No, I don't. But let me qualify with the reasons why:
1.) Most standards that I have ever heard of are extra-Biblical in a two-fold sense:
a.) They are either straight up nowhere to be found in the Bible, one way or another, or
b.) They are private interpretations of the Holy Scriptures made by a select view who then hold them over the majority and demand allegiance to them, without the ability to discuss, question, or reject out of hand as bad interpretations
2.) Biblical standards as they are actually written in the Book, are primarily designed to do the following:
- Display Godliness
- Honor and glorify Christ
- Demonstrate the restored image of God that was lost in the Garden of Eden
If they are only ever seen as fences or safety-nets, all they are ever going to be to the person who thinks that way is as some kind of anti-sin, anti-temptation mechanism that may or may not work out in any given moment of the day.
This is such a negative approach to our call to holiness and modesty. Make your standards about helping you be more Christ-like, not about keeping you from being carnal and sowing corruption to your flesh by sinning.
It is the duty of the Holy Spirit to purge us of wicked works and evil imaginations. Lust is not controlled by neck-lines and sleeve length and lack of facial hair, or anything else you can name. It is controlled by an endowment of spiritual fortitude from the Lord Jesus Himself, so that we can become more like Him and less like our carnal selves.
I hope you can see the difference here. I really do.
3.) Standards are in no way, shape, or form, comparable to the old landmarks described in the Bible. Men from our movement of however many decades ago took a stand for many different things, which is fine for them, and perhaps, even for the movement, back then, but taking a stand for something is not the same as placing a heap of stones at the edge of your property with a sign that reads "John Doe's Land", or what have you.
So, using the Biblical phraseology regarding landmarks and standards needs to stop, across the board.
Why not? Since these stands they took are not ancient Biblical landmarks, what are they? They are merely human interpretations of certain verses of the Bible, or simply extra-Biblical mandates no one is required to follow, since they cannot be binding if they are mandated in the Scriptures.
Therefore, this idea that change ought not to ever come, or that it better not come from an external source other than the person who originally created the standard or took the stand way-back when is ludacris.
Listen, everyone in the Body of Christ has a voice and a right to speak, even if they are wrong about something. The duty then, if the person speaking is wrong about something, isn't to try and shut him or her up and keep everyone from listening, it's to carefully and with patience, show the person their error and help them come out from underneath it.
To do otherwise is to cater to the territoriality mind-set so prevalent in Pentecost, which is simply to say, many pastors don't want people from their church ever interacting or fellowshipping with another church because they are worried some bad idea is going to be put into their heads, or the pastor might try to poach them, or etc. I'm sure you are familiar with all of this, so I assume you get what I mean.
Who in Oneness Pentecost has died for us to have the truth? Or do you mean men like the Apostles? Other 1st century martyrs? John Hus? Tyndale?
"I believed, therefore I have spoken" (
Psalm 116:10, referenced by Paul in
2 Corinthians 4:13). If we do not speak what we believe, what are we? If we are too afraid to speak what we believe, what are we? If we have kowtowed to others and deferred to them while we know they are wrong, or simply just believe that they are in error, what are we? If we've been manipulated, coerced, or threatened into silence, what are we?
Brother, we must speak what we believe. And we must all trust God and His wonderful Spirit to help each and every one of us discern and divide the Word in a righteous way. This idea that being exposed to new or different ideas is the very thing Jesus overturned on a daily basis, because almost all if not all of the religious leaders of His day were WRONG.
There is nothing new under the sun. It is fully possible for everyone to be wrong, including leadership, elders, pastors, and etc. Until we admit that, and not just theoretically, but in application, and find a way to love and trust each other enough to address errors, or perceived errors, and have them redressed, discussed openly, and then, see the truth prevail, we are all stifled and injured.
We grow through perseverance, by passing trials of our faith. We need resistance, and lots of it, to become strong in the Lord and the power of His might. Withholding people from that growth is contrary to the demands of Scripture.
And one trial we all have to face and overcome is what to do with errors in our midst. What do we do with false doctrine? Private interpretation? False prophets? Honest mistakes? The whole lot and gamut, front to back, and all the related issues.
I can tell you, the answer is not turn tail and run. Rather, get in front of it and fight the good fight of faith. That is correct obedience and submission to Christ, the One who sends the trials to begin with.
I'm not sure I am reading this sentence correctly, but if I am, it's fine, you don't have to defend yourself, or feel like you are being besieged. As for me, I simply feel like we are talking, cordially, about an important topic, about which we all ought to be passionate.
Please, please, please don't make such an assumption! You ruin your credibility by playing the God must be convicting you/you're a mind reader across the internet, card.
But if that's what you really think, I can only surmise you have missed the point.
The verse in Jeremiah, so often quoted, is not about New Covenant shepherds. God is speaking to Judah, not the Church. He is speaking to a generation of people who had the ark of the testimony in their very midst, inside of the actual temple built by Solomon, and that, because those things were going to be destroyed by the Babylonians, there was going to come a time where the Jews were not going to be able to rely on those things. Instead, they were going to have to rely upon men like Jeremiah and the other prophets who would speak the Word of God during the Exile, and after it.
Again, stay within the context of every passage, or risk mutilating it.
See, this is where you and many others go off the rails. You admit context, but then claim a "principle" can be established based off the Word of God. That's simply not true. No principle other than what was being addressed can be created, and what's being addressed is determined by context alone. And nowhere does Paul address church government in
Romans 13:1-7.
There, for example, he mentions rulers who don't bear the sword in vain, meaning, they have the power and the right to execute people as a form of capital punishment. You cannot create a principle out of this for 21st century NT times, unless you start stretching the text way beyond the original intent.
And that's a no-no, I assure you. Take a look again at the Gospels and watch Jesus show how badly the Pharisees had created "principles" based off of the Word of God. The Talmud is full of the same thing. Jesus was against it then, so how do you think He feels about it now?
Although this question has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the content of my posts, or the veracity of their claims, I will answer, for your sake.
Do I go to church?
No. I and my family meet with and assembly with other members of the Body of Christ, which is the church. We go to where the meetings are held, but we don't "go to church". No one does, or can, because the church is a people, not a place.
Am I under leadership?
I am under the headship of Jesus Christ and the leading of the Holy Spirit. Additionally, there are wise and diligent saints in my life who set proper Biblical examples on what it means to be a Christian, through their service and hospitality, who help exhort and provoke me to love and good works, sharing the Word of God when they feel led. They pray for me, sometimes laying hands on me, if the occasion merits, and likewise occasionally, give advice or recommendations, or simply discuss the Holy Scriptures with me and otherwise, simply share in the grace of the Lord Jesus, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, with me.
This is probably not what you meant by "leadership"; well, maybe it is, I don't know for sure. But it is the Biblical model. And yet, whether the answer meets the criteria of your question or not, it has no bearing, except for you, to formulate an opinion about me and whether or not you will end up making certain considerations about me and what I have to say here at AFF.
Which is fine. It's right and just to do so. I expect and welcome it, because it's like I wrote above. Expose yourself to an idea, in this case, mine, and trust the Holy Spirit to help you rightly divide what I am saying, to determine whether or not it lines up with the Scriptures, a right that all God's children ought to have, and will one day have to have, because that trial is going to come knocking, sooner or later, and it's going to be Jesus on the other side, bringing it to you.
So, better get equipped. Whether it's here at AFF, somewhere else online, or another source, we all get exposed to new and different ideas, and we are the ones ultimately responsible for how we handle the experience and what we do about it when it happens. You never know. You might just find some truth you didn't have .
Re: Apostolic Classic Elder L.E. Westberg
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