Growth in Godliness
Some who read my posts must ask themselves why Joe Durso is so hard on the Church. I see no problem with church leadership when it works strictly according to Jesus Christ's demands. If I am misusing Scripture, please tell me how. If people are responsible, I'm not asking for perfection or something I certainly do not possess, to make disciples and use their gifts in the Church according to Christ, then all is good. However, by elevating the few, the many have been rendered lazy, inappropriately tied to the world, a thing God hates, and no longer using lowly and even unlearned people as in the early Church. These things ought not to be this way.
When Church Corruption Happens
Recently, a dear brother in the faith was brought up on charges before the pastor and then several elders, except the individual who started the accusations. The charge was his desire to see revival come to the Church corporate, which would involve his home Church for many years.
He served as a teacher many times, taught about the inerrancy of scriptures on at least one occasion, was sent overseas several times as a short-term missionary, and never caused a problem the whole time he was there. Even though he has the right to face his accuser, and he has met twice now, the man has not been present, and the board thinks that he does not have to or that it is his responsibility to do so. He is said to be divisive, and the charge is said to be he does not believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, a thing I know to be false and thereby made up. No one is allowed to disagree with leadership.
What is Church Corruption
John 5 clarifies much about religious corruption:
The leaders were legalists (Sabaath breaking for healing a man), fearing their chief means of controlling their followers. No one wants to get thrown out of Church.
Jesus said he only does the things that the Father is doing. Conformity to Scripture can be a problem for leadership. I have spoken much about division in the Church. If you want to get removed, that's the way.
He spoke about raising the dead.
When George Whitefield came in the might of the Holy Spirit to preach the Gospel, he was eventually thrown out of the Churches of his time because he preached the second birth. These were Gospel preaching Churches in England and then America. George preached only two Centuries after The Reformation and was already corrupt.
Jesus said, "You have sent to John, and he has testified to the truth. "But the testimony which I receive is not from man..." (John 5:33-34).
4. One leader affirms another man's calling. Within the Church, all are responsible for walking as regenerated, well-saved children of God. Age with humility and an uncorrupted knowledge of the Scripture makes a good elder. Pride does not. Peter said, in Acts 3, "Men of Israel, why are you amazed at this, or why do you gaze at us, as if by our own power or piety we had made him walk?"
Do you know why miracles were so few during the Church age? Man is so proud without them that we can't imagine how extensive pride would be if they were common.
Who is Responsible for Church Corruption
Jesus said, "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life" (John 5:39-40). Eternal life is not knowledge, even of the Scriptures. Eternal life is the personal and intimate knowledge of Christ.
Unregenerate people have no intimate knowledge, only a book learning, an intellectual awareness without the intimacy of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, this corruption is caused by the regenerate who fail to prioritize prayer. The result of prayer, worship, praise, confession, and intercession in prayer is to make Christ head of one's life and thereby head of the Church. Then, what happened to my brother would not occur.
Church corruption is a given in light of the overwhelming number of warnings in the New Testament.