[TDDance234]

Should denominations reach out to work together with other denominations on service projects/witnessing attempts? We had an interesting debate in my Sunday School class last week and would be interested to see some responses here.

[Liberty4Life]

Should denominations reach out to work together with other denominations on service projects/witnessing attempts? We had an interesting debate in my Sunday School class last week and would be interested to see some responses here.

Yes, of course.

[SuperJon]

Absolutely.


But we all know they won't.

[TDDance234]

Should denominations reach out to work together with other denominations on service projects/witnessing attempts? We had an interesting debate in my Sunday School class last week and would be interested to see some responses here.

Yes, of course.

Scenerio A: Baptist and Church of Christ are working together and CoC worker starts to share Christ with person whom they are serving. Baptist has issue with CoC doctrine (specifically how one is saved).

Does the Baptist speak up, thus beginning a debate infront of a person who hasn't heard the gospel?

(This doesn't stem from a specific incident just thought it was an interesting debate)

[bigsmooth]

they should work together, but as SJ says they probably wont. and if the baptist wanted to speak up then i feel that is the wrong thing to do. speak privately about it, but try to win the soul first.

[phoenix]

Work together on service projects? Absolutely. We need to do more of this.

Work together on evangelism? Depends on the denomination. If you've got people who can agree on salvation by faith through grace alone, then sure. If there's confusion about how someone gets saved, then there's a big problem.

Illustration: If I'm working with someone from a Presbyterian church and we're sharing Christ (no attacks, yes they do it), we agree on how someone is saved. We disagree on mode of baptism, and the issue of infant baptism - neither of which factors in on someone coming to Christ. That's something to be brought up later, when baptism is discussed.

BUT, if I'm working with a Nazarene or a Free-Will Baptist who teaches that salvation can be lost, I have a serious problem. Security of the believer is a major point that I always bring up when sharing the gospel with someone, so there will be issues with me working with those folks. So I don't, and won't. If I'm working with someone who teaches baptismal regeneration (as most Church of Christ folks do) then again there is a major issue, and I cannot in good conscience work with them. Any Gospel that includes something besides coming to Christ by faith alone through His grace alone is a false gospel,. and I won't work with someone who is preaching that.

If it's a matter of ecclesiology, or eschatology, or something like that, then I have no problem working with someone else. But in matters touching the presentation of the Gospel, then we'd better be on the same page, or I'm out.

[Sly Fox]

Agreed, Phoenix. Although its been so long since I have been around a Free Will Baptist that I had forgotten all about their stances on eternal security.

We do a bunch of service projects here in Houston with churches of a number of different denominations. The most significant have been when we have not been denominational lines but racial. Working together with African-American, Hispanic and Asian churches has been a real blessing to all involved and demonstrates the true body of Christ to an unbelieving world that is highly skeptical of motives in any service project.

[phoenix]

Agreed, Phoenix. Although its been so long since I have been around a Free Will Baptist that I had forgotten all about their stances on eternal security.

When I was in West Virginia, I faced the free will folks over and over -- some of the people in the church I was pastoring had come from a free-will background. I ended up preaching quite a bit on eternal security, since so many people weren't familiar with it at all, except for the distortions they'd bee taught about it.

[Sly Fox]

We had Free Wills all around us in the 'Burg back in the day ... primarily those from South Webster, Minford and other mountain folks.

[Libertine]

If separate denominations could work together they wouldn't be separate denominations in the first place.

[Cider Jim]

Habitat for Humanity and the Boy Scouts are two excellent opportunities for varying denominations to work together.

[ATrain]

If separate denominations could work together they wouldn't be separate denominations in the first place.

If the same denominations could work together there wouldn't be a billion churches of each in every town.

[PastorZack]

Off topic, but, how many of you have seen the "community" church and their doctrinal statements???Everyone that I have come across could be a Baptist Church just not in name affiliation. It's almost like these churches don't want the "Baptist" label. Again, sorry for going off topic.

[Sly Fox]

Welcome to 90% of non-denoms who are Baptists who would only admit it under threat of death. Frankly the Baptist name is a problem for many folks.

[PastorZack]

Why is "Baptist" a bad name???? Frankly, I think "Community" is a bad name, because what that assuades people into thinking is that there is no doctrinal differences and there definitely are between these peoples.

