Are church meetings useful today?

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The revealed Word is ignored by the churches

LUKE 18:8  Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?

No end-time prophecy says anything good about the end-time

No end-time parable says anything good about the end-time.

Churches perform a good service of getting people saved from hell. That makes them part of the foolish virgins. Saved but fooled by their church leaders. Christ alone is the Head of the church. No man is the head of a church.

EPHESIANS 5:23   For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body.

But then comes a second step. We also need to be saved from the impending great Tribulation. That will take hard work to navigate our way through all the church errors. There are 45000 different kinds of churches and denominations, so there is a lot of error and deception in the church world. It is a complete swamp. Only the wise virgins with enough oil in their lamps will have enough light to be able to read the Scriptures with understanding and thus be ready for the Coming of the Lord.

When faced with difficulties in the King James Bible, the foolish or fooled virgins say, “Must we know?”

The Bride or wise virgins say, “We must know”.

PHILIPPIANS 2:12   … work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

You cannot work your way out of hell, the walls of the pit are too steep. You are saved from hell by grace through faith. It has nothing to do with your good works.

But you have to work your way out of the treacherous and deceptive church swamp by joining the Scriptures together until you can understand them.

MATTHEW 7:14   Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

The early church never had a pastor as the head of the church. Today, modern churches all have pastors in charge. Thus, the structure is wrong and the people are never taught to think Scripturally. They get saved by Jesus but then they dedicate themselves to their church and their pastor, instead of to the Word of God. They are crippled in their understanding of the Bible by the limitations of their pastor and cannot be prepared for the coming of the Lord.

HEBREWS 10:25   Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.

Christians must obviously gather together.

How many people form a legitimate church group?

MATTHEW 18:20   For where two or three are gathered together in my name,

there am I in the midst of them.

Two people can be a meeting. Three people is plenty.

62-0601  TAKING SIDES WITH JESUS

"Now, do you know, when those early men went out, sometimes there were only about six or eight of them, together? And they shook the country. Well, you know, when Aquila and Priscilla, that great revival that Apollos was having over there, there was only about six or eight men and women in that bunch.

That whole church, meant six or eight.

You got five or six, seven times as many here tonight as they had then.
You know, Jesus only had twelve apostles. We always thinking for something big.

But God don't deal in them big numbers. It's in these little groups is where He gets it. See?

Look all down through the age, at any time He ever met with men.

It was in small groups,

see, and spoke with them, and ordained them. It's God's good pleasure to do that. That's the way He likes to do it. And now we just want to keep God in our midst, and go, doing these things."

ACTS 13:27    For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him.

If a prophet’s words are read out then it is exactly the same as if he was standing there and speaking with his own voice.

The prophet then becomes another person who is present in the meeting. And it only takes two or three people to make a meeting in God’s eyes. Thus, a prisoner in solitary confinement who reads the Bible is in the presence of the prophet who wrote those words and that makes a meeting of two people. The same applies to you when you sit on your own and study the Bible. It is a gathering.

Where do they gather?

The early church gathered in a house. They could gather in the Temple in Jerusalem, but that was the only city that had a Temple. The Temple was destroyed in AD 70. After that they gathered in houses or they had an open air meeting like when Stephen and Peter preached.

ACTS 2:46   And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple,

and breaking bread from house to house,

did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, 

Breaking bread and eating meat have a double meaning as spiritually they refer to explaining or mentally digesting the Word of God, especially the more difficult verses.

The early church met in the house of a believer.
PHILEMON 1:2   And to our beloved Apphia, and Archippus our fellowsoldier,

and to the church in thy house: 

COLOSSIANS 4:15    Salute the brethren which are in Laodicea, and Nymphas,

and the church which is in his house. 

I CORINTHIANS 16:19  The churches of Asia salute you. Aquila and Priscilla salute you much in the Lord,

with the church that is in their house.

I CORINTHIANS 1:11   For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren,

by them which are of the house of Chloe, that there are contentions among you. 

