The following Scripture passages are offered to aid beginning fellowships. The readings and commentary for this week are more in line with what has become usual; for the following will most likely be familiar observations. The concept behind this Sabbath’s selection is judging rightly.
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Weekly Readings
For the Sabbath of February 6, 2010
The person conducting the Sabbath service should open services with two or three hymns, or psalms, followed by an opening prayer acknowledging that two or three (or more) are gathered together in Christ Jesus’ name, and inviting the Lord to be with them.
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When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life! So if you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church? I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers, but brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers? To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? But you yourselves wrong and defraud—even your own brothers! (1 Cor 6:1–8 emphasis added)
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If it is a defeat of righteousness to have lawsuits, with righteousness having a disciple suffer wrong, can the disciple place any importance on the things of this world? Plus, what constitutes a “trivial case”? Is it not trivial cases that Paul addresses, and do not these trivial cases pertain to the things of this world as opposed to questions pertaining to salvation and to whether an angel under condemnation should be given a reprieve? And do trivial cases involve all things of this world, or just cases involving the relatively unimportant things of this world?
If disciples can forgive the sins of anyone or withhold forgiveness (John 20:23), then disciples have the authority to resolve cases involving heavenly matters.
When Paul asks the saints at Corinth why they bring trivial cases before unbelievers, Paul has already made the judgment that the man with his father’s wife is to be delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh. Paul has already told the saints that they erred in tolerating the fellowship of the man, that sin was as leavening, and that they were to purge out the old leaven of ungodliness and keep the festival with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. And in commanding the saints at Corinth to deliver the man to Satan, Paul has judged a matter without hearing the man speak, without a trial-like hearing, without any of those things that secular courts afford to defendants. Paul issued a summary judgment based on hearing that such a situation existed, meaning that evil in the form of transgressions of Moses presents so serious of a problem to a fellowship that it must immediately be rooted out of the fellowship.
If the saints at Corinth were to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread inwardly with sincerity and truth, would these saints eat leavened bread that represented malice and evil during this festival? Can the body [the flesh] eat what represents malice and evil while the inner new man keeps the festival with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth? Or does not the person who eats leavened bread during the festival wrongly judge the matter?
The above questions are not trivial: if a person eats malice and evil during the festival will not the heart and mind be tainted and corrupted? Or will malice and evil pass from the person in a bowel movement, thereby leaving the heart and mind pure? Will deliberately eating what is leavened during the festival not be considered malice and evil? Can the mouth do one thing and the heart another? Or should not the person who deliberately eats leavened bread during the Feast be delivered to the Adversary whom this person apparently desires to serve?
The person who eats old leavening during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which spiritually began at Calvary but physically runs each year from the 15th through 22nd of Abib, wrongly understands Scripture and is not a person who can judge the Church or a matter in the Church.
Is the above a reasonable application of Scripture? Would a fellowship permit a man known to lust after women who are not his wife to judge matters in the Church? The man would be guilty of adultery before Christ even though his adultery is “covered” by grace in the heavenly realm and by inaction in this physical realm. But how would this man judge a situation involving adultery? Paul wrote, “Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God” (Rom 2:1–3). Therefore, would not the man who lusts when judging another who has committed adultery condone rather than condemn, for if he condemns he condemns himself? Hence, evil is tolerated within the fellowship, with this evil as leavening (yeast) spreading throughout the fellowship; for Jesus came to save sinners—is this not what is routinely said in Christian fellowships?
Pause and consider what happened to the Church in the 1st-Century. If Paul laid the foundation for the house of God through what he taught about Christ Jesus, and if no one can build on another foundation and be part of the house of God, then those in Asia who left Paul (2 Tim 2:15) were building on another foundation and were not part of the house of God. Likewise, those in Judea who sought Paul’s life built on another foundation and were not part of the house of God; those in Achaia who questioned whether Paul was even of God built on another foundation; those in Galatia who had begun to circumcise the flesh were no longer of Paul and were building on another foundation. Who’s left? James and the first disciples. Who else? Not many. Certainly none of the so-called Church fathers from the 2nd through 4th Centuries; for when the Apostle John dies about the end of the 1st-Century (100–102 CE), the Body of Christ dies with him just as Jesus’ earthly body died at Calvary at about 3:00 pm on the afternoon of the 14th of Abib in the year 3791 (in working from the calculated calendar, the month would have been Lyyar 3791). For the hours from three to six, Jesus’ earthly body was visible but very dead. Likewise, from the end of the 1st-Century until the Council of Nicea (ca 325 CE), the Body of Christ was visible in this world but dead. At Nicea, when the Emperor decided the issue of whether the Church would continue to observe the Passover of the 14th of Abib or would celebrate a new festival, Easter, a holiday that mingled the sacred with the profane, the Emperor buried the lifeless Body of Christ so that it was no longer visible in this world. The Christianity that emerged from the Council of Nicea was bastardized paganism, through and through.
