I immediately thought of this verse also, Revelation 3:17 "You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked." - Jesus
The Christians in the book if Acts definitely had the Gift of the Holy Spirit. The so called "pastors" of today have their MDiv and a DMin. degrees, but they don't have the Gift if the Holy Spirit. The men and women in the Book of Acts "turned the entire world upside down". How????! By the Holy Spirit in them and their intense love of Jesus The Christ 💗. A friend of mine recently wrote a book about how today's American Church is Broken....mainly because non of the people in them have the Holy Spirit 😢😢😢😢😢😢😢. The Apostle Paul is very clear in Romans 8:9b. " If one does not have the Spirit, they do not belong to Christ." (My paraphrase). Most people who go to a church building today sorely lack the Holy Spirit in their lives. Let's face it, saying a Sinners Prayer does absolutely nothing to change the Heart. Good channel 👍. Keep up the good work and may God bless you and your family. Miss Monique 🙂🙏🌷
I appreciate your channel and your perspe tive of early church. When i talk with Catholics I always point to the NT especially the book of Acts and say thats the 1st church.
Thank you for your thoughts on this. It has been one of the main topics of my study for a long time. Miss Monique did a very good job of expressing what many of my feelings about this subject are.
There is no doubt that the “church” has become ineffective in its missions... which I believe is mostly because they do not know what their mission is. I do believe that a church should evolve in a sense as it’s members evolve. It’s members should definitely evolve because we are predestined to be conformed to the image of God, meaning that all who believe are predetermined by God to look like his son; all of us fall short of this of course so we should be evolving into a better picture of Christ. As we do this the “church” or assembly of called out, born again, baptized, believers with a structure not repugnant to the scriptures should also evolve. The mission of a local church Should not be one of building cathedral. If God’s kingdom was of this world than it might be a good thing for us to build art-filled buildings and focus on temporal things. But his kingdom is not of this world... yet. A question that I believe is fundamental to first century ecclesiology, and one you might consider doing a video of, is this: what form is the church? Visible, invisible? Local or universal? Rom says visible universal, Luther and most Protestants Say invisible universal. I believe the Bible teaches visible and local, with the exception of when we shall all by assembled with God, than it will be both visible local and visible universal. Christ founded the church at Jerusalem and as that church grew those churches (Also founded by Christ, through his finished work on the cross) became an independent body of Christ though held accountable by the apostle until their death, they were free to follow Christ as they believed he led them, even if into apostasy as found in revelation.
This is a great comment. My thanks for taking the time and giving me a challenge and a topic. I’ve been thinking of doing this topic for some time but haven’t had the bandwidth to address it comprehensively. I’m just so busy in business and family life. I’ll see what I can do
Hi Joe. Love your channel. Is there a way to contact you directly. I have a channel also, (The Spiritual Christianity Podcast), and I'm hoping to link up with other channels outside the religious system...engaging a spiritual brotherhood based on the original gospel and spiritual growth into the full measure of Christ. I'm also an author (The Sum of All Possibilities in Christ). < John
Is it possible that Christ didn't build the Church, the way he didn't build the Church, for a reason? I'm forever intrigued by the things Christ didn't do.
After studying this extensively, I’m convinced that he didn’t build the church like our modern churches on purpose. The early church had none of the drawbacks and all of the advantages except freedom of religion and far less financial means, and they still out performed on an order of magnitude. I’m certain that didn’t surprise Jesus.
@@firstcenturychristianity6864 - It's really quite staggering when you look at the decline of the Church in the modern era. I can't understand why people don't question modern doctrine as a cause. I guess you could just say it's science, and the development of human understanding, but we both know that not the case. Thank you for your ministry.
For a start, the Bible is the BEST place to start. We should find what doctrines are or aren’t taught, if we want to study ecclesiology we must first start with the Bible and move outward. It should be the foundation for every truth we believe “thy word is truth” John 17:17 After that I would look at those who carried the doctrines that align with the Bible. Luther was not the first to challenge Rom. Many men, women, and children stood against the umbilical doctrines of the mother of harlots - Roman Catholicism - and lost their heads for it. I would follow these people to get an understanding of how they viewed “church” and not all of them view it the same way. Good places to start for this would be foxes book of martyrs, martyrs mirrors, cross and crown and many other such books.
