How about church being about what church should be about. Worshiping God.
How can a "seeker" worship someone he isn't committed to?
Maybe us Christians need to do OUR jobs, and lead others to Christ, instead of waiting for "seekers" to walk into churches of their own accord. Or expecting "the church" to do what we should be doing.
And instead of us looking to make the Bible relevant to our lives, maybe WE should be making our lives relevant to the Bible.
MAYBE YOU WOULDN’T LIKE…
OUR DRESS CODE
Many think our dress code is too strict. Skirts above the knees are not allowed. Men must wear neckties to class and must have short haircuts. Young ladies may not wear shorts or slacks.
OUR OLD-FASHIONED DISCIPLINE
Young ladies are not allowed to go off campus unchaperoned. Young men and young ladies may not date alone in cars. Absolutely no hand holding or other intimacies are allowed between the sexes. There are date nights with bus transportation and adequate chaperones provided by the college. Student insubordination is absolutely forbidden.
OUR INTENSE EVANGELISTIC ATMOSPHERE
All faculty, staff, and students are required to go soul winning weekly. Students participate in the evangelistic ministry of the First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana, which builds its ministry around personal soul winning. An average of over 10,000 new converts were baptized each year for the past several years.
OUR FUNDAMENTALIST EMPHASIS
We are fundamentalists and use the term proudly. We believe in a literal Hell which has fire and brimstone and a literal Heaven with streets of gold. We stand for the King James Bible as the only Bible and the local New Testament church as the only true church. We believe in redemption through the blood of Christ, salvation by grace through faith alone, and the premillennial second coming of Jesus Christ.
OUR SEPARATIST POSITION
Absolutely no drinking, smoking, or dancing is allowed. No student is allowed to attend Hollywood movies, play cards, or participate in other questionable amusements. We do not fellowship with liberals, but instead take a strict separatist stand from the world and apostasy.
OUR EMPHASIS ON CULTURE
We believe in students’ learning and practicing propriety. We oppose the paganistic, barbaric humanism that prevails on many campuses. We believe in refinement, dignity, courtesy, proper manners, and Christian grace.
OUR EMPHASIS ON THE PRACTICAL
We blend the finest of scholarship with the best practical teaching possible. We teach not only what to do but how to do it. Preacher boys are taught how to start churches; how to build buildings; how to borrow money from lending institutions; how to raise money and adopt a budget; and how to organize, operate, and perpetuate a New Testament church.
These guys know how to whoop it up.
Mountn man.... you stick with your strict approach if that is working for you. This guy is just trying something different and my only point is that since a large number of people don’t respond well to your way, maybe they’ll give this guy a try. There may only be one door, but there are a lot of paths to that door. Maybe if we Christians stopped judging each other so harshly, we wouldn’t repulse so many.
Getting people into a place where they are comfortable enough to drop their guard so the message of The Gospel can reach their hearts is a higher priority with God than beating them over the head with scripture over their addictions.
It's more important to get the Great Commandment hooked up with the Great Commission and get that all of workin' BEFORE we try to help people deal with some of their non-eternal-life-threateneing issues.
It's a LITTLE more like Jesus to get the fish INTO the boat BEFORE we try to clean them.
Jesus took the same kind of heat from the Pharisees and scribes that you're laying on this guy, and my reply to you is his reply to them, "It is not those who are well who need a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance" (cf. Lk. 5:31 & 32). And I remind you of Jesus parable concerning the lost sheep from Luke 15 wherein he concluded, "I tell you that in the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance."
The unsaved already have enough obstacles to salvation; need we impose more??
There are thousands of unsaved people for whom Jesus is an attractive and intriguing figure about whom they'd really LOVE to get the straight skinny. But these same people just cannot reconcile what they already know about Jesus with this bunch called "Christians". TOO often -- way too often -- we who have the faith are the greatest obstacle to others who're interested in knowing more about Jesus.
I refuse to risk getting to Heaven only to find out that somebody's burnin' in Hell because I objected to their dirty feet on my clean church carpet.
I refuse to risk getting to Heaven only to find somebody's burnin' in Hell because I was all hung up about them bringin' their personal addictions into church.
Billy Graham invited multiplied millions to come to faith accompanied by the hymn "Just As I Am", but millions more have been turned back from the church house doors because of pious people who couldn't deal with folks wanting to come just as they were.
Mahatma Ghandi came to church, as a boy, to find out who this Jesus was that he'd heard about. He was turned out of the church by an usher because of his attire. Just let THAT sink in for a minute or ten. What if...? And all because of an usher who did NOT have foremost in mind the things of God.
St. Paul said he wanted so passionately for his fellow Jews to be saved that he almost wished himself cut off from Christ -- eternally damned.
Who do YOU want to see saved so much that you feel like it'd almost be worth giving up your spot in Heaven?
This same Paul rejoiced because hucksters had latched onto the Gospel message and were going around preaching and passing the plate just to make money. He rejoiced that, whether out of good motive or bad, Christ was being preached.
Obviously his top priority was the Great Commission (go tell), and his zeal for it arose out of his exercise of the Great Commandment (love God), which goes hand-in-glove with the Second-greatest Commandment (love people). Unless we operate with those selfsame priorities, we will find ourselves hurting the very ones to whom we have been sent.
My Jesus laid aside his Heavenly Throne to take on flesh, endure 33 years of life on Earth culminating in the most tortuous, bloody, and horrific death ever. All because he's madly in love with me.
He's madly in love with Dan Smith, too. And he's madly in love with the lost folks that show up to the services there; he doesn't want to lose a single person to the fires of Hell.
And our greatest concern is...their style???
Because of THAT we're supposed to assume that Jesus isn't getting any airtime; that they're just a mob of apostates mocking the faith?
Get real.
That’s what the Mormons do. Guess who’s growing?
Two came to my house, and I was tickled by the fact that both had the same first name- Elder. I assume they were country boys.