Featured 5 Ways To Be Unsatisfied With Your Church

No Ive not modified my views. I dont want to join anything without evaluating it totally.....they wanted you to join & then go thru the process.....thats putting the cart before the horse. IE, just because I have been reborn does NOT mean Im going to rush out & join any church (not without properly examining what they believe, if it feels right, if the Pastor is teaching doctrine & from the bible, etc.)

And if they have the ability to teach me....or do I stay where I am & vegetate?

 

I totally agree.....well thought out:thumbs:

 

Would you put a college level student who has both the faculties to understand the curriculum & has both proven himself capable of performing the work back in high-school with the agenda to help up & coming students? Of course not....rather you feed & train & present more challenging material to the person in order for him to advance. Then if they choose to teach later, you work toward that goal....but thats another project entirely. 1st advance the student to his highest capable level. Maybe you got another Rocket Scientist there or maybe you got another high school math teacher but without allowing the student to advance & challenge & continue to learn, you will never know.

 

Here I agree! :thumbs:

 

LOL..... yes that would be of deeper interest to me at least. Good one:thumbs:

 

Why did you & your husband leave the PCUSA Church?

 

Not everyone in church can or wants to teach.

In a church where the leadership, especially the preaching pastor is teaching shallow doctrine, milk &c and some sheep feel like they aren't getting fed, the answer isn't to go teach a class. Sometimes it is to leave.

Some of the sheep who feel this way cannot do a thing about it as they are not equipped to teach and they can't change what they hear from the pulpit. Some of these are in fact doing things in and for the church, not just in a teaching capacity. There is a time to leave a church, and if it is for shallow preaching, and/or due to weak doctrine then I see that as valid.

I've heard this excuse from preachers for years; 'The reason you aren't getting anything out of my preaching is because you don't study yourself'. Utter nonsense. Sure, at times this may be true, but I don't see any person who is not getting a thing out of it as being this way. Why would they be worried about that? It doesn't seem to be a fitting attitude for a person who doesn't study but of one who does study in my opinion.

 

Agreed....my point was more basic even than what you just described. Out here, there are lots of RC's so they find there way into most of these mainline churches & they join for maybe a different doctrinal prospective, or perhaps some different prospective & maybe even some emphasis on scripture (that they hadn't received prior to). So they sit there and maybe they grow or maybe they just warm the bench. If God graces them with rebirth, they MUST move on. They aren't being properly fed in most cases & the pastor just doesn't want to stress doctrine, doesn't want to delve deep into salvation theology blah blah. Therefore they are forced to seek enlightenment elsewhere. Thats where Baptists come in. We are a peculiar people full of the HS & hopefully deeper thought theologically. I believe it is the job of the church to provide that deeper understanding & further I believe its the job of the student to seek it out.....not only by the pastor & staff, but independent study.

And your right, not everyone can teach or wants to teach....some feel the real need to learn (to drink deep at the well) & so they must move on. Its that simple.

 

When a church focuses on the propagation of the gospel, it will be effective both at evangelism and at discipleship. Both are part of the propagation of the gospel. It isn't either/or but both/and.

As far as the church being a family? Or for corporate worship?

There I respectfully part company. It isn't there to fill our social needs, and I believe becomes unhealthy when that becomes the focus. Youth groups should not take the place of the family in the life of the youth. And when it comes to adults, healthy ones are able to make friends outside the church as well as within it. My personal experience has been this focus on being a social bonding group has led down hill, away from preaching sin and salvation from hell and into the idea we cannot say anything of substance because it might offend.

As to corporate worship, what I disagree with is the idea we somehow are not really "with" God unless we are with a group of people also "with" God and with some sort of priest leading. With the right music and ego stroking talk and mood lighting, etc, folks can have a "wonderful experience" of "worship" without ever encountering Christ. So I am cautious there also.

But then I don't see the job of Christians as being forming and growing healthy churches. Rather, I see healthy churches as having the job of forming and growing healthy Christian individuals, which will form healthy families and be healthy citizens.

Or to put it simply, Christians don't exist to make churches, churches exist to make Christians.

All of this, of course, to be under the rule of Christ and used as God so desires.

 

:laugh: Holy Cow Nodak.......your on to something :applause:

 

"Utter nonsense......Sure sometimes this is true" An utter logical contradiction.

 

So there you go.....the church no longer fit....IE was no longer feeding you. And that is quite natural & you did the only thing you could do.

 

This is often used as an EXCUSE to justify false teachings. No church is perfect but there are Biblical Churches, and there are churches that DO NOT preach the gospel.

Areas of compromise are secondary. For example if I were in a good church with solid teaching, but they had few activities for adults I would be upset, but it would be am area of compromise. Other areas are the bible translation issue, the location, the music, the food, among other things.

 

I agree with this. I have been in churches that only fed milk and I needed meat. And I have been in churches where the teaching and preaching was very meaty and the pastor would often quote books, do deep exegesis, and such. However I was dissatisfied with the lack of social activities, but no church is perfect and thinking back I should have taken the meat over the social activities when I switched churches.

 

Exactly what we see on BB sometimes....:thumbsup: