My reading of the Word–particularly but not exclusively the chapter on civil and ecclesiastical government in New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrines–leads me to believe in an ordained priesthood as a special servant class under the church. I believe that “the church” is not the priesthood, but the full spiritual community of people trying to follow the Lord. I do think that there is always the danger of grafting false ideas of authority onto any system based on an ordained priesthood, but that itself is not a reason to ignore the teachings that show there ought to be such leaders within the body of the church.

My vision of a church planting movement, while it began as a vision for the General Church of the New Jerusalem, has plenty of room for independent congregations as well. I am in conversations with a few people who are working on church plants that will not be part of the GC, and I am very excited about the springing up of other independant New Church congregations, like the Church of Truth in Louisville, KY.

I would like to support your own work so far as it serves the Lord God Jesus Christ, looks to His Word, and benefits humankind, whatever it looks like.

I invite you to support my work so long as your conscience and your means permit, but if you think I am on the wrong path, then of course I can ask nothing of you, other than to respect that I have put years of study, thought, prayer and counsel-seeking into this decision.

The government structures that I see Jesus explicitly forbidding Christians to use are the forms and structures of government provided by the civil state like incorporation and those drawn from the Mosaic Law as it prescribed the Aaronic priesthood.

On the first, Jesus spent His entire ministry in conflict with leaders, teachers, scholars, and priests over the fact that they valued their institution, their power, and their cultural traditions more than the people God had given them to serve and the eternal truth embedded in the spirit of the law that He had provided them to use in service of those people.

His immediate disciples did not see this as central to His mission and so did not carry on His mission of refusing to engage in class warfare and bringing the good news of salvation through an immediate, unrestricted, freely available, uninhibited except by each believer’s own finite limits relationship with the one and only God, Jesus Christ whom they had met in person, to every soul who would accept it. Jesus even emphasized that civil governments give their leaders and officials authority over their citizens, but that it should never be that way among believers because we are all brothers and sisters with one father, who is Jesus.

And on the second, as far as the Aaronic priesthood is concerned. Jesus was a priest after the order of Melchizedek, called and ordained by God Himself and independent — not after the order of Aaron, chosen by Moses with a succession based on hereditary lineage. In spite of this, the early Christian church not only sought to remain inside the organization of the Jewish church until they were expelled from the synagogue, they also then remained in the traditions they had grown up with instead of following the teachings of Jesus — and so they set up a church model based on the Aaronic priesthood, completely missing the point of the full demonstration of the immediacy of the new era given by God when Peter preached on the day of Pentacost.

Jesus Christ is the one and only teacher, rabbi, master, lord, owner, father, and God. There is no vicar of Christ on earth aside from Jesus Christ Himself. He needs no representative man because He is Himself a vital, powerful, living, and immediately present, always available God for all people. He condemns those who insert themselves as required mediators between Him and His people, or even just between His Word and their understanding of it. And so, as you have been called by God Himself to preach His word and share His good news freely, you risk the millstone and the blood of the watchman if you empower an existing or construct for yourself an institution that grants you a position of mediating your follower’s relationship with their creator. God’s Holy Spirit is not given to you and then by you to those you lead, it is given to you directly so that you might show others how it can be given to them directly.

For myself, I founded the Second Advent Christian™ movement when I took off my robe, let go my claim to the stole of authority, acknowledged that the pastor’s rod and staff belonged rightfully only in the hands of Jesus and was baptized by full immersion in the name of Jesus Christ. Since then, instead of defending my claim to authority or relevance I spend my time out on the level playing field as simply a believer and priest after the order of Melchizedek aspiring to become in the complete image and likeness of Jesus Christ our God and so sharing the good news of salvation right here, right now that is meant for all people.

I want to ask you to join with me to build a network of believers that are all brothers and sisters in the body of Christ — on earth as it is in heaven — priests and prophets of the gospel, and ready receivers of the immediate presence and activity of God Himself because I resonate so strongly with the network effect that you propose as a model for churches. Is this something that resonates with your calling too?

“A faithful, sensible servant is one to whom the master can give the responsibility of managing his other household servants and feeding them. If the master returns and finds that the servant has done a good job, there will be a reward.” – Matthew 24:45-46

We aren’t the masters, we are His servants. Why build denominational churches under a structure of authority that is patterned after the church that Jesus fought to change and then to convert, when instead you could build independent local churches that aspire to the Lord God Jesus Christ as their soul, heart, and being and which their members populate just as all the heavens are populated and that are connected to other local churches around the world only through influence, communication, fellowship, love, and support? The arguments for the papacy and afterwards for denominations all came down to this, control is necessary for protection. But what if the protection we need is from control? After all, it may be that the only downside to independent churches is that when they are dead, they actually die because there is no controlling denomination to use extreme measures to preserve life past their useful function and contribution to the body of Christ.