ROMANS 16:3   Greet Priscilla and Aquila my helpers in Christ Jesus: ...

:5    Likewise greet the church that is in their house.

Paul taught from house to house.
ACTS 20:20  And how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you,

but have shewed you, and have taught you publickly, and from house to house.

ACTS 12:12   And when he had considered the thing, he came to the house of Mary the mother of John, whose surname was Mark;

where many were gathered together praying.

The first building that served as a church building that archaeologists have found, dates from about AD 220, which is well into the second church age when things were starting to go wrong.

In other words, the first church age did not gather in a separate church building. The first church age ended around D 170.

How do they gather?

Believers were usually gathered in a room to hear a speaker.

But now that internet ZOOM technology has been developed, a person can sit in their own house and listen to a Bible study that is done in another part of the world. The speaker in his house and the listener in his or her house make two people, which is a legitimate meeting. If a husband or wife or child or a friend is present in either house then the numbers increase. If 10 or 11 different people join into the ZOOM meeting, then it is a big meeting.

The ZOOM meeting can be recorded and listened to later by other people who are in different time zones, at a time that suits them.

You may wish to try:  https://churchages.net/zoom-recordings/

If you want to listen to recorded zoom meetings.

We have a weekly Sunday morning Bible Study on Zoom with some people from South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.

This takes place at 10:15 Central Africa Time, which is 11:15 Kenya time. People can normally log in 15 minutes earlier.

https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/837386325         link

People can listen to the ZOOM meeting or to the recording. If they listen to the recording they can continue to attend their own church meeting, if they want to.

Church meetings are not always a success unless the Bible's truth is preached.
ROMANS 3:12   They are all gone out of the way,

they are together become unprofitable;

there is none that doeth good, no, not one.

People who gather together but do not learn how to understand the written Word, have an unprofitable church experience that will not prepare them for the Coming of the Lord.

The evidence of the oil which is the Holy Ghost baptism

Virgins are clean women, representing saved people in the churches.
MATTHEW 25:1   Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom.
:2   And five of them were wise, and five were foolish.

:3   They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them:
:4   But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.
:5   While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept.

In the end, all the saved people in the churches are fast asleep. So, what can we do to minimize the damage that we do to ourselves by being fast asleep? The obvious answer is that we must leave the sleeping churches. Having the Holy Ghost does not mean that we are not fast asleep.

JOHN 16:13   Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself;

A Spirit-filled person does not make a name for himself or herself. The Holy Spirit enables a person to understand the written Word of God.

DANIEL 12:10  ... but the wise shall understand.

The only important thing at the end is the ability to understand the written King James Bible.

MATTHEW 25:6   And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh;

go ye out to meet him.

A cry at midnight—a huge disaster that threatens the world's financial system. Some kind of massive earthquake in a critical financial area. When people lose money, they wake up quickly.

When they wake up, they are told to go out of their churches to meet Jesus, because He stands outside the door of the church of the Laodiceans.

REVELATION 3:14    And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write;

REVELATION 3:20    Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

Jesus does not call to the church, He calls to an individual in the church.

REVELATION 3:16     So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.

Every church will be spewed out of His mouth, but not the individuals who have left the church.

I CORINTHIANS 11:34   And if any man hunger, let him eat at home; that ye come not together unto condemnation. And the rest will I set in order when I come.

This verse has a double meaning.

Spiritually, it means that if a man is hungry for truth, he will learn more by studying at home than by attending church meetings, where the full truth is not preached. By staying at home, he avoids all the errors that the churches teach.
I CORINTHIANS 11:17   Now in this that I declare unto you I praise you not,

that ye come together not for the better, but for the worse.
Where error is preached, people gather together in a church meeting and actually do themselves harm.

When asked about the end time, Jesus gave a chilling answer.

MATTHEW 24:4   And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.

We will be deceived and lulled to sleep by the church leaders.

REVELATION 18:4     And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people,

that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.

An inner, heavenly voice tells us to get out of the churches.