At first this seemed to make a little sense but then I thought more about it and went hold up, Christianity started as a tiny little religious following in a small sliver part of the world, and then blew up across the entire face of the earth over the last 2000 years….so of course Christianity influenced the world then in a way that it doesn’t, in fact couldn’t, now…because it went from unheard of to essentially heard of almost everywhere….but that doesn’t mean the church doesn’t have an impact now…the church is still making a huge difference, for example, Paul Washers church/movement alone has 380 missionary families in over 70 countries….and that’s just one church with many like it….Christianity has shaped the entire world, and the only way for the church to influence the world in the exact same way that it did in history would be to revert back to nobody knowing about Christianity, to it exploding over the whole earth again Just because the church doesn’t have the exact same influence it did as Christianity grew, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have any influence now and it’s somehow a bad thing for it to evolved in the way it has, generally speaking (there are ways in which parts of the church has evolved in a negative way, but there has always been little sects like that in history) ….we as the church are helping to build Christs kingdom here, we as true Christian’s, as the body of Christ, are each a little spiritual stone built on the conerstone of Jesus Christ which spiritually makes up the new messianic temple, each having the Holy Spirit within us, a little piece of heaven within us, and we should all use that to be light and salt in the world as we are called to do….there are some things that need to change, but they will only change with faithful Christian’s continuing to bear fruit on a large scale, as they have in history, and as they do now….we should strive to glorify God in all we do, in the buildings we build, in the families we build, the connections we make etc….let us grow and glorify God in all we do through the power of Jesus the messiah and the Holy Spirit who gives us the strength, courage and drive to do so
I think you’ve missed my point regarding influence. While I agree that Christianity has some level of influence today, it pales in comparison to the influence the early church had with far far less sums of money invested. In contrast the early church would have been the best investment ever while the results of the church today is pathetic, even without factoring in the massive amounts of money and treasure funneled into Corporation Christianity. You’re welcome to sink your treasures and time into modern Christianity. I’m just saying that history records a much better format of Christianity.
@@firstcenturychristianity6864 i understand your point, I’m saying the difference in influence is because Christianity was still growing at a rapid rate expanding over the world so of course the influence looks different than today….if you’re talking the big multi million dollar mega churches that funnel in money and goes who knows where, I agree with you to an extent….but we as people in Christs kingdom should do everything to the glory of God, including making money at our jobs and being faithful stewards of that money, and hopefully leaving an inheritance for our children for them to faithfully steward over as well….I guess your point is just so broad brushing that it doesn’t seem to provide any solutions to the issue you’re bringing up, and there are other factors that didn’t seem to be factored in
@@traymaunu8330 My point is that the early church existed and functioned from a huge deficit, in terms of freedom, finances and social standing. They still managed to influence the world for Christ on an order of magnitude higher than any could have predicted. In contrast, if the same church existed today, with the freedom, finances and social acceptance that we enjoy now, the influence that Christians should be experiencing SHOULD be even greater that the first century Christians experienced. It would certainly be astronomically greater than what we see evidenced today. I’ve become convinced that the primary reason for this disparity is not due to greater freedom and finances, but rather that our structure and function, both internally and externally, is nothing like the model Jesus established. We’ve accepted the theory that the further we progress from the model of the early church, the more effective and productive we will be for Christ. Unfortunately, most Christian’s don’t want to consider this evidence because we like the community we’ve created, and are comfortable in it, even though there’s this niggling suspicion that something isn’t quite right. We’ve been groomed to accept a substitutionary priesthood with its clergy laity separation, and a corporate structure that bleeds the assembly as bad or worse than politicians do financially. This Corporation Christianity severely handicaps the spiritual growth of its members, but operates under the cover of spiritual placebos and platitudes. Modern Christianity has become a bigger den of thieves than the Levites ever dreamed of, without the slightest scriptural validation to do so.
@@traymaunu8330 That’s a great question. Basically to return the Christianity norm to first Century model, including a revival of a Melchizedek priesthood, repudiation of the pseudo Levitical one, and a return to Grassroots Christianity instead of the Corporate.
I immediately thought of this verse also, Revelation 3:17 "You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked." - Jesus
The Christians in the book if Acts definitely had the Gift of the Holy Spirit. The so called "pastors" of today have their MDiv and a DMin. degrees, but they don't have the Gift if the Holy Spirit. The men and women in the Book of Acts "turned the entire world upside down". How????! By the Holy Spirit in them and their intense love of Jesus The Christ 💗.
