You once told me in an email that NO subject is as important to you as the IM question. Not Jesus, not prayer, not salvation by faith through faith, no you said the music question is number one with you.

I think you are reading beyond the sacred pages so to speak. At the time old church in Seattle was under attack by a man willing to twist all of the Bible, church history, the old church bylaws, and minimal common decency to make a place for his wife as a “musical worship minister.” She came to Nashville–a city set on seven hills- to learn all of the tricks. Music was the HOSTILE ATTACK in most Bible-based groups so not to be a coward in the words of Martin Luther you refute the heresy standing in front of you and BETWEEN the simple and the real Jesus: Paul’s unique worship concept means to give heed to the Word: if you are giving heed to the sight, sound and motion of someone CLAIMING to bring God into your presence you are DEFACTO worshiping the performers and the silly-ditty writers.

That attacked my local quite isolated hill country church: they leaped the church from 350 to less than 200 and make the Church of Christ a stink in the whole county. Why would anyone obey the false law of “laying by in store” knowing that a church had the hidden agenda to divert the monies as soon as it was safe to take the Purpose Driven cult leap.

ME gets involved only when the coffee thermos runs dry. I do claim to have posted all of the important MUSIC papers beginning with clay tablets and do solemnly and dogmatically assert that you don’t know any preacher or scholar who knows about the fatal music-induced Fall from Grace at Mount Sinai. Nor, do they grasp that the NOBILITY of Civil-Military-Clergy complex was PERMITTED when God warned that they were FIRING him to get a Senior Pastor to carry out the captivity and death sentence imposed at Mount Sinai. Nor did the Spirit Who promised them robbers and parasites has men like Nehemiah LABELING them as robbers and parasites BECAUSE OF their own sin. In the Greek world the sacrificial musicians were called PARASITES. The priests who lifted the dumb lambs up to cut their throats were called HERETICS: that is the word Paul outlawed as self-pleasure caused by “the creation of mental excitement.”

I do dogmatically assert that none of the white paper writers have ever gone beyond the “sacred pages” of their simple lexicon to collecte all of the remote instrument passages to say that:

Right there at that spot about 1994 the Holy Spirit said to me in the middle of my sermon, “and that’s what you and all the preachers like you were doing, who haven’t for years believed that the worship of God with instruments is wrong. But you continue by your silence to let people think it’s wrong, to allow the body to be disrupted, and you do so under the plea, ‘Well, we’re just maintaining peace.’ But that’s not peace; that’s cowardice.” I knew then the day would come I’d have to teach this lesson.

Yet for 12 years he slowly “boiled the frogs” and warned that those who objected should not bother the elders and others might have to make a “choice between instrumental music” and their church and marriage families. Because people are BONDED to anyone with a voice they can easily be DELUDED by the only definition of LYING WONDERS which is a false prodigy such as “the worship team can LEAD you into the presence of God” and the delusional BELIEVE that when all of their pleasure centers (all) the FEELING is the presence of the spirit person inside

Right there at that spot about 1994 the Holy Spirit said to me in the middle of my sermon, “and that’s what you and all the preachers like you were doing, who haven’t for years believed that the worship of God with instruments is wrong. But you continue by your silence to let people think it’s wrong, to allow the body to be disrupted, and you do so under the plea, ‘Well, we’re just maintaining peace.’ But that’s not peace; that’s cowardice.” I knew then the day would come I’d have to teach this lesson.

Yet for 12 years he slowly “boiled the frogs” and warned that those who objected should not bother the elders and others might have to make a “choice between instrumental music” and their church and marriage families. Because people are BONDED to anyone with a voice they can easily be DELUDED by the only definition of LYING WONDERS which is a false prodigy such as “the worship team can LEAD you into the presence of God” and the delusional BELIEVE that when all of their pleasure centers (all) the FEELING is the presence of the spirit person inside

I have been among cofC all my life, enjoy singing praise to the Lord, have no interest in adding instuments to the singing, but I can see that some among cofC view acapella singing as something that sets them apart from others who trust in Jesus for the forgiveness of our sins.

