The Bible claims for itself authority unlike that of any other writing, being the very Word, and words, of God, and that it is both alive and powerful and sharper than any knife or sword in piercing to man’s innermost being.
This website is an outreach to Believers in the St Petersburg, Florida area who long for the opportunity to fellowship with other Believers in weightily considering God’s Word not part of any denominational attachment or for any fund raising purposes.
Faith Does Naturally, Seriously, Deeply
Seek Understanding
Long ago, a man known as Anselm of Bec wrote a little book with a fabulous title that captures the essence of this opportunity: Faith Pursues Understanding. In its original Latin, the title was given as Fides Quaerens Intellectum; Fides is of course Faith, and Intellectum is Intelligence or more accurately Understanding; Quaerens is the root of the English words Quest and Quarry (where quarry is both a noun, as for a precious metal mine, or a verb as in pursuing something of great value). Our Faith is God’s gift to us. But that gift is a motivation to understand ever better who God is, and thereby reciprocate in adoration. That motivation, or pursuit, is at root the underlying purpose of any serious study of His Word.
The “Church” Today
There are some 400,000 “churches” in the United States today. Almost all of them, in terms of numbers, are claimed to be “Christian.” Really? What are they up to, really? Why do they exist, really?
There is today, as there has always been, a huge, thriving “Religion Industry.” In the United States the Religion Industry is massive in revenues, employees, attendees / members, activities, and influence. Estimates of its annual revenues range of more than $400 million (!) to more than $1 trillion (!!!).
The current assessment of the Religion Industry is that it is declining in numbers and influence, as increasing numbers of people are declaring themselves to be of no religion (the so-called “nones”), or even atheists. Not so fast: what these trends reflect is not a going away from “Religion” in the broadest sense, but every re-shaing “Religion” into man’s own image and for his own purposes. What may be changing is any pretense that such “Religion Industry” has with any form of Christianity, ancient, Reformed, or even modern and post-modern.
But, how does the true New Testament “church” of Jesus Christ align with such 400,000 “churches” and the “Religion Industry” overall? The serious, and tragic, answer is not closely at all. Is that too cynical, or pessimistic, or shocking, answer?
Consider the closing admonitions of the New Testament writers here:
What does The ‘christian’ Religious Industry (TRI) look like? It is here:
In contrast with TRI, we will seek to develop a foundation for that answer by using the Epistle to the Philippians as an exemplar of “The NT Church,” here: