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Post by Admin on May 24, 2023 18:57:17 GMT -5
Some recent posts relevant to how Wm Irvine's original movement has evolved. Here's a tip. Rather than studying the bible, study how it came to be, the timelines, and everything surrounding the creation of the bible, and also specifically the version you are most fond of. After you are familiar with most of that, again read the Bible with the new information you have learned in mind. And the historical context of when this movement arose, the Victorian era, is also really important to understand. It was a time of huge change when you consider the Industrial Revolution, science and Darwinism, women beginning to demand rights and speaking up, and immense change in religion. The Victorians are known as the first modern doubters of the bible. It was a time of an explosion of evangelism and the ability due change of laws to actually choose your religion. The mainstream religions moved towards more of the outward symbols the friend in a previous post is opposed to. They were adopted in the Victorian era. At the same time there was a rebellion towards returning to the simplicity of the gospels. Lots of push and pull. And if you read some of the writings of that time the debates are so similar to now. I will post article that puts this all together in a fairly readable form and look at page 5 and a paragraph that addresses Ireland in particular. In short, it is not surprising the beginnings of this group arose at that time. How it has evolved would greatly surprise and disappoint those who started the movement. orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/122273/3/2.+Heimann+UK.Victorian+Piety+and+the+Revival+of+Material+Religion+in+Britain.8+May+2019.pdfThe article re religion and Victorian Britain and Ireland page 5. In case anyone is interested. It didn’t come out of nowhere. Evangelical groups were everywhere as it became legal to preach on a street corner. We tend to see this birth of the 2 by 2’s not only through our lens but as a singular event rather than something that happened as a result of the massive historical change of that time.. To separate it is to not understand it and to assume God was a part of all or part of it. It becomes mysterious and elevated. Just food for thought.
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Post by Admin on May 24, 2023 18:57:36 GMT -5
orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/122273/3/2.+Heimann+UK.Victorian+Piety+and+the+Revival+of+Material+Religion+in+Britain.8+May+2019.pdfThe article re religion and Victorian Britain and Ireland page 5. In case anyone is interested. It didn’t come out of nowhere. Evangelical groups were everywhere as it became legal to preach on a street corner. We tend to see this birth of the 2 by 2’s not only through our lens but as a singular event rather than something that happened as a result of the massive historical change of that time.. To separate it is to not understand it and to assume God was a part of all or part of it. It becomes mysterious and elevated. Just food for thought. Very true. When you have some understanding of the context, the mysterious and elevated become, well, not so mysterious and elevated. I think this is true of all people and of all times. When I was in the leaving process from the 2X2's, I sometimes wondered if my grandparents would be disappointed in me. (Yeah, I know, I think too much, and about too many things.) My maternal grandfather professed somewhere around 1915 in the Lafleche area of Saskatchewan. My paternal grandmother professed around 1925, where her family had homesteaded in rural Manitoba and (as craftsmen and furniture makers) had built the local Church of England there. There was no end to the family legends (and pride) surrounding their surrender to (and embrace of) 2X2ism. What helped me in the leaving process and all the years since, was understanding that their choice for 2X2ism was one of life and liberty and a kind of self-determination. A clean sweep of what had become moribund for them. (One way to look at it, is that they were kind of the hippies of their era.) When I chose to leave 2X2ism 70/80 years later, my motivations were probably largely the same. My contrariness and rebelliousness (and hunger for more) was deeply embedded in my genes.
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Post by Admin on May 24, 2023 18:59:43 GMT -5
How it has evolved would greatly surprise and disappoint those who started the movement. I believe that as well. Goodhand Pattison was there at the beginning, and he wrote of the change even in the first quarter century. He wrote the following in 1925, referring to William Irvine: www.tellingthetruth.info/publications_index/pattisong.php
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Post by fixit on May 24, 2023 20:15:50 GMT -5
I find the similarities from 130 years ago interesting.
William Irvine and those around him were breaking free from clericalism.
They were despised for it in the same way that those who speak out about 2x2 clerical domination are despised today.
Shortly after Pattison wrote his account a number of workers rejected the growing clericalism and were pushed out.
One of them was Alfred Magowan, and what he wrote in 1931 is probably quite relevant today.
4 Kiwi Street Sandringham, Auckland, New Zealand 21 January 1931
Dear Wilson: We would have reported ourselves sooner but need a little time for reflexion (sic) after making some calls. It is hard to believe some of the things we have seen and heard, and we wondered whether you knew about them.
You and I came from the same county in Ireland and were brought up Protestants in the strained relations of a divided people. The city of Armagh has two cathedrals as witnesses to the division, and we have the peculiar distinction of not being on one side or the other. We breathed the atmosphere of Orange Protestantism as children and later on when we heard the gospel were willing to break with all tradition and become a people neither Catholic nor Protestant.
