Series on the Modern Lukewarm Evangelical Church – No. 12

Many Protestant churches succumbed to the secularizing modernist culture during the first sixty years of the Laodicean period (1870 to the soon-coming Rapture of the faithful church). They became known as the liberal-modernist-progressive Protestant churches that have a strong history of following the episcopal form of church government (e.g., top down rule of the pope through church hierarchy to the local priest, and the laity at the bottom) or the presbyterian form (committee rule). During those sixty years, the Roman Catholic Church continued its 1,700 years of corrupt church government. Together, the Catholics and the liberal Protestant churches are false churches that claim to be Christian but are apostate.

Those faithful Protestant churches that came into the Laodicean period were generally described as conservative, fundamentalist, or evangelical and almost all kept their allegiance to the first century congregational model of church government. However, a disturbing trend began to emerge among evangelical churches in the 1950s and 1960s. Even though evangelical churches generally retained the congregational form of government in their constitutions and bylaws, many began adopting a CEO-corporatist style of church leadership which in many respects contains significant elements of the […] Continue Reading…

Series on the Modern Lukewarm Evangelical Church – No. 11

In the Introduction to this series titled “Church, Inc.,” the author presented the following premises which are necessary to guide our understanding of the history of the organized church over two millennia to its present condition—the modern lukewarm church at the end of the Church Age just before the Rapture of the church.

1. Satan knows that separation of man’s relationship from God will occur if he can corrupt the truth of God’s Word and/or the Church.

2. Corruption of the truth of God’s Word comes through the infiltration of false teachers into the church to spread lies and false teachings. [See previous three-part series: “False Teachers in the Evangelical Church.”]

3. Corruption of the essentials and details of God’s design, organization, and operation of the church will damage or destroy God’s pattern for the church and its mission.

4. The essentials and details of this design, organization, and operation of the church are portrayed in the leadership gifts given to the elders of the church and the gifts of the Spirit given to all members in the body of Christ. To corrupt the operation […] Continue Reading…

Series on the Modern Lukewarm Evangelical Church – No. 10

In Part V we shall examine the last two periods of the Church Age – Philadelphian (the faithful church) and Laodicean (the lukewarm church).

• Philadelphia – The faithful church (AD 1720-1870). It was a church of revival and spiritual progress. The church had proved itself faithful and obedient to the Word. As its name implies, it was a church of love and kindness to each other. Because of their excellent spirit, they were an excellent church. They kept the word and did not deny His name. No fault was attributed to the church, only mild reproof for having only a little strength or power. The Philadelphian period began about 1720 with the early stirrings of the First Great Awakening in America and the British Isles.

The sixth period is named after the church at Philadelphia (1720-1870). For the first time since the first half of the second century (the early-mid 100s) the universal church, comprised of all born again believers, created a society that made possible a substantial return to the doctrines and the design, organization, and operation of the first century New Testament church. This return came of age at […] Continue Reading…

Series on the Modern Lukewarm Evangelical Church – No. 9

In Part IV we shall look at the fifth (Sardisean) period of the seven periods of history in the Church Age. The Reformation era (1517-1720) is described as similar to the church at Sardis (the dead church) in the first century. In this period the Bible’s doctrines, leadership gifts, and the gifts of the Spirit continued to be substantially ignored, compromised, corrupted, or abandoned altogether.

• Sardis – The dead church (AD 1517-1720). It was representative of the church that is dead or at the point of death even though it still had a minority of godly men and women. The great charge against this church was hypocrisy. It was not what it appeared to be. The ministry was languishing. There was a form of godliness but not the power. This description of the dead church fits both the Roman Catholic Church and the warring factions of Lutheranism and Calvinism in the Protestant Reformation period between 1517 and the late 1600s.

It is interesting if not confusing to most Protestants that the Reformation period is called the dead church by Jesus. We may think this description best fits the Roman […] Continue Reading…

Series on the Modern Lukewarm Evangelical Church – No. 8

In Part III we shall examine the third and fourth periods (Pergamum and Thyatira) of the seven periods of history in the Church Age and how the Bible doctrines, leadership gifts, and the gifts of the Spirit were substantially compromised, corrupted, or abandoned altogether. These periods encompass the rise of the Roman Catholic Church in the fourth century (300s) to the Reformation era beginning in 1517.

The Church enters the era of compromise

• Pergamum – Church of compromise (AD 312-590). It was labeled as the “throne of Satan” and the church where Satan dwelled. This church mixed with the world. They were faithful in spirit but filthy in flesh. They communed with persons of corrupt principles and practices which brought guilt and blemish upon the whole body. This period saw the beginnings of the Catholic Church (both Roman and Eastern Orthodox) in the late 4th century and 5th centuries.

Here we must return in our walk through church history back to the beginning of the fourth century (the 300s). Given that the first century was the most momentous century in church history, the fourth and sixteenth centuries would be runners-up. The […] Continue Reading…