Question from a Two-by-Two:
We are discussing (we,being my hubby and I) different ways to tell if what we are doing is right or wrong. I know many of you have made up your minds, but we are slower.
How do you discount the fact that Jesus sent “HIS” disciples 2x2?
Someone said, “Part of the problem may be your premise. You seem to be emphasizing that others are “discounting a fact.” This is an error you make because true Christians do not discount the fact that Jesus sent out some of “HIS” original disciples in pairs. Rather Christians do not put such great emphasis on this issue and build a whole religion around it. Some very good reasons for Jesus doing it this way have already been mentioned. But Jesus did not direct this as a future for the entire church.”
When you make the below comment, where can you justify the common method of a preacher and a church?
“The word 'church' in the New Testament almost always means 'assembly of Christians. King James required this translation wherever the 'assembly of Christians' is mentioned. Christians always assembled in buildings and sometimes in the open air, weather permitting of course. Affluence in America allows for Christians to have their own buildings. This is a good thing, not bad as dictated by Workers.”
I'm not trying to make anyone angry, not discounting anyone's faith – just trying to find my own.
Susie
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I don't think anyone here who attend “outside” churches are discounting the fact that Jesus sent “HIS” disciples 2x2 on this occasion (the scripture that the workers quote to justify how they do it). However, there were many other times when one went alone, by three's and maybe other combinations. Scripture indicates that at least Peter and Philip were married and it is likely that some wives, children and some light camping gear went on this journey too.
Perhaps the confusion comes from taking that out of context - - he was basically saying, “grab your things, don't take lots of luggage to slow us down, we are in a hurry 'to pursue the lost sheep of the house of Israel.'
We were never taught anything about the 12 tribes of Israel in the 2x2 meetings I attended, so when we studied this, we had no clue it was about seeking one of the lost tribes of the Jews. This thing about not taking more than one change of clothes, etc., sounds like people going on a trip where they don't need to b3e encumbered with a lot of possessions to delay them.
When we went to meetings, we were taught this scripture was about 'workers who were going 2x2 to find outside people “to get them to profess and come to meeting.”
That is also how they practiced this verse.
I don't try to justify a preacher and a church. Anyone who follows Jesus is supposed to preach and teach the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to every life they touch. I don't think anyone should be looking to one man or a dozen for answers that Christ wants us to get from “HIM."
We are not to be following a man or woman (or several), we are supposed to be following Christ and when we do that, “HE” will cause us to become acquainted with some very fine men and women who may be in the ministry 100%.
The fact that we have a public meeting place is no different than in the scripture when they met for prayer in the temple, or teaching in the synagogue. Jesus called it “my house” in one place when he overturned the money changers tables when they were buying and selling. In another of the gospels, “HE” called it “God's House” when “HE” said they were “making merchandise.”
Certainly, 2x2's own millions of dollars worth of church property in “buildings also made with hands.”
They just don't use it but four days per year so they can self-righteously say:
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“I'm so glad we are not like those other churches who pay their preacher and who go to meetings in a building made with hands.”
What a waste!!!!
Those who dedicate themselves to ministry 100% of the time, usually are on duty 60-70 hours per week, not about 4-10 hours a week like the workers.
The four ministers in our church are on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and they are all working 60 or more hours per week.
Whatever we pay them is not enough for what they do.
I BELIEVE THE WORKERS ARE PAID MORE PER HOUR FOR THE AMOUNT OF TIME THEY SPEND DOING “MINISTERIAL WORK: THAN ANY MINISTERS ON EARTH!!!
(I define “ministerial work” as: preaching, teaching, visiting the sick, community outreach to the needy, not writing fund-raising letters to a long list of people hoping for filled envelopes when the mail is delivered).
Have any of you ever thought about (made a list?) what a worker “saves” in dollars (per year) by not having a job and the usual monthly expenses of the “cares of a family, home, bills, etc.?”
If the friends are providing all these things, then the workers are compensated very well even if they do not call it a “salary.”
I have yet to see ANYONE offer for the work with no EXPECTATION of compensation, free room, car, meals, etc.
On the flip side, I have seen dozens of missionary couples (going 2x2) offer for the foreign mission field because they had a calling on their life to go. I have seen them sell everything they have and take just the bare necessities to the mission field, going by faith that God and “HIS” people would provide for them while they lived among people who were NOT followers.
They went with no expectation whatsoever that people who are unbelievers would give them housing, meals, health care, etc.
They trusted God and “HE” has provided. To God be the Glory!!!
I care deeply about the workers, but I don't see workers as “going by faith” - - it takes no faith at all to KNOW that people are going to give you their best bedroom, best beds, best foods, etc.
In fact, nearly all of us have witnessed them going to the “best places” where the provisions were the nicest more often than going somewhere among the friends who have very little to share but their love and respect.