All Christians who eat old leavening during the Feast of Unleavened Bread are automatically excluded from judging between brothers in Christ. They are unbelievers, and they should be treated as unbelievers even though they bear the name “brother.” And the pool of Christians able to rightly judge a matter has greatly shrunk.
It is true that Jesus loves sinners, but not the sin they commit. But if these sinners do not love Jesus enough to strive to walk uprightly before God, they do not return to Christ the love He has for them—and this is a situation seen in human infancy. A newly born human baby is fully dependent upon his or her parents, and selfishly demands that needs are satisfied. The parents love the child and strive to provide for the child, but the parents’ love is not immediately returned by the child even though the child bonds with his or her parents and will for the remainder of his or her natural life do things in a manner similar to how his or her parents did those things. The child’s love for his or her parents develops as the child matures, but develops from dependency and trust. And so it is with God: a disciple’s love for God develops from dependency and trust and will have the disciple obeying God when the disciple has matured enough to return rudimentary affection. This means that a disciple when first born of God will not necessarily keep the commandments but will pray for things, asking God to provide for the disciple in a manner analogous to the bawling of a human infant when hungry or wet or uncomfortable. Only when this infant son of God “matures” to an age comparable to a human infant of a year old will the disciple begin to walk uprightly before God through keeping the commandments; for the disciple can spiritually see him or herself through the behavior of a human infant. When the disciple begins to keep the commandments, the disciple is as a human infant who has begun to walk and who no longer crawls on hands and knees wherever he or she wants to go.
The problem that presently afflicts the Church is really one of arrested development: because of what men such as Martin Luther taught, generations of Christians have crawled on their bellies as if serpents instead of standing and walking uprightly before God, keeping the commandments of God as children obeying the directives of human parents. And about those who crawl as serpents, the Apostle John writes,
Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother. (1 John 3:4–10)
The seed of the Adversary crawl as serpents before God; they refuse to stand and walk uprightly as spiritual bipeds. And because they did not stand and walk when the promise of entering Christ’s rest stood, they cannot enter 20 or 30 years later. They become crawling beasts that are vessels of wrath endured for a season.
Human infants are dependent upon their parents for socialization, for verbal skills, for wanting to stand and walk uprightly … in a sad story that came to public awareness November 4, 1970, with the arrest of the elderly parents of a 13-year-old girl codenamed “Genie,” a modern wild child, the victim of severe isolation, the child and later adult never learned to communicate in sentences. The team assembled by Los Angeles’ Children’s Hospital to care for Genie received a private screening of The Wild Child, directed by Francois Truffaut, a movie based upon the diary of Jean-Marc Itard, the young physician who sought to civilize the wild child known as Victor, discovered in 1800 in southern France; the movie premiered in Los Angeles a week after Genie was discovered. But Itard failed to fully civilize Victor—the reality of what happened to Victor was not the triumph nurture over nature, but the realization of Eric Lenneberg’s critical period hypothesis which holds that if a first language isn’t acquired by puberty, it might be too late for the person to become a language user: after six years, Itard gave up on Victor, who lived out the remainder of his life with the housekeeper of France’s National Institute for the Deaf in a forlorn existence. Victor learned to read simple words, but he never really learned to talk. And Genie, who mastered many vocabulary words, never learned to construct sentences. Victor died in his forties in 1828; Genie, at last report, lives in an adult foster care home in southern California. Both seem to demonstrate that if a human being is prevented from living as a human being when young—either from intentional abuse or from neglect—the human child will not develop those traits that are characteristic of humankind, with the grammatical use of language topping these characteristics.
