Church and State

Certainly, Constantine's church was not separate from the State and Ambrose asked the government to persecute those who did not believe in his private interpretation. On the other hand the Church established by Christ was to be in the world but not of it. Certainly, Christians following Christ would not be exiling nor persecuting or exercising authority over others as we see in the First Council of Nicaea because Jesus said we were not to be that way.
Justin the Martyr wrote the Emperor of Rome to explain the nature of the private religion of Christianity and their practice of "Pure Religion" which was separate from the State religion and "legal charity" which was at the core of the Christian conflict between the Church and State. It was the covetous practices of the Citizens of Rome through their Rulers which was and remains contrary to the decrees of Christ. Without the social bonds of true Christian fellowship the masses would degenerate and the people would become merchandise.
When Christians were being persecuted by the State of Rome the reason was Christians did not sign up for their "free bread" offered by the State through their temples.
The duties of true Christian pastors included rightly dividing bread from house to house in a "daily ministration" of fervent charity. The diligence and sacrifice required in the practice of pure Religion created the bonds of fellowship of Christ.
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The mixing of Church and state is the mixing of iron and clay which was done by the Pharisees and Herod. What results is the Coercive church which snares the people in their system of legal charity.

Church and State

Is there a separation of Church and the State?

Some will say that the "Founding Fathers" never intended for church and state to be completely separate.

They will say that religion based on the Bible was indispensable to the moral foundation of the nation they were creating.

That may be true concerning a moral people being essential to a free society but no one should assume that the constitution is biblical because it appears to be missing four of the five elements the Bible tells us to put in a constitution,

Certainly there are good ideas in it but by itself it way still fall short because the authors state it was only written for a moral people.

We should not assume that everyone who professes Christian morals actually have the same morals that Christ taught to the early Christians.

What we call a church today is not doing the same things as we see being done in the early Church on a daily basis in the practice of pure Religion.

Separation of Church and state

Thomas Jefferson’s letter concerning the "separation of church and state" was actually to the Danbury Baptist "association".

Almost all social welfare in the Americas was provided through charity by the actions of such associations.

We should ask and examine what the definition of religion was when Jefferson wrote the letter.

Religion was defined at that time as “Real piety in practice, consisting in the performance of all known duties to God and our fellow men”.

Religion was simply how a nation, the people or a society, takes care of its needy and therefore how they serve the God or gods they have chosen for themselves.

If you ask Google what religion is it will not tell you it is a duty but it is no more than "what you think about a supreme being".

There was no welfare state in America like Horatio Bunce, David Crockett and most American people would and did oppose such degenerate ideas because of the iniquity of it.

Now that we know the definition of religion that Jefferson knew we can reread the text of his letter with a better understanding of to be context of his meaning.

"To messers Nehemiah Dodge, Ephraim Robbins, & Stephen S. Nelson, a committee of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut."

Gentlemen

"The affectionate sentiments of esteem & approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction, my duties dictate a faithful & zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, and, in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more & more pleasing."

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his god, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only and not opinions, I contemplatep with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" thus building a wall of eternal separation between Church & State. Congress thus inhibited from acts respecting religion, and the Executive authorised only to execute their acts, I have refrained from prescribing even those occasional performances of devotion, practiced indeed by the Executive of another nation as the legal head of its church, but subject here, as religious exercises only to the voluntary regulations and discipline of each respective sect,

[He first wrote: "confining myself therefore to the duties of my station, which are merely temporal, be assured that your religious rights shall never be infringed by any act of mine and that." But then crossed out those lines and then wrote: "concurring with"; but having crossed out these two words, he wrote: "Adhering to this great act of national legislation in behalf of the rights of conscience"; next he crossed out these words and wrote: "Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience I shall see with friendly dispositions the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced that he has no natural rights in opposition to his social duties."]

"I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & the Danbury Baptist [your religious] association assurances of my high respect & esteem."

Thomas Jefferson
Jan. 1. 1802.

