Church Support Of Divine Institutions
If I understand the proposition correctly, it is the argument of brother Guy Woods and others of like conviction; that the church has the perfect and scriptural right to build, operate, and maintain 'divine institutions'. Since the home is a divine institution; they try to show that the man-made orphan institutions, hospitals, and other institutions for unfortunate individuals are 'divine institutions' like the home of Genesis 2. Therefore, to the mind of these people the church may build, operate and support these institutions with regular contributions.
Then the logical conclusion is that since the governments are ordained of God and spoken of in the same light as the home as a divine institution; that the church may build, operate, and maintain by regular contributions its own civil government. The proposition should read something like this: "It is in harmony with the scriptures for churches of Christ to build and maintain civil governments, such as the United States Government, Canadian Government, and other civil governments."
I wonder? Where did the church ever build an institution, divine or human, except the church? Where did the church ever operate an institution, divine or human, other than the church? Am I right in saying that the only institution, divine or human, that the church ever established, built, operated, maintained, or supported as an institution was the church?
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