A friend of mine recently wrote a book about how today's American Church is Broken....mainly because non of the people in them have the Holy Spirit 😢😢😢😢😢😢😢.
The Apostle Paul is very clear in Romans 8:9b. " If one does not have the Spirit, they do not belong to Christ." (My paraphrase). Most people who go to a church building today sorely lack the Holy Spirit in their lives. Let's face it, saying a Sinners Prayer does absolutely nothing to change the Heart.
Good channel 👍. Keep up the good work and may God bless you and your family.
Miss Monique 🙂🙏🌷
I appreciate your channel and your perspe tive of early church. When i talk with Catholics I always point to the NT especially the book of Acts and say thats the 1st church.
Just found your channel and it’s beautiful. Thank you.
I couldn’t agree with you more❤
Good point! I have been saying the same thing
Thank you for your thoughts on this. It has been one of the main topics of my study for a long time. Miss Monique did a very good job of expressing what many of my feelings about this subject are.
God does not change , he is the same in the past, now and forever more
There is no doubt that the “church” has become ineffective in its missions... which I believe is mostly because they do not know what their mission is. I do believe that a church should evolve in a sense as it’s members evolve. It’s members should definitely evolve because we are predestined to be conformed to the image of God, meaning that all who believe are predetermined by God to look like his son; all of us fall short of this of course so we should be evolving into a better picture of Christ. As we do this the “church” or assembly of called out, born again, baptized, believers with a structure not repugnant to the scriptures should also evolve.
The mission of a local church Should not be one of building cathedral. If God’s kingdom was of this world than it might be a good thing for us to build art-filled buildings and focus on temporal things. But his kingdom is not of this world... yet.
A question that I believe is fundamental to first century ecclesiology, and one you might consider doing a video of, is this: what form is the church? Visible, invisible? Local or universal? Rom says visible universal, Luther and most Protestants Say invisible universal. I believe the Bible teaches visible and local, with the exception of when we shall all by assembled with God, than it will be both visible local and visible universal. Christ founded the church at Jerusalem and as that church grew those churches (Also founded by Christ, through his finished work on the cross) became an independent body of Christ though held accountable by the apostle until their death, they were free to follow Christ as they believed he led them, even if into apostasy as found in revelation.
This is a great comment. My thanks for taking the time and giving me a challenge and a topic. I’ve been thinking of doing this topic for some time but haven’t had the bandwidth to address it comprehensively. I’m just so busy in business and family life. I’ll see what I can do
Hi Joe. Love your channel. Is there a way to contact you directly. I have a channel also, (The Spiritual Christianity Podcast), and I'm hoping to link up with other channels outside the religious system...engaging a spiritual brotherhood based on the original gospel and spiritual growth into the full measure of Christ. I'm also an author (The Sum of All Possibilities in Christ). < John
I’d love to hear from you. You can contact me at verifyveritasfcc@gmail.com
Is it possible that Christ didn't build the Church, the way he didn't build the Church, for a reason? I'm forever intrigued by the things Christ didn't do.
After studying this extensively, I’m convinced that he didn’t build the church like our modern churches on purpose. The early church had none of the drawbacks and all of the advantages except freedom of religion and far less financial means, and they still out performed on an order of magnitude. I’m certain that didn’t surprise Jesus.
@@firstcenturychristianity6864 - It's really quite staggering when you look at the decline of the Church in the modern era. I can't understand why people don't question modern doctrine as a cause. I guess you could just say it's science, and the development of human understanding, but we both know that not the case. Thank you for your ministry.
Our church is a seeker church scared to death to touch on abortion and LGBTQP, but not tithing.
If you follow the first four books of the NT, a " pastor " can't become a $$$ multi millionaire by "doing ministry ".
Where is a good place to study church history? So far I got to orthodoxy.. 🤷🏽♂️
Earlychristianwritings.com is one of the best resources. Strait from the early church elders without interpretation or bias.
For a start, the Bible is the BEST place to start. We should find what doctrines are or aren’t taught, if we want to study ecclesiology we must first start with the Bible and move outward. It should be the foundation for every truth we believe “thy word is truth” John 17:17
After that I would look at those who carried the doctrines that align with the Bible. Luther was not the first to challenge Rom. Many men, women, and children stood against the umbilical doctrines of the mother of harlots - Roman Catholicism - and lost their heads for it. I would follow these people to get an understanding of how they viewed “church” and not all of them view it the same way. Good places to start for this would be foxes book of martyrs, martyrs mirrors, cross and crown and many other such books.