The definition of religion 200 years ago and 2000 years ago included the duty to our fellow man to love him as ourselve,

Jefferson mentions his duties several times and also the right of individuals to perform "social duties" only as "rights of conscience" which are to be performed "with friendly dispositions".

John the Baptist spoke of those duties telling us to repent and seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness.

At that time many sought the disposition of a social utopia though force as opposed to the "friendly disposition" which John direct us to do through sharing "coat" and "meats" in charity.

Jefferson promotes the "progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights".

This welfare through charity by Americans is what made the nation great according to Alexis de Tocqueville and "legal charity" has become pervasive in the U S and the "world" since FDR's New Deal and the steady progressive move toward the "welfare state".

The Bible tells you that "pure Religion" is taking care of the needy of the Christian society like widows and orphans without the covetous practices of the men in government who call themselves benefactors but exercise force through that same legal charity of the welfare state.

State vs state

Early Israel was a republic where the leaders, the Levites, were titular and separate and public servants, providing public welfare through charity, which in the Old Testament was called freewill offerings. They also attended to the weightier matters by providing an appeals court system through the cities of refuge.

There was no king, presidents, nor prime-ministers but each man was king in his own family and his wife and bride was his queen for they were no more twain but one. There was no rulers like FDR and LBJ who provided welfare through legal charity by way of men who exercise authority. This freedom is only provided by fervent charity of the free people who gathered in free assemblies because they loved their neighbor as themselves.

The state of the people was the state of freedom and liberty. They belonged to themselves where there was no tribute but to God provided by freewill offerings to the true public servants of a free society and fellowship. These Levites who provided the essential services of society as a communion of righteousness who were separate because they belonged to God. This gave the Levites a status that provided them a position or standing in the Law of Nations as a body without taking away the rights of the individual through force, fear and fealty.

There was virtually no taxation but only tithes to the ministers of society. You organized that free society and supported the ministers of your choice "according to his service".

The militia of society was bound by love and charity through the perfect law of liberty and a daily ministration of a righteous welfare as a band of brothers not by the legal bonds of force, fear, and oaths of fealty.

They would have to attend to the Weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith which include caring for the needs of our neighbors and the widows and orphans of our society through Pure Religion in matters of health, education, and welfare. We are NOT to provide for the needy of society through the Covetous Practices and the men who call themselves benefactors but who exercise authority one over the other like the socialists do.

The Way of Christ was like neither the way of the world of Rome nor the governments of the gentiles who depend on those fathers of the earth through force, fear and fealty who deliver the people back in bondage again like they were in Egypt. Christ's ministers and true Christians do not depend upon systems of social welfare that force the contributions of the people like the corban of the Pharisees which made the word of God to none effect. Many people have been deceived to go the way of Balaam and the Nicolaitan and out of The Way of Christ and have become workers of iniquity.

The Christian conflict with Rome in the first century Church appointed by Christ was because they would not apply to the fathers of the earth for their free bread but instead relied upon a voluntary network providing a daily ministration to the needy of society through Faith, Hope, and Charity by way of freewill offerings of the people, for the people, and by the people through the perfect law of liberty in Free Assemblies according to the ancient pattern of Tuns or Tens as He commanded.

The modern Christians are in need of repentance.

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"Follow me!" —Jesus the Christ.

• One of the most important things to do is to become involved in a network of Charitable Practices. Everyone should want to join a Living Network of Love and Charity.

• If you think you have a calling to be a Minister of God or you might want to dedicate your life to Christ as an Ordained Minister of His Holy Church, contact us to start the process of discipleship and become the benefactors who exercise only love, NOT authority.

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But through the righteous cities of refuge the justice that lives in the heats and minds of the people would bless the nation.

Be ye Separate

"Did Christ exclude interaction with man's government, or even the unbeliever with His call for separation?"

