On church succession

Lillian,

My first response to Zaynab was deleted.

I however expounded and reframed it, and posted it on my wall.

Like you said, we move…

But first, your 3rd point addresses a point I do not understand. Perhaps you are a member of that assembly.

As I mentioned in the reframed article, selecting whomsoever is to succeed a departed General Overseer is NOT a matter for public debate!

However, if you wish to justify it, a roll-call of well-known charlatans having done the same thing is not a very strong argument:

Warren.

T.D. Jakes.

Franklin Graham.

I have omitted Osteen because:

(1) I love him like a brother, and

(2) I know he was never groomed to succeed his father.

He was a cameraman in his father’s ministry, and when he told his mum that the Lord had spoken to him to take over the mantle of leadership, his mother laughed!

I heard his mum tell this story herself. Live. Not on TV.

The rest of my argument is on my wall, but the summary is this:

THE APOSTLES.

They gave us a formula for replacing “fallen” members of Church leadership.

Fallen spiritually.

Fallen physically.

Doesn’t matter.

That formula is the CASTING OF LOTS.

Ballots.

(Interesting. I never realized until now that “lots” is contained in “bal-lots.”)

Sons and daughters succeeding parents in Church leadership is a phenomenon found principally in what I call Prosperitarianity: Prosperity-Christianity.

Not even traditional African churches such as the Cherubim and Seraphim and Christ Apostolic Church routinely succeed leadership in this worldly manner!

Worldly?

Yes!

You find sons succeeding parents routinely in family businesses and corporate organizations.

If these churches are corporate organizations, then THAT is THAT!!

Let them only admit that they are BUSINESSES, stop the pretence and deceit, and no one cares.

But to pretend these “worship houses” are part of the Body of Christ?

That must be grievous to the Holy Spirit!

The personalization of these churches through hereditary succession must surely raise a profound theological question: if the Holy Spirit truly DID build these churches, should THEY not be afraid to proceed without seeking HIS leading, and without seriously considering the example of the early disciples in a matter as important as choosing a new leader?

My next statement is harsh, but it came to me just now:

“The Holy Spirit appears to do nothing at all, not even express His dislike for these leadership shenanigans, perhaps because He has nothing to do with a self-serving, heretical church system?”

They survive because God is patient and merciful.

NOT a single evangelical church I know meets all the good deeds for which the “Churches in Asia” were commended by Christ in the Book of Revelation. Yet those churches were still condemned, sometimes in extraordinarily strong language, for their shortcomings.

That should make serious Church leaders think.

Deeply.

Isn’t it ironic, and I’ve said this before, that churches such as these, which do not believe in the doctrine of Purgatory, are perhaps the ones which most desperately need it to be true?

I rest my case.

#Dk

#MyFrancisEssays

#WeMove