to a special status over another is not what Christ demonstrated for His followers, nor died to give us. I don't care how you try to justify it, it is clear in Christ's Words that though a true leader is recognized within the body of Christ, it is not positional, as in a place of being "in charge" and "lording over". A true leader would be there to help guide the body and assist together in decision making which should involve each member of the body.

When are we going to take the New Testament seriously ? Each member of the Body of Christ is a part of the other, not separate from the other. Anyone who reads the New Testament seriously cannot ignore these truths and fail to admit that we need to stop practising this kind of distinction and elevate people with titles and names like Rev. so and so, Pastor so and so, while others waste away and never reach their potential. We DO need all the parts. But we need to stop excluding the parts that are sitting in the pews week after week. We are all equal and a part of the other. It is about community , it is about how we live out these truths that will or will not have an impact on another. Is our community life-sharing, life-giving, is it real as God intended, or is it just positional lording over others?

We need to evaluate these truths seriously in our hearts and acknowledge that many things that are being done in "churches" today are dead wrong, ,,, so many people are truly waking up and praise God for that .. because what is being "practised" for lack of a better word, is no where found in scripture. But true community is. You simply cannot find in scripture a church in the new testament that has one man in it as "The Leader", I mean that's a good starting point, isn't it ?

On a side note, 80 to 90 percent of "tithes" goes towards paying salaries and maintaining and paying for a building. Compare this to Acts 20 , Paul's heart and own words to His FELLOW believers:
"I have coveted no man's silver, or gold, or apparel. Yea, ye yourselves know, that these hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me. And when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down, and prayed with them all."

Paul had the kind of heart that was sincere and would not consider taking a salary from the saints that He loved dearly. Rather the other way around, he worked so that he himself would have the funds available - available to give to the poor, because he knew the need was so great and that was where his heart was. He loved and cherished the poor deeply. (oh to have a heart like Paul's) His heart was to have available the means to share with the poor and at the same time, not be a burden to anyone. He wanted to be free and to freely give to them... hmm