Greg writes..........

"it is not good enough to say the model is wrong, the model is not what our Lord is as interested in as surrendered vessels that He can have His way in."

This statement displays a lack of discernment. Of course the Lord is deeply interested in how we gather. Why do you think there was correction for the Corinthians? There is a difference between our personal walk with the Lord and the corporate gathering. Of course the Lord wants surrendered vessels, that goes without saying. Of course the Lord wants us to be sharing our faith with others and seeing people saved through that. Caged people do not share their faith. According to Barna, over 90% of professing Christians have never saw anyone come to a saving knowledge of Jesus through their personal sharing.

Greg you and I have disagreed many times over the years about " the system." Your position has changed many times. Back and forward, back and forward, like a wave tossed by the wind. Perhaps you should settle on a position brother, settle it in your mind. ...............bro Frank

~~~
It is God being present not 5 fold, 12 giftings, all speaking or one speaking. If the Lord is not present it is in vain.
~~~

Greg on that I agree. Jesus says below,

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Again I say to you, that if two of you agree on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by my Father who is in heaven. For where two or three have gathered together in my name, I am there in their midst...Mat.18:19-20
~~~

Brother seems that what Jesus is saying that there must be agreement. And the agreement can be in as few as two or three people where Jesus is present in their midst.

That is why I believe the next revival will be grassroots and in small groups. It will not be owned by a large gathering or by well-known pastors. The next revival will simply be Jesus manifesting Himself in small anonymous groups of people and moving on behalf of their prayers. For this is what is happening in the persecuted church.

As ever brother these are simply my thoughts.

Blaine

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Travis

Bro Travis writes........

" We have forgotten that our ultimate goal is to bring sons into maturity so that they can reproduce sons and bring them to maturity. Our job is not to help large groups of people survive until the next meeting. Our job is to raise them up and send them out and see them, hopefully, exceed us in every aspect of their spiritual lives. Thank you for this post."

Amen brother. This of course will bring us into conflict with the keepers of the status quo. It seems there is nothing new under the sun...............bro Frank

I believe we have, by and large, lost sight of the essence of the gospel. Jesus came to restore that which was lost in the fall. It is not all about prayers for forgiveness of sins and a far-off place called heaven or hell. It is not about God helping us through our daily lives. It is about bringing sons into glory. It is about His image being restored in us. It is about us once again being partakers of the divine nature.

But we have made it about saying prayers to change our eternal destinations and about having God help us live the lives we want to live. Case in point are the testimonies I have heard about people using their faith to believe God for a parking spot up front at Walmart. Testimonies like these show just how little we understand the gospel sometimes.

When we have an incorrect view of the gospel, it leads naturally to an incorrect structure that we call the church. It leads to church growth strategies and man-made programs meant to meet the day to day needs of those we minister to. It causes the body to view the church as a place where we employ men and women to minister to us each week. The church takes on a self-serving consumer identity.

But if we have a correct understanding of the gospel we will, I believe, naturally assume the structure God always intended. Men who have this understanding will be seeking God with their whole hearts. They will be seeking total life transformation, growing in intimacy with God, and will be receiving revelation of the word from the throne of God as they daily commune with God through the Holy Spirit. They will naturally become fathers and will desire to raise sons and daughters into fathers and mothers.

In their individual, local bodies, these men will hear from God about direction for the body. They might very well establish classes or programs as the Lord leads, but the motivation and end result will be much different from what we so often see in the modern American church. The goal will be maturity (Eph. 4), raising men and women to the measure of the full stature of spiritual manhood, and the fruit will be men and women who look increasingly like Jesus and who walk in His power. These people will change their communities. They will walk in the power of the Holy Spirit and, far from needing weekly ministry, will instead be ministers themselves.

It is a totally different paradigm from what we so often see today, but it is possible, and happening all over the Unites States and the world where people are after God's heart.

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Travis

Yes Amen!

That’s what I was attempting to articulate-

In Acts 13 they heard directly from Holy Spirit and if we are to walk in and keep step with the Spirit we have to hear directly from Him and obey.
Remember when Phillip, who was a very successful evangelist converting thousands, was told to go south and met with the Ethiopian eunuch... which seemed like an inequitable exchange as he was only one man, but today there are millions of Christians in Ethiopia all tracing there history back to this eunuch!
Now imagine if Phillip had the church structure being exposed in this thread and didn’t hear directly from HS, being content with his local success and missing the Lord’s will ?
We forget what the Lord can do with a surrendered vessel and instead employ mans marketing schemes:/

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Fletcher

Great posts by Fletcher and Travis, I say amen to the points raised................bro Frank

Greetings

I can second that amen to what Frank, Fletcher, and Travis have posted.

My own heart, it is incredibly difficult to have daily relationship with brothers and sisters in CHRIST when you only see them once/twice a week for a few hours? JESUS is all about relationship. HE IS ALIVE and wants to have an ongoing relationship with us daily!

How can anyone disciple another in just three hours a week? There are a 168 hours in a week and at most the average church goer spends 3 hours with other Christians...is that really enough time together to impact one another lives meaningfully?

On a side note, I do not comment so often any more Frank but you be sure to know that I read what GOD has for you to share here :)


God Bless
mj

Thank you sister, I appreciate that and know that many on SI consider you to be a most gracious and discerning sister in Christ. I totally agree with your comments. The brothers and sisters I am most close to are the ones with whom I have labored in prayer with over the years. You can really hear the heart of a saint when you hear them pray, not just once but many many times, you can really tell what lies at the center of their hearts and this is an intimate thing.

Tragically, for almost all churches, prayer meetings are a thing of the past, the most neglected of all the meetings because prayer meetings lift up Jesus and we labor together in prayer. This does not fit well at all with the structure of most churches where the central focus is the sermon on the Sunday morning. The central focus of every single meeting should be the presence of God and the preeminence of Jesus. Whatever flows from that, whether it be preaching or a word of knowledge or a tongue or a prophecy/exhortation or a spiritual song, this should be the focus of the saints, being led by the Holy Spirit in all things. Unfortunately I believe that this is simply a bridge too far for most. Only when everything is stripped away and all we are left with is Jesus, shall we finally understand that Jesus is all that we need.................bro Frank

[This statement displays a lack of discernment.]

[Greg you and I have disagreed many times over the years about " the system." Your position has changed many times. Back and forward, back and forward, like a wave tossed by the wind. Perhaps you should settle on a position brother, settle it in your mind. ...............bro Frank]

So you have better discernment?

Maybe you could have expressed yourself with a bit more respect for brother Greg.