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"And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:" Matthew 25:32

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Christ did say "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." Matthew 6:33

He also said "...Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar’s, and unto God the things which be God’s." Luke 20:25

Paul when talking to the Corinthians he said "Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean [thing]; and I will receive you," 2 Corinthians 6:17

Many people use this single line to justify not paying Caesar and even dishonoring the vows of their fathers. Paul was talking to the Corinthians as if they were his children and telling them to not be unequally yoked with unbelievers because we were not to have fellowship with unrighteousness.

The word here for fellowship here in 2 Corinthians 6:14 only appears once in the Bible. The word in the Greek is metoche and has to do with sharing and communion and is from the word metecho.

Normally the word in the Bible for fellowship is koinonia. It also has to do with communion but more in the sense of community and association. The Greek word metecho specifically has to do with partaking as in eating of the same table.

Eating of Benefactors who set their table by exercising authority is contrary to Christ, Moses and even Proverbs where we are told to put a knife to our throat rather than eat with those men.

What and to who was Paul talking to and why?

The Latin inscription of 1st century AD. in ancient Corinth of Greece reads, "Erastus...bore the expense of this pavement." This is "Erastus" of Romans 16:23 as a city official.

Paul's friend Erastus was the "public treasurer of Corinth" by the name of Erastus. He was trying to influence all of Corinth to switch to a system of Corban that would make the word of God to effect because it would depend on freewill offerings rather than covetous system of social Welfare that depended on force.

He was trying to influence the people of a whole nation to change their ways and he understood how agreements with governments and the men who call themselves Benefactors yokes the people unequally.

Paul understood that if you make an accord according to the ways of Belial and the Nicolaitan.

Paul is trying to teach a whole nation the Perfect law of liberty

He is talking about the idea of not making covenants or agreements with the people where you go which is as old as the Ten Commandments and even the Garden.

Paul also talks about being righteous and how we must free ourselves righteously or continue as servants in righteousness.

Remember it is the Spirit that giveth life and being in His Spirit is the tie that binds us together as a body free or bond.

We of His Church like Israel are supposed to be a priest to all nations. We are to set an example of righteousness in all things. Israel when called were in bondage to Pharaoh and they continued serving him until they were cast out. They also learned to serve one another in hard times and even helped other Egyptians. This same pattern was repeated with Christ and in the early Church.

We are prodigal sons returning to our Father's house. We must come to serve not be served or we come not in the name of Christ.

Christ was rich but made himself poor and Paul the Apostle was also rich in funds and authority but made himself a servant of the people by the way of Christ.

This is what Christ called out His Church to be and to do. The ministers are to make themselves servants of Christ by leading the people in service one to another. The people are to be a part of that service by supporting the faithful.

1 Timothy 5:8 "But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel."

The word "infidel" is from the Greek word apistos meaning the unbelieving. Them that believe not.

Believe not what?

The ministers of Christ tend to the Daily ministration by charity so that the people will learn to sacrifice for one another in love as Christ sacrificed for us. This was the righteous Corban of Christ and the corbanus of the early Church.

Christians are to be one form of government who become Benefactors without exercising authority or force. Any priest or pastor, minister, monk or mullah, or rabbi, rector or representative who does not seek to provide the needs of society through charity alone betrays the God of creation and all the true prophets of God.

Jesus talked about His ministers not being of the world. Understanding what world he was talking about may clarify His divine position concerning being separate.

We have a choice to seek to live by faith, hope and charity through the perfect law of liberty or by force, fear and covetous practices through the governments of the world. That is what separates a peculiar people as children of God from the adversaries of God and the workers of iniquity. The true servants of God are separate and even excluded from many of the benefits offered by the world which most modern church ministers refuse to see. To be true ministers of Christ they must repent the ways of force and seek to provide for the needy according to the way of love.

Many want to come out, but who wants to come out and serve like Christ and daily lay down their life for their fellow man in pure religion and to set the table of the LORD in true Christian fellowship? Moses and Christ called out their ministers to go in and out, and in that interaction they would bless the world in righteousness.

