An Essay by Paul Rapoza

The excerpt below is an essay found in a book by Paul Rapoza entitled The Messiah, The Ekklesia and The Kingdom of God. The book is about 80 pages long and is filled with short essays, most of which focus on the Kingdom of God and His Ekklesia.

Rome was the first official denomination in Church history. If we miss that understanding then we will never truly understand what took place after that or what is about to happen on the earth.

The Church at Rome committed fornication with the kings of the earth (the Emperor of Rome) by taking what was intended to be, for all intents and purposes, an embassy or representation of the Kingdom of God. (Ekklesia) By doing so and identifying with the government of Rome they forfeited the status of an embassy in a sense. What was birthed by that unholy union was a hybrid “Church” that bore the DNA of the government of Rome and what became less and less a representation on earth ruled by Christ via the Holy Spirit.

You will take note that after a time, Rome was eventually called “The Holy Roman Empire” and the hybrid was then called “The Roman Catholic Church.” At that point, the transition of the fornication was complete and the hybrid “Church” grew exponentially in a physical sense but lost much of the spiritual nature of the Ekklesia. That hybrid “Church” no longer represented the Kingdom of God or Jesus as the Messiah or coming ruler of the whole earth. A part of that transition was that another “Christ” was formed of that hybrid was separated from the “Christ” that is the Messiah. Belief in Christ as the head of HIS Ekklesia and the coming Kingdom was replaced with “faith in the hybrid Church.” The concept of the believers being called to a common priesthood serving together among each other as the “Temple of the Holy Spirit” was replaced by the heathen Roman concept of “God” living in a building with a separate hierarchical priesthood separated from the “laity” or common class. Instead of the live interaction by the Spirit among all that was characteristic of the Ekklesia which was a type of forum, other than the separate class of priests, everyone else was merely an audience. A man became the “head” of the new hybrid “Church” as opposed to Christ being the head of His Body and by the Spirit ruling in the assembly.

When the various reformations took place, they separated from the hybrid but still retained the DNA of the mother “Church” to a degree and they also took on that nature and relationship with the governments of their countries. They committed fornication with their own kings of the earth that ruled them. They were the hybrid’s daughters who came out of her womb. Even today, men are following that pattern and partner with the governments of this world in creating an artificial “church corporation” that is wholly dependent upon the government for it’s very existence and identity. That identity serves as a mask to hide the true nature of any believers assembled under that identity.

Now that is not to say that were wasn’t a remnant of people who remained in godliness and loyalty to the Lord both inside and outside of those temporal organizations. The very definition of “Ekklesia” is “the called out assembly.” As long as believers remain spiritually “outside the walls of the city,” they remain in Christ and a functional part of the Ekklesia on the earth.

What we are slowly seeing today is the solidifying and separating of the Ekklesia (the believers faithful to Christ and called out from among the nations of this world) from those that are “faithful” to serve the idol of their organizations. The coming and severe persecutions around the world will largely be used by the Lord to accomplish His original purposes in “assembling” His Ekklesia together knit together solely by the Spirit. It will be the last witness of Christ upon the earth before the end of this age and His return. It is the blood of the faithful martyrs through which that faithful witness is presented to the people of this world and to powers and principalities and spiritual wickedness in high places. That cannot come about with a hybrid “Church” that owes its existence and loyalty to the kings (governments) of the world system that they rule. The Ekklesia that is separate from this world system and ordered from Heaven directly through Christ must rise up to take it’s heavenly ordained place in the plan of God to culminate this age and usher in the return and rule of Jesus Christ.

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