Showing posts with label contemplativeness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contemplativeness. Show all posts

Tuesday, 19 May 2015

Not everyone in the churches of Christ are “ungodly”

English: A of .
English: A of . (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Last Thursday up tot the end of the weekend it was time again for the many communion feasts and Spring feasts in Belgium.
The Catholic churches have to face a lessening in communion feasts. The second communion is mostly placed aside to celebrate with the humanists and atheists their Spring feast.

It is the sign that more and more people are leaving church. They complain about the several acts of church people which are not acceptable by ethic and normal people. The population has encountered to many cases of paedophile clergy, which has made them lose interest in those who should preach the faith in sacred love and love for God.

Lots of people spit on the church, but they do forget that there are many more churches than the Catholic Church. They also seem to forget that not all the priests and bishops in that Catholic church are such pervert beings. Strange also when they would really believe in God, that they do not seek for other solutions, other churches, other people of God.

Would we all "have to blame Jesus Christ for Judas Iscariot?" asks also John T. Polk II.
His answers is:
No, because “Satan entered Judas” (Luke 22:3). {5-8-2015 Why Reject Jesus’ Church?}
He still considers his church as the church of Christ, the body of Jesus Christ today (Colossians 1:24), and wonders why to blame the churches of Christ for the “ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ” (Jude 1:4 NKJV)? 
But should the church not be an example for the gentiles? Should those who are in charge of the church live according to what they preach and according to what they demand from their flock?

He is right in saying:
It seems people want to dismiss the churches of Christ by emphasizing the hypocritical few.
We also may not reject Jesus because of Judas, and should not reject the church of Christ because some have failed to be faithful.
Paul wrote “To the saints and faithful brethren in Christ who are in Colosse” (Colossians 1:2).
Everyone in the churches of Christ are not “ungodly,” anymore than all Apostles are betrayers of Jesus Christ!
John T. Polk II writes

People should come to see that there are many more churches than the Roman Catholic church or any other church where they bow in front of crucifixes, graven images and paintings, contrary to the demands of the Most High God.

It’s useful to realize that we are two years away from marking the 500th Anniversary of the “symbolic” beginning of the Protestant Reformation, noted to have begun on October 31, 1517 by Martin Luther.

Peter Traben Haas  writes:
Of course, like all movements, it is impossible to peg a precise date, since often such movements emerge from within a multi-dimensional environment with diverse social factors and influences. But, for all practical purposes, Luther’s posting of the 95 Thesis is as good a moment as any to mark the Reformation’s beginning. {2020 Vision & Formation 2017}
Throughout the ages many changes took place. We even can notice when there where efforts to come back to the Word of God, the Scriptures Alone, and getting away from the idolatry, the bowing down in front of pictures, we can see in those renewal movements a shift took place after a few years and as such in many protestant churches we can find today also again a lot of pictures or Christ and of God and even of different saints.

Peter Traben Haas does think that
2015 is a good time to begin thinking about how Christianity has changed since then, and how Christianity is currently evolving, and more importantly, what might be the next phase of spiritual evolution Christianity is moving into. Everything is growing, including the sphere of consciousness in which Christianity “lives, moves and has its being,” and we would want to grow with it. Most of us are, which is probably one reason why you are reading this.{2020 Vision & Formation 2017}
For sure anno 2015 lots of 'church people' do not take much time to read the bible or to spend time with or to pray to the Most High God.
the contemplative dimension of Christianity is a niche “market,” primarily visible in monastic communities and other like-minded teachers, groups and organizations, such as Richard Rohr or Contemplative Outreach. For the majority of Christian’s, though, “contemplative” is a “boutique” way of being and doing Christian life, totally appropriate for retreats and monasteries, but not yet ready for the mainstream, so the thinking goes. But such ignoring and resistance is about to shift into attention and acceptance. {2020 Vision & Formation 2017}
writes Peter Traben, who would like to see a
Sola Silence. Sola Solitude. Sola Stillness,  Simplicity and Service.
But God perhaps does not want such a silence. God and His son want us to go out in the world proclaiming the Good News. Coming closer to the end times we should shout even more clearly and pronounce to the world the necessity to come closer to God and to worship the Divine Creator, thanking Him for His son who has brought salvation to the world.

Those who love God should let others know that they love the heavenly Father and that they would like to see that more people would come to love this Only One God. It is our task to let the world that not all people are ungodly or are people who love to tell lies or do not mind telling lies. The world has to know that there are still many people who prefer not to tell lies and to worship that One God Who did not tell lies.

That God said about the man in the river Jordan that he was His begotten beloved son. His words we should accept and spread throughout the world, so that all people can come to know Jesus Christ, our saviour, the Messiah.

We also should invite those around us to come to visit us at our meetings, our church, which is the Body of Christ. In-there we should show them what the real  love of Christ is and how we want to share that agapé love with each other. To the world we should prove that there are other churches, who have people who really want to live according to the Laws of Christ and to the Laws of God.

It is up to you, believer, to show the world not all in the Church of God are ungodly.

°°°
If you are looking for a church with men and women who want to be 'set apart' as godly people, please contact the Christadelphians.
Find the Christadelphian Church in Belgium: Ecclesia Brussel Leuven

+++