Zangetshumody
Member
- Joined
- Nov 19, 2009
- Messages
- 458
- MBTI Type
- INTJ
"Brother in the faith," you say? Like an organized church?
Like an establishment?
Like coercion?
How can man eat man when all people are alone and independent?
I do not endorse any of things you levy against me as part of having a spiritual brother.
I wonder if you quote me out of context:
It is not that you have a brother in the same faith. It is the point of how this particular faith describes and allows for 'the love of one's brother'.
1Jn_4:20 If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
1Jn_4:21 And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.
So: I am not referring to organised establishment at all; I'm asking as to the doctrine's position on relationship between those offering their spirit in accordance with the doctrine; and how much real support and autonomy is truly supported in that bond (according to the [particular] faith [under scrutiny]).
Of course a doctrine can be supported by a community being made up of various roles and offices (to just have leader and follower designations does not a community make); which will involve a kind of "establishment": in my church, each member contains all the gifts of all the offices;- each member can have visions and dreams, can prophesy. Often the prophet calls on others to prophecy and to access this gift. Because you cannot understand an office, unless the gift resides inside you also. The body of Christ is made up of members in particular, if there is but one member- s/he can be a member in particular (and so all circumstance is covered for) this was part of a teaching given by an Elder on a Sunday.
But my church is quite different from a lot of other forms of Christianity in its doctrine. We are not waiting for anything, we believe in Emmanuel (God with flesh); we have a clear distinction between spiritual understanding and natural understanding: the Priest has told me twice that Joseph is Jesus's natural (biological) father. We see Genesis chapter 1 as the story of the mind's development in man; we believe that God is a Word. This is an insight that John brought to Genesis in the New Testament. The biggest test of faith is: can you believe the spirit of God lives inside the corruptible flesh of someone else.