View Single Post
  #6  
Old 07-15-2009, 01:52 AM
greenbear's Avatar
greenbear greenbear is offline
 
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Ohio
Posts: 492
Default

Christians shouldn't adulate pastors and other christian leaders and christian leaders should not engender it:

Revelation 2:15 So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate.

(The Greek word Nicolaitans means "lay conquerors" or "conquerors of the lay people".)

Luke 6:26 Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.


I have noticed the word "shepherd" is not used in the pauline epistles. It only appears in the Old Testament, the gospels, and Hebrews and I Peter. "Shepherds" is only used through the gospels. The word seems to relate to the Jews only. The word "sheep" is only used once in the pauline epistles:

Romans 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

The context of the verse is that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, and that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, and that we are, in persecutions, hardships and death more than conquerors through Him that loved us. The context isn't that we are a bunch of dumb sheep that follow a man as our shepherd.

Romans 8:33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth.
Romans 8:34 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.
Romans 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
Romans 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
Romans 8:37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

No man is to tell us what to believe and how to live. Pastors/elders are to preach and teach from the Word of God. Their function is not to tell us what to believe and how to live. We are ALL members of the body of Christ. There is only one head and that is Christ.

Most of Christendom is a man-made edifice built by man to glorify man. The structure will remain behind after Jesus comes back to take His church to heaven with Him.

Thank you again, brother George, for the care you take in preaching and teaching the Holy Word of God.