The Apostolic Voice

©2012 Stan Hallett

But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.  – 1Peter 2:9

The word peculiar appears seven times in the King James version of the Bible. Many think that it means odd or weird, it does not.  In fact nowhere in the Word of God is His Church ever referred to as odd, or weird.  It is the world that is odd, weird, and contrary to what God intended for us.

The word peculiar as used in the Word of God means a “purchased possession”, or “purchased treasure” (See also Exodus 19:5, Deuteronomy 14:2,26:18, Psalms 135:4, Ecclesiastes 2:8,Titus 2:15).

Having said this, I think someone needs to tell some that are in the Church.  Some of us act weird! Holiness or Godly does not mean contrary to the natural, or contrary to what is taught in the Word of God.

Let me give you an example; If you were to look upon the crowd at a rock concert or a sporting event like a football or baseball game, you would see people responding naturally. If music was being played we would perhaps see people moving to the music or beat.  They might sway, bounce, dance, or even jump up and down.

When people get excited they clap, jump up and down, shout, etc. Should we be doing anything different or unnatural? We are just getting excited, and are happy about different things.

We have the same natural response regardless if we are in the World or in the Church. Having said that, we shouldn’t be doing weird things that are contrary to the natural, as well as contrary to the Word of God.

In my sixty-two years I’ve seen some pretty strange practices in some assemblies as I’ve traveled around the country. Most of them I’m not going to mention here.

I want to start by saying that I think some use Church as a reason to do the same things in the Church building that they did in the world.  Some folks talk like Church is just a big party, looking for an opportunity to run or dance in the aisles, or “shake their hair down”.

Why do we assemble ourselves together?  Do we come together to worship God together as a Church, or do we come to Church to go crazy and put on a show for each other?

Do we come to hear a message and learn of God? Or, do we come to get worked up emotionally by a screaming preacher and organ music getting everyone all pumped up so that they can all go crazy and talk about what a great time we had, and how the Holy Ghost moved?  Holy Ghost or flesh?

We should be bold in proclaiming the gospel.  We should be bold in our worship, lifting our hands and our voices unto God.  But we should also have wisdom.

Here is the wording an actual sign the I saw in front of an Apostolic Pentecostal Church building:

“Apostolic Pentecostal, One God, Tongue Talking, Holy Rollers“.

A sign at another Apostolic Pentecostal Church Building in another location read like this:

(Name of the Church) – “A Place to Belong and Believe”.

It was bold to put up the first sign, but did it show wisdom?  If you were not in the Church and were looking for a Church to attend, which one would attract you?

Did you ever notice that some of these things that Pentecostals like to do in a Church service always seem to happen down front where they can be seen by everyone, and never up in the back? Did you ever notice that they only happen in front of an accepting crowd and never in WalMart or in their own back yard? Just saying.

It might help some of our assemblies grow if some of us stop acting weird. It might help the Church grow if we stop looking down our long self-righteous noses at the unsaved, and love people instead. We need to allow the Holy Spirit to work on it’s own, and stop trying to help it with our flesh, and calling it a work of God. We need to be full of the Spirit, but far too many are full of flesh. Whoops! Did I say that?

Do you have questions?  Feel free to write to me via my contact form.