Experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit ?

General Christian Theology
Sudsy
Posts: 5854
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2017 3:32 pm
Affiliation: .

Re: Experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit ?

Post by Sudsy »

Josh wrote:
Sudsy wrote:Thanks Josh for the corection. I did some more investigating and one of my findings said that decisions for the church are made on a vote at a conference with a certain percent required to adapt or change practises. So, it would seem then that a certain percentage are not being Spirit lead and the COGM are trusting that the majority are Spirit lead even if those who see things differently believe their views do not conflict with scripture. Then these better follow the decision or may be excommunicated.
That's not really how excommunication or conference decisions work, but yes, we do trust our fellow brethren to help us make sure we aren't being deceived by thinking we are being led by the Spirit when we are in reality being led by our own minds, or worse, being led astray by the enemy of our souls.

I got the conference decision process from this link and it does point out a certain consensus is sought or the issue is tabled until next conference - http://mennoworld.org/2015/12/14/news/h ... rtainment/
I suspect you have run across this site but if not, it addresses some of the same concerns I have of some conservative Mennonite groups. Do 25,000 or so COGM Christians make up the 'one true church' ? Millions of other Christians over the centuries would not agree that 99.9+% of them are not Spirit lead. While reading some of this I wondered what the take is then on Romans 14.
Holdemans believe that Christians outside of our church are also Spirit-led, and that the Holy Spirit guides and takes care of each believer. They also believe that not every sincere, honest believer will be led into a Church of God in Christ, Mennonite church, and that only Jesus can understand how this can be when the scriptures also teach the church is one body and led by one spirit.

Thanks for the clarification. Seems that the concept of the 'church' being physical (as in being a specific organized group) or 'spiritual' may be the difference.
That site gets rather busy attacking nonresistance and the head covering. It's hard for me to take it credibly when I think the New Testament is so clear on those things.

There are also two sides to every story; the proponents of that site are not very forthcoming about the reasons they left the church.

Why they left was shared here - http://theholdemans.com/why.htm
0 x
Pursuing a Kingdom life in the Spirit
Sudsy
Posts: 5854
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2017 3:32 pm
Affiliation: .

Re: Experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit ?

Post by Sudsy »

Valerie wrote:Following this with interest- having come from Pentecostal, then seeking out Anabaptist & also being introduced & studying the Orthodox Church- my husband & I find ourselves really sifting through all this when it comes to experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit- where we come from it was quite common for people to claim they were hearing from the Spirit- directed by, led by, filled with, baptized with, manifestations of, etc- as has been mentioned, 'testing the Spirits' is/was always essential but by what test? Does the Spirit continue to direct & reveal? Where we fellowship now, we just learned that the belief is 'illumination' but no 'revelation'.

Perplexed-
I think the view that you are being presented with is that revelation is complete with the coming of Jesus and the assembling of the NT scriptures. In other words there won't be anything new today that was unknown before. Illumination is the Holy Spirit shedding light on the truths in the scriptures and how to apply them. Is this your understanding ?

Our former backgrounds believe they both still exist.
0 x
Pursuing a Kingdom life in the Spirit
Sudsy
Posts: 5854
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2017 3:32 pm
Affiliation: .

Re: Experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit ?

Post by Sudsy »

Josh wrote:
Wayne in Maine wrote:The truly grievous thing about the Bruderhof Communities, of which I was a member, is that this was essentially how things worked. If one disagreed with Christoph Arnold then one was obviously not hearing God's voice. In the end it stifled the Holy Spirit's speaking to the community. It's entirely possible that nearly all the brotherhood members, except Christoph himself, were in true unity hearing God's voice on some occasion or another. But instead of following God's leading everyone chose to agree with Christoph (I saw this anti-consensus at play on several occasions).
One of the reasons I have cast my lot in with the CGCM is because it doesn't work this way at all. In particular, observing the discernment process of the Lord speaking to the entire church on issues of technology use has been a blessing to me. It really does seem like people are trying to hear what God would want for us to do, search the scriptures for answers, and also search our Anabaptist forefathers for approaches and principles we might apply to our present day concerns.

By the way I have no reason to believe the Spirit is not doing likewise in other bodies of believers. But there is something special about the unity we experience congregationally and conference-wide. And I think a big part of what we experience is due to there being no special anointed single earthly man who is the head, or some deceased leader whose words are nearly the same as scripture.

