Jun 30, 2010
Choosing a healthy Church
Posted by Mitch Sliwa in Theology | Comments (1)
Todd wrote a fantastic position paper that you can read here. I strongly suggest that you do, but I would like to give a few brief points and excerpts from the article to hopefully cause you to read it for yourself.
You will normally conform to and practice the faith you are converted to. This is to say, your personal expression of your faith, will reflect what has been modeled for you. Think about it for a minute. If you are converted by a Pentecostal tradition, that will most likely be the one you identify with and gravitate towards and so on with Non-denominational, Baptist, Presbyterian, etc. If If you have come to faith or worshipped for some time in a very emotionally driven expression, it will reflect in your own. If you have cut your teeth in a very academic and bible study oriented tradition, you will likely look very similar. Also if you are one of those few people who have a conversion experience from very unbiblical and impersonal evangelistic practices that use tracts, manipulating people into making “decisions” and the like, you will in turn naturally want to practice evangelism this same passive aggressive way.
In this section, Todd points out the fact of "What you win them with, is what you win them to". If you are brought up in a certain tradition, you will continue on the current trajectory until something blocks your path and causes you to redirect. He then goes on to explain an example of a particular denominational downfall.
Let me offer an example. I sit squarely in a theologically Reformed/Presbyterian tradition, one which I am quite in agreement with and committed to. However, in my many years within these circles I have seen many churches, though theologically in agreement with me, in absolute disobedience in regard to living out the Gospel and making disciples.
He goes on to explain that many people (yours truly) do not know how to pick a healthy church because our criteria for choosing is very hostile to the gospel and selfish to the core.
Unfortunately most of us do not know what that good Gospel criteria for discerning what an healthy local church looks like. Even more unfortunate is the fact that the reasons most of us pick one church over another, more often than not, has little or nothing to do with the Gospel. In fact, as we will see below, much of our typical criteria for deciding where to make our church home is actually most of the time very subjective and contrary to the Gospel, if not purely selfish and all out hostile to it.
Once he diagnoses the problem, he goes on to list the reasons why a church is embraced or rejected in the subsequent sections.
“I am thinking about dining at your buffet. You have rotisserie chicken and steak tips on the menu, but me and my family are looking for the honey baked ham. Will you be getting the honey baked ham soon, or should I go look for another buffet?”
Most people tend to pick a church the way they pick a buffet. Choosing a church is very consumer driven for most people, and the reason for embracing or rejecting churches is based off of what they can do for ME instead of how well it equips and send us out to serve others and share the gospel.
I am not going to continue on because I want you to go read the article for yourself.
Posted by Mitch Sliwa in Theology
