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<TD class=PostTitle>Do the Churches Read Enough of God’s Word?
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<TD class=Post>Do the Church Pastors read Enough of God’s Word?  

I see the current state of the different sects of church in a fallen state at this time.  This is based upon where I live, not where you live.  I can only give you information that is subjective, my information, my experiences, not yours. 

The churches here in Richmond, Virginia are completely lost, absent of the Holy Spirit and lost.  The most they read is one or two sentences of scripture each Sunday, usually out of context, followed by some kind of handshake ritual, maybe a hug ritual, all smiling and acting like your friend even though they would never have you over for coffee or visit you for coffee. 

You would be lucky when going to church here if you read a whole paragraph of God’s word per week.  If that is not enough they expect you to be involved with some kind of church activities that take up more time but involve absolutely no spiritual growth.

The problem is time.  My wife and I both work six days a week and our daughter goes to Korean school on Saturdays.  So it is like our daughter works six days a week also.  This is modern society I guess.  No time for self, no time to read God’s word.  So our expectation from Sunday are maybe greater than most families.

Sunday school is no different.  You go there to learn and read what the bible says, what God says, and all you get is spoon fed unscriptural fluff that some evangelist wrote at sometime somewhere.  The elders always wish to read what another man wrote, never what God said in the bible.  When you point out that what the evangelist said does not line up with scripture the elder ostracizes you for daring to hold the group accountable to scriptural accuracy.  “Your making waves.”  They say.  “Your murmuring.” Others say.  Some say “Don’t rock the boat.”

Children’s Sunday school is even worse.  My daughter was learning absolutely nothing over the last 15 churches we visited over a ten year period.  The children’s Sunday were nothing more than a babysitting service in which they would do some kind of artwork or something.  Meanwhile my daughter was growing up and growing up fast.

I know some say “It’s not the church’s primary job to fill your family up with the word of God.”  And others say “This is the individual’s responsibility to read the word daily, get filled with the word.”  This is what I have to say to those people.  I see christians everywhere and very few people passing the gospel to their children.  The worst ones are the pastors and elders kids.  If they are an example it is not a very good one.  I see a  lot of people wearing polo shirts and playing golf but very little real spiritual growth. 

So time was ticking away and I just kept wondering, in two years is my daughter going to be on drugs, will she have the full armor of God to be protected from the tulmulteous coming jr. high years, or will she have to learn the hard way like I did.  Will she have to learn at the school of hard knocks.

So I just kept looking for a better church.  My expectations were not that high.  Just read a couple of pages out of the bible each week.  At the rate they were reading scripture it would take twenty years to get through the whole bible.  Hardly the armor my daughter needs to overcome all the spiritual attacks from, teachers on evolution, teachers on humanism, hollywood filth, Bus drivers playing ungodly music, friends with multiple piercings into gothic, teacher molesters, predators at your child’s bus stops, and generally all the cultural garbage of America.

If these things were not enough I started to notice huge areas being ignored or blacked out so to speak by these teachers and pastors.  They would always quote the different epistles of Paul out of context, usually quoting one or two sentences rather than reading the whole letter.  Usually these same teachers were teaching some part of mosaic law or part of many times related to tithing as such or some type of Sabbath teaching as such.  And forget about the old testament and prophetic books.  They would ignore those altogether.

Seems like a lot of acting like your doing something but very little real doing.  A lot of sailboats with no sails.  So after seeing my daughter almost grown up and my wife with very little spiritual growth I took a scary major step.  I decided to take my family out of church so we would have more time to get closer to God, more time to read the scriptures, more time to see what God said, in his word to mankind.  Rather than spend all day Sunday pretending we were getting close to God we decided to do it for real, in faith.  All of our families friends are christians anyways so we really didn’t need fellowship, we need to get filled up with the word of God.

The first couple of weeks were real rough.  My wife and daughter,(4th grade), were not used to reading the bible more than couple of sentences or paragraph at most weekly.  They kept getting sleep and it seems they weren’t used to it.  They were not participating very well.  Dozing off at our kitchen table during church.  Of course the times were longer.  The first three Sundays were about  eight hour church reading services.  We would sometimes sing songs as the Holy Spirit led us.  Quick five minute snack and lunch breaks here and there were helpful. 

My wife kept saying and comparing us to people in church and how little they were reading the bible.   I just kept teaching that anything, anything that separates us from God including pastors, friends, not following Sabbath, religions, sleepiness, anything that separates us from God is sin.  They agreed to get more rest before next Sunday. 

After about five to six weeks of this suddenly I started seeing them participating more, actually enjoying it.  We were making headway I thought.  I instituted an additional scriptural reading for my daughter before school each day.  She would start reading the bible at the beginning of each day with a little leadership to avoid reading scripture out of context. 

At about eight weeks their eyes were all shiny and bright.  It is now two years later and my daughter is in the sixth grade.  Last week my wife and I were used by God to lead one of her best friends to Christ, a catholic friend that was asking questions about god, from us.  My wife didn’t wish to answer her questions thinking her friend might be offended.  I told her just trust God.  A long story short after she joined us for a few bible studies during the week , my wife’s friend is now on fire for the Lord and actually tries to teach us.  Can you imagine that!  

Now all my daughter’s friends are christians because she wants to “be yoked” the same.  We still have to remind her once in a while though.