The above holds true for sons of God … if an infant son of God is prevented from obeying God, then as this son of God ages in the company of sons of disobedience, who, as if wild animals, crawl on their bellies as the bondservants of the Adversary, this son of God becomes unable to stand and walk upright before God and speak to his Father as a human child speaks to his natural father. In a human infant of six months age, or of seven months, the person who has been born of God can see him or herself immediately prior to when this firstborn son begins to keep the commandments, especially the Sabbath commandment, and thereby walk uprightly before God. Unfortunately, as a human infant lacks developed self-awareness when six or seven months of age, the spiritual son of God lacks discernment prior to walking uprightly, keeping the commandments by faith. And if the spiritual son of God delays for decades walking uprightly, this son of God will never be able to stand and speak to this son’s Father—
The writer of Hebrews says,
Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. As it is said,
“Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”
For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was he provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.
Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened. For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said,
“As I swore in my wrath,
‘They shall not enter my rest,’”
although his works were finished from the foundation of the world. For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.” And again in this passage he said,
“They shall not enter my rest.”
Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, again he appoints a certain day, “Today,” saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted,
“Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts.”
For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.
Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. (Heb 3:12–4:11 emphasis added)
If a disciple does not enter into God’s rest as exemplified by Sabbath observance when the disciple is still a spiritual infant, this disciple when he or she ages in the faith will not be able to enter into God’s rest because of unbelief: the disciple will become a wild son of God, a wild child that cannot be socialized into the household of God. And all of this bears directly on judging the Church.
What does it say about the Church when lawsuits are brought because there is no authority in the Church able to compel restitution in even trivial cases? What does it say about disciples that one who claims to be a brother defrauds another who is a brother?
The Church is not a wolf pack; it is not a family of coyotes. There will be no Romulus (who allegedly slew his wild brother Remus) in the kingdom of God. Rather, if an infant son of God does not enter into God’s rest while the promise of entering stands, entrance isn’t afterwards possible. And the Christian Church that is visible in this world is formed from those Christians who suffer from arrested development by not entering while the promise stood. They might well be as engaging as Genie was with researchers, but they are not able to organize their thoughts along godly lines so that they can speak in spiritual sentences. Instead, they speak as spiritual livestock to be sacrificed when the heavenly temple of God is dedicated.
The 1st-Century situation Paul addressed with the saints at Corinth differs considerably in outward application from situations disciples face in the 21st-Century and even from the situation Paul would face in Asia: Paul would not have asked Phygelus or Hermogenes or any of the saints in Asia that turned away from him (2 Tim 1:15) to judge even a trivial matter between brothers. By turning away from him, the saints in Asia ceased being qualified to judge the Church; so in Asia there was no one wise enough to settle a dispute between brothers. There were no longer any brothers. There were only those who walked as enemies of Christ, with their minds set on earthly things (from Phil 3:19).
This reading could stop here, for the person who eats old leaven during the Feast of Unleavened Bread walks as an enemy of Christ and this person is most all of Christianity. But the theoretical doesn’t always translate well into the applicable. Whereas greater 21st-Century Christendom walks as an enemy of Christ; whereas Christian America walks as an enemy of Christ Jesus and does not walk as Paul walked when imitating Jesus, for Paul outwardly as well as inwardly kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread (e.g., Acts 20:6), genuine disciples are few in number and not easily found.
When running material through a gold sluice, the overburden is rapidly screened away. A separator of some sort (classifier screen) is used to send the larger stones to a tailing pile for they will dislodge the gold in the riffles if they are run through the sluice—and the Sabbath functions as a primary classifier. But it is the annual Sabbaths that function as riffles, with the Feast of Unleavened Bread being the first set of spiritual riffles that traps gold while sending the lighter theological “stones” on down the sluice as worthless tailings. Therefore, the disciple who does not outwardly keep Unleavened Bread wrongly judges Scripture and is part of the centuries of Christian overburden now visible in mounded tailing piles; for the disciple who will not keep the festival with sincerity and truth will keep it with malice and evil.
If genuine disciples are spiritually as gold nuggets are physically then are there genuine saints today who have the standing necessary in the Church to judge a matter, and by this disciple’s moral authority, compel good behavior? If there are, who would that disciple be?
