Following Christ Requires Suffering, Death to Self, and Death to Religion

This week I week I started reading the sequel to Pagan Christianity, "Reimagining Church" also by Frank Viola. The first thing I took notice of as was pointed out to me by a reader of this blog some weeks ago. I have found I had to edit a paragraph in the Moving Toward Religion and Institution Free Jesus entry of my story. I stated I disagreed with Frank Viola as after reading Pagan Christianity I believed he promotes House Churches as the answer to becoming the Ecclesia Christ is building. I have to say that impression was not true at all Frank Viola is rightly teaching that the answer is organically gathering under Christ as the only Head of His Body. I now recommend every reader of this blog and every follower of Christ read all three books in what Frank Viola refers to as the Organic Church Series all authored or co-authored by Frank Viola and reading them in the following order if possible: The Untold Story of the New Testament Church, Pagan Christianity, Reimagining Church. All three of these books can be purchased from the Religion and Institution Free Jesus Book and More Store just click anywhere on this last line.
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I am an employee of the State of California and have been for 15 years. It was announced Friday December 19 by the Sacramento Bee news paper that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed an executive order that beginning February 1, 2009 I and all other California State Employees will be forced to take 2 days off per month without pay. To read the Sacramento Bee article making the announcement click here.

God has been very good to me in providing employment with the State of California. Nevertheless it has not been without some extreme challenges that I have been allowed by Father to experience. In some ways those circumstances have been more harmful than this act by our Governor. In the past under a different department and different management then I currently work for, but doing the same job I have had managers and or supervisors accuse me falsely of criminal acts and make other false accusations for which God has faithfully intervened and vindicated me, nevertheless in one instance it took 7 years for me to free of effects of the false accusation.

Under that same past management a supervisor once told me that God had told her to make me miserable until I would leave or quit and it was that manager's accusation that took 7 years to be free from the effects of and that was only about 6 months ago. That false accusation was in my employee file until it was brought to our new department Personnel Director's attention as she was been involved in bringing charges against that same manager for retaliation against another employee who brought a winning law suite against the State over the same managers behaviors.
Nevertheless that accusation prevented several departments from hiring me for promotional opportunities I had applied for after looking in my employee file.

Now I have to admit this current thing is challenging my faith and dependence upon God to meet my families needs. I am barely above entry level salary and my family and I have been living from pay check to paycheck as long as I have worked for the State, because of being unable to promote due to what was formerly in my employee file and now there is a hiring freeze. On top of what I have always done I am also currently doing the work that people used to do whose net monthly salary is twice or more what I gross . Nevertheless 2 months ago I began praying if God wants me to stay where I am if he would provide opportunities to work overtime and for the past two months I have been able to work a couple days overtime which has helped immensely especially in this season of life in which I as a single parent am starting this year to help both my daughter and son pay college expenses plus it has also provided more resources to share with those in far worse need.

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Back to the topic of church or in actuality the word church. I have been thinking for a while that we ought to stop substituting the word "ecclesia" with the word "church" as they have completely opposite definitions.

Ecclesia refers to an organic living organism its New Testament application means the community of all who are in Christ. In the United States we have falsely often been taught in churches, Bible Colleges, and even seminaries that the word church is is a translation of the Greek word ecclesia. In reality the word church is the English translation of the Greek word kyriakon. The definition of the word kyriakon is a physical gathering place and until the Roman Emperor Constantine supposedly became a Christian in Greco/Roman history kyriakon only referred to pagan religious or government buildings.

I personally find it interesting that it has been taught that the word ecclesia means the people of God and that the word church is the English translation of word ecclesia, but still the word church in our culture has come to be defined in our culture as buildings and institutional religious organizations which is the very definition of the word kyriakon. It is my belief that is, because when the ecclesia, began practicing the kyriakon/church system it, became conformed to the pattern or in other words patterned after the world system. You as I do may also find it interested that in various parts of the Greek speaking world the word kyriakon took on different pronunciations just like English words in the United States are often pronounced differently then in the United Kingdom. In the case of kyriakon variations were spoken with the letter "h" and those variations are where the English word hierarchy comes from. Interestingly churches have hierarchical leadership structures that are completely absent from the pages of the New Testament.

Satan is referred to has the God of this world system in 2 Corinthians 4:4 (New American Standard) it says "in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." The kyriakon was birthed out of the womb of that very system and therefore so is the word church. I say it is time we as followers of Christ stop using the word church and bible translators stop using it as it changes the meaning of the scripture and we have proven that we practice what the word church actually means regardless if we use the correct definition of the word ecclesia to describe what it means. I say to hell with church and all that has come with it lets send it back to where it came and start being the called out people of God who are in Christ in the world, but not of the world system the Body of Christ with only one head. Not the many headed beast called the church with self appointed leaders and hierarchical leadership structures.