I'm not opposed to proper boundaries. But I am opposed to a closed system ruled by fear.
Can you see the difference? (of course you can)
Absolutely agree! But again history reveals the place that fear held in the apostasy, leading to the corruption that Jesus and his apostles warned about.
This term in Greek (a·po·sta·siʹa) comes from the verb a·phiʹste·mi, literally meaning “stand away from.” The noun has the sense of “desertion, abandonment or rebellion.” Paul was accused of apostasy from the teachings of Moses. (Acts 21:21) Yet his accusers were the ones who had apostatised hundreds of years earlier. The last prophet Jehovah sent to his people was Malachi. As usual, they ignored the prophets sent to them.
Malachi’s prophecy indicates that the religious zeal and enthusiasm aroused by the prophets Haggai and Zechariah at the time of rebuilding the temple had passed away. Priests had become careless, proud, and self-righteous. Temple services had become a mockery. Tithes and offerings had lapsed because of a feeling that God was not interested in Israel. The hopes centered in Zerubbabel had not been realized, and contrary to some expectations, Messiah had not come. The Jews’ spiritual state was at a very low ebb.
History tells us that God did not try to correct his people again, instead he allowed them to do what they wanted until it was time for Messiah’s appearance.
By that time Judaism was what Jesus said....
“You hypocrites, Isaiah aptly prophesied about you when he said: 8 ‘This people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far removed from me. 9 It is in vain that they keep worshipping me, for they teach commands of men as doctrines.’” (Matt 25:7-9)
Their worship was “in vain” because they had lost the plot completely. In that environment Saul of Tarsus had been persecuting the Christians and believing that he was working for the good of the God he was serving. But after his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus, he turned around and became their enemy...an “apostate” from their corrupted teachings.
Fast forward to the second century and we see a weakened Christian Faith gradually eroding the teachings of the Christ and substituting human traditions just as Judaism had done.....history was repeating.
In the fourth century we see the installation of the Roman Catholic church as the mandated state religion of the Roman Empire. It was a political strategy to consolidate a religiously divided empire, combining pagan concepts and celebrations with elements of the Christian Faith. This corrupted form of “Christianity” then became the only form in existence for some 1500 years....deeply ingrained concepts that find no origin in scripture became doctrine, and are still in evidence to this day. Fear of the inquisition kept people from speaking up back then, and fear of burning in hell still keeps people in bondage. Where there is fear, there cannot be love. True love has to be the genuine motivator. Morbid fear has no place in a Christian’s life...our only fear should be in engaging in conduct that displeases our God. By our conduct we can lose his favour as was demonstrated throughout the Bible.
We all have the same choice today as the first Christians had in Jesus’ day. The Christian scriptures were recorded and the entire Bible is there for our benefit...to teach us how NOT to allow history to go on repeating with us. We have to identify all forms of false religion and remove ourselves from it. (Rev 18:4-5)
The “wheat” are in the world, but finding them is difficult when the devil has planted a whole forest of fakes around them. Like the genuine prophets before them as God’s messengers, the devil will make the “wheat” look like they are the “weeds”. The masses will stick to what they know and reject the truth because it seems wrong to them......but why? The strongly entrenched ideas planted by the devil all those centuries ago is the only “truth” they will accept. This is brainwashing at its best.
We have to examine the scriptures prayerfully and ask for God’s guidance because only he can direct us to his true servants.....(who wil be a hated minority like the first Christians were. John 15:18-21)....and only if we have the qualities that God is looking for in the citizens he chooses to live in his Kingdom. (John 6:65)
That Kingdom will “come” in ways that the majority do not expect, and only then can God’s will “be done on earth as it is in heaven”.....(Rev 21:2-4)