Church...

From the days of the Reformation, a large segment of Christianity had denied the necessity of formal ordination or conferral of divine authority, stating instead that all men and women, as Christians, constituted “a priesthood of believers.” Another segment perpetuated the falsehood that only a small minority of the Christian community—the trained clergy—were entitled to ordination and priesthood. Both positions missed the mark and resulted in major misunderstandings. Without the blessings of the priesthood, man could not come to know God or gain those powers of godliness which prepare him for life with God and angels.

Theologians and philosophers, ministers and rabbis from various persuasions during the 1960s united to announce “the death of God.” Evidencing that they were without divine direction, they determined that direct intervention of divine power was a thing of the past, that man’s present plight was one of pathetic alienation. Those who knew not the living God could hardly teach him.

Others profess a God known only to the ancients: “There is no God today—the Lord and the Redeemer hath done his work.” They rejoice in the revelations and visions of a bygone day; they thrill to biblical accounts of apostolic and prophetic power. These same individuals, however, recoil at the thought or suggestion that God can speak and has spoken anew in this day, and that gifts and signs and wonders, that priesthoods and keys and powers, that prophet and Apostles and visions are available once again. Many contend that the act of atonement was undertaken on a cross some two thousand years ago and that no righteous work performed in the twentieth century will have any efficacy, virtue, or force, or can make a difference, for God’s work is done.