Jesus told us to beware of....."Pink Elephants"

submitted by blog visitor: openwaters415

Got your attention?  I would have said LEAVEN, but might have lost your interest too quickly. We typically use the phrase "nobody wants to talk about the pink elephant in the room". We know what it means when we say that. I think we do that all the time in life, thinking things will "go away" if we just kind of leave them alone. 

                                                  

The kind of churches I have been around for the last many years, with a strong pastoral one man system driving the people as a spiritual CEO, taking a stance as the people's own "personal priest", truly lends itself to this problem of leaven. We are taught throughout the New Testament about the problems of spiritual "leaven" in our lives. Jesus spoke of it. Paul spoke of it. Yet we often don't think of it with much significance, as though it is only something for really religious people or theologians to deal with.

What is leaven?...

Leaven is a symbol of evil DOCTRINE, evil PRACTICES, evil LIFE, and evil TEACHING. It is never good throughout God's word.  Spiritually, it works in the unseen realm to bring impurity and pollute the things of God in our lives. It dilutes the things in the Kingdom of God from their intended original purpose.

Let's take a look at the different types of Leaven: 

1) Leaven of the Pharisees - Jesus explained in Matthew 16:6 what to beware of. He explains what that leaven is in verse 12. He noted that it was the poor doctrine of the Pharisees (as well as the Sadducees). He also spoke further in Luke 12:1 about what the leaven of the Pharisees is........ HYPOCRISY. Don't do as I do --but do as I say. Dictatorial leaders often think that they have some sort of "spiritual immunity" for believing and following the Word. Many times they will expect extra grace towards them when they "get side tracked" or "mess up", but will refuse that same grace to the congregation. After all, "I am God's man (or woman)". This leads us tomightily in spiritual gifts and the supernatural. Yet they were called CARNAL by Paul throughout 1 Cor. 3rd chapter. He mentions their carnality many times. In 1 Cor. 5:6-9, Paul admonishes the leadership to NOT even eat with a brother guilty of sexual immorality because of what it can do to the flock. It is interesting to me that when a Pastoral dictator is involved in sexual sin, and a person from the congregation chooses to leave because of this, how the person that leaves is the one marked as evil or divisive, yet those involved in lewd behavior are the ones who should be disciplined. If the leaders are admonished to be on the look out for sexual immorality and deal with it, how much worse is it when the leadership are the ones involved in it. Sadly, you are told not to judge or "cast any stones", rather than make