QUESTION:
Why Do Denominations Reason?
ANSWER:
“The baptism of John, whence was it? from heaven, or of men? And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we shall say, From heaven; he will say unto us, Why did ye not then believe him?” [Matthew 21:25]
“And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, Who is this which speaketh blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?” [Luke 5:21]
“There were certain of the scribes sitting there, and reasoning in their hearts.” [Mark 2:6]
“Reasons, reasoning sense, sees what the world wants you to see, big denomination. Well, are you a Christian? "Oh, I'm--I'm Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran, and Pentecostal, whatmore. I'm this, that, or the other." See, that, that's senses. "I belong to the first church, you see. Oh, I'm Catholic. I'm--I'm this, that." See, you say that. Now, that, that's senses. You like to say that because it's a denomination, something big. "Well, we--we--we got more members, nearly, than any church in the world.” [Why Cry? Speak! Jeffersonville, IN 63-0714M]
“Look at all denominations. Look at Pentecost. What did we do? We sowed denominational seeds, we reaped the denominational harvest. Why, the church ought to be on fire for God right now, if there had been a Word seed sowed back there, and there would be signs, wonders, miracles, and that church would be together, one heart, one accord, and marching toward Zion, for the Rapture. That's right. What did we do? We had intellectual speeches instead of the Word. We had reasoning against the Word, and everything else.” [To Take On The Whole Armor Of God, Santa Maria, CA 62-0701]
“I'm here as a Gospel preacher to let you know what's truth, then you do with it whatever you wish to. Then when you go to doing those things, you'll begin to reason, "If this woman can do it. She's well-thought-of. She goes to church. She lives in ranks of society. Why can't I do it?" That's reasoning, when your soul tells you it's wrong. God covered women up, and men up, in the garden of Eden, never stripped them. See? But it's reasoning. You'll reason it out, "The rest of them are doing it." Younger girls, you--you take heed this morning to the Gospel. The Gospel said, "Let the women dress themselves in modest apparel," not immodest, "modest apparel." And it's getting... It's a disgrace.” [The Uncertain Sound, Jeffersonville, IN 55-0731]
“They creep in. All right. And try to spoil your faith. They just try to take it away, see, by their polished seminary reasonings, you know, they come in and reason out, "Now, looky here, isn't it reason now? Could you just imagine in the days of Jesus they'd do the same thing? They'd come and say, "Now, isn't it reasonable?" [Putting On The Whole Armor Of God, Aberdeen, NC 62-0607]
“They've got intellectual giants in the world today that can almost explain away everything that God said to be true. They can take it from a theological standpoint, intellectual. And if you just take your own mind of thinking, reasoning like Eve did at the beginning, they can explain everything of the Bible away from you.But if a man, or a woman has ever been on the backside of the desert in those sacred sands where no intellectual can stand, and there come in contact with the living God, no devil, or scientist, or anything else can ever explain that away. You were there. It happened. You know it's the truth. There's no one can take it away from you. You met God. And I believe that God, in every age sending forth a messenger, always first, meets that person on a sacred ground, because it's got to be so. There's too much of evil to try to explain all the supernatural away. And where there's a supernatural God, there's going to be supernatural things happening, because He is supernatural.” [Hear Ye Him, Spokane, WA 62-0711]
“If those Pharisees would've just set down, and reasoned! Jesus said to them, "You stoned the prophets. You--you whitened the--their walls of their--polished their sepulchers, and you're the one that put them in there." See? But how... “Which one of the prophets that God sent that your fathers didn't stone?" See? And those... So forth. We've got to set down and think it over.” [From That Time, Spokane, WA 62-0713]
“If you'll pardon this expression, that's what's happened to our churches throughout the country. They're fine people in there. Some of the best in the world goes to church. I think the best in the world goes to church. But the thing of it is, the--the organization system gets lifted up. That's what's happened to the--the Methodist. That's what's happened to the Baptist. That's what's happened to the Nazarene, to the Pilgrim Holiness, to the Pentecostal; lifted up, self-willed, self-centered, pride, that you can't tell nothing to. God can't find a way to get into their hearts. It's because they become so know-it-all that nobody can tell them anything. And by building themself around reasoning, with brethren, they build themselves around their creed. And when they do, they leave God in the back. That's what happens to doctors when they get so self-centered that they don't need any help from God, that's when I don't want--want one fooling with me. Right. Yes. When you leave God out of anything, you, I want you to leave me out, too. See? Because, you must always remember God first.” [The Influence Of Another, Jeffersonville, IN 62-1013]
“Korah, I believe he was sincere in his act. I believe the man didn't--didn't mean to do wrong. I believe it was the ignorance of the man that didn't see the hand of God moving and know the Scriptures, and that's the reason he just brought it to reasoning. And that's just about ninety percent of the trouble today, that we try to inject into the program of God, our thinking. And we're not supposed to think, at all. He does our thinking. We're supposed to surrender our thinking to His will. You understand now?” [Why I'm Against Organized Religion, Jeffersonville, IN 62-1111E]
“Just as natural Eve fell, spiritual Eve fell. God's bride fail--fell in the garden; Christ's bride fell in Rome (See? Notice.) by the same reasoning against God's Word. She also forfeited her rights of virtue to Satan, which we found in the breaking of these Seals that that was Satan and still is Satan there. The Bible said it's the very seat of Satan. And as Eve forfeited her--her virtuous rights and give them over to Satan in the garden of Eden, the church, the bride of Christ did the same thing at Rome when they forfeited the Bible for their dogmas and reasoning.” [The Third Seal, Jeffersonville, IN 63-0320]