You and I heard the same words and made the same profession of faith in the same person, went forth to preach in the same way, saw the same works accomplished in those who believed our words, enjoyed the same fellowship, endured the same hardships, were victims of the same opposition, read the same Scriptures in the same light, and with the same historical background. There was no variance in anything we believed, or in the purpose with which we went out into the world
I do not know how far back your memory and experience goes; but in 1907, I remember seeing you at Crocknacrieve when, as a people with a testimony, we were at our spiritual best.
My own experience goes back to 1902, and my most real recollection of fellowship was that gathering in Portadown 28 or 29 years ago. [Portadown Co. Armagh, Ireland Convention] There were no regulations and no asserting of authority. The Lord had mercifully set us free in spirit to worship and serve him under the guidance of the Holy Spirit through a good conscience; and there was neither machinery nor any of those things that religious people think necessary and which are necessary in sects under human control. There was nothing in the vision we had of 'the way in Jesus' that would have led us towards another kind of sectarianism, nor did we ever anticipate a time when we would become a strong people in an evil world.
We had only one commission and that was to make disciples as we had been made; and we had only one authority, viz., if the Lord was with us we would so live and speak that He would use us in getting people saved. And as they listened to us they would recognize the voice of Him because of the anointing. That was the simple outline in the days of our beginning.
Afterwards, dominion began to appear, and God’s answer was the casting of it down in the person of William Irvine. That ought to have been the end of it, but it was not taken to heart by those who exulted under him. And the same spirit that had set him above his brethren began to be seen in them, so that in a little while they had divided the earth among themselves as rulers over little kingdoms, exercising authority after the way and according to the spirit of Rome, and doing violence to the consciences of men in the name of the ‘Truth' or the 'Testimony'. When the anointing ceased, authority took its place, and then cruelty had to be resorted to in keeping people under control. It has always been so, as in the case of Saul toward David; but it always works out in the triumph of the anointing, and martyrs have been made in that conflict.
I do not know how far you have gone in the way of religious dominion, but if you gave encouragement to some of the things which have been told us, I would tremble to be in your shoes. You know the history of Rome and how cruelty was her characteristic under the cardinals and the popes. The persecutions and the martyrdoms of the early Christians was only a testimony to the insatiable desire for dominion, not only over the bodies of people, but also over their souls.
Now, if the things that we have heard here and elsewhere are required by those among us who are looked upon as leaders, then I say we have ceased to be disciples of Jesus and have joined the ranks of his enemies. People are forbidden to visit friends, and some have been excommunicated on that miserable ground. Letters have been intercepted and sent to others or destroyed and the person to whom they were addressed never saw them. Pressure has been brought to bear on struggling souls to compel them to deny the truth that was in them. Even bodily violence has been done, that through fear of pain they might be brought back to the ‘church’. If Rome did that in these days the world would be horrified, and we would raise our voices in loud protest against the spirit of antichrist. But for some strange reason, when the same spirit is revealed among ourselves we justify it because the welfare of what we call the 'Testimony' is at stake.
Now I want it to be known that we are against that spirit wherever it shows itself, and that we will devote all the power that God gives us to withstand it. No godly end justifies cruel means, and persecution is always wrong no matter how 'holy' the cause may seem to be in which it is used as a weapon. If the work of God seems to require dominion and cruelty so that a 'Testimony' may be preserved, then the sooner it is dissolved the better.
It would ill become you or me to turn away from the tradition of our fathers and give our lives to a cause that we once abhorred when we saw it under Roman robes.
I have written to most of our leaders, and they think it beneath them even to say they got my letters. They have never seen me, yet they know all about me from prejudiced witnesses. One is afraid that if he acted the decent human part it would be noised abroad and he would get into trouble when his brethren heard it. They have entered into a conspiracy of secrecy and fear, and have set the approval of one another above the approval of God. May the Lord give us all a fresh vision of Jesus and what it means at the end of the world to be his disciples. Beating our fellow servants will be a miserable occupation when he returns suddenly, and no excuses will be taken or reasons given in the light of his kindling anger.
Suppose he came now and found his servants labouring to build up a little sect in the world and defending it by outraging the souls of those who were devoted only to him, what do you think he would say to them? And how would they explain that it was His testimony they were building and protecting? I think they would be speechless.
Now don't deny or belittle these things because an 'outsider' calls then to your attention. Both you and I have responsibility, and part of mine is to find and feed lost sheep and to protect them against cruel shepherds who drive them out of the fold and compel them to go astray. Ezekiel 34 is good to read, not as we once did with the preachers of the world in our mind, but thinking about ourselves.
Now may the grace of God abound toward us, softening our hearts towards one another and toward all who need our compassion. . Yours truly, . Alfred Magowan
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