The disciple who has standing to judge a matter cannot be a novice, nor can this disciple teach error; for teaching error or teaching when the disciple has not been called by God to teach speaks to the discernment of the disciple. The disciple who teaches error lacks discernment. The disciple who teaches when not called to teach practices Christian hubris. This disciple lacks discernment, a necessary prerequisite for righteously judging a matter. Thus, when the ministry of various fellowships cannot agree on even what the endtime good news is that must be taken to the world as a witness to all nations, there is no oneness within Christendom. There is no life in the Body of Christ. And disciples are as untested gold, nuggets of mixed metals that will be refined before the disciple is glorified, with this refining coming by trials in this world and by trials brought on by other disciples.
Truly it is a shame when one Christian brings a lawsuit against another, but the question must be asked, is the Christian who defrauds another really the brother of the one whom he defrauds? Is not defrauding another ample evidence of a failure of faith?
It is here where Philadelphians must pause for a moment: if a person in this world defrauds a Philadelphian, does Paul enter a prohibition against the one who is defrauded bringing the matter before the law? He does not, does he? The law exists as an extension of the governing authorities that have been ordained to be God’s avenger against the wrongdoer. Therefore, when a person clearly of this world defrauds a Philadelphian, the one who has been defrauded has the right to pursue restitution in a civil lawsuit, which does not mean that the disciple has to sue or even should sue but that the disciple retains the right to sue for redress.
If a person calling him or herself a Christian defrauds a Philadelphian, what’s to be done? If this Christian is theological overburden—a stone from the tailings—this Christian is really not a brother to the Philadelphian; for gold is not shale. The one who has been defrauded retains the right to pursue restitution as he or she would against a person of this world, which again does not mean that the one who has been wronged cannot bear that wrong or should not bear that wrong. It is the one who has been defrauded decision as to how this person will proceed, with no condemnation coming to the one who seeks legal restitution.
If a person calling him or herself a Philadelphian defrauds another Philadelphian then the matter should be handled within the fellowship; for within Philadelphia are disciples who have the standing necessary to judge a matter. But a question emerges: is the one who would intentionally defraud a brother really a brother? The answer simply is, no, such a person is not a brother but a heathen who should be delivered to the Adversary for the destruction of the flesh. Thus, this transgressor’s intentions determine how he or she will be treated.
There will be times when, within a community of brothers, a business deal is not executed as it should be. Sometimes no one is at fault, but usually one brother misjudges what he or she can do. This misjudging of ability causes the one not to perform, thereby causing harm to the other. Thus the one who is at fault for the failure to perform should acknowledge his or her fault and should seek from the other what the other deems as equitable reparations. If no agreement can be reached between the brothers, then the matter will eventually have to be judged by the Church, and by someone with the authority to compel restitution—and it’s here where bringing a matter to the Church breaks down; for there really is no authority within Philadelphia to compel good behavior if the transgressor is willing to leave Philadelphia and become part of another association.
Christian America practices lawlessness, and because of its lawlessness it has absolutely no standing in the Church of God. And even among Sabbatarian disciples, most sects grant at least one free divorce and multiple opportunities to defraud brothers. Revilers and drunkards are not put out, but are encouraged to seek counseling. Why? Because if a brother doesn’t like a judgment, the brother joins another sect, one that will excuse bad behavior in order to gain another tithe payer … the sect takes a bribe paid on an installment plan.
If disciples are to settle trivial matters within fellowships, with these trivial matters including serious cases of fraud or of one who calls him or herself a brother swindling another, who has the authority to compel restitution? Inevitably, the one who has been swindled will have to accept being swindled; for the swindler will simply move to a different city or to a different fellowship within the same city and do again the evil the swindler just did. No one within the fellowship will have the authority to enforce restitution, or to even prohibit the swindler from defrauding others. Competing Christian fellowships ignore the marking of evildoers. Therefore, in this endtime era are matters such as large-dollar-amount swindles not better handled by civil courts that have been set up to judge such matters in puddingstone America?
Again—and this cannot be stressed enough—because the Body of Christ is dead from having left Paul, Peter, John, and Jesus (from rejecting Moses and refusing to believe the writings of Moses), there is no living Body to judge even a trivial matter between one Christian and another. There is no one who has standing outside of the sect in which the disciple fellowships.
