I got an email from an acquaintance this weekend raising many of the questions that have been plaguing me about our church practices. It got me thinking, it just seems that there are more and more people who are looking at Scripture and looking at how we “do church” and sensing a disconnect. It raised a couple of questions:
Is that truly the case?
What is causing it?
Does it just seem that way because we have a social network that extends far beyond people who live around us and family or are the same electronic resources making it easier for people to talk to others with similar feelings and embolden those who sense something amiss? Maybe it is both. Whatever the case, I am glad to see that people are getting as serious about seeing church practice be faithful to Scripture as they are about theology being faithful to Scripture.
3 comments:
I see the discussions of how we should "do church" at many Christian blogs these days.
I can understand all the reasons that many want to move away from the institutional church model and in a more 'home church' style of worship.
I just want to say that many of the problems that they think they will avoid, will be present in the less formal model as well, and there may be some new ones to boot.
Where you have people, you have problems.
I think the key is to saty centered on Christ and what He does FOR US and resist the temptation to devolve into fretting so much over what WE DO.
I'm a Lutheran and I love the liturgical form of worship. It helps us to be Christ centered. It acts like an anchor that we might not float hither and yon into our own feelings, or "religious" projects that center on us.
I do realize that there are problems in Luthernism.
We happen to be very blessed that we have an old time Lutheran pastor who has not jettisoned God's Law and who knows how to hand over the gospel free of charge.
Steve,
Simpler forms of the church certainly seem to have their own problems. As you say, when you get sinners together there are going to be problems. My contention is that much of what we find in the I.C. not only is not encouraging fellowship but is impeding it.
Arthur,
I absolutely think that it's more of a communication thing that an actual increase. House churches and other non-traditional fellowships have been around for generations. But when you start thinking about something, you notice others that are thinking the same way. The internet makes it much easier to connect with them.
Do you think that if you had gone to INCH three years ago you would have paid attention to how many women were wearing headcoverings? I doubt it. I reminds me of the pantry. We often get items at the pantry that I've never seen before. Yet after we get them, I suddenly notice these things on the shelf at Wal-Mart. Did they just start carrying them? No, it's just that now I have a reason to notice them. Just the way the human mind works!
Debbie
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