AssemblyBoard

Some one I know thinks that Genesis 1:28 means that he should have as many children as he can.
I would like advice on how to talk him out of that interpretation.
By the way, he knows Hebrew.

Hi Steve! :)
  Share with him the simple hermeneutical principle:

     "All scripture is for us, but not necessarilyto us."

  Even without understanding Hebrew it should be obvious the exhortation was to Adam and Eve and did not necessarily apply to every human couple.

  I like the example of a misuse of scripture that I saw many years ago:

  "Judas went out and hanged himself"------ "Go and do thou likewise".

  "And all the Saints said?!" ;)

                                 God Bless,  Mark

Genesis 1:28
Soundn't the verse be used in context?
The earth wasn't populated them.

I wonder if his wife is of the same mind?

"If a man doesn't provide for his own household, he is worse than an infidel."

This verse could very well become problematic for a person with ten children, who becomes disabled, or has catastrophic medical bills, etc.  I think we are allowed to exercise some prudence with regard to how many children we should have, and how we shall care for them.

The real argument here is in regard to birth control vs. abstinence.

Also, this command was given before God cursed women with painful childbirth!  

Brent

I once heard Walter Martin, aka "The Bible Answer Man" answer this.  Regarding the command to "Be fruitful...and fill the earth" he said...."We have".

Tom

I'm not sure how to interpret that verse, but my children
Billy, Bobby, Andrew, Herbie, Hugo, Imelda, Mary, Angela, Diedre, Nola, Nora, Abigail, Elizabeth, and Heidi might know--I'll ask them.

Good Answer Joe

Geez--i was so qucik to reply I forgot about Edna, Louise,
Tabitha, Marie and Jenny.

--Joe

Well that is five possible Fathers day gifts you can kiss goodbye  ;D

G

I guess this is as good a place as any to post this question without starting yet another thread.

The Assembly had the teaching on marriage right in principle, but not in application.

Any thoughts or opinions??

MM

WHAT????????????  I can't even answer this question right now it makes me so mad (not at you MM).  I'll give my $1,000,000.00 tomorrow after I've been able to relax watching some T.V. :o!

Marcia,

Haven't had a lot of time today for the BB :( ;D ;D ;D!  But I definately wanted to weigh in on this one!

For a good example, I would like to state what transpired just before we left the assembly.  This actually was one of the catalysts for my husbands' and my departure (kind of the straw that broke the camel's back, so to speak!)

Let me paint the picture:  We are at a "required" campout.  I say "required", because we did not want to attend this campout and told the leadership this when asked to attend.  We were told later that this was "the Lord's appointment" and to not attend was to be in disobedience to God.  By the way, originally, this campout was announced in the meetings as an "invited event".  You know.........."Dear saints, we're having a great campout and you're all invited, please see so and so if you are able to attend."  Later, when the majority of "saints" didn't want to attend, it became a "required event", "the Lord's appointment".  You see, there wasn't going to be a "good showing" of people from the Valley at the event where other assemblies were going to have numerous "saints" in attendance.  This would look bad on the leadership, it now became "the Lord's appointment". ::) ::)  UGH!!!!!!!  

This is the kind of stuff that began to make me sick about the assembly.  And I shared this with my husband.  I began to see the hypocrisy of this kind of behavior and resented it.  It made me sick that some leading brother would take my husband out for coffee to discuss these kind of things and he would come home "seeing the light".  He NOW knew what the "will of God" was for his family.  He spoke with a leading brother!  UGH!!!!!!!!  I told my husband I was beginning to lose respect for him.  If he had gotten down on his knees with a bible and the "Lord" told him this is what he wanted for his family, that I could respect.  Some MAN telling my husband what the "will of God" was for his family made me sick.  That is walking before man, not God!

I digress!

At this campout (remember, I'm there under duress), my husband and I are pulled aside to be entreated by a leading brothers wife.  She begins to tell us of the things that are "again" wrong with our teenage daughter (nothing new.......it was a constant thing with this woman......always telling us what was wrong with our daughter......again....UGH!!!!!!!!!!)  This wasn't the worst of it...........she then proceeds to entreat me for "producing bad fruit in my marriage."  You see, I had begun taking a stand with my husband, as he was beginning to verbally abuse my daughter (his step-daughter) and me.  I told him, gently, kindly, I would not stand for it.  It was sin, and it wasn't right.  (An aside - I have since spoken with our pastor and my biblical counselor about this issue and they both concurred that Matthew 18 would apply in this circumstance.  Both my daughter and I are sisters in Christ with my husband, and if he is in "sin" we are to use Matthew 18 in order to restore him.  Not to submit to his abuse!)

