Divisions in the Church

Leaving Our First Love to Fight Each Other as “Heretics”

Ian Johnson June 14, 2020 4 Comments

Christianity lost its true influence in the world when it pursued the power it could gain as a mass movement, stopped loving, and started fighting. One of the overlooked consequences of this was the rise of Islam.

Church purpose versus church growth, Divisions in the Church, Heresy, Islam and Christianity, Islam as a Consequence, Leaving Our First Love, Our Oneness in Christ book revision, Peril of Seeking Numbers, Peril of Seeking Power, Religious violence and persecution, Wars as consequences, What Islam borrowed from Christianity

Arabia, Arian, Christ, Christian, Christian history, Christianity, Church History, Coptic, enmity, hate, heresy, heretics, Islam, Jesus, Love, Montanist, Muhammad, Nestorian, Persian church, Quran, Quran 5:14, Trinity, Unity

Another Consequence of Divisions: Wrongs and Lawsuits Among Us

Ian Johnson June 11, 2020 1 Comment

Our disunity also leads to the multiplication of wrongs and injustices between us, often motivated by our greed. These wrongs lead to lawsuits among us. To our shame, we look just like the world in this matter!

Divisions in the Church, God Speaks to Us, Injustice and Lawsuits, Our Oneness in Christ book revision, Through others, Through the church, To live in unity

Body of Christ, Church, disunity, fraud, greed, Injustice, Lawsuits, Offenses, oneness, Unity, wisdom, Wrongs

The First Consequence of Division: A Sick Body

Ian Johnson June 11, 2020 3 Comments

Causes of division in the Body of Christ are compared in the scriptures to gangrene and leprosy. There are also valid comparisons to cancers and autoimmune disorders. Divisions have led to rejection of whole branches of the church by other branches, to religious violence and persecution and to bloody wars. They have also caused many to reject Christianity.

Death of Members, Divisions in the Church, Islam and Christianity, Islam as a Consequence, Our Oneness in Christ book revision, Religious violence and persecution, Wars as consequences

2 Timothy 2:16, 2 Timothy 2:17, autoimmune, battlefield injuries, Body of Christ, cancer, chatter, division, empty talk, gangrene, leprosy, religious violence, root of bitterness, sick body, spiritual battle, violence, war

An old dream about dirges, Sunday school classes, and the expectation to hide problems

Ian Johnson April 30, 2020 4 Comments

How a dream about the word “dirge” led me to recognize two of the major problems of modern Western churches: our insistence on hiding problems to preserve our “witness” rather than dealing with them in the Spirit (hypocrisy) and our one-way, “fact”-intensive teaching style.

Discipline or Correction, Emotions, End of the Churched Society, God Speaks to Us, Heresy, Historical Background, Human Rationality, Illness as a Consequence, In the Church, Meaning of Unity, Our Oneness in Christ book revision, Purpose of the Church, Restoration of God's Image, Restoration of our Relationships, The place of visions, Through others, Through the church, To live in unity

actor, Christian education, Christian witness, Common Good, Common Problems, Death, Dirge, Emotions, empathy, Fear of Death, Grief, how to teach, hypocrisy, hypocrite, Negative emotions, One Body, positive sales atmosphere, Sales, Sunday school, sympathy, witness

Leaving Our First Love to Fight Each Other as “Heretics”

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Another Consequence of Divisions: Wrongs and Lawsuits Among Us

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The First Consequence of Division: A Sick Body

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An old dream about dirges, Sunday school classes, and the expectation to hide problems

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Divisions in the Church

Leaving Our First Love to Fight Each Other as “Heretics”

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Another Consequence of Divisions: Wrongs and Lawsuits Among Us

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The First Consequence of Division: A Sick Body

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An old dream about dirges, Sunday school classes, and the expectation to hide problems

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