Again, Paul’s question of why not rather suffer wrong, why not accepted being defrauded, poses a serious challenge for every disciple … should a disciple accept being defrauded by an unbeliever? If a disciple pulled up to a drive-through restaurant, ordered a hamburger, paid for it, as is the customary practice of drive-through establishments, then after waiting to receive the disciple’s order is told that the restaurant won’t deliver the hamburger to the disciple, would the disciple drive off and accept being defrauded in this most trivial of trivial matters, or would it be proper for the disciple to ask for his or her money back? What happens if the restaurant refuses to return the disciple’s money? Should the disciple exercise his or her legal recourses, or should the disciple say, Oh well, and accept being defrauded, while realizing that another person will most likely be similarly treated because our Christian permitted the wrongdoing without legally protesting.
Where does love for neighbor enter into being defrauded by a so-called Christian?
Most likely no drive-through restaurant would refuse to deliver a hamburger and then not return the customer’s money, but one disciple will do such a thing to another disciple. Christians will steal the property of other Christians for any number of reasons. Christians will borrow from another Christian, then when unable to repay, expect the one who loaned to joyfully suffer the loss. And when third or fourth parties are involved in a deal that turns sour, situations develop that threaten fellowships, especially when there is no authority possessing true discernment.
Being defrauded in the most trivial matters is hurt that can be absorbed by the disciple, but what happens when life-savings are lost? What happens when the swindle leaves the victim homeless? What happens when, say, half of the disciples knowing of the swindle approve of it? What happens when the one who defrauds is marked, but such marking is not recognized by those disciples approving of the swindle? Is not this clearly a case where a division among disciples exists to establish who is and who isn’t genuine (1 Cor 11:19)? And how is the victim of the swindle to respond? Should he or she accept being made homeless by the marked individual, or should the victim bring his or her case before civil authorities, thereby seeking redress in the court system that has been ordained, albeit indirectly, by God to be a terror to bad conduct?
A situation developed in the late 1970s among Sabbatarian brethren on Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula that saw several disciples “investing” life savings in a fishing boat being built at Seward to fish black cod in the Bering Sea. The boat was a hull when these monies were invested, but not enough money was available from disciples to fully rig and equip the vessel so two Japanese-owned canneries also invested money in the boat just before the vessel put to sea. But these two canneries invested on different terms from how the disciples invested: instead of a handshake and a good faith pledge, the canneries had their attorneys draw up contracts favorable to the canneries. Then when the boat failed to make the promised payments to the canneries, the canneries foreclosed on the boat, legally taking it as their own, and the (by this time) many disciples lost all they had invested—and the “brother” who had convinced his brothers to invest in the vessel quit attending services and more or less disappeared into the flotsam of ex-members that had returned to Sunday worship for one reason or another.
The many members that lost money (with some losing both time and money for one family had several members working for months on the vessel) felt that they had been defrauded. Perhaps they were. Perhaps promises were made that were not kept. But because members were dealing with members, normal business practices and cautions were not utilized. Monies were loaned with no corresponding paperwork. There was an under the radar psyche that should not have been: in this world there is an accepted, legal way to conduct one’s business affairs, and when this way is circumvented for any reason, problems will occur that would not occur if the kingdom of this world were truly ruled by the Son of Man.
When a brother delivers to another brother only half as much money as was promised, does the other brother go through with the deal or simply wait until the remaining moneys are delivered? How about if a year passes? Does a third brother who lost much money to the brother unable to deliver go after the one who holds half of what he was promised in an attempt to recoup something? Putting dollar figures on these amounts, the first brother promised to deliver $7,000 to one brother for the purchase of an inflatable boat and outboard motors, but only delivered $3,500. The remaining $3,500 was to be delivered in thirty days, but after a year was still not forthcoming. Meanwhile, after that year another brother who had invested more than $100,000 with the first brother, in an attempt to recover some of his investment, demanded that the second brother give to the third brother the $3,500. How should the situation have been handled, considering that the $3,500 wasn’t sitting in a saving account but had gone to distributors for outboard motors and inflatable skiffs, with the complication that by this time the first brother was no longer on the scene but had disappeared? Without question, the $3,500 would have been returned to the first brother, but what about the third’s brother’s claim against the monies?