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"Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake." Luke 6:22

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Death of the states

The death of freedom comes with the death of righteousness.

"Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils." 1 Corinthians 10:21

The practice of pure Religion through charity rather than public religion through "legal charity" is critical to repentance.

Repenting is the changing of the mind. Today, that likely means admitting that some things we have believed to be okay with God are actually deeds hated by God. Deeds or actions that we once thought were okay for a Christian to do are actually unacceptable, even in opposition to the doctrines of Jesus.

Like the covetous practices of desiring benefits from men in government who call themselves benefactors but exercise authority′ by taking from your neighbor and giving to you is clearly against the teachings of Christ and The Way.

Welfare of the world for the modern Christian is provided by men "who exercise authority one over the other".

Those modern Christians have become accustomed to getting there daily bread their benefits at the expense of their neighbor, not by charity and love for one another but by the force and authority of men in governments who call themselves those"benefactors.

Jesus was clear without question that His followers in His direct teachings and instructions:

Luke 22:25 "And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors. 26 But ye shall not be so: .. " see also Mark 10:42 and Matthew 20:25

It would appear that desiring a benefit at other people's expense would come in conflict with the teachings of Christ to say nothing of such policies falling under what can only be "covetous practices".

Yet, almost every modern [[denominations|denomination from pontiffs to protestants says it is okay to desire and have an appetite for the those benefits of those governments who provide a daily ministration and ][daily bread]] by the "legal charity" of the exercising authority of ruler or neighbors one over the other as has become customary in almost all modern governments.

To desire such benefits while claiming to be a believer in Christ and His teachings is a house divided.

"But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. 21 Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils." 1 Corinthians 10:20

History is repeat with the warnings of apostles to prophets and Polybius to Plutarch.

"I am deeply convinced that any permanent, regular administrative system whose aim will be to provide for the needs of the poor will breed more miseries than it can cure, will deprave the population that it wants to help and comfort, will in time reduce the rich to being no more than the tenant-farmers of the poor, will dry up the sources of savings, will stop the accumulation of capital, will retard the development of trade, will benumb human industry and activity, and will culminate by bringing about a violent revolution in the State..." Alexis de Tocqueville 1840 volume of Democracy.

Nullification

The Doctrine of Nullification from the State's point of view has been held that states have the right to declare null and void any federal law that the State deem unconstitutional. The Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions declared in 1799 that nullification was to be the rightful remedy used by the states for all unauthorized acts done under the pretext of the Constitution.

That was possible when those "States remained “as foreign to each other as Mexico is to Canada" even after the ratification of the Constitution and the citizens of those state were still Not a party to that constitution. The States were truly independent in 1799 but by 1899 that was no longer true and by 1999 it could not have gotten farther from the truth.

While the process of the modern assent into bondage can be debated the out come is self evident. Today the federal government has an increased interest in its citizens whose labor, property and children have all become surety for its debt like in the days of the bondage of Egypt.

Because a citizen in the United States is no longer the same as the natural citizens in states that had once been Republics. Neither the State governments have the capacity to assert such rights as the Doctrine of Nullification nor can citizens of the U.S. as residents in those States practically defend their right through Jury Nullification either. That right was once a key element of liberty in America and freedom from unwarranted usurpation from either State or Federal governments.

The United States government and those to whom they are indebted have now a prior right to protect their interests. The citizens have become a surety for debt among other compromised positions that have come about over many generations of degeneration, by avarice and sloth, and a myriad of benefits by way of a mire of moral compromises.

For true nullification there must be a real call for a large social group of people who are bound by virtuous "social bonds" alone. Decades of "Legal charity" has bankrupted the character of society required for a free society. The people must breath life into the care for one another by attending to what Christ called the "weightier matters".

Things forgotten

Americans have forgotten the art of liberty but there is a way back that is found by creating the social bonds that have connected all free societies throughout the history of mankind and had once made America great.

• “America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.”

