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Post date: Jul 1, 2015 4:12:45 AM
Well, quite simply if the pastors salary is dependent on his disciples remaining subject to him then he is perversely incentivised. In business it it is called "conflict of interest".
When we see it in government we freak out and run to the papers, and yet, believe it or not, institutional church is 100% dependent and measured by money.
If the pastor has to choose between growing his disciples to becoming adult males like him, and better than him, which means they will become more powerful and productive than him, or keeping them in subjection then its empire building (see the Book Under Cover for an extreme case of this perversion).
The best case study and example of the healthy and natural way, is a father with his son.
What father wants his son to stay in the house permanently, give the father money and remain beholden to the father when the son is 25, 35, or 45 years old? Well the answer is, a perverted father. It is unnatural. Please remember God is supernatural, but He is never unnatural. Creation is God's testimony of Himself, after all.
So, a healthy father raises his son to eclipse him and certainly not to need him in the long term. Off course the father and his adult son love each other and the son will show great respect and love, BUT the son is not subject to the father,once he has become an adult. They become brothers.
5 “and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?
Matthew 19:5
Boys will stay, but men will leave.
So if the pastor is doing what the Bible says he should be doing, i.e equipping the saints TILL they grow up:
11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,
12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,
13 TILL we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;
14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,
15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—
16 from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.
Ephesians 4:11-16
Then you will find a steady stream and adult males becoming equal to the pastor. IE the the sons will become brothers. Quite soon the pastor will be invisible among the adult males (elders) he has raised and if the pastor is in fact an apostle he will move on to op the same elsewhere, leaving the church in the care of elders, over whom he has no further jurisdiction. He can preach, admonish, even beg them, but he cannot control them. Control is only appropriate for infants.
BUT
If the pastors cashflow for his company is dependent on tithing then he cannot afford to grow them up into equal status as himself.
This is empire building. It is conflict of interest and leads to scripture twisting and all manner of manipulation and abuse.
Money is fundamental to the functioning of institutional church and thus one sees all the bad fruit Paul warned against.
6 Now godliness with contentment is great gain.
7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.
8 And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content.
9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition.
10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
1 Timothy 6:6-10
God's order is always organic, natural and works like a human body. It is not hierarchical, institutional and title based.
There is a better way... :)
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