This is one of the reasons our teaching pastor came from Pentecostalism to Anabaptism and that is that the direction of the church was more congregational than 'one man behind the pulpit' getting the direction or at least, expecting to be the main decision maker.

For starters, John Holdeman liked the idea of untrimmed beards... a lot... and there's exactly one person at my church with a 5-button beard. And he's quite a character (and I love him).
0 x
Pursuing a Kingdom life in the Spirit
Valerie
Posts: 5309
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2016 6:59 am
Location: Medina OH
Affiliation: non-denominational

Re: Experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit ?

Post by Valerie »

Sudsy wrote:
Valerie wrote:Following this with interest- having come from Pentecostal, then seeking out Anabaptist & also being introduced & studying the Orthodox Church- my husband & I find ourselves really sifting through all this when it comes to experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit- where we come from it was quite common for people to claim they were hearing from the Spirit- directed by, led by, filled with, baptized with, manifestations of, etc- as has been mentioned, 'testing the Spirits' is/was always essential but by what test? Does the Spirit continue to direct & reveal? Where we fellowship now, we just learned that the belief is 'illumination' but no 'revelation'.

Perplexed-
I think the view that you are being presented with is that revelation is complete with the coming of Jesus and the assembling of the NT scriptures. In other words there won't be anything new today that was unknown before. Illumination is the Holy Spirit shedding light on the truths in the scriptures and how to apply them. Is this your understanding ?

Our former backgrounds believe they both still exist.
Correct- and I believe it would be a dismissal of how the Holy Spirit was 'directing' and 'fortelling' by way of prophets (example the prophets in the NT Church, we read about in Acts).
It really presents opposing views of the work of the Holy Spirit in these areas. There is serious wariness in trusting- "testing the Spirits to see if they are from God" personally, we have witnessed to much trusting that things were 'of the Spirit' that did not seem to be "Holy" and that is one of the reasons we backed away from Pentecostalism- at the same time, I find it difficult to dismiss the Holy Spirit in the way He operated in the early Church, (and further if you read 2000 years of history) and I think it is advantageous to the devil's work to claim once the canon of the Bible was completed, that work of the Holy Spirit the Church was experiencing, was no longer necessary. It seems like that is either quenching the Spirit or if not careful, blasheming Him-
0 x
Sudsy
Posts: 5854
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2017 3:32 pm
Affiliation: .

Re: Experiencing the Work of the Holy Spirit ?

Post by Sudsy »

Valerie wrote:
Sudsy wrote: I think the view that you are being presented with is that revelation is complete with the coming of Jesus and the assembling of the NT scriptures. In other words there won't be anything new today that was unknown before. Illumination is the Holy Spirit shedding light on the truths in the scriptures and how to apply them. Is this your understanding ?

Our former backgrounds believe they both still exist.
Correct- and I believe it would be a dismissal of how the Holy Spirit was 'directing' and 'fortelling' by way of prophets (example the prophets in the NT Church, we read about in Acts).
It really presents opposing views of the work of the Holy Spirit in these areas. There is serious wariness in trusting- "testing the Spirits to see if they are from God" personally, we have witnessed to much trusting that things were 'of the Spirit' that did not seem to be "Holy" and that is one of the reasons we backed away from Pentecostalism- at the same time, I find it difficult to dismiss the Holy Spirit in the way He operated in the early Church, (and further if you read 2000 years of history) and I think it is advantageous to the devil's work to claim once the canon of the Bible was completed, that work of the Holy Spirit the Church was experiencing, was no longer necessary. It seems like that is either quenching the Spirit or if not careful, blaspheming Him-
Interesting to me how some can be very wary of 'testing the spirits' as it sounds too mystical and yet believe in 'illumination' when there are all these various understandings on what is said in the canon of scripture. I believe Anabaptist roots were strong on the need for the Spirit's illumination as a community, which appears to be a safer way to get things right than a single individual's view, but then Anabaptists differ considerably, especially on practise. For instance, modesty is agree upon yet what forms it takes has not been made clear by the Holy Spirit as to how it is to be practised. So, the safe way of saying we no longer accept any 'new revelations' beyond the scriptures has not been any safer by individual or group 'illumination'.

I'm left to believe that God is more tolerant of our differences than we are of each other's views and practises. Our belief of what is primary in the Gospel, 'the Gospel that saves us' as Paul puts it, is what we are mainly to believe and share.
0 x
Pursuing a Kingdom life in the Spirit
Post Reply