However, I don’t mean “market”, but “marketplace”, as in a network of providors that interact competitively to best serve people looking for particular goods or services. For example, Ebay has as its market all people with access to the Internet and junk to sell; but apart from that, Ebay is itself a marketplace. In fact, that’s the main use they serve: they create a marketplace.

So when I was talking about the church–denominationally–as a marketplace, I mean as a collection of different providers (church congregations and parachurch organizations) that collectively offer different ways of participating in church life. The more participants there are in a marketplace (like Ebay or the NYSE), the more efficient the market, and so the better the service provided. Perhaps I should have just stuck with talking about the GC as a network, rather than as a marketplace. (Google “network effect” for more on that.)

But you said something I want to hear more about:

Stephen Simons :

From my study of the scriptures, what I have seen is that Jesus explicitly forbade His church from adopting the governmental structures provided by the state…

I can see a general implied message along these lines, but I am curious about which statements you specifically see as an explicit command against governmental structures.

I don’t think its a matter of how you look at it, if your church is incorporated under the laws of a US state, then it is a business with established bylaws, governance, fiscal structure, and a defined relationship with its shareholders, officers, etc.

And as far as any single church being a marketplace — the world, the country, your local region, your membership, and your target demographic(s) are the marketplace just like every other business. Your church is just one of many businesses competing for market share in that marketplace.

I resonate strongly with your goal of increasing freedom, harmonious diversity, and healthy competition. However, I think that increasing the number of congregations under an existing central control will only result in increased freedom if the nature of their relationship to the central control and other congregations is differentiated at their inception. Otherwise, the scale will work against diversity as you bring more adherents, revenue, and influence to that central control, allowing it to scale right along with your network in order to maintain its control. If you want to create independent churches, they have to be planted independent. To overwhelm the corporate governance and structure of an existing church is a conflict amounting to revolution and it is more likely to kill the start-up than the established business. This has been a challenge faced by church planters of every denomination, which is what gave rise to the non-denomination movement. If you are embracing the financial, legal, and cultural weight of altering an existing corporation I think you are proposing what amounts to a hostile takeover bid. I don’t think a start-up business should be founded for the purpose of taking over the market leader in that space. Innovate and effectively compete to take their market share, yes. Take their assets, no.

Anyway, tell me more about what you see as the model of Heaven. From my study of the scriptures, what I have seen is that Jesus explicitly forbade His church from adopting the governmental structures provided by the state, which is why early Christians refused to incorporate under the laws of their lands and so were ripe targets for persecution by the state. Interestingly, this was in sharp contrast to the theocracy that all of the apostles had grown up in.

In comparison to the human body — like its archetype, the body of Christ, it is not operated by control. The homeostasis which allows for health and life is a balance and communication between the differentiated and individual cells, organs, and systems which, in a state of health, naturally order themselves according to their functions because of the higher order provided by its soul. And so for a church, the connection between God and the human race is not continuous, but contiguous. There is no Divine spark residing in and controlling the members in the body of Christ, but instead there is a relationship with our creator and savior which maintains and establishes our eternal life. God doesn’t control us, He leads us. This is what He was speaking of when He commanded that we should call no man our teacher, father, rabbi, or master, for only one person can fill those roles in His church, and that is Jesus Christ Himself — we are all brothers and sisters in Him.

Structurally speaking, rapidly scaling up will overwhelm our current structure. The only reason our current church government works with concentrated central control is that we are working with so few moving parts. By massively adding complexity to the system, increased congregational and individual freedom will also be added.

There is a brand problem, too, but that lies more in the direction of not having a brand at all–i.e. no one has heard of us yet, so we do not exist in the minds of the people of the world.

Increased numbers of congregations will also create more freedom for both harmonious diversity and also healthy competition. Rather than all of us trying to influence how all of us look and behave, we will be more free to associate with whichever subculture within the church best represents our viewpoints.

You can think of the church as not a business, but a marketplace. The more players in the market (or participants in the network, if you want to think in terms of the network effect), the stronger and more valuable the overall market or network is.

But beyond all this, I am trying to follow the model of Heaven as I understand it. I want to see the church move from embryonic to fully human, and that means increased complexity, which in turn requires more cells.

Scale is the solution for businesses like Amazon.com that can realize the economies of scale as they grow and so increase their margin as they sell more product and expand into new markets by attracting users to a brand experience that works. However, companies who try to scale as a fix for internal problems, fail and often die because of those same internal problems. Read Jim Collins most recent book, How the Mighty Fall and Why Some Companies Never Give In for more insight on this. So, my question is why do you believe that scale is the solution to a branding problem in your church? If you replicate the General Church brand and so enlist more people in it as adherents, users, visitors, and friends how does that change its fundamental brand principles, values, and identity? Aren’t you just empowering the very core of your church’s brand that you wish to change?

I’m still praying for you. Every day. But only you can answer the call:

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!” (Isaiah 6:8)

Love,
E