New IFB church directory site...

Hello all,

I am have not been to the board in a few weeks with training I am going to. I am going for my MCSD(Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer) and have just completed my ASP.NET course.

I have been wanting to for sometime make a IFB church directory. But my vision for this was that it would not only be a directory of contact information, but also a library or database of how IFB churches believe on the issues.

The site has a submission form with 21 questions with multiple choice answers. I realize the way I worded some of the answers some people won't like any of them. But I wanted to get a feel for how IFBs accross the country feel, and at the same time give people a way to search for churches not just by name or location, but also by belief.

The site is in the "beta" testing mode I would appreciate all the feedback I can get on it. You can begin submitting churches to it right now.

The best part is, at least for now, it is a live submission process. That means you can submit a church, and then search for it and find it in the database.

You can do wild card searches to, with only part of a churches name or the city where you think they are.

Let me know what you guys think.

The site is at http://www.ifbreformation.org/IFB_Listing.aspx

Thanks

IFBReformer

 

I just received an email from someone who was not sure how to submit a church, here are the directions I gave:

There is a link on the top of the page called "Add a church to the list".
This will take you to http://www.ifbreformation.org/IFB_Listing_SubmitNew.aspx

At the bottom of this page is a link to the actual submission form with the questions. The link is http://www.ifbreformation.org/IFB_Listing_SubmitNew_form.aspx

After you submit a church(or before) you can search for churches with the link at the top of the page "Search for a Church" this is a link to http://www.ifbreformation.org/IFB_Listing_Search.aspx

You can type just the name of a church and it will search by that, add as much or as little info for the search as you like.

 

LRL71,

Thanks for your comments and suggestions.

I had struggled as well with the length of the questionaire. I even cut a few questions out.

But I wanted it to be through, and if that means I don't get as many people than so be it.

I have a good calling plan, and I was actually thinking of calling churches as I see them online or people email about churches. I will call and interview someone from the church and add the church myself.

I also realized at the start, a lot of churches, including IFBs don't like the way they believe on some of these things advertised. But these things are important to look for when you are looking for a church.

Also I wanted this to be a gage of how IFB churches around the country feel. I am thinking of adding international as well, good suggestion.

I don't think the listing will fill up over night and it will be something that takes months and even years to be comprehensive.

IFBs like alot of other churches don't like to be categorized, so I knew from this start it would take a lot of teeth pulling to get info into the database.

Thanks again for you comments.

IFBReformer

 

I just wanted to let you know the first few church posting came in.

It is interesting to look at just few that are there and see the differences in how they answer these questions.

I will be adding in the future statistics pages to show what percentages of IFBs stand where on the issues. Also I will be adding a counter on the pages to show the total churches in the database as well as those added on the current day.

Right now, to see all the churches you can go to the search page and just type the letter 'a' in the name of the church and hit the search button or just press enter. This will look for all church names with 'a' in them and thats pretty good chance you will get all of them.

I hope more of you will participate as this could be a very useful tool for gaging where our IFB movement is today.

IFBReformer

 

QuickeningSpirit,

Just out of curiosity, what Baptist Distinctive do you disagree with?

Also, I did include a question about repentance that leads to salvation. These two questions would answer you position:

Notice that I always ask what statement comes "closest" as everyone would word things slightly differently.

IFBReformer

 

DeafPosttrib,

If you would have read the whole homepage for the site I say that you can list even if you are postmillennial or amillennial. I say that last point about premillennialism is not a sticking point, you only have to be IFB to list.

By the way, I am post trib as well. But I am the postrib premillennial though.

So go ahead and post, make sure you read all the way through before coming to a conclusion though, I myself have been guilty of that at times.

