[Cindy]

Originally Posted by jaamez

I would agree with this statement as well, and I hope you understand that my purpose is not to be contentious, my dear sister. My purpose is just to encourage non-traditional thinking that is open to the notion that how things are setup TODAY may not be how the first century church was setup. I've heard sermon after sermon of preachers saying that we should be seeing the same results that the first century church did because WE ARE the Book of Acts church. Well, in doctrine we probably are - I sure hope so. But in organization... not so much. We are not just a contemporary clone of the first century; we can't expect the same results if we're not willing to look deeper into what they really did and how they really operated.

I'll admit that the current structure of the church is very comfortable to me. It's familiar to me and I like it...and that makes me happy. But God's blessing does not always equal his endorsement or pleasure with something. He's blessing the current structure, I believe, because there are sincere hearts that are diligently seeking Him. But how much more COULD He bless, or WOULD He bless, if we were truly operating in the structure of the five-fold ministry that they had in the first century.

I posted this in another topic, but the theme of it applies here as well. God still blessed the people with water from the rock when Moses disobeyed. But His blessing clearly was in spite of disobedience.

I don't think anything has stayed the same since the first century churches, why should this be any different?