Dating Churches or Settling Down Visiting churches seems a lot like dating: both parties are, in theory, on their best behavior and hopeful of a positive outcome. Dating is fun—for a while. There’s variety and excitement for each outing, but eventually an emptiness emerges, and you yearn for more. You seek connection, you want commitment, […]
Excitement Prevails I removed every church from my list that was part of a denomination. At best they would merely offer variations of what we’ve already experienced—and rejected. Left are three churches with intriguing implications. Perhaps one will click with Candy. We’ll visit them the next three Sundays. This church meets in a public school […]
Jesus Focused on the Kingdom of God, Not Church Jesus talked about the kingdom of God, but we made a church instead. What if he never intended us to form a church? After all, Jesus did tell his followers to “seek first the kingdom of God,” (Matthew 6:33, ESV). Let’s look at where else the […]
Segregating Attendees into Members and Nonmembers Divides Jesus’s Church In our look at things the church must change, we’ve already considered our buildings and facility, our paid clergy and staff, and our tithes and offerings, that is our charitable giving. Now we’ll turn our attention to some secondary issues, starting with church membership. Membership is […]
Instead of Joining a Church, Align Yourself with Jesus Most churches talk about church membership—a lot. Some treat it as the next step after salvation, even as if it’s salvation part two. It’s not. And if your church is part of a denomination, membership in the local church is automatic membership in the denomination. Church […]
May We Be One in Jesus and Ignore What Could Separate Us We live in a divisive time, with one group opposing another, often in the most zealous of ways, sometimes even with violent outcomes. As a society, we’re quick to put people in a box and label them according to some aspect of their […]
Discover What the Bible Says about Being a Member The word member appears throughout the Bible showing up eighteen times in the Old Testament and nineteen times in the New. A common convention in studying the Bible is to let earlier uses of a word inform our understanding of later occurrences. Here is how the […]
Make Sure Your Faith Community Focuses on the Right Thing We need to examine the purpose of church. Why do we meet each week? What are our goals when we come together? What should our focus be? Though people will give various answers, the responses fall into two broad categories: ourselves and others. Church Is […]
Why We Shouldn’t Join a Church A few decades ago American Express unveiled the tagline: “Membership has its privileges.” Their ads implied that great benefits awaited those who qualified to carry one of their exclusive cards. To start, there was a high annual fee and, as I understand, minimal annual levels of usage for their […]
Discussing Church 8 This week we visit our third new church. It’s a grand experiment, one quite radical from their conservative denominational roots. Consider these four discussion questions about Church #8: 1. A greeter welcomes us and explains what to expect during our visit. How can you help visitors at your church know what will […]