That accounts for a lot of the worst features of European history, but it does NOT, at any point, originate in the bible, or the church of Acts. It originated in reverting to a pagan model of priesthood, and then forcing the true forms and nature of Christianity to be interpreted - wrongly - through it.
Because everyone then believed that they had to have communion regularly to go to heaven, and priests had to give it, it was then necessary to have everyone get communion in church on a Sunday, because otherwise priests would have had to travel from house to house, and would have had no time for anything else.
Because they had to have communion in the church, then that meant that the religious meeting must be based around that act of communion. Because there were priests, worship from the body ceased, and had to originate from the priests, or they would cease to be priests as the term was now understood.
As a result of that, all of the personal knowledge of God was drained from the people as they expected to have the priest impart it to them. It was as though you ceased to go to the movies, and appointed one friend to go for all of your group of friends, and then come back and tell you about the story, a story that you could never go and see for yourself.
And thus real faith and personal knowledge of God were obliterated by the adoption of a model that did not come from Christianity, and was fundamentally inimical to it.
This only began to be changed in a major way when the bible became freely available in the languages that ordinary people spoke. Then they could see for themselves that the bible did not speak of this form of communion, or of priests in this form, at all; so those that looked and wanted to use the bible as the basis for their faith, began rejecting the church that they knew, and as a result countless numbers of them were killed by church or state (sometimes both) for doing so; countless Baptists and Quakers in Europe burned alive for preferring the bible to the monstrosity that had been forced on them.
But in the 500 years since that epoch, those who got out of the 'Laodicean' church and were not burned have carried on in many if not all of the traditions that were first imposed in Laodicea for the express purpose of controlling them, because they do not know how to do otherwise.
Today the forms of Christianity that are spreading are the ones that were known in Acts, based on a personal knowledge of God and the power of the Holy Spirit. Those churches that believe in formalism are dying, very rapidly.
If you want to worship in a religion without a reality, then there is nothing to stop you doing so, but it is only sensible to recognise that that is what you are doing, and that any real religion must fall outside of that.
If you want a real religion with a real God, the very fact that you CAN worship in a religion with no reality through symbols, and that the bible SAYS that the symbols are unacceptable to Christianity, shows that the use of those symbols is the biggest barrier you could ever have to a real religion, that is, one where you personally meet with a real God.
Many do not yet know that real God, or may doubt that he exists, but in that case think about the above; if you ever want to meet a real God, those forms are the very fastest way to avoid doing so. If you want to know the truth, you will never, ever find it out by entering into a form of religion in which the symbols are the only reality. The truth may be that there is no God or that there is one, but symbols that are worshipped in their own right will merely divert you from finding out the truth.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-12-26 11:49 pm (UTC)Because everyone then believed that they had to have communion regularly to go to heaven, and priests had to give it, it was then necessary to have everyone get communion in church on a Sunday, because otherwise priests would have had to travel from house to house, and would have had no time for anything else.
Because they had to have communion in the church, then that meant that the religious meeting must be based around that act of communion. Because there were priests, worship from the body ceased, and had to originate from the priests, or they would cease to be priests as the term was now understood.
As a result of that, all of the personal knowledge of God was drained from the people as they expected to have the priest impart it to them. It was as though you ceased to go to the movies, and appointed one friend to go for all of your group of friends, and then come back and tell you about the story, a story that you could never go and see for yourself.
And thus real faith and personal knowledge of God were obliterated by the adoption of a model that did not come from Christianity, and was fundamentally inimical to it.
This only began to be changed in a major way when the bible became freely available in the languages that ordinary people spoke. Then they could see for themselves that the bible did not speak of this form of communion, or of priests in this form, at all; so those that looked and wanted to use the bible as the basis for their faith, began rejecting the church that they knew, and as a result countless numbers of them were killed by church or state (sometimes both) for doing so; countless Baptists and Quakers in Europe burned alive for preferring the bible to the monstrosity that had been forced on them.
But in the 500 years since that epoch, those who got out of the 'Laodicean' church and were not burned have carried on in many if not all of the traditions that were first imposed in Laodicea for the express purpose of controlling them, because they do not know how to do otherwise.
Today the forms of Christianity that are spreading are the ones that were known in Acts, based on a personal knowledge of God and the power of the Holy Spirit. Those churches that believe in formalism are dying, very rapidly.
If you want to worship in a religion without a reality, then there is nothing to stop you doing so, but it is only sensible to recognise that that is what you are doing, and that any real religion must fall outside of that.
If you want a real religion with a real God, the very fact that you CAN worship in a religion with no reality through symbols, and that the bible SAYS that the symbols are unacceptable to Christianity, shows that the use of those symbols is the biggest barrier you could ever have to a real religion, that is, one where you personally meet with a real God.
Many do not yet know that real God, or may doubt that he exists, but in that case think about the above; if you ever want to meet a real God, those forms are the very fastest way to avoid doing so. If you want to know the truth, you will never, ever find it out by entering into a form of religion in which the symbols are the only reality. The truth may be that there is no God or that there is one, but symbols that are worshipped in their own right will merely divert you from finding out the truth.