This woman proceeded to posture that I should simply take the abuse and that God would honor me.  She clearly said that if I continued with him as I had in the past, that God would NOT HONOR that and that is why I was producing "bad fruit" in my marriage.  The "bad fruit" was all the issues she was addressing with my teenage daughter.  

This is the kind of stuff I disagree with in regards to how we were counseled as couples.  There was nothing scriptural or a "biblical principal" that was being taught through this kind of counsel.  It was the assemblies' way of controlling the couples.  

This is the stuff that makes me sick about the assembly and their way of teaching regarding the marriage relationship.  In the future, I may write a book. ;)  I could fill pages with stories such as these with regards to their lack of "biblical principals" in the marriage relationship and in their parenting techniques.

Maybe more later.......... ;) ;) ;)

Kimberley,

I know this is off topic, but your post about the coercive campout reminded me of something.

For the last few years attendance at outreaches in the community of SLO had been declining.  We were not zealous for outreach like we were a long time ago.  So, a leader announced that we would have a team of "community saints" to start a big push for outreach.  I attended because I didn't want a lecture on my lack of concern for the lost.  Another leader commonly preached, "People out there are going to hell.  What are we doing  about it?" (noth'n like a little guilt trip to get you going, huh?).  Anyway, after being put on the spot twice in front of several of my peers, I reluctantly agreed to be in a gospel skit at the Farmers Market.  The whole time I practiced I kept wondering why I let myself get roped into this.  I didn't want to get a lecture from this leader and appear as if I were "drawing back" from total commitment to the Lord.  I almost approached the leader in order to tell him that I would not do the skit, and to tell him to stop coercing me, but I chickened out.  I thought, "Gee, those poor leaders are going through so much right now with that mean old Brent attacking them on the website.  I'll just let this slide."  I should have told him, but I was still deceived and easily talked myself into protecting the leaders from scrutiny.  I see now that I was not concerned with what God wanted, but with what others would think.

The reason I don't have zeal for outreach is due to the fact that I'm burned out from all the burdensome legalism and guilt that permeated the assembly culture.  I'm sure I looked pretty pathetic handing out those invites at the Farmers Market during those last few months.  I hated every moment of it.  And, surprise, surprise!  Nobody came to the meetings as a result of meeting me.  I'm sure they saw the weariness on my face and figured they had better things to do than to come to our meetings.  Of course, some would say that I needed to just "leave myself at home, put off the old man, put on the new man and do it with a good attitude!".  That's right along the lines of, "Think happy thoughts, Peter Pan, and you'll fly away to Never-never Land!" (the context of Eph 4:22 is that of lust, not outreach).

With time and spiritual rest God will give me desires for new ways to serve Him.  I know that I don't have to try to be Mr. Uberservant.  I am enjoying His rest.

Jack

I think you mean "Kimberley".  I was the one who posted re: the "coercive campout". ;)

Andrea,

I always go to coercive campouts  :).  Actually my kids love camping, so I go camping.  You're invited to visit us next weekend with your whole family; we're all going camping July 11-13; it's our annual assembly campout.
Last weekend June 27-29 we camped out because we went to Soul Fest (the kids used some of their money they had saved for the teen team).

So camping can be fun.
MM

Andrea,

You better start unpacking if you were planning to come.  I am not to go either; I do not want the others to opt out because of me being there, so I decided to opt out instead.

Lord bless,
MM

Marcia,

Does that mean that others wouldn't go because you'd be there, so now you're not going?   :-\

That's really too bad.  I'm sorry to hear it.

If this is true, makes me want to ........  :P!!!!!!  You get the picture!  This should show you where people's beliefs are falling.  If they can't receive you as a sister in Christ, they are still clinging to their "assembly teachings" no matter how much they argue the opposite.  

Doesn't surprise me.  Does it surprise anyone else?

By their fruits you shall know them.

No, It does not surprise me at all.
It grieves me.

We should have a 'Survivers Retreat', with a time of sharing testimonies, fellowship with no 'telloship' and some sound teaching from a true lover of Jesus Christ.

Well the campout is to be postponed because the forecast is for rain all weekend.

MM

You better start unpacking if you were planning to come.  I am not to go either; I do not want the others to opt out because of me being there, so I decided to opt out instead.

Are you saying you were not allowed to go?

I was planning to go. But many others were opting out from going because they were uncomfortable with me being around. So I opted out from going so that they could go.

But now it has been postponed anyway.

So....


Marcia

Hooray for divine intervention. I hope it pours.
They would be uncomfortable with you there because they are still stuck in their elitist, arrogant attitudes about the superiority of the assembly. What an obnoxious way to be!  What ever happened to grace?