Basic HTML Version
commercially in a competitive economic system; organized into
man-ruled civil governments of man's devising; organized into
CHURCHES. And this we know---the TRUE church must be different,
and separate!
So to understand exactly what each of our own little local
groups OUGHT to be---our true divine PURPOSE and FUNCTION and
REASON FOR EXISTING---we need to begin at the very beginning.
Let's briefly sketch it thru.
When God created our first parents, He gave them His law--
His way of life. But as men multiplied upon earth, they turned
from God's ways of LOVE---the way of humility, of GIVING, of
serving---to the grasping ways of lust and greed and vanity---their
minds on evil continually.
So God wiped out, thru the flood, the entire human family
save eight souls. This colossal judgment should have taught men
their lesson. But it took Satan only two generations to find a man
of ability and capacity thru whom he could DECEIVE the whole human
family into a society of ORGANIZED competition based on the selfish
principle. Ham, son of Noah, survived the flood. The first son
of Ham was Ethiopia. And "Ethiopia produced Nimrod, the first man
on earth to be a despot. . . His Empire at first was Babylon, Uruk,
Akkad, and Kalneh, in the land of Shinar; from which he PUSHED OUT
into Assyria, building the great city of Nineveh and its suburbs."
(Gen. 10:8-12, Moffatt Translation).
Beginning of ORGANIZATION---Man Ruling Man
Nimrod was the first man to huddle families together in
CITIES---to ORGANIZE people into the ORGANIZED form of society
whereby one man or a few men assume AUTHORITY over, and regulate
the lives of the others.
IT WAS CONTRARY TO GOD'S WAY FOR MEN TO BE SO ORGANIZED
THAT ONE OR A FEW MEN HAVE AUTHORITY TO RULE OVER THEIR FELLOWS!
It is contrary to the principles of God's Law. But thru Nimrod
Satan started this world off on the ORGANIZED system. This
system began with and is based on the principle of building
CITIES as centers of various organized activities--centers of
civil and other GOVERNMENT; centers for industry, commerce,
business; centers for religious and social activity.
Thus the competitive principle--the selfish, greedy,
self-exalting way of life--the SINNING principle--became
ORGANIZED. At first, as the Scripture shows and ancient
histories record, each CITY was a kingdom in itself. Each city
had a KING. The world was organized into a system of CITY-
STATES. Each city had its army. The selfish, getting, sinning
principle was now organized for carrying out the principle of
competition in ARMED AGGRESSION. One king, lusting for more
power and wealth, sent his army invading a rival city-state. If
he conquered it, he now ruled TWO city-states. Soon he rules
over three--then more. Soon some of these despots were ruling
over NATIONS composed of several cities and the rural population
in between. Thus NATIONS came into being. Life inside each