I hate to pick on this topic once again, but the accumulation of decades of experience, input from others, and observations of articles, books, documentaries, and other discerned realities, I've come to some preliminary conclusions...although simplistic sounding when taken in isolation...lend credence to the title of this thread.
The following video is interesting, but demonstrates the unwillingness of even someone like Doug Wilson to carry this topic to its logical and truthful conclusion:
There are two main reasons the institutional gathering scene is in decline, as I see it, and deemed unnecessary by more and more people with the passing of time:
1) Far too many organizations convey the idea that everyone is just fine the way they are, and
2) The historic and traditional relinquishing of the men in the institutions having given up their birthright to function as the Church.
To point #2, I will clarify by saying that the brotherhood within the ranks of the men in a gathering has relinquished that brotherhood, and thus replaced by silence...in the name of what is perceived as "order," the modern day god within that holds the mass of believers in the sway of a mere audience rather than an interactive, vibrant, thriving family that actually functions actively in each others lives, and thus fulfill the mutual edification called for within scripture. They have historically chosen to hire their responsibilities out to a professional clergy class in the place of functioning as a living body.
Many an intellectual through the decades have wrestled with this phenomenon, and settled on the idea that making it more institutional, or to change the "flavor" of things a bit in order to spice it up, are the right answers...rather than to consider that maybe, just maybe, scripture betrays a more dynamic model for the gathering than all their man-made constructs.
Granted: Paradigms locked into the psyche of most is never an easy beast to overcome, and so many will reject this, but the numbers continue to decline, and will decline dramatically when the institutions are forced to bow their knee to the State.
MM
The following video is interesting, but demonstrates the unwillingness of even someone like Doug Wilson to carry this topic to its logical and truthful conclusion:
There are two main reasons the institutional gathering scene is in decline, as I see it, and deemed unnecessary by more and more people with the passing of time:
1) Far too many organizations convey the idea that everyone is just fine the way they are, and
2) The historic and traditional relinquishing of the men in the institutions having given up their birthright to function as the Church.
To point #2, I will clarify by saying that the brotherhood within the ranks of the men in a gathering has relinquished that brotherhood, and thus replaced by silence...in the name of what is perceived as "order," the modern day god within that holds the mass of believers in the sway of a mere audience rather than an interactive, vibrant, thriving family that actually functions actively in each others lives, and thus fulfill the mutual edification called for within scripture. They have historically chosen to hire their responsibilities out to a professional clergy class in the place of functioning as a living body.
Many an intellectual through the decades have wrestled with this phenomenon, and settled on the idea that making it more institutional, or to change the "flavor" of things a bit in order to spice it up, are the right answers...rather than to consider that maybe, just maybe, scripture betrays a more dynamic model for the gathering than all their man-made constructs.
Granted: Paradigms locked into the psyche of most is never an easy beast to overcome, and so many will reject this, but the numbers continue to decline, and will decline dramatically when the institutions are forced to bow their knee to the State.
MM