Yet God frequently used the armies of men to fulfill His Will; or do you not read the OT?Christ doesn't need armies.
Christ destroys His enemies without any help from us ...
Revelation 19
11 I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and wages war. 12 His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. 13 He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. 14 The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. 15 Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. “He will rule them with an iron scepter.” He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. 16 On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written:
King of kings and Lord of lords.
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun, who cried in a loud voice to all the birds flying in midair, “Come, gather together for the great supper of God, 18 so that you may eat the flesh of kings, generals, and the mighty, of horses and their riders, and the flesh of all people, free and slave, great and small.”
19 Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to wage war against the rider on the horse and his army. 20 But the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who had performed the signs on its behalf. With these signs he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshiped its image. The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur. 21 The rest were killed with the sword coming out of the mouth of the rider on the horse, and all the birds gorged themselves on their flesh.
I know that any kingdom established by the armies of men hasn't lasted ...Yet God frequently used the armies of men to fulfill His Will; or do you not read the OT?
Eternal means existing forever. Since these are works that God does within time, they cannot be truly eternal, since there was a time when they did not exist. It is a small quibble; but a necessary one to prevent us confusing God with His creation.The works of God are eternal ...
Everything in this world is fleeting; including this world. It does not change the fact that "Yet God frequently used the armies of men to fulfill His Will" and likely still is to this day. Fact.I know that any kingdom established by the armies of men hasn't lasted ...
This church was not Jesus' church ... which was a church NOT tied to temporal power.
Why the change from Jesus' church ?
Of course the christianity that the OP yearns for ... was not even the christianity of the masses of christians at that time, most of whom were poor peasants.It's always been the same Church. That the Church has at times wrongly tied itself to worldly evil demonstrates that the Church is a Church of sinners, not that Christ's Church ceased to be His Church.
There is a great and grievous danger that often comes by the claim that "those people then weren't 'True Christians'" because it places the standard of our salvation not on the Gospel, but on the ability of man. The Gospel means that even wretches such as you and me are in Christ because of the overabundance of His mercy toward us sinners.
-CryptoLutheran
This seems to be reading the discontent of the peasants during the Reformation at the clerics and church authority in general back into a previous time in history without showing that this attitude was actually prevalent at that time. Certainly the Peasant's Crusade seems to negate your theory.Of course the christianity that the OP yearns for ... was not even the christianity of the masses of christians at that time, most of whom were poor peasants.
The christianity the OP speaks of would be that only expressed in the rich and powerful of that time ...
Is this the movement you point to as evidence of people following Christ ?This seems to be reading the discontent of the peasants during the Reformation at the clerics and church authority in general back into a previous time in history without showing that this attitude was actually prevalent at that time. Certainly the Peasant's Crusade seems to negate your theory.
The beginning of the Holy Roman Empire simply started with the very influential wife of the Emperor becoming a Christian; this not only ended the persecution of the Church, but resulted in it becoming "the" official religion of the Roman Empire. It culminated in the Council of Nicaea and the "standardizing" of doctrines (more or less); everything that happened after that was either theological driven or more often than not politically driven.