Buff Scott Jr.
Junior
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Why I Defected The Religious
Establishment
[Part III]
BUFF SCOTT, JR.
WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN
If apostles Peter and Paul had endeavored to spread the message of the risen Christ while working with and furthering the sects of their day, the new movement would have become stalemated and stagnated. If Martin Luther had burdened himself with the ecclesiastical anatomies of his time and had attempted to advance reform while clinging to their bosoms, his towering crusade to rid Catholicism of its corruptions would not have gotten beyond Wittenberg’s city gates. His famous words before the Imperial Diet at Worms, Germany in April, 1521 are descriptive of his restless, truth-seeking spirit of reformation.
“Unless I am refuted and convinced by testimony of the Scriptures or by clear arguments...my conscience is bound in the Word of God—I cannot and will not recant anything.”
Luther escaped the hands of his enemies on this occasion, but the “Unholy See” hounded and hunted him for decades. It was Luther who begged his followers not to call themselves “Lutherans” but simply Christians, saying that he had not been crucified for them. And because his disciples did not heed his advice, the Lutheran sect has become an integral part of the divisive dilemma within the Christian community.
But this is the history of all noble movements that become entangled in partisan, rival affairs. Their affections are no longer centered on the resurrection account but on building up the party. The world drifts farther into a state of darkness while institutional religion organizes, plans, scrutinizes, and develops new ways to increase the size of her sects and enlarge her church coffers.
If we hope to achieve reformation, we must reach beyond the established order and ecclesiastical structures. We must bypass religious sculptures, theological systems, clerical institutions, religious symbols and rituals. The activities, movements, and efforts of the first believers were unskilled, ordinary, unsophisticated, and informal—although serious and edifying. Our contemporary arrangement is perplexing, rehearsed, organized to the brim, ritualistic, formalistic, and boring.
As most everyone is elected to some church office, there’s no one left to enhance the practical aspect of the program! So the officers go around in circles, involving themselves in paper work, organizing meetings, filling speaking engagements, and otherwise doing nothing to convert the world. The world keeps hanging, if only by a thread, waiting for “Christians” to toss it the lifejacket of salvation.
But no! Institutional religion is too busy keeping her churches and organizations afloat to bother with the Great Commission. Millions are waiting for someone to bring them the message of salvation, but she sits around creating more organizations to implement the ones that have already become dormant and stale. Until the modern church becomes more interested in more people, she will remain out of the people business. She will eventually self-abort.
HOW MAY SHE BE AWAKENED?
Who can motivate the Religious Establishment? She will not be aroused until she discerns the urgency of the times and gets off her butt and out of her organizations and into the world, where Jesus said to go. Her elaborate church palaces stand as monuments to her failures and complacency. Her comfortable pews have weakened her, and her Reverends and Pastors and Priests have wrecked her. She demands to be spoon-fed by professional functionaries, even though she has had ample time to acquire the gift of mutual ministry. Where will it all end? The whole mess will culminate in the trash-heap of bygone religions unless the entire system is reformed.
It was individual Christian action that brought results 2,000 years ago, and it will take individual Christian action today to achieve the same results. When we, too, begin where the early believers began, we will turn the Religious Establishment and her “Pharaohs” upside down, just as the early believers turned the first century Establishment and her Pharisees upside down. We can do likewise by abandoning our comfortable pews, ceasing to demand that professional ecclesiastics spoon-feed us with their warmed-over “sermons,” and “going out into the byways and highways.” [Look for Part IV Wednesday, Aug. 7.]
If apostles Peter and Paul had endeavored to spread the message of the risen Christ while working with and furthering the sects of their day, the new movement would have become stalemated and stagnated. If Martin Luther had burdened himself with the ecclesiastical anatomies of his time and had attempted to advance reform while clinging to their bosoms, his towering crusade to rid Catholicism of its corruptions would not have gotten beyond Wittenberg’s city gates. His famous words before the Imperial Diet at Worms, Germany in April, 1521 are descriptive of his restless, truth-seeking spirit of reformation.
“Unless I am refuted and convinced by testimony of the Scriptures or by clear arguments...my conscience is bound in the Word of God—I cannot and will not recant anything.”
Luther escaped the hands of his enemies on this occasion, but the “Unholy See” hounded and hunted him for decades. It was Luther who begged his followers not to call themselves “Lutherans” but simply Christians, saying that he had not been crucified for them. And because his disciples did not heed his advice, the Lutheran sect has become an integral part of the divisive dilemma within the Christian community.
But this is the history of all noble movements that become entangled in partisan, rival affairs. Their affections are no longer centered on the resurrection account but on building up the party. The world drifts farther into a state of darkness while institutional religion organizes, plans, scrutinizes, and develops new ways to increase the size of her sects and enlarge her church coffers.
If we hope to achieve reformation, we must reach beyond the established order and ecclesiastical structures. We must bypass religious sculptures, theological systems, clerical institutions, religious symbols and rituals. The activities, movements, and efforts of the first believers were unskilled, ordinary, unsophisticated, and informal—although serious and edifying. Our contemporary arrangement is perplexing, rehearsed, organized to the brim, ritualistic, formalistic, and boring.
As most everyone is elected to some church office, there’s no one left to enhance the practical aspect of the program! So the officers go around in circles, involving themselves in paper work, organizing meetings, filling speaking engagements, and otherwise doing nothing to convert the world. The world keeps hanging, if only by a thread, waiting for “Christians” to toss it the lifejacket of salvation.
But no! Institutional religion is too busy keeping her churches and organizations afloat to bother with the Great Commission. Millions are waiting for someone to bring them the message of salvation, but she sits around creating more organizations to implement the ones that have already become dormant and stale. Until the modern church becomes more interested in more people, she will remain out of the people business. She will eventually self-abort.
HOW MAY SHE BE AWAKENED?
Who can motivate the Religious Establishment? She will not be aroused until she discerns the urgency of the times and gets off her butt and out of her organizations and into the world, where Jesus said to go. Her elaborate church palaces stand as monuments to her failures and complacency. Her comfortable pews have weakened her, and her Reverends and Pastors and Priests have wrecked her. She demands to be spoon-fed by professional functionaries, even though she has had ample time to acquire the gift of mutual ministry. Where will it all end? The whole mess will culminate in the trash-heap of bygone religions unless the entire system is reformed.
It was individual Christian action that brought results 2,000 years ago, and it will take individual Christian action today to achieve the same results. When we, too, begin where the early believers began, we will turn the Religious Establishment and her “Pharaohs” upside down, just as the early believers turned the first century Establishment and her Pharisees upside down. We can do likewise by abandoning our comfortable pews, ceasing to demand that professional ecclesiastics spoon-feed us with their warmed-over “sermons,” and “going out into the byways and highways.” [Look for Part IV Wednesday, Aug. 7.]
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