The above is a real life situation that had no satisfactory resolution in 1979, and has had none since. Thirty years have passed, but the situation has not been forgotten. The Kenai fellowship fell apart although not for this reason: it fell apart because of idolizing a man. But the warning signs of the idolatry that was the fellowship’s undoing were evident in how members handled being defrauded, if they truly were … rather than use the legal system before moneys were invested or after moneys were lost, members tried to handle the situation internally; they tried to handle the situation in a biblical manner. But no member possessed the paperwork necessary to partially recover moneys invested in the vessel when the canneries foreclosed on it; therefore, members were reduced to attacking each other as their carnally surfaced. That $3,500 was all the canneries did not get, so there were many hard feelings generated because of it. After all, most every member in three fellowships lost moneys when the canneries foreclosed, but the member to whom the $3,500 was given merely lost credibility with his distributors, and that became a bone of contention within the Kenai fellowship.
In this world, Christians must necessarily use the legal system or be willing in advance to stand the loss that might occur if a business deal turns sour. If the disciple cannot stand the loss, cannot simply walk away from a business deal with no hard feelings, then the disciple needs to protect him or herself through the rulers of this world being put into place to be God’s avenger on the wrongdoer, with these rulers having established civil and criminal courts to hear matters that cannot be resolved between individuals. This does not mean that disciples should be going to court to seek redress in matters in which the disciple can suffer the wrong, or can absorb the loss if swindled. Nor does it mean that a disciple should not bring a matter to the Church. But when a matter has been brought before the Church and the transgressing brother mocks the assembly and is thereby marked by the assembly as someone who has been delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, the brother who has suffered the loss is free to pursue restoration by whatever legal means that are available to the brother. The one who is marked is no longer considered a brother, but a heathen, a person returned to Satan. This individual is no longer under the authority of the Church, but remains fully subject to the authority of God’s avenger. And before this transgressor can be returned to the Church, the transgressor needs to bring forth fruit worthy of repentance, with words not being this fruit. Only deeds will suffice.
Paul expanded on what he meant by malice and evil when he wrote,
Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Cor 6:9–11)
If the person who was washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of Christ Jesus returns to an exercise of greed, such as happened in 2004 when one who called himself a brother conspired with another who called himself a Christian minister to file a revised real estate purchase agreement that removed without their knowledge three brothers who had, with the one calling himself a brother, legitimately purchased the real property, then this person should be delivered to the Adversary for the destruction of the flesh as was done. To this point, this 2004 situation was handled as Paul commanded. But the difference between the 1st-Century Church and the 21st-Century Church became immediately apparent: the one who had just swindled three of his brothers was welcomed with open arms by Sabbatarian fellowships throughout Michigan, where the swindle occurred. The swindler, who seemed to be somebody in the Church of God, was welcomed in fellowships in Wisconsin, Texas, Arkansas, and North Dakota. Even though the marking of the swindler was his third such marking, Sabbatarian fellowships tolerated (and continue to tolerate) him as the saints at Corinth tolerated the man who was with his father’s wife. And these Sabbatarian fellowships stand condemned by Paul’s rebuke of the Corinthians.
Paul did not anticipate the death of the Body of Christ; he did not understand that Jesus’ earthly body formed the actual shadow and type of His spiritual Body. He did not appreciate the fullness of disciples as the spiritual Body of Christ being crucified with Christ, dying with Christ, and being resurrected with Christ after the third day. Therefore, Paul addressed situations from the assumption that disciples would put their faith into practice, thereby making their faith complete. He did not realize that disciples would speak of faith in Christ Jesus while continuing to openly practice lawlessness, using his epistles as justification for their evildoing in an unholy mingling of the sacred with the profane.
The Adversary wins when the sacred is mingled with the profane, for a little leaven [yeast] leavens the entire lump. A little comprising with wrongdoing in the guise of hating the sin but loving the sinner causes the entire assembly to be puffed up in malice and evil. And this is the trap imbedded in going to law in matters between brothers: if a man and woman sign a prenuptial agreement, they unintentionally commit themselves to separation and divorce. Likewise, if legal contracts are drawn up before a brother engages in business with another brother, the two have prepared in advance to protect each one’s interests. It isn’t the interests of the other that matters, but the protection of the self. And when one brother puts his interests ahead of his brother’s interests, he errs spiritually.
