The Dangers of Surrounding Ourselves with People Just Like Us It’s understandable that we want to spend time with others who are like us, with folks who all think, act, and believe the same. Yet when followers of Jesus do this it’s too easy to fall into a Christian echo chamber. A Christian echo chamber […]
We’ll Bypass Visiting This Church (For Now) So far, we’ve visited twelve churches. With one exception—a spiritual community that wasn’t exclusively Christian—we’ve faithfully attended every church on our list, according to their distance from home. As our journey continues, we’ll skip some to maximize the breadth of our experience. The first church we’re skipping is […]
Breathing Life into Old Practices The three churches nearest to us—The Closest Church, The Traditional Denominational Church, and The Church with the Fundamental Vibe—all have traditional-sounding names, meet in traditional-looking buildings, and have traditional-style services. I want a church with a fresh spin. A Denominational Connection This church, only 1.8 miles away and just past […]
An Easy No As Sunday approaches, I want to return to last week’s church. Instead, I refer to our list. The second closest church to our house is another from traditional denominational church, a short 1.4 miles away. I attended a church in this denomination for the first decade of my life. Later, early in […]
Warm Inside Despite my encouragement, Candy has provided little input on the churches we visit. Though she recommended The Church with the Fundamental Vibe and The Nonconventional Church, I compiled the rest of the list. Today we’ll visit the closest church. Originally containing thirty-five names, I’ve now cut my list in half. While it might […]
A Country Fresh Church Last Sunday we went to church with our daughter and son-in-law. This week we go with our son and his wife. However, we aren’t going to their regular church. Instead, we’ll visit one a couple miles from where they plan to move. Part of an old denomination, the church recently changed […]
New Approaches for an Old Denomination It’s a holiday weekend. Our son and daughter-in-law are out of town, so we’re free agents. A return trip to the Megachurch is in order, but our daughter invites us to go to a church she and her husband have visited the past couple of weeks. A friend from […]
We Glorify God and Serve as the Most Effective Witness When We Get Along I write a lot about the importance of Christian unity. This is because Jesus prayed that we would be one, and I embrace his request and vision as imperative. If we profess to following Jesus, we need to all get along. […]
A Different Approach As we transition between homes, we’re living with our son and daughter-in-law. We’ll go to Sunday services with them, holding off on our search for a new church home. We’ve already gone with them a handful of times over the past few years, and for this season in our lives, it will […]
Our Good Shepherd Has More Sheep Than Just Those in Our Pen Jesus talks about a sheep pen with a gate (John 10:1-21). The shepherd goes into the pen through the entrance. He calls his sheep, and they follow him into the pastures. Only a thief would sneak into the pen another way. Yet the […]