At first this seemed to make a little sense but then I thought more about it and went hold up, Christianity started as a tiny little religious following in a small sliver part of the world, and then blew up across the entire face of the earth over the last 2000 years….so of course Christianity influenced the world then in a way that it doesn’t, in fact couldn’t, now…because it went from unheard of to essentially heard of almost everywhere….but that doesn’t mean the church doesn’t have an impact now…the church is still making a huge difference, for example, Paul Washers church/movement alone has 380 missionary families in over 70 countries….and that’s just one church with many like it….Christianity has shaped the entire world, and the only way for the church to influence the world in the exact same way that it did in history would be to revert back to nobody knowing about Christianity, to it exploding over the whole earth again
Just because the church doesn’t have the exact same influence it did as Christianity grew, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have any influence now and it’s somehow a bad thing for it to evolved in the way it has, generally speaking (there are ways in which parts of the church has evolved in a negative way, but there has always been little sects like that in history) ….we as the church are helping to build Christs kingdom here, we as true Christian’s, as the body of Christ, are each a little spiritual stone built on the conerstone of Jesus Christ which spiritually makes up the new messianic temple, each having the Holy Spirit within us, a little piece of heaven within us, and we should all use that to be light and salt in the world as we are called to do….there are some things that need to change, but they will only change with faithful Christian’s continuing to bear fruit on a large scale, as they have in history, and as they do now….we should strive to glorify God in all we do, in the buildings we build, in the families we build, the connections we make etc….let us grow and glorify God in all we do through the power of Jesus the messiah and the Holy Spirit who gives us the strength, courage and drive to do so
I think you’ve missed my point regarding influence. While I agree that Christianity has some level of influence today, it pales in comparison to the influence the early church had with far far less sums of money invested. In contrast the early church would have been the best investment ever while the results of the church today is pathetic, even without factoring in the massive amounts of money and treasure funneled into Corporation Christianity.
You’re welcome to sink your treasures and time into modern Christianity. I’m just saying that history records a much better format of Christianity.
@@firstcenturychristianity6864 i understand your point, I’m saying the difference in influence is because Christianity was still growing at a rapid rate expanding over the world so of course the influence looks different than today….if you’re talking the big multi million dollar mega churches that funnel in money and goes who knows where, I agree with you to an extent….but we as people in Christs kingdom should do everything to the glory of God, including making money at our jobs and being faithful stewards of that money, and hopefully leaving an inheritance for our children for them to faithfully steward over as well….I guess your point is just so broad brushing that it doesn’t seem to provide any solutions to the issue you’re bringing up, and there are other factors that didn’t seem to be factored in
@@traymaunu8330 My point is that the early church existed and functioned from a huge deficit, in terms of freedom, finances and social standing. They still managed to influence the world for Christ on an order of magnitude higher than any could have predicted.
In contrast, if the same church existed today, with the freedom, finances and social acceptance that we enjoy now, the influence that Christians should be experiencing SHOULD be even greater that the first century Christians experienced. It would certainly be astronomically greater than what we see evidenced today.
I’ve become convinced that the primary reason for this disparity is not due to greater freedom and finances, but rather that our structure and function, both internally and externally, is nothing like the model Jesus established. We’ve accepted the theory that the further we progress from the model of the early church, the more effective and productive we will be for Christ.
Unfortunately, most Christian’s don’t want to consider this evidence because we like the community we’ve created, and are comfortable in it, even though there’s this niggling suspicion that something isn’t quite right. We’ve been groomed to accept a substitutionary priesthood with its clergy laity separation, and a corporate structure that bleeds the assembly as bad or worse than politicians do financially. This Corporation Christianity severely handicaps the spiritual growth of its members, but operates under the cover of spiritual placebos and platitudes. Modern Christianity has become a bigger den of thieves than the Levites ever dreamed of, without the slightest scriptural validation to do so.
@@firstcenturychristianity6864 like I said I agree partly, but what are your proposed solutions ?
@@traymaunu8330 That’s a great question. Basically to return the Christianity norm to first Century model, including a revival of a Melchizedek priesthood, repudiation of the pseudo Levitical one, and a return to Grassroots Christianity instead of the Corporate.