I know that some in cofC love to say that we have RESTORED the first century church. But there is something that has NOT BEEN RESTORED
in cofC, or other churches, and that is the CONFESSION of sins. 1 John 5:16 & James 5:16
point to praying for others that is absent among us.

Further, the DIALOGUE that Paul engaged in at Troas, Acts 20:7&9, is also missing from our assemblies. Still further, the distinction we have embraced between Bible classes and the assembly is entirely unknown in scripture.

Most serious of all is the lack of prayer in our daily lives. Jesus described God’s ELECT as those that cry unto Him day and night, Lk.18:7. Does that describe my life — am I in the faith, 2Cor.13:5?

15 years ago a devout brother acknowledged, “I have learned that I do not maintain the disciplines of prayer adequately by myself, and that I MUST pray regularly with others.”

I know the tempatation to idolize the CofC. It is an idol that had to be cut away from my heart. To bear the fruit of the Spirit, we must rely upon Jesus alone to save us from our sins. Confession crucifies our pride.

You did say it. Deny you said it but you did say it.

I have used my site for the past three years to preach and teach Jesus and to tell folks what He has accomplished for sinners.

You have majored on the music question and liabled good men whose only offence is preaching the Bible instead of coC dogma.

Who is sowing discord? I invite anyone who questions to go to your site and mine and decide. I refuse to allow this kind of nonsense without a challenge.

Royce

It so happens that all of the money, high powered thought leaders, workshops, forums, and sowing of discord since my attempt to retire in 1979 has been spent on trying to SHAME or threaten everyone to join the music band. Jesus did not bow, sing or dance when the pipers played. Jesus “cast out” the musical minstrels meaning “like dung” and much like Lucifer “cast as profane out of heaven” meaning to play the flute, steal other’s inheritance, pollute and prostitute. The Levites “prophesied” does not mean PATTERNISTIC WORSHIP but making self vile and defined as sorcery: that makes sense if God turned them over to worship the starry host.

So, you do confess that it is NOT judgmental to twist all Scripture and known historical documents to SOW MASSIVE discord but it IS judgmental to point out that it is only in these very late latter days that you could find ANYONE using the bible to defend instruments: the Disciples tried the word psallo as late as 1878.

If you define the word JUDGMENT that means that you impose a punishment or sentence on someone when they are not guilty. My side says breaking up real and church familes and being joked about all over the country is passing judgment.

I can post Bible from Genesis where the serpent was recognized by any school kid in Babylonia as the NAGA or Musical Enchanter. I challenge you to prove that he/she/it was not a musical enchanter.

The king/queen of Tyre is defined as Lucifer and called the “singing and harp playing prostitute” in the garden. And the Assyrians were the “tallest trees” in Eden.

The Levite NOISE MAKERS were performers in Egypt and brought their curse with them. Do you think that MUSICAL IDOLATRY at Mount Sinai for which God yanked The Book of The Covenant of grace is something that you can trump by appealing to David abandoned to worship the starry hosts? Do you understand that David’s PRAISE word is a very nasty, polluted concept from which the word for Lucifer is derived? That’s in the Bible. I can quote you Bible all day long and all you can find is the PATTERNISM of a cursed nation being led into captivity and death.

You are very upfront in accusing me of being evil or ignorant but I have to ask is it only the LATEST CROP of preachers who think that making musical noise when Jesus promises to give us rest and be out ONLY teacher that now has the truth to TRUMP all recorded history?

Do you grasp the word PLAY or SPORTING?

Grace hath appeared teaching us to DENY what the people who just discovered grace want to impose on us.

Ephesians 2 has a FIRST PART also which is Paul’s ALWAYS definiton of Baptism is the SHOWING act down through history of HOW God saves BY grace THROUGH faith.

If you PROMOTE something based on the workshops or reading the latest musisings among th scholars I would lose lots of sleep if I were you.

I am correct or all of the Bible and all known historical literature is wrong and ONLY the end time preachers are right. I rest my case by appealing to the preachers, elders and old ladies who could teach preachers a thing or too SOUNDLY REPUDIATED the most hostile attack against those who feed their face. There may be abourt 18000 congregations worldwide and you cannot find more than about a dozen who have gone instrumental even on a “tippy toe basis” and ALL of those if my counting is correct are the same men who vowed 2 decades ago to RESTRUCTURE the church of Christ. And I believe that they deliberately twisted those passages tghey looked up in a lexicon and I am POSITIVE that they have never read the context.