I can honestly say as looking back this was the best thing we ever did, to leave church to get closer to God.  My daughter told me about six months ago, proudly, that she learns more in one Sunday from her pastor Daddy then she learned going to church for a whole year.  My wife chimed in “I agree.”  I took this as a big complement.  I was jutting my chest out like a rooster.  I would not recommend this to everyone though, I was lucky, I had attended two different christian universities taking basic courses such as Old Testament survey.

So we have church every Sunday at the kitchen table and I believe this is now where God is calling the church, to leave church to begin church again.   We have learned more in the last two years than it would take going to church for twenty years.  How many of you believe we are the last generation, hugh?  Well, if you believe we are the last generation then that means the tribulation saints will go underground during tribulation.  Maybe the church is now being called out of the church buildings,  the buildings some people might say are the buildings of the pharisees.  Just a thought….

The amazing thing is that it has actually turned into an amazing blessing.  What was once struggle became spiritual growth.  What was dry bread became manna in the wilderness.  Anyways this was my story, how church became for my family.  I am really glad you did not misunderstand.  Sometimes people misunderstand when your experienc is different then theirs.  I think many people are that way sometimes.

To Intheson above,

                             I just don’t see any of the pastors teaching from the bible.  A lot of people that appear they are doing something but are doing nothing.  And as far as the down trodden and ghetto people here downtown, the church pretty much ignores them anyways.  I didnt say the father pastor would not consider prior theologians discourse, only that he would give it little weight in compared to the actual reading of scripture, actual interpretation of scripture via the Holy Spirit.  Now here are some questions for you:  Are you saying it is wrong to trust the Holy Spirit.  If you believe there is the Holy Spirit why not act on your belief?  Are you saying people of less stature and economics are less capable of spiritual growth and teaching their families about God?  Christ didn’t think so and most of those Christ ate with and hung out with were the downtrodden, poverty stricken and outcasts of society.  Are you saying only the educated are capable of spiritual truth?  Your logic is faulty.  The church experienced it’s greatest growth ever during the first three hundred years when most churches were in the homes and most groups had many spiritual leaders within a group.  Also, do you not know where God is taking the church today?  Haven’t you heard it was like this in the very beginning?  Don’t you know that God gave us all bibles?  Why do you think God gave them to us, to let a pastor tell us what we should and should not read?  You act like you know so much about God, anybody can quote scripture, but don’t you know that God is slowly teaching man to each be responsable for their own individual housholds?  Don’t you know that if history teaches us anything it is that all prior theologians are almost always wrong.  I have no desire to follow techings of man anymore.  As for me and my houshold, we will read God’s words always and serve the Lord! 

I am sorry!  Your statement that God did not give us the bible or the word of God sounds like the closest think to heresy I have heard in a long time!  And you think your a teacher?  You do not even know where truth comes from.  How can you teach truth when think the bible is falliable and came from man?  Your claim that God did not give us bibles goes against all accepted christian doctrine!  So are you saying it was never God’s intention to give us bibles so we can check and make sure pastors and bishops and priests are telling us the truth or not?  I think your teaching is nonscriptural!  You are also ignorant of history.  Don’t you know that going way back before Christ they were writing things down on the scrolls?  It was God’s intention from the very beginning for mankind to have a written word so that each man could teach himself and not rely on some false teacher somewhere that chose to not do a sermon on Paul’s Letters because of the teaching against mosaic laws like tithing, True Sabbath days, what you eat and festival celebrations.  Oh but the pastors and teachers and priests and bishops all hated that because they couldn’t manipulate the truth.  They couldn’t sell indulgences and twist and pervert the word of God.

You are so legalistic.  I wonder if people can even find God when you are attempting to lead them.  I get plenty of community going out and ministering to people I meet.  God uses me to minister to people all the time.  I think if what you are doing is what the Holy Spirit is leading you to do, fine.  Good for you.  But don’t judge me because the Holy Spirit leads me in a different direction.

I have also seen how little these ministries do for the spiritual growth of the downtown area.  They make everybody sign in so they treat the people they feed as income producers.  They do not hand out tracts nor are they concerned at all for the spiritual growth of those that eat their food.  Essentially they are not fulfilling the mission of the gospel because they do not preach the gospel.  The so called homeless they help are actually alcoholics and drug addicts that are mostly committing fraud on the American Social welfare system.  Essentially these churches have been putting all the businesses downtown out of business just so they can run their church business.  Many of these business owners are christians, fellow brothers and sisters, that lose their life savings because some churches have mixed communism and socialism with the gospel. 

They make everyone sign in, count the list, use that as an excuse to get funds from United Way and other government grants.  They also use that as a reason to get more donations from the congregants.  They do not actually teach the gospel nor do they hand out tracts. 

So you named two out of ten thousand churches here in the Metro area that in my opinion have actually increased the homeless problem since they started.  All people pretending to do something but when you look closer not really doing anything at all. 

Nothing more than taking people’s dignity by giving them handouts if they go and stand in front of this church or that church so everybody in the city can say “oh this church is so Godly.” or say “Look at how many people that church is feeding.”  Then drug addicts, convicts and alcoholics all over the East Coast want to come to Richmond, Virginia because of all the churches that hand out the free food. 

All revival starts in the family, all revival starts in the home, by the reading of God’s scriptures, to find out how the church got so far off track, and failed mankind just like the pharissees and Sadducees did.  All legalism, the blind leading the blind!