How do you tell your Baptist Church is....

Don't forget the brandy. :laugh:

 

Oh :laugh: I never do? :love2:

 

I prefer a good Glenlivet single malt scotch. ;-)

 

Dealing with a Calvinist almost always requires at least one drink, however, I prefer Budweiser to Brandy. I don't like hard liquor at all, but, if I were forced to sit under Calvinistic teaching very long, I might learn to like it! :laugh:

 

No worries....I seriously doubt any Calvinist Pastor would entertain touching you with a 10 foot pole. And if so, they themselves would surely be drinking! :laugh:

 

A man after my own heart!:thumbsup: And you don't like things blended either apparently:love2:

 

I didn't know Penn State was a Calvinistic university! :laugh:

 

Ahh, that explains everything on this board. All the hostility is just alcohol but your actually good folks inside im sure...

 

I find it rather amusing to read the rantings of those who are not Calvinists about something they know little about. There are enough straw man points made in this post to keep the board fighting for the next 10 years.

One might actually think that what goes on at church resembles what happens here on the board. Of course, those who think so have probably never attended any other church than their own on any regular basis so they really have no frame of reference from which to judge -- only that "they're against it...", that ever so common refrain we hear in business meetings all the time.

My guess, and somewhat supported from what has been reported above, is that the average person would never know if they were in a Calvinist-leaning church based on what happens during the service. That so many are so worried about it would be even more humorous if it were not so sad at the same time.

My wife and I came from a decidedly Calvinist-leaning church in Louisville. The church is 10 years old. We started with 26 members. We are now 2600+ and growing every week. We baptize over 100 a year, and have added 3 more locations with multiple services each week. We are vitally active in transforming the communities in which we reside and support any number of community programs that minister to thousands. Not bad for a church that let's God be God, huh? Or is what we are doing precisely what one might expect when God is God and in sovereign control of His church?

 

Amen
_____

 

Yes... I am more than a little curious as to what your seeing in Wisconsin now that your back home. I will preface my question by stating that the people who live in the Bible belt have very little understanding of what the sad condition of the church is when they leave their own back yards (& probably could care less)! However what happens in the North & West can & will eventually move to their home town communities. Give it 10 years!

 

You mean Spurgeon didn't really drink brandy? :laugh:

 

Amy.....you say that like its a bad thing? I esteem a man who can drink, enjoy & hold his liquor. Now as for those insidious self righteous teetotalers.....

 

Actually I was just making a joke. :saint:

 

I never met a glutton who didn't eat.

I never met a pervert who didn't indulge in sex.

Perhaps we should all become teetotlers when it comes to eating and having sex too?

 

I drink because I enjoy it & I dont drink to excess....I think (correct me if wrong) so did Christ. And didnt the pharisees claim he was a drunk?

Cheers

 

The question was how to tell if a church was calvinistic, not the preacher.

The preacher could have racist leanings he doesn't reveal, but that doesn't make the church racist.

The whole church being calvinist would be much more obvious, dont you think? LOL

John

 

Spurgeon did a lot of things that others might see as sinful. I expect that he was operating fully in God's grace instead of the legalism that accompanies a more man-centered theology. Doesn't make it right for others -- or even for Spurgeon -- just a sin that he practiced.

Ever use Nyquil? Scope? Any number of other products medicinal and otherwise that use a load of alcohol? Then you are as guilty, but that is only if one must imply guilt to the issue. That is probably the question that we should be dealing with on that issue, but that is probably another thread.

I've found Wisconsin to be the most pagan state I've ever visited or lived in. On average, though a great many people claim Christianity, the percentage of born-again Christians is between 3 and 10% depending on the area and the level of churchedness in that area. On any given Sunday, a parking lot survey (drive by and see how many cars are at any given church during worship, then count the number of churches in any given community) indicates that less than 3% of the populace could possibly attend church if they wanted to -- no room for more than that!

In the 3 churches I've been in during worship since returning, the average attendance is less than 40, the spirit during worship is virtually dead (though to be fair, I did preach at one church and actually got a response from the people during the sermon), the music worse than dead, and the level of work (for the most part) dead as well. One church has a spark of life, but cannot seem to grow. Another is merely religious and I have doubts as to whether anyone, including the pastor, is saved. The third also has a spark of life, but they are tired and beating their heads on the wall to retain the old way, when the old way is dead. Should they call me, I greatly fear that they would rebel against any level of change.

Resource levels are non-existent. Cognizance with current trends, music, theology, missiology, etc., is missing. In Baptist circles, I find a great many "transplants" from the south who are yet chasing license plates looking for the next new Southern Baptist to transfer to the north. They have not learned to assimilate the indigenous populace into their format, and worse, the format they hold is left over from when they transfered and started the church in the 1950s! They would not recognize their home church in the south should they ever have chance to revisit. There are virtually no Christian resources like book stores, radio stations (we do have a couple, one is so fundamentalistic as to be of no value in reaching the lost, another is K-love, that mostly plays tapes to a national audience), or any training venues for local pastors without sending them away. The final two nails are the level of spiritual warfare that exists in a place where the church is this weak, and the weather that tends to halt most any effort at an evangelistic campaign around about Thanksgiving weekend.

My plans, one way or another, include teaching, importing resources, seeing God work in lives in a way that prepares new leaders who can in turn reach the indigenous population, and then to encourage far more local congregations to get on board with church planting efforts.