Accountability
groups
Accountability Group (no more than 3) What
are some good questions to ask each time 2 or 3 of us men meet to
hold each other
accountable. What are the do's and
don'ts of such a commitment...size limits...suggestions for such a
commitment. If women want to do this, what accountability questions
would be asked in this case? Your ideas and experiences and suggested
resources please. We are ministers wanting to lead holy lives before
our community in the hope that we may have opportunities to minister
and teach. Thanks!
This type of accountability can be hard but
it is where people really grow. Especially us ministers have a hard
time admitting our faults for fear of discovery and losing our jobs
and/or reputations. The end result is that many of us live double
lives with secret sin being our second god that we worship when no
one else is looking.
Obviously in some cases this deeper type of
accountability is only appropriate within all male or all female
groups.
Accountability groups only work when there
is trust and openness. This may take a while to develop. Give it time
and start slow until you feel that your relationship can progress
into these more intimate areas.
The
Corpus
Hermeticum, 7
asks:
"Whither stumble ye,
sots, who have sopped up the wine of ignorance and can so far not carry it that ye already even
spew it
forth? Stay ye, be
sober, gaze upwards with the [true] eyes of the heart! And if ye
cannot all, yet ye at least who can! For that the ill of ignorance
doth pour o`er all the earth and overwhelm the soul that's battened down within the body, preventing it from fetching port
within Salvation's harbors. (Eph 4:14 winds of doctrine. Sop
and psallo
or external melody have the same root.)
"Be ye then not
carried off by the fierce flood, but using the shore-current (lit.,
"back-current" or "up-current"), ye who can, make for Salvation's port, and, harboring there, seek ye for one
to take you by the hand and lead you unto Gnosis' gates.
Where shines clear
Light, of every darkness clean; where not a single soul is drunk, but sober all they gaze with their
hearts' eyes on Him
who willeth to be seen. (Paul: He is not far from all of us).
"No ear can hear Him, nor can eye see
Him, nor tongue speak
of Him, but [only]
mind and
heart. (John 4:21-23)
But first thou must tear off
from thee the cloak which thou dost wear - the web of ignorance, the ground of bad, corruption's chain, the carapace of darkness, the
living death,
sensation's
corpse, the tomb
thou carriest with thee, the robber
in thy house,
"who through the things
he loveth, hateth thee, and through the things he hateth, bears thee malice. (Body-spirit conflict. See Rom
7-8)
"Such is the hateful cloak thou wearest - that throttles thee [and holds
thee] down to it, in order that thou may'st not gaze above, and having seen the Beauty
of the Truth,
and Good that dwells therein, detest the bad of it;
"having found out
the plot
that it hath schemed against thee, by making void of sense those seeming things which men think senses. For that it hath with mass of
matter blocked them up and crammed them full
of loathsome lust,
so that thou may'st not hear about the things that thou should'st
hear, nor see the things thou should'st see. (2 Cor 3:13-17)
What follows is our
Bible-supported commentary -- not for the non-reader -- and
review of public statements or public
writings of the "Top of the Pyramid" change agents working on your
external self. We have added links to some of those considered to be
human change agents by other fellowships. If your god is a human
change agent then you need to click the back button.
Because musical worship is
the only effective Change Agent for pseudo-worship, we
should not a key "proof-text" used to restore legalistic
worship to replace the church of edification and service
to others:
-
-
And
king Solomon offered a
sacrifice of twenty and two thousand oxen, and an hundred
and twenty thousand sheep: so the king and all the people
dedicated the house of
God. 2 Chronicles 7:5
- And the priests
waited on their offices: (Religious)
- the Levites also with instruments of musick of the Lord, which (Authorized for
Civil-state)
- David the king
had
made to
praise the Lord,
- because his mercy endureth for
ever (To
stop the plague!)
- when
David praised by their
ministry; (Notice: not the
congregation!)
- and the
priests sounded trumpets before them,
- and
all Israel stood (ordained to be present or stand
fast). 2 Chronicles 7:6
-
Did you get it? No? Well, take
another look. David did not compose, invent and institute
musical instruments under the commanders of the army for
you! Nor did he do it for congregational
worship. Plato would warn us that when the music changes
people are involved in "changing the government" and, at
first, it seems harmless.
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DOES THE GOSPEL "APPLE" HAVE MORE THAN JUST A CORE?'