My friend it sounds as if we have a few issues with the local establishment!?

You are right, the "church" as we look at it nothing more than a building where we gather from time to time. The real church is you and I standing in belief of the word and the power in which it contains..... The "church" has no other reference...... without people believing.... FingerStyle.
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few issues with the local establishment!? - Not really. And not to say there havent been differences in the past. But these differences are not the issues themselves - but only a symptom of bigger problems that transcend what the church may be on a local level. The last church I was in fellowship with (I left in December 2005), I did not leave because of problems or issues with anyone. I left because I could not pursue what God has for me, while remaining in relation to the fellowship. It was a move I wrestled with for several months. Changes were occurring, I did not find myself fitting comfortably into the evolving new form. For me to be what God made me, I had to move on. This was not a forced move in any sense, purely a realized conclusion that to be faithful to God - in me - I had to cease reliance on finding God in the collective fellowship, a pastors well meaning advice, and any other external resource as the Word of God. real church is you and I standing in belief of the word and the power in which it contains . . .in belief of the word. . . - And here is the heart of the matter. Is the word the words and language, stories and principles, history and proverbs, psalms and poetry, prophecies and epistles and more, contained in the sixty-six books of the Bible, between Genesis and Revelations? OR is there a depth and reality to the word that both transcends what is contained in the chapters and verse we refer to as the book, the Bible? AND although transcending containment in paragraphs penned by human agents, resides in the depths of our humanity? Yet is not the product of our humanity, but is the source of our being? We, the Church, have allowed ourselves to become slaves to systems. And there are all kinds of systems. In the USA, the most pre-eminent system is the rule of corporate law. This manifests in a myriad of ways. The most obvious is economic dominance. But the particular system is not the issue. The issue is the bondage to any system as the way, in difference to the inner life, the Word (Christ in US), the true Light which gives light to every man - resident in us - the real me - you. The confusion of the Bible as the Word is a primary perpetrator of the enslavement of the church to religious systems. Nowhere does the Bible make claims to itself as the Word. This is an inference made by the religious establishment, which may be a well meaning intention, but is ultimately the source and foundation upon which any particular form of religious bondage may be imposed as absolute. Now - dont presume that I discount the Bible. It simply is not God. It - in itself - is not the Word. The Word is resident in each and everyone of us. Sadly - in most -

repressed and held in fear and bondage. But - that is changing.