In every turn of the writings of Alexis, he saw “Individual charity is a powerful agency that must not be despised,” and that “Any measure that establishes legal charity on a permanent basis and gives it administrative form thereby creates an idle and lazy class, living at the expense of the industrial and working class." -Alexis De Tocqueville, Memoir on Pauperism

"good should be done without the hope of reward, as it is done by the Deity himself."-Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America p 147

"American moralists do not claim that one must sacrifice oneself for one's fellows because it is a fine thing to do but they are bold enough to say that such sacrifices are as necessary to the man who makes them as to those gaining from them. . .They do not, therefore, deny that every man can pursue his own self-interest but they turn themselves inside out to prove that it is in each man's interest to be virtuous" (Tocqueville 1840, 610).

"Enlightened self-love continually leads them to help one another and inclines them to devote freely a part of their time and wealthy to the welfare of the state" (Tocqueville 1840, 611).

"I have seen Americans making great and sincere sacrifices for the key common good and a hundred times I have noticed that, when needs be, they almost always gave each other faithful support" (Tocqueville 1840, 594-595).

“It is indeed difficult to imagine how men who have entirely renounced the habit of managing their own affairs could be successful in choosing those who ought to lead them. It is impossible to believe that a liberal, energetic, and wise government can ever emerge from the ballots of a nation of servants.” ― Alexis de Tocqueville

“Society will develop a new kind of servitude which covers the surface of society with a network of complicated rules, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate. It does not tyrannise but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.” ― Alexis de Tocqueville

"The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults." ― Alexis de Tocqueville

"When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness." Alexis de Tocqueville

Alexis, like many others in history, understood more than most that "The health of a democratic society may be measured by the quality of functions performed by private citizens." That would mean private religion which was a form of private welfare does far more to secure liberty than the legal charity of public religion.

"Americans group together to hold fêtes, found seminaries, build inns, construct churches, distribute books, dispatch missionaries to the antipodes. They establish hospitals, prisons, schools by the same method. Finally, if they wish to highlight a truth or develop an opinion by the encouragement of a great example, they form an association." Alexis de Tocqueville 1840, Democracy in America 596.

The Contrast

"There are some nations in Europe whose inhabitants think of themselves in a sense as colonists, indifferent to the fate of the place they live in. The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved. They are so divorced from their own interests that even when their own security and that of their children is finally compromised, they do not seek to avert the danger themselves but cross their arms and wait for the nation as a whole to come to their aid. Yet as utterly as they sacrifice their own free will, they are no fonder of obedience than anyone else. They submit, it is true, to the whims of a clerk, but no sooner is force removed than they are glad to defy the law as a defeated enemy. Thus one finds them ever wavering between servitude and license."

Zero Point

"When a nation has reached this point, it must either change its laws and mores or perish, for the well of public virtue has run dry: in such a place one no longer finds citizens but only subjects.” Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America

"A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself.

"For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.” — Cicero (106-43 BC)

The night was provided by those who thought themselves righteous and born again but still loved the darkness.

Edwin Emil Witte focused on social insurance issues for the people who already were forgetting the nature of Pure Religion.

"Social insurance is a form of social welfare that provides insurance against economic risks either through public or private means.

The contributions, which may be be considered a form of insurance premiums does create a common fund out of which the individuals may then be paid benefits in the future.

That common fund is not different than the One purse referenced in Proverbs. While, in Alexis de Tocqueville's America and in the Early Church such Social protection was provided by fervent charity of the people the same Social protection, as "defined by the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development is concerned with preventing, managing, and overcoming situations that adversely affect people's well-being."

This Social protection through policies and programs designed to reduce poverty and vulnerability by the use of men who exercised authority was done through the Imperial Cult of Rome and its Temples and by Herod and the Pharisees but such systems not only make the word of God to none effect but they usher in the rule of despots and tyrants.

The Gospel of the kingdom requires men to repent and seek The Way of righteousness and a rejection of the reward of unrighteousness.