http://blog.metacentricities.com/2007/12/08/spiritual-authority/ The intersection of vertical lines through the center of buoyancy of a floating body when it is at equilibrium... A collection of centers... Where religion, politics, science, technology, the environment and Michelle's brain and life meet. Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:32:56 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 http://blog.metacentricities.com/2007/12/08/spiritual-authority/comment-page-1/#comment-4360 anon evang Mon, 17 Dec 2007 22:22:44 +0000 http://blog.metacentricities.com/2007/12/08/spiritual-authority/#comment-4360 As someone who was once in a group that used this book by Watchman Nee, I can tell you that there's a real potential of abuse with that perspective. If your view is that the person in authority over you is God's deputy authority, then to disobey that person is to disobey God. That kind of authority can lead to control. I saw this happen, with people assuming that the decisions of the leader in our church were automatically the same as God's decisions. If you think, "Right or wrong, it doesn't matter, I'm just going to submit to God's authority," you are ignoring the aspect of living before Christ Himself. The Christian life must include personal contact and fellowship with Jesus Christ. As someone who was once in a group that used this book by Watchman Nee, I can tell you that there’s a real potential of abuse with that perspective. If your view is that the person in authority over you is God’s deputy authority, then to disobey that person is to disobey God. That kind of authority can lead to control. I saw this happen, with people assuming that the decisions of the leader in our church were automatically the same as God’s decisions. If you think, “Right or wrong, it doesn’t matter, I’m just going to submit to God’s authority,” you are ignoring the aspect of living before Christ Himself. The Christian life must include personal contact and fellowship with Jesus Christ.

]]> http://blog.metacentricities.com/2007/12/08/spiritual-authority/comment-page-1/#comment-4069 Mata H Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:56:08 +0000 http://blog.metacentricities.com/2007/12/08/spiritual-authority/#comment-4069 I really do like the Lutheran take on this -- that ordination/ministry does not exist apart from community. A person is called to a position of leadership by a community for the sake of convenience and good order, not because of some exalted image of their holiness. A direct quote from Luther --" To make it still clearer. If a little group of pious Christian laymen were taken captive and set down in a wilderness, and had among them no priest consecrated by a bishop, and if there in the wilderness they were to agree in choosing one of themselves, married or unmarried, and were to charge him with the office of baptizing, saying mass, absolving and preaching, such a man would be as truly a priest as though all bishops and popes had consecrated him." I really do like the Lutheran take on this — that ordination/ministry does not exist apart from community. A person is called to a position of leadership by a community for the sake of convenience and good order, not because of some exalted image of their holiness. A direct quote from Luther –” To make it still clearer. If a little group of pious Christian laymen were taken captive and set down in a wilderness, and had among them no priest consecrated by a bishop, and if there in the wilderness they were to agree in choosing one of themselves, married or unmarried, and were to charge him with the office of baptizing, saying mass, absolving and preaching, such a man would be as truly a priest as though all bishops and popes had consecrated him.”

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