Institutionalized Joshua 24:15 If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. Here in America we lead the world with the most incarcerated and imprisoned populations in human history. People who come out of prison into the outside world forget how to function, their ability to find work is limited and therefore more than half return back to prison classifying them to be institutionalized. There are 2 personality traits of institutionalized people, and those traits stem from: 1.Passive compliance to the demands of authority figures and 2.Elimination of critical decisions and personal decision making. As I was reading this information it reminded me so much of the people in the institutional church today. It’s crazy how people just accept what their preacher says to be true and go along with it, rather than studying as “Bereans” to make sure what he said was true. As long as a preacher has the title “apostle”, “prophet”, “bishop”, or “pastor” people agree with everything they say as if it came from the very mouth of God. And since there is no room for the gifts of God to be truly in function like the Bible commands, there is only one person who preaches the entire time every week and the people have no voice nor can they make decisions on anything. You have to comply with the church, the “institution”, or they will ask you to leave. I’ve heard from to many people that have been thrown out of church’s just for having a different opinion. It’s sad, but its only comes from being institutionalized. In many of these institutional churches I visit I hear people clapping and saying amen to comments and teachings that are not even biblically based and don’t even exist within the pages of the Bible. They agree with principles and gibberish that go against the Bible 100%. After sitting in the church I know the preacher has taught the people absolutely nothing, but why don’t they know that? As the so called gospel is preached today, you might as well name the church after the pastor cause most so called ministries are named after the pastor anyway. After considering that I too use to be institutionalized once upon a time, I conclude that one must make a choice to obey the Bible or their pastor. There are no gray areas in the Bible, you must make a choice: God or money, discipleship or selfish ambition, following Jesus even if it means losing everything. I want to point out something very personal that I’m going through right now to let you know that there is no law or government that supercedes the Bible. The Bible tells us to obey government and the laws put in place, but what do you do when the law commands you to do something that goes against the Bible? I personally have chosen to obey the Bible, and though it has come with some losses, I would rather stand before God with those losses and obey, rather than with earthly gain following the ways of the world and living in fear. I get opinions from others who are close to me and though their intentions are good, they compromise the word of God to obey government because it is a hard decision to make. I honestly don’t consider such opinions. I am one who wants the word of God every time, leave your opinion at home. Even if the what the Bible say hurts me, give it to me cause nothing else matters. But it is frustrating talking to people who have not taken on discipleship, not taken on hard teachings, and have not accepted the losses that come along with it. So in the end it becomes very lonely. What choice will you make?
Posted on: Mon, 08 Dec 2014 01:50:25 +0000