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Valoel wrote:
Any denomination that calls themselves by that name, to me, is automatically not the Church of the Firstborn.
I love it! Valoel says what I desperately wanted to say, but didn’t know how without sticking my foot in my mouth.
Valoel wrote:the people that “get it” while still in this life.
That’s a great and original description. I also like “the rest of the Lord”. “Has he seen what I’ve seen? Has he felt what I felt? Does he know what I know?” Nobody likes to be alone. And there is no need to. There is a church! The general assembly and church of the Firstborn!
From Slipper and the Rose:
There’s a secret kingdom all my own
With no castles and no vassals and no throne.
Just [a million] subjects, you and me
In our private monarchy
Where the king is love and love alone.
For some reason that occurs to me.1
This is a good link that pretty much sums up what I have always been taught regarding the Church of the Firstborn. http://eom.byu.edu/index.php/Church_of_the_Firstborn Of course there have been several secular, and at least two LDS movements using the name (LeBarons and Morrisites), but the Church of the Firstborn is actually a heavenly organization. As I understand the only way a person can consider themselves a member would be to have their second annointing (their calling and election made sure).
Down the block from the LDS church which I spent my teenage years in (it has now burnt and will not replaced) was a tiny little church set back from the street with the interesting title of: General Assembly and Church of the First Born. We often wondered if it had LDS
ties, but never walked entered it to find out. This was in Long Beach, California some fifty years ago.
Tom Haws wrote:
From Slipper and the Rose:There’s a secret kingdom all my own
With no castles and no vassals and no throne.
Just [a million] subjects, you and me
In our private monarchy
Where the king is love and love alone.
For some reason that occurs to me.1
Oh my stars! Did you just quote
The Slipper and the Rose? I think I have to like you more! 
It seems to me that the concern of the OP keeps coming up over in over with this spin or that spin….this language or that language. Perfectionism and blind faith…..or maybe its a commentary on mormon culture or a vent about the letter vs. the spirit of the law. And it really boils down to correct understanding and vision. Correct vision concerning of all the parts, and then correct understanding of the whole and how it all works together. I think what happens is that we get bothered or maybe even strangled by the perceived confines of it all. We get impatient with those around us who appear not to “get it” or who have some sort of blindness folded into their devotion and we certainly don’t want to be that! Or our own blindness keeps us straining at a gnat or missing the forest for the trees…. and then we rebel. We throw off the confines and try to square it by taking only the nuggets of meaning with us. And we throw off the confines outside of ourselves, which is a mistake because the origin of the confines is not in the environment or in the organization but inside of us!
I think those who really acheive the church of the firstborn are the ones who can acheive the correct “rebellions” if you will, on the inside of themselves as pride and other fetters are conquered. I think the real cool synergy happens when one truly understands that obedience equals freedom and they are able to have both humility of heart and humility of action thus enjoying the possibilities. This is the goal! Getting ourselves oriented to the right process! The understanding and the discipline…this is the essence of coming unto Christ. It is a crazy combination of limits and experimentation and knowing and not knowing and humbling oneself to another and being true to oneself at the same time. And I think there is so much freedom inside the process that is sometimes missed. And one can be free inside the organization and free from the organization at the same time because it isn’t about the external stuff anymore. It isn’t about what everyone else is doing or thinking or protecting ourselves from it or them. It is just about us and Christ and what He is doing inside of us because we are letting Him in to do it…..and our efforts to help each other get there.
Quote:And one can be free inside the organization and free from the organization at the same time because it isn’t about the external stuff anymore….. [but it includes] our efforts to help each other get there.
Amen – to your whole comment, poppyseed, but to that line, in particular.
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