This welfare-like lifestyle just sets people up to have an “entitlement mentality” and if they get kicked out or need to leave the work, they cannot function in the “REAL WORLD!" Jane
Hello,
Shelley mentioned something significant about the two-by-two deployment of the twelve disciples. I don't think
Matthew 10
makes anything of the pairing off, but two parallel passages in other gospels give some of the same and some different details of the event.
Matthew 10 is the passage most often cited by workers when they make claims about their system being Biblical and others not being valid.
It was a principle of Jewish law that giving notice or announcing or bringing an accusation or an ultimatum required two messengers:
One to make the statement and one to affirm it to the audience, while being in a position to confirm later that the statement had been made.
We in the Western cultures may not find this obvious, just as we could easily miss a great deal that is in scriptures that rests on an understanding of covenants and covenant principles.
The most efficient way of spreading the small number of fully empowered disciples was to send them out in pairs. The minimum size team that allowed for the necessary witness was two, but Jesus wanted as many teams as possible so that many communities could be covered within a short period.
The “two-by-two” refrain that you keep “hearing' could be the echo of the many times you have heard “workers” and “saints” mention it. Chances are they were indoctrinated similarly, in their turn!!!
If any who have heard the insistent refrain, since early days when the “Go Preachers” were recruited by William Irvine were to take a good look at the rest of what they claimed were the key Bible verses controlling evangelists and clergy, they would have had to do it somewhat differently. If they had given equal emphasis, for instance, to the inquiries concerning worthy households, the staying in the same home throughout a sojourn in any community, the preaching in Jewish communities and not to Gentiles, the ceremonial shaking off of dust from the feet (signifying an indictment against the people who rejected or defied a message, also a part of the “legalities” that applied in the culture where this mission took place).
There would have been some “proof” miracles and demonstrations of the love and the power of God, such as healings and freeing those who were possessed. There would have been total reliance on the hospitality and material support accorded travelers on an official assignment for their employer, sometimes with the messengers earning their board by performing some labor for the host family.
The early Go-Preachers were a lot closer to the instructions Jesus gave, in that they did not take much of any money and I think it is likely they did not have access too much. They were often called Tramp Preachers because of their footloose ways, hiking about, sometimes sleeping in the open or in barns, having just the clothes on their backs and looking bedraggled and shabby. Just as tramps used to make the rounds in rural America and other countries, the early followers of Irvine were itinerant, seeking food and lodging along with receptive listeners, and probably offering some incidental labor to hospitable families. But those practices have not been present in the 2x2's for several generations!!!
Initially, Irvine and his cohorts would not have been able to use “professing families” as the households where they stayed while preaching in a community, because originally the concept was that all true disciples or followers of Jesus would be itinerant preachers.
There would be no laity.
All were called to imitate Jesus and the 12 and wander.
“The church in the home” was not part of the original “revelation” of Irvine, but was a concept developed some considerable time after.
Marti
Susie, if you start a study of the “Gifts of the Spirit,” sometimes (this is a very important study), you will find that teaching, preaching, exhortation, pastoring, etc., are all gifts of the Holy Spirit. A Pastor in a church is doing nothing more than exercising his gift.
Actually 2x2's have no idea what a modern day preacher/pastor does. For he serves as a true minister, ministering to the people the various fruits of the Holy Spirit. He does this through very time consuming counseling sessions (Christian sociology) and organized activities such as Bible studies, preaching, teaching ministries, writing, and many, many other sanctioned church activities.
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2x2 workers conduct no true ministries, but rather are the focus to whom all the ministering is done by the ''friends.”
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This is quite backward.
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Jesus and “HIS” initial disciples/apostles always ministered to the people as the modern day Pastor/Preacher does.
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The congregation did not minister to Jesus, “HE” washed their feet!!
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“HE” healed them.
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“HE” provided for them - - bread, fishes, wine, etc.
The early church leaders did the same.
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This is all very opposite to the 2x2 Worker/Friend relationship. The workers tend to operate more on the parasites/host relationship principle. The Host, being the “Friends” do all the providing for the Workers needs. As with parasites, this relationship sometimes gets out of hand and the parasite goes too far.
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Examples: Misuse of the 'Friends” money, taking advantage of host family children, sexual encounters with each other and spouses of the families where they reside, etc.
So, Susie,...........you really should be rephrasing your question to where did the emphasis on 2x2 workers come from and why the great emphasis by 2x2 workers on not meeting in church buildings?
How much of these improper emphases is self motivated?
These are some of the questions Christians ask when they first hear of the 2x2 principle: Preaching 2x2 and meeting in the home.
2x2 worker/preachers lead people to their system and themselves and away from Christ!!”