You cannot define words without understanding the Greek words AS they are used in actual literature: there is NO definiton of words.

You cannot get sick at your stomach until you literally search through most of the Babylonian tablets, literature contemporaneous with the Bible, the Greek, Egyptian and Canaanite documents LOOKING HONESTLY to find one jot or tittle to vindicate those who have NOT a jot or tittle of positive information. WHY do you suppose that only some of the latest hatch are totally convinced that the Bible is FILLED with direct commands to do music? Doesn’t this upside down pyramid make you shudder if you teach that grace is going to cover deliberate or uninformed sin. Yes, I have served most of the church roles and I know that without exception that when a man gets ordained he is not going to listen to the cheap seats.

Because I am convinced that MUSIC is that which MARKS or hard-wires the mind or spirit beyond recovery, I believe that lying about Scripture to wilfully sow discord is not redeemable. And I would be careful about labeling those discorders as the brightlights and those who refuse to BEGIN doing something they have ALWAYS REJECTED as the legalistic, sectarian patternists.

Remember that I got my degree in Electronics Engineering before there was such a field and I have made it pretty well as an inventor: I can read and digest material. However, now 30 years since I retired I JUST NOW begin to understand some of the basics. So, I urge you that you grasp that what it takes to become a preacher necessarily misses ALMOST ALL of the Bible in depth. Pride is not seemly in a pastor person. And also don’t forget that most of your progressive thinking comes from the same level and a Phd doesn’t advance you much further because it is based on THEOLOGY and not BIBLE.

I think those on the payroll of churches of Christ really need to stop misleading them and making them fell guilt because THEY did not let the MUSICAL people impose instruments in THEIR congregation. I would be ashamed of using the grace or love guilt clause. Abraham Lincoln tole one of many I have collected beginning with Adam.

A man rides down the road and a highwayman jumps out of the bushes and pokes a gun in his ribs and shouts “Stand and deliver or I will shoot you that will make you a murderer.”

That’s exactly the psychological violence which has been heaped on those who are Bible literate and don’t sing, clap and gyrate when Jesus comes to be our SOLE teacher in synagogue or “A school of the Bible–Only.”

Royce

It is possible and perhaps probable that the judgment you heap on others will be your own.

You once told me in an email that NO subject is as important to you as the IM question. Not Jesus, not prayer, not salvation by faith through faith, no you said the music question is number one with you and you have lived up to what you told me here. Sad but true. I’m sure you think you are more in God’s favor than those you condemn.

Why in the world shouldn’t we just go by the Bible? It is inspired, your history lessons are not.

Royce

A lying wonder has lots of Greek literature to define it. The OBJECT of music in pagan religions was to induce charismatic ecstasy or an artificially induced arousal: medicine ascribes that to music or motion induced endorphins which induce the impulses of fight, flight or sexual feelings: the oldest Babylonian tablets understand that and the serpent in the garden of Eden was a “musical enchanter(ess) and in the end-times she/he/it will uses rhetoricians (a hypocritic art), singers and instrument players. John calls the sorcerers who HAD deceived the whole world. So we have musical enchantment or sorcery sending strong delusions in the BEGINNING TIME and ENDING time.

If you won’t define these terms then it is pretty certain that the multitudes (with whom Jesus spoke parables) that most can be in a state of delusion and sing and clap about it. Operative words of the “new style singing” (one definition of the BEAST) include enthusiastic or (Enthus O Mania or Paul’s madness outlawed as “areskos” or self pleasure), being enraptured or experiencing a sexual-like encounter with the spirit (Wimber, wineskins code word). The laded burden Jesus died to removes is the same abrassive “anxiety created by religious ceremony” under the PSEUDO word “worship.”

The PROMISE when the “musical worship teams” (assuredly a presumptious title” was that they could LEAD THE WORSHIPER INTO THE PRESENCE OF GODd. Since they are standing in the Holy Place (type of temple) and of church architecture, how do we who are the abradees know that you are not fulfilling prophecy? You must be: a Christian has to go OUTSIDE the camp or gates and suffer reproaches while HE teaches us only when the elders “teach that which has been taught.”

