I hope y’all don’t mind, but I’d like throw a bit of a challenge your way by pointing you to an online book written by Andrew Strom entitled “The Secrets of the Early Church“. What’s the challenge you ask? Well, it’s two-fold actually. The first is that it’s a lengthy read - definitely not for those who are distracted easily. But you who aren’t afraid to study a bit will find viewpoints here that you may be unaccustomed to - particularly if you’ve been walking out your Christian faith for any length of time. And therein lies the second challenging aspect: your preconcieved ideas about what “church” is will be called in to question.
Now, I’m not the sort of guy who jumps onto every bandwagon that comes rolling into town. And the truth is, I’m still in the process of wading through this document. So, despite the fact that much of what I’m reading so far really strikes a chord deep within me, I’m not going to try to “sell” you on all or even some of Mr. Strom’s views. But I will encourage you to simply take a look. Study it out for yourself. Allow yourself to be exposed to some teachings you don’t usually hear during today’s mega-Sunday-morning-multi-media-extravaganza-broadway shows. Then, see if the Holy Spirit just might bear witness…
Sep 18
This entry was posted 3 years, 2 months ago on Sunday, September 18th, 2005 at 9:43 pm and is filed under Living, Everything. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
1 Comment The Secrets of the Early Church
royaldghtr
September 19th, 2005 at 8:01 am
1It strikes a deep chord in me as well. Haven’t read the document in its entirity, but skipped around to see what he had to say on certain issues.
One point I do agree with is the fact that the church of Acts did meet together in each other’s homes and fellowship together. This is almost a lost art in the United States today. I long for the day that Christians really know one another. Affluence has cursed us today. When people had less and lived much slower lives (on the farm) it was common to have a neighbor drop over for a visit. It wasn’t considered rude either. It would have been considered rude to say you were busy that day and couldn’t visit though.
Perhaps God is allowing natural disasters lately, not as a curse but as a blessing to draw us closer to our fellowman. Just a thought. It has happened—people have been drawn closer together through tragedy. Though allowing disaster (from the author of disaster–the enemy) must be God’s last resort. It just shows how dire the situation is. The situation of our estrangement from one another, that is.
I would love to study the Bible together with other Christians in my home. The closest we have come to this in our home, is inviting others over to watch a downlink in our home and then having prayer and snacks together with converstion and Bible study.
http://www.theappearing.com
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