Dear Bob & Doves, Many years, after I became a born-again creature, I attended The Assembly of God. All that time in there, I felt as if I was truly a part of an congregation of fellow believers. It was then I began to read the Word of God and found out that church was not a Hebrew Word for the gathering of like-minded people. It wasn't a building either. As a former Catholic, I was very interested in learning about my former 'religion' and just how these terms such as "Church" could be inserted into God's Word and realized a whole lot more than that term came out of that Holy Roman Empire, which is plainly seen now as the Seat of Satan's Ecclesia that is bringing about a One World Ecumenical Movement - back to the Babylonian beliefs. The translators, I guess, couldn't be blamed for using the modern usage of the poor Greek founded by Alexander the Great Greek that as a lanuage was unique in that it was able to connect the various people of the Empire he had conquered.That is an example of how a wrong usage of words became the present term or slang for what should have remained the Hebrew word Cahal, meaning Assembly/Congregation. Bob Anderson, I read your reference that you gave of E.W. Bullinger's book. He shows ample proof of how the word Assembly and others were used to describe people gathered ofr common purpose. Bullinger was a brilliant man who was able to take God's unwritten gospel and explain it's connection to the Written Word. I love the Hebrew term Assembly. There are too many pagan forms of worship connected to the word "church" such as Church of Satan, Mormon Church, The Holy Roman Catholic Church, Unitarian Church, etc. You get the idea. We are of the Body of Christ referred to in the Heavenly Constellation Cancer that are called Sheep, Cattle, Bees and other animal bodies that make up the Righteous Assembly Redeemed going home in the Ship Argo that is sent for them. Since the Body is made up of Jehovah's own Hebrew usage for an Assembly of people, why not return to that word usage once we find out the truth instead of thinking that the Seven Synagogues (Assemblies) would change the meaning of Revelation? It changes nothing. The charge of how an Assembly ought to behave is the same, is it not? We are Spiritual Jews when saved, not Roman/Greek Churches. We are seen in Heaven in Chapter 7 after the 144,000 are given their seal on their head that will do their work once we, The Assembly of Jehovah God, The Great I Am, are gone.Thanks for the link Bob, I have the Wittness of the Stars by Bullinger and may just order this one even though I feel and sincerely hope our time left is very short.Thanks,GerlindaHere below is just a short portion of Bullinger's teaching about the Hebrew Word Cahal which describes what we are. Hebrew is God's language and that is set in Stone, The Ten Commandments.This Hebrew word is (...) (Cahal), from which we have our English word call. It means to call together, to assemble, or gather together, and is used of any assembly gathered together for any purpose. This Hebrew word Cahal occurs 123 times, and is rendered: "congregation," 86 times; "assembly," 17; "company," 17; and "multitude," 3 times: but is never rendered "church." Its first occurrence is in Gen. xxviii. 3 - "that thou mayest be a multitude (margin, assembly) of people," I.e., a called-out people. That is what Israel was, a people called out and assembled from all other peoples.
In Gen. xlix. 6 we read - "O my soul, come not thou into their secret (Council or Senate); Unto their assembly (cahal), mine honour, be not thou united."
Here the word cahal is used, not of all Israel as called out from the nations, but of the assembly of those called out of form the Tribal Assembly (or Council) of the tribes of Simeon and Levi.
Then, it is used of the worshippers, or those called out from Israel, and assembled before the Tabernacle and Temple, and in this sense is usually rendered "congregation." This is the meaning of the word in Ps. xxii. 22: "In the midst of the congregation will I praise Thee;"
and verse 25: "My praise shall be of Thee in the great congregation."
This is the usage of the word in the Gospels, and even in the Acts of the Apostles before the new use, which the Holy Spirit was going to make of the word, was revealed.
When Christ said, "Upon this rock will I build my Ecclesia," He did not use the word in the exclusive sense in which it was afterwards to be used, but in the older and larger sense in which the word had been before used, which would embrace the whole assembly of His People, while not excluding the future application of the word to the Church or Body of Christ when that secret should have been in due season revealed.
When the Spirit, by Stephen, speaks of the Ecclesia in the wilderness (Acts vii. 38), he means the congregation of pious worshippers of God at the Tabernacle.
When the Lord added to the Ecclesia daily (Acts ii. 47), He added to the number of those 120, who first assembled themselves together in the upper room in Jerusalem.
When Saul says he persecuted the Ecclesia of God, he does not use the word in the limited sense, which it subsequently acquired after he had received the special revelation concerning it: but in the sense in which it had been used up to, and in which it was used at, that time.
It means merely that he persecuted the People of God - the congregation of God. He is speaking of a past act in his life which took place long before the revelation of the secret, and his words must be interpreted accordingly. We must not read into any of these passages that which was the subject of a subsequent revelation! which passages are perfectly clear without it.
The word Ecclesia in the Old Testament, the Gospels, and (for the most part) in the Acts, must be taken in the sense of its earlier usage as meaning simply the congregation or assembly of the Lord's people, and not in the sense which it acquired, after the later and special signification had been given to it by the Holy Spirit Himself.
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