SUBJECT: Ministry

QUESTION:  Can you give a description of the ministry of your church?

ANSWER:

REGARDING MINISTERS: 

Assuming a minister does not have a special gift of some kind, the ministry IN GENERAL does not know more than a lay member.  Each member of the church has direct contact and link with both God the Father and Jesus Christ.  Each member and each minister has the same Holy Spirit.  Each has his or her own Salvation Process and each is alone in that process and responsible for and to it.  No minister can get a person into the Kingdom.  No person in the judgment can blame a minister or anyone else for failing to attain the Kingdom.

Ministers are servants and helpers in the Salvation process.  Sermons are an encouragement to the congregation to immerse themselves into the Word of God themselves.  Ministers can preach truth and true ministers always do (Matthew 7:15-20), but truth MUST be established in the heart and mind of the member (including the ministers) by their working in the Salvation Process (prayer, meditation, study, counsel) and proving each truth.

If ANY member EVER believes something a minister says, in and of itself, without proving it for themselves, they are IN ERROR, even if every utterance of the minister was ABSOLUTELY TRUE.  Each member must expose him or herself to every element of the Salvation Process.  The Bible is a handbook for the Salvation Process.  It contains all the truth one needs for Salvation, though it clearly does not answer every question a Christian could have.  There are many more subjects in God's realm besides Salvation and those things will be addressed when we are spirit beings.

REGARDING THE FLOW OF TRUTH:

1) I want to state that I have no Biblical foundation to believe that a person outside a church organization would somehow bring some truth to that church organization.

Example:

I do not believe that a member in Church organization A would bring great truth to the ministry in Church organization B.

2) I do not believe that a non-minister member in Church organization A would bring great truth to the ministry of that organization.

God has always brought knowledge, truth or some mission or instruction to a chosen servant and/or the leader of an organization.  Why would God do it the other way?  We know, absolutely, that God is the one with the truth and the mission and the instruction.  We know, absolutely, that He invented the ministry and put them in the congregation.  We know, absolutely, that God put the members in the congregation.  We also know, absolutely, that Satan is doing ALL he can to disrupt congregations and dissuade members.  We know, absolutely, that there are individuals in the Body of Christ, in various organizations who develop their idea babies, their special doctrines or who focus only on twigs, to the exclusion of the trunk of the tree doctrines and the Salvation Process.  These individuals OFTEN seek to get ministers to change their [the minister’s] beliefs and/or doctrines.

I want to make it clear that all this does not make ministers infallible or even special.  My point is that I have a belief that God (focus always on God) works the way He works.  That way seems clear in the Bible.  If it were true that God brought truth to an organization or the ministry through members and outsiders, then we would have to listen to thousands and even tens of thousands of members and outsiders on hundreds and thousands of issues.  The Work would grind to an abrupt halt.  Fact is, hundreds of individuals DO approach both Mr. Armstrong and me with new doctrines, specific issues, twigs, and idea babies on a WEEKLY basis.  I suspect the other organizations have the same experience.  I just do not have any Biblical foundation that God would bring truth this way and we must, as individuals and as organizations and as ministry live by every word of God.