Re: http://www.youtube.com/user/fotm1 (fotm1 - Doug, "Fellowship of the Martyrs," God, Inc., Liberty, Missouri)

Quote Originally Posted by fotm1
You have an interesting opinion on some things. I can't find any scriptural requirement that twelve apostles be in a particular place to appoint the city elders. Paul might have had one or two with him, but not twelve.
You're misunderstanding. I never said the 12 Apostles have to be in "particular place." What we are doing here at Biblocality.com is locating them. One might be in South Africa, another in Moscow, and another in Tokyo. What is being established is agreement among the Apostles. If the Apostles are not right before God then how can the Church be? Hence, you can clearly see it starts from the Head to the Apostles and Elders to the Body of Christ. By not accepting this you are in disharmony, independent and going your own way with your own opinion. You may not have thought so before, but realize it now.

You know, the apostles that I have met that are truly mature apostles appointed by God, learned that they don't need to TELL people what they are. If I can't tell who you are by what you do, then what it says on your business card is moot. I would urge you to stop using a title as a club to get people to listen to you. It's going to be really counter-productive in the long run. Some of the most humble that I have met don't know even know what they are, they just DO.
Paul told people he was an Apostle, so your theory doesn't fit the facts. The same is true of the other Apostles. You are accusing Paul, Peter and John for saying they were Apostles. How can they be Apostles if they are so timid they are so afraid to even admit what they are? What you are doing is rejecting the Apostles flat out whenever they say they are Apostles. And yes, they should acknowledge themselves clearly they are Apostles just like they do in Scripture. What the Holy Spirit is telling me is you seem to be jealous of the Apostles and so you accuse us. It is the same nature of the independency of the fall of man. Do you see what the problem is? You claim you might accept the Apostles but at the end of the day, you don't. Therein lies the problem. We shall know you by your fruit.

Just like you claim you would accept the Apostles by their work, the Apostle or any Christian can respond to you by saying we observe how you respond to the Apostles which shows you are not treating others as you would like to be treated. Their work is their teaching. It is like you are two-faced in claiming they can teach whatever even though you hold to some teaching of some kind they should meet. We can observe you how you place a clause in your theology that says whenever someone says they are an Apostle they can't be an Apostle. Likewise, anyone who says they are a Christian can't be a Christian according to your theology. You're just making excuses for your own fleshly disharmony with the body of Christ.

Why do you hold a double standard? A Christian ought to say he is a Christian, but an Apostle is not suppose to say he is an Apostle!? You're showing your hostility to the Workers for the Church because they don't meet your criteria, but your criteria is false. What you lack is humility to be able to accept the true Apostles, so you are of no use to God since you will only create problems and factions. May God humble you. Realize you already made one mistake assuming biblocality.com requires the Apostles be in one place. Not at all. They don't have to be here, we are just helping bring them in agreement and establishing that agreement like the Apostles in the first century did. First 12 then more to follow in agreement. In Scripture, the Apostles would go out and appoint Elders, but then return to the central locality and meeting place to discuss their travels and work. For example, the Apostles of Judea would go out then come back to their meeting in Jerusalem. The same is true of other regions such as Asia Minor. At biblocality.com we are first locating 12 Apostles to have that agreement as they adhere to working regionally and meeting informally every once and awhile in their central locality for their region of churches. Hence, we can apply the Meeting Place Finder for this purpose. We sell no products. We do nothing but encourage and support agreement of the Apostles. My prayer is you stop clubbing the Apostles over the head because they don't meet your false criteria.

I don't think that you get to say whether someone is apostle or not based on their responses to your quiz. I don't think that you can Biblically just appoint an apostle because they answer right or automatically disqualify them because they disagree with you. A whole bunch of that stuff is secondary issues for which we need to seek peace, not force agreement. There is some of that where your interpretation of the scripture is pretty obvious. And you seem to leave off some stuff, like have they seen Jesus.
Apostles are not appointed by men, but God appoints them. Where is it said that biblocality.com appoints Apostles? Rather, by these questions we can know if someone is an Apostle or not if they claim to be, for we hold nothing against them if they agree, since they appear to be holding the requisite knowledge of an Apostle. You may, for example, say someone is an Apostle even though they may still disagree with questions 14 through 16, but I am telling you that an Apostle would not be such a false teacher. You claim such false teachings are "secondary" issues, but they really are primary issues, because if they were only secondary, then they would not produce denominations, but denominations are formed based on such dividing false doctrines. Think about that. The only way the body of Christ is divided is by locality.

There is no peace in such divisions and false teaching. But there is peace in agreement. You're juts fooling yourself otherwise. That someone is a false Apostle because they claim to be one (your idea) should not tell you right off the bat they are false. But if they disagree with questions 14 to 16 lets say, that is how you know! How are you testing the Apostles by holding such a low standard and allowing them to teach a great many false things without challenging them? That's how cults are born, by not asking questions and just shutting your mind down.

How are you accusing the Apostles? Because you accuse us of "forcing," but we are just merely in agreement with the truth. Nothing forced at all! It would seem you are forcing people into being Apostles if they don't say they are Apostles and if they teach falsely, but as long as they have the appearance of being peaceful it is ok. Satan can put on this facade, so are the Antichrist and False Prophet Apostles also? In Scripture when there was disagreement among the Apostles it was quickly resolved. Such division based on false doctrine did not linger around for centuries as would be the case under your system. Look how quickly matters got resolves between John, Peter and James. You don't have to see Jesus to be an Apostle. There you literally reject the Apostles because unless you see Jesus physically you can't be an Apostle, but the Bible says there were other Apostles: "then of all the apostles" (1 Cor. 15.7) and second generation Apostles. You don't realize you are the problem with your false ideas. How can you be of any use to God?

I'm not trying to fight with you. I was NOT defending Calvinism or Witness Lee. I get what you're doing with biblocality, but I'm called a different direction.

Doug
When you mention Puritanism or Paul Washer, you're defending Calvinism for Calvinism is their main deal. When you claim Witness Lee started in the Spirit but ended in the flesh, you are still claiming he is saved. Yet reality is, he was never born-again. Scripture does not know this god you speak of who teaches modalism, deification, calvinism, screamers, bearing false witness and suing for faith which you seem unwilling to stand up against. The direction you are called is not by God to show your hostility to the Apostles. This is where God judges you. God has not called you to promote locality by rejecting the Apostles. Pray on this.

Amen.