Justin to the Greeks…

“cites as a witness him whom Plato had banished from his republic as a liar, and as being an imitator of the images of truth at three removes,

Note 1See the Republic, x.2. By the Platonic doctrine,

the ideas of things in the mind of God were the realities;
the things themselves, as seen by us, were the images of these realities;

and poetry, therefore, describing the images of realities,
was only at the third remove from nature.

for so Plato calls Homer; for he wrote: “Thus at least did Homer speak, And Zeus obtained the wide heaven in the air and the clouds, ‘”

wishing to make his own opinion appear more worthy of credit by the testimony of Homer; not being aware that if he used Homer as a witness to prove that he spoke truth, many of his tenets would be proved untrue.”

Speak is the OPPOSITE of poetry or music
Music is the opposite of SPEAK.
The direct command is to SPEAK one to another
The Resources are: Rom 15 that which is written, Eph 5 the Spirit (words of Christ John 6:63) or Col 3.

Music causes DELUSION which was the PURPOSE DRIVING the Orphics and Dionysiacs Paul silenced by outlawing “doubtful disputations” or that which oozes out of human imagination which Scripture says is evil continually.

You simply have NO hint of music in the synagogue of the saints and the noise of the people who slaughtered innocent types of Christ performed EXORCISM “to make the lambs dumb before the slaughter.”

You have massive, floods of instruments being the MARK of telling God to shut His Mouth.

I have spend three decades on this and I assure you that what has come upon us like a MIRACLE or WONDER . My absolute proof is that you will never find a “defense” of instruments which does not betray a total lack of contextual knowledge (whatever the “degree”) and even that Lifting-From-The-Lexicon is twisted totally.

You cannot get music of any kind out of the Spiritual Thread of the prophets by the Spirit of Christ, and those who boast about “infiltrating and diverting” do not NEED any authority, I challenge you to find one Babylonian or Classical document which does not mark music, or one church father or one founder of a denomination. Because that is true the hostility to posting the texts as the ONLY way to define words, how do you know that you are NOT living in a state of delusion: Hebrews 6 warns that people who lose the love the truth are doomed without redemption.

The POPULAR way is defined by Jesus as the WIDE PATH AND GATE.

If you trust scholars who quote scholars who quote scholars you are several REMOVES from the truth and I can assure you that the major THOUGHT LEADERS on the subject never quote original resources or define word.

Now, I am through because dismissing a clear definition of LYING WONDERS as all of the hypocritic arts mean that one seeking honor or money is going to change and get a Biblically authorized job. Jesus identified hypocrites as mouth religionists: slick speakers, singers and instrument players. THOSE are marks of those who have no intention of obeying.

THAT is what the Bible universally reserves to MARK those who have rejected the Word by believing that they can compose better songs and sermons. That is the subject.

Until someone can find a jot or tittle proving that GOD loves to be entertained or aroused as in wimber/wineskins, fed, housed or interpreted then the 100 negative against 0% positive SEEMS like someone has been “carried outside of themselves.”

Remember the REMNANT of the Jews who trusted the Scribes and Pharisees (speakers, singers, instrument players): it is VERY tiny and my job is to bear witness.

The truth that saves is Jesus and what He accomplished for wicked sinners. It is not church of Christ legalism.

You were not “invited off”, you were asked to follow along with the discussion which is Phil’s proposal where he said in part, “I am saying that people who continue to entertain and press beliefs that are false and harm others are sinning. Doctrinal error can lead to eternal damnation.

Doctrinal error can lead to eternal damnation, and yes I believe this can be any doctrinal error. It is so because error is equated in God’s eyes with sin. Any sin can lead to eternal damnation. Doctrinal sin is not less evil than moral sin. Doctrinal error has led a multitude of souls astray from God.”

Phil is wrong and you are wrong but I’m sure you are welcome to comment if you stay on target. This blog is not discussing the merits of a cappella vs IM, it is about staying with a wrong view will damn you to hell. And suddenly I’m thinking it might.

Royce