IFBReformer

 

or something simarly worded. Because that is the situation in my home church. Mind you, we would actually like to have this problem. That would mean our teen/young adult group had grown in numbers for viable dating and courting.
Kind of like a few years back when we started to have problems with room usage. Before on Saturdays, you could use just about any room you thought was suitable for your use without checking with any one. Then we grew to a point that now you need to schedule ahead of time with the Admin. Asst. As the Pastor says, "This is a problem we like." </font>[/QUOTE]Squire,

Thanks for the suggestion, but I would be the looking for how your church would "theorectically" handle this problem then. Actually I am thinking of removing that question altogether, as it is a difficult question to get a straight answer from many churches on.

IFBReformer

 

When I see where a church won't put Baptist on the label, it's almost they're ashamed to be called Baptists. I know the reasoning behind it is to not drive people away, but then to be Baptist whole heartedly and not openly is somewhat deceitful and throwing off on the distinct honour of being first class.

I'm sorry you misunderstood me to think I don't agree with all the "distinctives", I do.

Also, the part on repentence not clear. The portion says "regenration is the result of belief". That seems to skip over repentence unto salvation and also opens the speculative that even the devils believe and tremble at the Word of God.

It just seems to me that you are so longwinded on the possible answers that the clarity should be there to prevent question. I do see where you ask about repentence, but then you keep it at the "change of mind" level. Repentence is more than just a change of mind, it is a complete change of life, involving the power of God to change that willing vessel, any one can simply change their mind, so it seems an injustice to limit it to just that. </font>[/QUOTE]Quickening,

I think this answer I gave on repentance would come closest to your postion, like I said, everyone would word things a little differently, but I think this comes close to what you said about repentance:

"B. Biblical repentance as it applies to salvation is not just acknowledging one's sinful state and accepting Christ as God and Savior. It also requires turning from known sins. Christ empowers all who are truly his to give up their known sins when they come to him. For example if someone comes to accept Christ and they are living in adultery they must give up this sin in order to be saved. Since Christ empowers them to do this if they are truly his, this is not really their own work of cleaning themselves up, it is his. If they cannot give up this sin they prove their unwillingness to surrender to Christ and thus their unwillingness to be saved."

So I don't keep it at a "change of mind" level for this answer. You see the reason I did not include repentance in the election question is that there is a difference of opinion and belief for that matter amongest IFBs who do hold to the doctrine of election.

In fact on my listing now, are two churches that both believe in election, but take different views on what "repentance unto salvation" is.

I am not here to argue this point with you here, although I have written my view on this in an article at http://www.ifbreformation.org/Assurance_What_Is_The_Gospel.aspx#C3

But please don't turn this thread into a discussion of this subject, start a new thread if you want to do that. The point of this thread is this new church listing and profile system.

Thanks

IFBReformer

 

You post in a debate forum and ask for imput concerning your new listing. All I did was ask for clarity according to the questions and made comment.

Sorry, I'll know better from now on. </font>[/QUOTE]Quickening,

I am all for discussion of the question format and I think I answered your question. I did not include repentance in the election question because even those who believe in election disagree as to the nature of and relation of repentance.

That is why I separated the issues of election of and repentance, although I realize many people like yourself would have put them together. You still would get to voice you feeling on repentance with the repentance question. I am sorry if you do not like that format.

I am open to critisim and suggestions, but that does not mean I will always implement them.

I am sorry you misunderstood me. When I was talking about a different thread, I was speaking on the nature of repentance. I heard you and appreciate your suggestion that repentance should be included in the regeneration, but like I said those who believe in election differ on this and I wanted to avoid that in the election topic. Instead I gave them the chance to select their position on repentance in another question.

IFBReformer

 

Just an update for everyone,

After receiving much feedback on the site(both good and bad) I made some slight changes to the questions.

I removed three questions having to do with dancing, card playing and dating as they were proving to be more trouble than they were worth.

Also I slightly changed the wording on the election question and added repentance, although there is still a separate question on what repentance is for clarifacation.

I also fixed a few bugs that were reported and I am sure there are more.

There are a whole 7 churches in there now so please add your churches.

You do not have to be the Pastor of your church to add a church, you just have to know what your church teaches and believes.

For those of you who are still not adding your churches, I would like to hear your reasons why you are not.

Thanks

IFBReformer