“When He came to the Hebrew bride, she was the mother of all that was living, but she rejected it. Natural Eve fell in Eden by listening to Satan's reasoning against God's Word. That's how she fell. All right, sir. She fell because she did that. Spiritual Eve, now that's the Church, Christ's Bride, she fell not in Eden but in Rome. See? At the Nicene Council when she rejected that Pentecostal church that went down to Nicaea and listening to Roman's reasoning instead of holding on to the Word, she fell and everything away from her, died with her, around her.” [The Third Seal, Jeffersonville, IN 63-0320]
“We know that spiritually they're doing the same thing today, for they are doing it, too, for the same purpose, and in the same way that they did in the crucifixion of the Lord, physically. They are doing it because of jealousy, because of spiritual blindness. That, they don't want to see. They won't listen to It. Jesus, in His journey here on earth, He said, "Well did Isaiah speak of you, 'You got eyes and can't see, and ears and can't hear.'" See? The same reason, the same--the same purpose and the same reasonings, they're bringing the crucifixion of Christ anew, afresh, (as we'll get to it after a while), for the same reasons that they did then. They cannot find nothing against It. They are daresn't to try to challenge It. And they know the evidence is there. And they know the Bible says so. And the only thing they can do is blaspheme It. That's exactly. So, and all this, the same reasons.” [The Indictment, Jeffersonville, IN 63-0707M]
“They sold out to reasonings, sold out to reasonings of denomination. "If I can just belong to this! The--the mayor goes to this church." See? "If I can be a Methodist, or a Presbyterian." Just look where they've gone. Now, I've just explained, them limbs are pruned off. They're dead. They're not connected with Christ any more; they'd be bringing the same Life. They're not connected with It.” [Christ Is The Mystery Of God Revealed, Jeffersonville, IN 63-0728]
“You let down the bars, got away from the Word. When Eve let down the bars, to intellectual reasonings of Satan, death come in; and the bars that God had her barred in with, was His Word of promise. And we have substituted something else, a creed, instead of the Word. Amen. You know that's the Truth.” [Once More, Chicago, IL 63-0804A]
“The woman who wants to have short hair and wear shorts, or wear paint and anything, she can go right through a Pentecostal filter just as easy as pie, nothing about it, right into death. Cause, he the... She say, "Well, there's no harm in that." ("If you love the world or the things of the world, it's because the love of God is not even in you.") Down through this spirit, then, she can pull down into her soul, things that isn't of God and against God's Word, if that's the taste in the soul. It can come through the taste; see, taste... It can come through the think, through the reasoning, "There's no harm in it. I have taste. I have feelings. I have a feeling that this is all right." She can come right on down through that, and right into her soul, if her soul is of that type. Shows that she isn't drawing through God's Filter. But if she's got bobbed hair, wearing makeup, shorts, pants, looks like man's, all these slacks and ever what they call them; saying those kind of things, and doing those things, and living for the world, she'll stop; she can't get through There. No, sir. It'll stop her at the beginning.” [A Thinking Man's Filter, Jeffersonville, IN 65-0822E]
“We cannot, we must not, listen to any other man's word. We don't care how smart, how educated. The Bible, in Proverbs, says, "We must cast down reasonings." See? Now, here in this second realm... First realm is your senses of see, taste, feel, smell, and hear, that's in your outer body. On the inner body, which is the spirit, is reasonings and thought, and so forth. We must cast all that down. Can't reason, say, "Now wait, if God is a good God..." And we're told so much today that He is. "If He is a good God, then if I be sincere, though I can't see that in that Bible being right, though I be sincere, I'll be saved." You'll be lost. "If I go to church and just do the things that I believe that's right, and try to hold up for what I think is right, well, I..." You're still lost. "There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof is the ways of death." See? You won't be saved; you'll be lost. See? See? It must be that inside control Man.” [Christ Is Revealed In His Own Word, Jeffersonville, IN 65-0822M]
“Satan got Eve to listen to his gospel of theology, the gospel of knowledge, higher schooling, higher ethics, better civilization, higher education, and so forth; then when he got the... her to stop and listen to him a minute, to his reasonings (which we are commanded to cast down), when he got her to listen to it. "Now, looky here, the church is so-and-so. It's been established for so long. We're one of the oldest churches in the country. The mayor of the city goes." I don't care what it is, see. If it's against God's Word, be against it. That's your enemy. Anything that's against the Word is your enemy. Everything that's for the Word is your brother. He's a part of you.” [Satan's Eden, Jeffersonville, IN 65-0829]
"Seven days, eat unleavened bread." No leaven shall be found amongst the Bride, no--no word added, no nothing. Remember, one word caused every death that's in the earth; every illegitimate child was born because Eve, the first church, the bride of the first Adam, doubted God's Word and accepted a denominational, or a intellectual, or a school exceptions of It; because It was reasoned out, and "Surely, God is a good God." God is a good God, but He's also a just God. We must keep His Word! School, she accepted it. There's where some of you seminary boys, no doubt a call in your life, but you run off to some Bible school to have this doctrine injected in you, and there's where you die... Stay with God and His Word. They won't let you; or, you can't even belong to their congregation, won't accept you on the platform. So let them have it, let the dead bury the dead, let's follow Christ the Word.” [God's Only Provided Place Of Worship, Shreveport, LA 65-1128M]
“For the clergy to organize themselves with one rank over another until they are finally headed up by a president is a manifestation of the antichrist spirit, regardless of how wonderful and necessary it may seem. It is nothing but human reasoning taking the place of the Word. And any person who is in the organized denominations is right in the midst of an antichrist system. Now let me say this and make it very plain. I am not against the people. I am against the system.” [Seven Church Ages Book, A Resume Of The Ages 65-1204]
Bible References: Matthew 21:25; Luke 5:21; Mark 2:6
[Answer provided by Bro. Ken Andes, Minister, Lynden, Washington, USA]