The survey shows that for nearly half of Christians, involvement in a local church body is a minimal part of their daily lives.
"Faith is relevant for many people, but church is not," says Bryan Wilkerson, senior pastor of Grace Chapel in Lexington, Massachusetts. "People want to attend to the spiritual side of their lives, they are interested in God, but their experience of church has not been relevant. They say, 'Why do I have to sit through boring sermons and old music that don't speak to my real needs and problems?'"
"A growing element of the Christian population is disappointed with or frustrated by the local church," says D. Michael Lindsay, assistant professor of sociology at Rice University and former consultant with the Gallup Institute. In part, this trend can be attributed to factors within local church bodies themselves, such as lack of strong leadership or teaching....
Lance Eccles wrote: No, it doesn't. It told the Jews to do that. The New Covenant, which binds Christians, replaces the customary laws of the Old Covenant.
Gasp! You've been hanging around Christians too long, Lance!
Gil Rugh said or, wrote: ...It is good to alleviate problems such as poverty; it is a disaster to turn the church into a work to alleviate poverty. We are not here to change the social values of the world. The Church is not the Kingdom of God. To be the Church of Jesus we need to do the will of God. Jesus Christ and we are co-laborers in building the Church not the Kingdom. The Kingdom cannot be established except with the physical return of Christ.
Ekklesia, an assembly, doesn't always mean a religious assembly, sometimes it even refers to a mob. Where Ekklesia occurs in the Bible almost never means "Church" before Second Chapter of Acts.
The Universal Church fully manifested in the local church. The local church is complete. It doesn't need to be a part of a group of churches.
Anyway, Lance, again, you should think about becoming a Christian.
Peter1 wrote: davey: Very good insight. Faith is not an emotion, but a gift from God to his elect people that connects them with Jesus Christ. Ephesians 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Peter1, God bless you and AMEN!! It so blesses my heart to hear someone give all the glory of our salvation to the LORD...
Ephesians 2:8-10 truly separates the real from the unreal.... No one wants to hear that God has HIS Elect but he does.. Thank God for HIS GRACE.
Mark M. Very good comments. I would encourage you however to logically come to a deductive reasoning of your comments in order to expand them in a direction you may not have thought of. You correctly state that Muslims claim that God has "no son". You correctly claim that this belief is a denial of Christ and equals "hell bound". Do you realize that your criteria applies to unbelieving Jews as well? If the God of the Bible is a Triune God (and He is) then are not the Jews (I am speaking here of those who are not atheists and agnostics as most are) also worshipping another god? Kind of causes a little indigestion to the brand of American Evangelicalism we worship in doesn't it? Also, if the Koran teaches the killing of Christians & Jews, does it not also teach the killing of Hindus and Shintos (also "infidels")? Does that bother you as much as the order to kill Christians & Jews? Does our Bible not tell us to stone certain people (sodomites & adulterous women for example)? How does that effect you? I am not trying to degrade you, I'm just trying to make you think, which is good for all of us to do now & then when we make generalizations. O-K brothers & sisters - cut loose!!!!
I read and hear so much about "faith" and in this article, "Faith is relevant"....please preachers, teachers and others, (even the politicans take up this term) "What do you really mean when you talk about faith?" Terv davey
This is a pretty good article, but when it comes to what the article calls "cultural Christian" I wouldn't consider them to be Christian at all. The entire essence of being a Christian means to accept Christ and Christ alone as the only means for entry in to heaven and forgiveness of sins. I don't think you have to go to church every week or be a leader in said church, not everyone is meant to be a leader, to be a Christian, but certain criteria needs to be meant. Believing that Muslims are worshiping the same God as most of us do is being ignorant of both religions. Muslims are called to kill Jews and Christians and one of their main beiliefs is that God/Allah has no son. That's denial of Jesus which equals Hell bound in my view.
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Dr. Alan Cairns | 11/2/2009
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Thank God for HIS GRACE.
john uk from wales: "
frank
very good scripture; thanks! it sounds like a true..."
