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Tuesday, April 11, 2017

Preparing revolutionaries-proper role of the church?


Interesting question isn't it?  What prompted the question is that the local Congregational Church has that on their sign.  It raised a couple of questions for me.  First what are they revolting against?  Second, is it proper for the church to be doing that? 

Here is the Scripture selection for today.

Matthew 16:5-12(NKJV)
Now when His disciples had come to the other side, they had forgotten to take bread. 
Then Jesus said to them, “Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.”
And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “It is because we have taken no bread.”
But Jesus, being aware of it, said to them, “O you of little faith, why do you reason among yourselves because you have brought no bread? 
Do you not yet understand, or remember the five loaves of the five thousand and how many baskets you took up? 
Nor the seven loaves of the four thousand and how many large baskets you took up? 
How is it you do not understand that I did not speak to you concerning bread?—but to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” 
Then they understood that He did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and Sadducees.

The Congregational Church in Kalamazoo is quite a Liberal congregation.  So it is my belief that their sign is calling for Revolutionaries against what they consider to be unjust government policies. 

On the other hand, maybe they are actually following Jesus' example and they are calling for revolution against the "Pharisees and Sadducees" of the church today.  But since they are part of the "Pharisees and Sadducees" of today's Christianity, in other words the official power structure of the church, I would find it odd that they would be fomenting a revolution against themselves.   Because of that I think the first choice is more likely.

So on to the second question.  Is it proper?  There are some who would say they are following in the steps of Jesus by doing so.  I would beg to differ.  Jesus' revolution was against the power structure of the church.  Jesus on more than one occasion, when asked about dealing with governments said very specifically that we are to obey our leaders because God put them over us.  Give unto Caesar and all of that. 

So it seems to me that raising revolutionaries against the government might not fall within the boundaries that Jesus had in mind.  But I could be wrong.  Only time will tell.  At judgment day even though we are saved we still have to answer for our works or lack of works.  It is at that time we will find out if they were right or wrong. 

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