Christian order

[Staropramen]

Excellent post ElleJay!

[Kentucky]

ElleJay said

Why is our affliction light? Because we could be facing the WRATH of God, but by His grace we are not.

That is a really good-point to keep in mind. Thanks Elle.

Two choices:

1. the yoke of iron

2. the yoke of wood

Mark

[Kentucky]

If God wants us to learn & be humble....he won't give us nice lives we learn NOTHING from. He'll put us in the furnace....wether we have "faith" or not. Its the ones that have real faith by the end of it,...when theres no earthly reason to, he'll "notice".Thats my take on things. Personal experience [

Ever hear of Joseph of Arimathea? "Personal experience" does not trump Scripture.

Mark

[Joe]

Two choices:

1. the yoke of iron

2. the yoke of wood

Mark

His yoke is light. I think many white people will have a hard time.

[Nayto]

However if we do not order our personal lives first, and get our intentions in line with the intentions of Christ, then what is the use of proceeding? We shall only be assisting in the formation of another cult, which the world is full of and which we should seek to avoid.

If we do not all agree with Christ, then we will never build a cohesive communtiy, either in the "real world" or here online. If we compromise our agreement with Christ, then wedges are easily driven and those communities which we do try to build simply crumble.

By this reasoning at which point are we good enough to build a community? This is actually the first way for people to naturally think about situations like this but it is counter productive in my opinion. Using an example of IT systems development, the idea of building a system from the ground up in one go almost never works. One might think one has all the necessary resources, but there are always far more unforeseen problems. Also problems are far more difficult to deal with in established structures, especially in complex systems involving people. I'm not saying people are IT systems, but I think my experience with growing companies and systems is somewhat applicable.

The best approach is almost always to start with something small and build onto it, especially in circumstances where the end goal and surrounding environment are unknown. Cast aside the bad and keep the good, which is a process. I mean, one doesn't go from a state of being a complete sinner to perfectly ordering their lives and likewise a community doesn't do the same. Also a system growing from a smaller state establishes its legitimacy when it works and if it fails completely a lesson can be learned without as much loss.

Tying it back to Scripture, the apostles didn't wait for all members to have ordered their personal lives before ordering the community. There were core members who were elders who administered and made sure things weren't going awry.

Not having a community is even counter productive to most people being able to order their lives, especially in our movement where people are isolated. People are far more likely to fall by the wayside without community. There are some people made of stronger stuff who are able to order themselves, but people are weak willed for the most part. Also a lot of people don't have the attention span for forums and research, although I won't presume to know the reasons for the activity of the members of this forum. People who have put in the time and effort, having been afforded the grace from God, would form the elders, servants and administrators. For many being a part of something is what gives them the staying power for a longer haul. I'm not advocating a numbers game, but rather an environment more conducive for social types.

I also think that a prospective community shouldn't try to be more than what it deserves before its time. Acting out of turn and out of time is one of the most common mistakes in Christianity. We should start small and if it is not ordained, it will fail and our loss will be small. If it is ordained it will grow.

Starting small isn't reason to be morally lax in any way. Basic morals can be established i.e. That which can never be crossed or broken, whereas smaller doctrinal differences are tempered in friendship and collaboration. This is why companies have team building exercises and why personal relationships are encouraged more and more. You're far less likely to have a damaging argument with someone you are familiar with. Community builds familiarity. Arguments can still occur and relationships can still be damaged, but it is less likely amongst those who are familiar.

Those are my thoughts for now. Sorry if they're a little jumbled.

[Joe]

I am grateful for what we have. If CI grew we would need to build something better, I think it would be quite natural, we would hear the call and act. We would feel the obligation.

We have to be patient too.

[Kentucky]

I am grateful for what we have. If CI grew we would need to build something better, I think it would be quite natural, we would hear the call and act. We would feel the obligation.

We have to be patient too.

We are growing IMHO. It's just that we're having growing pains. We are building something, but it is spiritual. Our movement began in the 1950's and encompassed White people, of whom God did some pruning; then came the ministries and churches and they ran their course; we went through a period of encountering denominational baggage; the last ten years or so, many have gone semi-underground, forming home churches or study groups; this parallels along with the blessings and curses of the internet. I believe the next phase will be the overcomers i.e. those who get the epiphany to live as close as they can to being like Christ, overcoming the world. I don't know what comes after that other than the Second Coming of Christ and the sons of God manifesting the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. Those who know what I mean already feel their divine duties; nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ; love is the keeping of His commands. I got the call many years ago to not only hear the Word, but to be a doer of it. May we all be patient enough to first hear that still small voice.

Mark

[wmfinck]

By this reasoning at which point are we good enough to build a community? This is actually the first way for people to naturally think about situations like this but it is counter productive in my opinion. Using an example of IT systems development, the idea of building a system from the ground up in one go almost never works.

I am still very busy moving, so I apologize for having even far less time than normal for the Forum.

Agreeing with Christ does not mean that we should all know all things. None of us can know everything.

Agreeing with Christ means that we should all be ready and willing to be reproved and corrected by Scripture. Doing that, we will all be humble and concede that Christ is good, so we should follow His will and not our own.

Using an example of IT systems development (LOL), before the system can be built all the developers need to first agree on the language and the library functions.

Building a Christian community, agreeing with Christ means that the Bible supplies the language constructs (data types and operators, etc.) and the library functions, and not the will of man since individual wills may be non-compliant with the standards. If our wills are proprietary, then most likely we cannot agree.

If you programmed your routines using the Borland C++ library and I used the Microsoft C++ library, we would not be cooperating. So we had better stick to the standard C++ library. (Sorry my paradigm is so dated. So am I, LOL).

Sort of like demanding to inspect the original language of Scripture, to see if the interpreters had programmed their own routines on top of it. Things like stuffed functions and class inheritance apply to Bible translation as well.

[Nayto]

Starting small isn't reason to be morally lax in any way. Basic morals can be established i.e. That which can never be crossed or broken, whereas smaller doctrinal differences are tempered in friendship and collaboration.

Then lets agree on the language

Or at least start to agree. While saying this, in the back of my mind I think it is starting already.

EDIT:

Alternatively what is the plan? Is there one? There is the old adage that not planning is planning for failure. Obviously it is all a part of God's plan, not ours in the end. I revert back to my argument in the first post in this case that we are obligated to try to move forward.

[Kentucky]

Then lets agree on the language

Are you talking about the language of the Bible? If so, then it becomes a matter of "rightly dividing the word of truth" or discerning what God is communicating.

Alternatively what is the plan? Is there one? There is the old adage that not planning is planning for failure. Obviously it is all a part of God's plan, not ours in the end. I revert back to my argument in the first post in this case that we are obligated to try to move forward.

Yes, Bill has rightly mentioned that we're not really a movement anymore, because there's so many different directions that people are going in. But, some of our forward motion is caused by an enemy, which we should dutifully identify and shun as having nothing to do with Christian Identity other than to destroy it. We know who they are. God's plan per se is much like His will, because it goes directly to His sovereignty. Which begs the question, who's in charge?

Mark