What has given the "Baptists" a bad name???? It's not like we have sex scandals with alter boys or anything...what really gets me up here in the Northeast (PA) is when churches are lumped into what the media describes as "the church" meaning the Catholic Church. I don't want anything to do with the Catholic church. They are mutually exclusive.

[SuperJon]

People simply don't like denominations anymore. Look at the largest churches in America. Of the top ten, only one has a denomination in its name. I know that I, personally, would look for a church without a denominational name attached to it before I would look for a church with one.

[Sly Fox]

Come on, Zack. You're a Texan. You were here when all the squabbling between Conservatives & Moderates in Texas gave everyone named Baptist a bad name.

As for the lack of denominational titles among the Top 10 largest churches in America, it doesn't bother me as long as it doesn't change anything doctrinally. If Ed Jr, Rick Warren or Kerry Shook want to drop Baptist from their marquee then I don't mind. For guys like Ed & Kerry having the name would probably give folks a false expectation of what to expect in their worship services. But that is a subject of discussion for some other day.

Actually Bob Coy's church sort of lists his denomination since for all intents & purposes that is what "Calvary Chapel" is. And it should be noted that after the top 10 it becomes the norm rather than the exception to list denomination for the rest of the Top 25.

[phoenix]

When denominational labels actually told you what you were getting, they were valuable. Now, there's too much variety.

Look at Baptists. You've got everything from the more liberal/moderate CBF churches (and there's a pretty wide variety of churches just under that label) all the way right to the Sword of the Lord/PCC fundamentalist Baptists, to the wonderful folks at Westboro Baptist. There's no way to tell what the word Baptist means on a church anymore.

I used to get upset when Baptist churches took the name off, or refused to put it up. My pastor still does. Any more, I'm more upset at some of the churches that keep the name.

[ATrain]

Why is "Baptist" a bad name???? Frankly, I think "Community" is a bad name, because what that assuades people into thinking is that there is no doctrinal differences and there definitely are between these peoples.

What has given the "Baptists" a bad name???? It's not like we have sex scandals with alter boys or anything...what really gets me up here in the Northeast (PA) is when churches are lumped into what the media describes as "the church" meaning the Catholic Church. I don't want anything to do with the Catholic church. They are mutually exclusive.

When I think of baptist, I think of people who get dressed up on Sunday mornings, fill the pews from the back forward, sing what they're told to sing and when they're told to sing it, act all holy and then go out and live their lives completely different from what they proclaim to believe, and hostile business meetings-and that goes for both Southern and independent baptists, except independents can be worse due to more rigid legalism regarding dress, etc...

When I started going to a community church, people wore basically casual clothing, worshipped, and didn't act like they were holier-than-thou but were able to admit they were sinners who became saints through God's grace, and were able to-without complete embarassment-talk about their past mistakes and God's finding them. Doctrinally it was the same as a Baptist church. I didn't get shunned or anything when I came out as gay there, even though they made it clear that they disagreed with my views on the Bible and homosexuality, and I didn't get the sense that anyone thought they were more righteous either-which is sometimes how I think I'd feel if people in the Baptist church I grew up in knew, and thats also the vibe I get whenever I visit some friends from LU as well.

I'm not saying that every Baptist church is like the one in the first paragraph and that every community church is the same as the second one, thats just been my experience. Though now I'm going to a Methodist church since I moved out to Salem.

[ALUmnus]

Why is "Baptist" a bad name???? Frankly, I think "Community" is a bad name, because what that assuades people into thinking is that there is no doctrinal differences and there definitely are between these peoples.

What has given the "Baptists" a bad name???? It's not like we have sex scandals with alter boys or anything...what really gets me up here in the Northeast (PA) is when churches are lumped into what the media describes as "the church" meaning the Catholic Church. I don't want anything to do with the Catholic church. They are mutually exclusive.

When I think of baptist, I think of people who get dressed up on Sunday mornings, fill the pews from the back forward, sing what they're told to sing and when they're told to sing it, act all holy and then go out and live their lives completely different from what they proclaim to believe, and hostile business meetings-and that goes for both Southern and independent baptists, except independents can be worse due to more rigid legalism regarding dress, etc...

