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Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Answers, Unanswered Bible Questions, Notes Ordered by Verse | ||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | is selling in a church building fine? | John 2:13 | retxar | 59691 | ||
EdB, I have a lot of respect for the things you have to say, bro, but for lack of better judgment, I felt I needed to air out my thoughts here. I have a really hard time thinking of the Temple of Jesus's day as being the same thing as the Church building we have today. What we call the "Church", is a building constructed by men to offer a place for believers to come together to worship God. It is not what people often times refer to as "Gods house". Gods house and presence is no longer behind the veil of the Temple, but in the heart of believers, who are now His temple. To give a Church building that same glory today seems to violate Jesus’s prophesy in John 4:20-24 and seems to be an attempt to sew the veil back up. To me, it seems to accommodate people’s view of the building, not God’s view of His people. I understand what you are saying about things being done in church today that take away from worshiping God in spirit and truth, as He requires, and that cannot be compromised, but when we can approve of something for the simple reason that it is not done on church property, that somehow seems wrong and hypocritical to me. If I felt it was wrong for a musician to offer CDs after a service to support his ministry, I would also feel it was wrong for him to offer them at any other time or place. If I thought it was wrong for a church to offer tapes of there services to cover their expenses in the church library, I would also have to say it was wrong for them to mail them out. If I thought it was wrong for the women’s group to have a fund raiser to help with a mission project on the church’s property, I would also have to say it was wrong for them to have the same thing somewhere else. If I thought it was wrong for the youth to have a hot-dog supper in the Church’s fellowship hall, I would also have to be against them renting the local community center and doing the same thing. I know from reading most of the post, that maybe most people here have a different view of this matter than I do. Maybe even a lot of people I go to church with have a different view too. I also know that even unbelievers have been lead to believe that the Church building is “God’s house”, and that if anything happens there other that a normal church service, that it somehow dishonors God. I know that we are to not cause others to stumble, so sometimes, I guess, we have to do things for appearances sake. But I cannot help but believe that God is after our hearts, not our appearance. Anyway, I would be very willing to change my view. I will listen to anyone who knows of any coming together of NT believers that God honored more because of the building they met in. Or perhaps if God was dishonored in someway by any of the other day to day things that might had taken place there in the place where they were meeting. Worship Him in spirit and truth! retxar |
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2 | is selling in a church building fine? | John 2:13 | EdB | 59738 | ||
Rextar You and I agree on pretty much the same things so I find this difference interesting. Ministry is a call upon ones life, it is not a vocation, a career or a job. It is a lifestyle. Today too many have that point confused, many enter the ministry thinking it to be a great job or fantastic career. Unfortunately our pulpits and churches are showing the results. The matter is not that your buying and selling. If your going to sell your talents why not be up front hold a concert/seminar and pitch your wares. If you coming to worship God worship Him and bless the people. Don’t let the ends “I’m doing this to support my ministry” justify the means “merchandising in the house of God. “ First I think every Christian has the obligation to pay for his own seat. In other words if the person feed you spiritually you are indebted to feed him physically. And here is the first failure we have churches full of free loaders. They want air conditioning, heat, good preaching, pleasant surroundings but they want someone else to pay for it. That is wrong and there is no excuse for this in the church today. If everyone paid his fair share there would not be a need to “support my ministry”. But since the church has that upside down does this give the person the right to merchandise in the church? No. Why don’t they go get a job or learn to live on what they do receive. If God truly gave them the ministry and they were faithfully doing His will I guarantee you God would see they had the means to carry on. It is God’s promise He said he would provision us to do His work. Rextar why do you think Jesus cleansed the temple driving out both the buyers and sellers? What lesson do you think he was teaching us? Remember he knew the temple would become worthless for that style of worship within a few weeks. So what was his reason? EdB |
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3 | is selling in a church building fine? | John 2:13 | nimrod2 | 59750 | ||
ED states: "we have churches full of free loaders" Oh Ed, I really can't believe this is how you feel! What shall we do? Have an auction and sell the free loaders to the Muslims? |
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4 | is selling in a church building fine? | John 2:13 | EdB | 59751 | ||
Nimrod2 Your taking bits and pieces and dicing them up. You know exactly what I was saying here. I'm saying there are people within the church today that are not supporting the church. They take and they take. Am I blaming them, not until I understand if they have been taught to know beter. One of the things the church is responsible to do is to teach people they need to share the load. It is not necessarily equal giving but it should be equal sacrifice. Now if you don't mind please do not take something I said out of context and try to make me appear to be an heartless uncaring person. EdB |
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