my rant

[A.W. Bowman]

While it is has yet to catch on through out the entire body of Christ, there are many folks who are no longer content to sit back and listen every week the same old song and dance from the platforms.Teaching of the word of God (feed my flock) has, for a very long time, become a reoccurring theme of religious propaganda (we are right, everyone else is wrong).

Some folks are actually starting to study the Bible for themselves - and what they are getting out of their studies is sometimes markedly different than the church dogma that is dished out every week, regardless of the organizational source. What is being demanded is that spiritual leaders start doing their assigned jobs of teaching and leading, not condemning and commanding.

The truth? Many of those in church leadership are there because they were called and ordained by men, not God. Their study of the word gets filtered through church dogma and man-made doctrines, so that the original word has become of no affect. Men and women are starting to use the resources for study that the internet provides to reexamine long held beliefs, to see if they are actually valid or not. What they are finding is that many doctrines were created by men who did not really know nor understand scripture, but interpreted it according to their own understanding and religious philosophies (1Tim 1:7). It is called 'indoctrination'. Personally I do like 'indoctrination', I long for fellowship (relationship) and sound teaching on how to improve that relationship with both God and man.

As a movement, we have never, well, almost never, moved beyond the doctrines a baptisms, the laying on of hands, etc (Heb 6:1-2). It is always the same old same old. The question remains unaddressed: Why? For the same old reason that has been used since the beginning of time: If you don't want people to think for themselves, keep repeating the same message to them over and over again. Tell them if they do not think your way and submit to your authority, they are evil and can not continue in your fellowship. Conform or be dammed. These are strong arguments and have worked for centuries.

People are starting, as the men of Berea, to ask hard questions. Questions are a danger to any establishment, religious or secular. So, another political movement is created and a new religious organization is started.

Communities such as this one allows those with questions, to ask - and to pole its members as to "what do you think, and why?" And, our religious leaders are having a hard time responding in a meaningful way. "Because I said so." is just not working any more.