When I started going to a community church, people wore basically casual clothing, worshipped, and didn't act like they were holier-than-thou but were able to admit they were sinners who became saints through God's grace, and were able to-without complete embarassment-talk about their past mistakes and God's finding them. Doctrinally it was the same as a Baptist church. I didn't get shunned or anything when I came out as gay there, even though they made it clear that they disagreed with my views on the Bible and homosexuality, and I didn't get the sense that anyone thought they were more righteous either-which is sometimes how I think I'd feel if people in the Baptist church I grew up in knew, and thats also the vibe I get whenever I visit some friends from LU as well.

I'm not saying that every Baptist church is like the one in the first paragraph and that every community church is the same as the second one, thats just been my experience. Though now I'm going to a Methodist church since I moved out to Salem.

Sounds pretty close-minded to me.

Do people break out in spontaneous singing in all the non-Baptist churches you attended?

[BJWilliams]

As someone who was raised COGIC (Protestant) and spent much of my life in Baptist churches since 2001 (and visited a number of other churches in my life), Ive seen a little bit of everything, but really if you go in looking for a fight, chances are youll find one no matter what denomination the church is. I have enjoyed my experiences wherever I go. I went to a Baptist church that was mostly lots of old people who dressed up all the time but one thing is for certain these are not people who live two different lives.

[SuperJon]

Denominations have a PR problem. Yes, you can say Christianity has a PR problem, but denominations do just as bad. If someone had one bad experience at one Baptist church, they're going to think that every Baptist church is like that. The same can be said about any church that publicly says, "Hey, we fall under this denomination that has a convention where everyone comes together and argues about stuff in the name of Jesus." I was raised Church of God (Cleveland) and it's just as bad there. I have a view of Church of God churches as old-people oriented with people who want to focus everything around them and show how great of a Christian they are. It's because in my experiences at multiple COG churches, that was the case.

Now, fast forward to when I started checking out "non-denominational" churches. Every single one of them I've been in (in Winston-Salem, Lancaster County PA, Wilmington, Lynchburg, Burlington, Clayton, Raleigh) have been very friendly, very open, and more than anything, people seemed humble in their worship. It wasn't a "look at me, I love Jesus more than you" attitude among the people in the church. It was a "Yeah, I do stupid stuff and mess up quite a bit but luckily this Jesus guy still loves me and I'm going to praise him for it" type of attitude.

Also, another reason, typically, that people like the "community" or "non-denominational" church better than the denominational one is because the "community" churches have adapted to the current culture much more than denominational churches have. Most denominational churches still fall into the "Sunday School, morning worship, Sunday evening worship (maybe), and Wednesday night programming" that has been around since pretty much forever. In those churches, especially the smaller ones (200 or less), people feel like they're looked down upon if they're not in every single service and because of that, they spend more time going to church out of obligation as opposed to going to church because they want to. I got so much crap growing up because I wanted to play rec league basketball and the team that I was chosen to be on was given the Wednesday night practice slot and I had to miss Wednesday night church. And God-forbid I ever had a championship soccer or baseball game on a Sunday morning. You would've thought I was the worst 12-year-old on the planet.

The "community" church has moved to a once-a-week corporate worship and then you do your stuff during the week with the people that are in your life already. Your "Wednesday night programming" is now meeting in small groups at someone's house on the day of the week which works best for everyone as opposed to at the church on Wednesday night. This allows you to still be active in other things during the week, plus you don't have to drive all the way to the church, you can stay in your own neighborhood or community (not a big deal around here, but a much bigger deal in big cities and rural areas). People go out and do things in their community because they want to do it, not because they feel like they have to. Instead of a forced church-team softball team, you have a few guys who are in a small group together deciding they want to play softball and they do that together and invite their friends along.

The "community" church has much more of a "relational" and "people-oriented" feel to it than the denominational church which has a big time "programs" based feel to it.

</rant>

[Sly Fox]

Wow, very few denominational churches around here act the way SJ suggests. If anything I think most denominations have watered everything down to the point that it is tough to tell what type of church you are in.

Technically I believe both lifechurch.tv & Granger are considered non-denom but both are Methodist. Northpoint & Fellowship are likewise with their Baptist tenets.

[SuperJon]

Sly, how many of your churches are the small, run of the mill, 100-200 person church? Remember, you're in a much different "market" than most. You're in a big city. If you look at those who have said things negatively towards denominations (mainly me and ATrain), we come from much smaller towns than Houston.

[Sly Fox]

No question that rural & suburban churches are different creatures. Then again, the vast majority of America's population now is in either urban or suburban settings.