Ultimately, until the kingdom of this world is given to the son of Man, it is impossible for the genuine disciple to engage in business in this world and not be contaminated by it. It is only the degree of contamination that is at issue … it isn’t simply having just weights and balances that matter, but suitability, liability, toxicology, and a whole host of concerns that 1st-Century CE or 10th-Century BCE Israelites did not have to consider.
In making his brother’s or his neighbor’s interests equal in importance to his own, a Christian businessman will regularly come up short in his business dealings; for this world is not focused on honest transactions but on getting ahead, accumulating wealth and the things of this world, things that are not from the Father. The world of business has become a spider web drifting on the winds of time: what was impossible is not only possible, but probably for sale on E-Bay.
When the Second Passover occurs, the present fight to do what the disciple knows is right, a fight that invisibly occurs within the mind and heart of the disciple, the fight that Paul described in Romans 7:15–25, will be moved outside of the disciple, with victory or defeat visible to both humankind and angels. The fleshly body of the disciple will remain mortal, but there will no longer be indwelling sin and death. Therefore, if the disciple dies it will be by an outside cause; hence martyrdom will return as seen in Revelation 6:9–11. The disciple must necessarily do what is right, for the disciple will not longer have a covering for sin but for his or her obedience to God—and this is not a situation that Paul anticipated, for the visions of Daniel remained sealed to Paul, and the vision of John (i.e., the Book of Revelation) was not yet given. Whereas Paul had expected disciples to do what is right; had expected disciples to cease living as sons of disobedience, he never really understood why even he couldn’t always do what he knew was right.
Every disciple in business for him or herself faces daily the war to do what the disciple knows is right, with expedience and the cost of doing business pitted against what can be charged for the job or the profit made from the sale. If the disciple “gives” away his or her work, the disciple robs his or her family. If the disciple gives a warranty or implies a warranty, the disciple might well face a lawsuit that would bond the disciple into guaranteeing the product in perpetuity. If the disciple disables or tells a customer how to disable a safety feature that actually hinders the operation of a piece of equipment, the disciple takes upon him or herself liability for the product. So the disciple’s desire to serve the customer, to do what is “right” by the customer must be tempered by legally protecting the disciple, even against a brother who might not be a brother next year, as well as providing for those of the disciple’s household. And once is a while, all objectives cannot be achieved. The disciple must either be a “bad guy” as far as a customer is concerned, or must rob moneys from his or her family to satisfy a customer, with this being the price paid for doing business in the Adversary’s world.
The war outside of the flesh that every disciple will fight following the Second Passover is today fought in type by disciples engaged in business in this world; for despite a disciple’s desire to conduct his or her business in an upright matter “things” will happen that are beyond the disciple’s control, things that will cause the disciple to be as Abram was when in Egypt. And if the disciple’s business is more than that of a subsistence farmer or of a solitary craftsman, then the disciple will truly face in this present era the type of “war” the disciple will wage following liberation from sin and death.
Although agreement between two brothers should constitute a binding contract on both, in this present world a handshake is not adequate; for the relatives of, or even a surviving spouse of either brother might not be of the household of faith. Plus, one or both brothers can leave the household of faith and join with another sect or fellowship that does not recognize the authority of the first. Therefore, even a brother in the faith must, in a business deal, be treated as neighbor, as someone from the nations, meaning that the disciple should be wary of being unequally yoked to the person … too often the brother who has converted from Sunday will return to lawlessness if profits are being lost in keeping the Sabbath.
When there is no truly “right” way to handle a transaction in this world except by complying in an upright manner with how the world contends that transactions should be documented and recorded then lawyers, unfortunately, need to be consulted before transactions are made, not afterwards. Even then, the disciple will occasionally encounter difficult situations from which there is no easy way out as the disciple, as if gold, is tested against the touchstone of Christ Jesus.
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The person conducting the Sabbath service should close services with two hymns, or psalms, followed by a prayer asking God’s dismissal.
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"Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved."