by Motema Bolingo 19 Replies latest jw friends
skally...yeah run with that and I hope it keeps you busy...Good lord! There is no documentation that says that Ray would start such a thing, but you can always leave it to the people, who are tanamount to gossip mongers IMO, to keep looking and making vague insinuations ad nauseum...skally...you don't have any better search engines than anyone else dear...get over it...and take your medicine for dog's sake!
Sincerely,
District Overbeer
What is kiononia?
'Understanding Ministry: Kiononia'
http://www.xenos.org/classes/um2-7.htm
The early Christians "continuously devoted themselves to fellowship." (Acts 2:42) The word for "fellowship" is koinonia, which means "to have in common" or "to share." As those who are united with Christ, we are to share the life of Christ with one another in a way that results in individual and corporate spiritual growth. This is accomplished through the exchange of God's love and truth, which is called "ministry" (which simply means "service").
Koinonia is viewed by the New Testament as a non-optional environment for spiritual growth.
Clearly such koinonia is not just a matter of attending one or two meetings a week. It is much more than that. This is why the verse so often used to stress the importance of attending church (Hebrews 10:25 ". . .not forsaking the assembling together as is the habit of some. . ."), is frequently misunderstood today. This verse is often taken to mean that only our presence at church meetings is necessary. Instead, we find that according to 1 Cor. 12:21 (". . .the eye cannot say to the hand, `I have no need of you'. . ."), it is not just the presence of the other members that we need, but also their function.
Christians are viewed as the body of Christ because we are spiritually united with Christ and with each other. Since we are members of one another, we need to relate to each other in a mutually interdependent way. The important point, therefore, is not just that we attend meetings (although this is a necessary aspect), but that we authentically share the life of Christ with one another. Thus, ". . . speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the Head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love." (Eph. 4:15,16).
The New Testament defines normative involvement in Christian koinonia in two major ways. One way is by serving other Christians with our spiritual gifts and receiving others' service through their spiritual gifts. The sphere in which we use our gifts is our ministry, or service.
Another, and perhaps more basic way to practice koinonia is through loving one another in various practical ways. In Jn. 13:34,35, Jesus told his disciples that they were to "love one another as I have loved you." Since they had been with Jesus for several years, they knew how he expressed love to them. Since other Christians would not have this opportunity, the apostles carefully described what this love looks like. Through what are sometimes called the "one another" imperatives of the epistles, we are given a profile of the ways that we can love one another. Below are examples:
As we practice giving love to other Christians in these ways, and as we allow them to express love to us in these ways, we are practicing koinonia and expressing mutual interdependence as members of Christ and one another.
Christian meetings are important in this regard because they enable us to experience koinonia during the meeting in varying degrees. They also facilitate the meeting of other Christians with whom we can build koinonia-based friendships. New Testament churches commonly met in homes as well as in large groups (see Acts 2:46; 20:20; Rom. 16:5).
The reason for this was probably so that the Christians could more easily practice this kind of koinonia. Xenos has always emphasized the importance of home groups for this reason. In the context of a home group and the relationships which develop between members, a level of koinonia can occur which is impossible by attending only larger meetings.
Valis,
Bite me!! Get off my back. If you don't like me or what I do or what I say...
Get over it!! I'm not here for you!! Good lord, shake your penis off and have a cold one on me!!
sKally
Ray has noted in his books that he has no desire to join any other kind of organization.That he is content to have a relationship with Jesus and leave it at that.
Blueblades
Valis,Bite me!! Get off my back. If you don't like me or what I do or what I say...
Get over it!! I'm not here for you!! Good lord, shake your penis off and have a cold one on me!!
sKally
see...that's the problem...I don't think you are here for anything other than your own paranoid AND delusional agenda. You tried w/Pat Garza threatening people with info that was no more than your own observation...but you kept it lingering and threatening to foist your idea upon people who didn't even have a clue and could possibly of all things become as paranoid as you. BS and so forth...futile dramatics. Shake my penis off? *LOL* You are stretching it...as it were...*LOL* Sincerely, District Overbeer
I believe it is correct that M James "Jim" Penton says he founded Koinonia in a small footnote in Apolycalypse Delayed.
Also, Ray Franz advocates no particular group but attends a nondenominational Bible group that meets in homes.
His second book In Search of Christian Freedom discusses a Free Christians movement.
It is true that there is a house- and internet-meeting movement based on Bible fellowship instead of having the same beliefs, which is called the Free Christians and which includes inactive JWs and ex-JW's.
Some I have emailed with who are in the movement say he and Ed Dunlap were sources of inspiration, among others, for it but they did not found it. It still exists.
Besides Koinonia and the Christians there have been (and are) other lesser known groups among inactive (even active) JW's and ex-JWs, such as The Order of Tyndale which was started by James "Jim" Reed, who had been an elder.
I don't think Reed continued with it but others may have done so on their own?
Bonham, Texas, had a breakaway group for a while but Watchtower broke them up as fast as possible and I don't know that they even exist. There were the "Latter Day" JW's in Florida, too. Etcetera.
Still another that dead-ended though was started by a former JW up, I think, in Eagle, Idaho.
It would take a group of ex-JW elders to meet and start attracting members openly to really put the squeeze on the Watchtower.
sKally said:
: Please explain why Rays name appears below it then and not Jim's.
I can't. Ask them yourself if you're interested. Whatever, they're wrong.
AlanF
Jim Penton contacted me and confirmed that he and some from a group of 83 ex-JWs, who had quit the Watchtower cult in 1981, formed Christian Koinonia International in 1981. Raymond Franz was not involved.
AlanF
Don't "whatever" me Alan. It was a question. I asked you because you SEEM to [edited to add the word: know] it ALL.
sKally
I don't think you are here for anything other than your own paranoid AND delusional agenda
Think again.
You tried w/Pat Garza threatening people with info that was no more than your own observation...but you kept it lingering and threatening to foist your idea upon people who didn't even have a clue and could possibly of all things become as paranoid as you.
Audiotapes don't tell lies. It's all on tape. I'm not the only one with those seven tapes. It's not just my observation.
I think these tapes need to be heard and then tell me I'm paranoid and clueless.
What about it Alan? How about everyone hears them? Then they will know I'm not making this up and it will be out in the open.
sKally
