One of my favorite songs is a song titled, "Lost and Found" by the Randy Rogers Band. The other day I was in the bookstore and I found a book by that same title and it caught my eye. I tend to buy books simply because of the title or the way the cover looks. This may not be the best way to choose a book but it has worked for me.
My next few post will be my reflections from this book. The purpose of the book is to talk about how we can reach the unchurched population of young adults (18 - 29 years old).
In the first chapter of the book they list four types of young adults that are unchurched. 1) Always unchurched (never been at all), 2) De-churched (having attended as a child, 3) Friendly unchurched (not particularly angry at the church), and 4) Hostile unchurched (angry at the church or have had some negative experience with the church).
The authors asked this question to the younger unchurched, "If you were considering visiting or joining a church, would knowing that the church did not endorse the ordination of women as pastors negatively or positively impact your decision?" Here is the response to this question, 65% of younger unchurched said this would negatively impact their decision. 47% of the friendly unchurched said this stance would negatively impact their decision to visit or join a church.
My question is this, "How as a heritage is the church of Christ going to handle this feedback from the younger unchurched?" Are we going to ignore it and move on and tell them this is just what we do and this is the way that it is? Or are we going to listen to them and take a serious look at our tradition?
More to come. May the Lord bless you and keep you.
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ReplyDeleteProbably some combination of the two. We like to take things that we know are tradition but are not essential and create some halfway patronizing version for the "seekers" while placating those who might not agree with it by not totally embracing it. (ie. the Saturday night instrumental service) Unfortunately, all this does is make us look more confused and directionless to the outside world.
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ReplyDeleteWho do we have to wait on before women serve publicly in the assembly as men? Whatever allow most of our women not to be bound by head coverings should be able to allow their public service.
ReplyDeleteWhat is more important -- the world to see the church free as God intended, or for us to let them walk away confused, die, and go to hell just so people stay comfortable?
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ReplyDeleteI think that as visitors attend Sunday morning I am sure they're confused why the Church looks and seems as a male dominant place. We talk and preach there is freedom in Christ except on Sunday morning for the ladies. The trouble in my opinion comes when how do we walk with our members who sees "womens role" as a issue and those outsiders who do not understand. Is there a happy medium?
ReplyDeleteThe church will never be able to please everyone. No church body is perfect because it's full of sinners.
ReplyDeleteAnd I really could care less about an outsider's opinion concerning the way a church works. You cannot expect a non-believer to understand the church and its function. God's ways only make sense to the regenerate Believer.
That said, I absolutely believe the church should function according to how Scripture describes. I don't see the issue of women's roles in the church as an issue of traditions either. I see this as a disconnect in the way we interpret Scripture. Now, I am quite sure that most people in the church do things the way the do because "that's how it's always been done". If that's what you want to call "tradition" then I'm fine by that. I also think this is a dangerous way to run a church body because you simply assume that those before you were correct in every issue. I'm not here to tell those before me that they were wrong, but I do disagree with the way the church handles its women members.
All in all, I see the main question being along the lines of, "I interpret Scripture this way. You interpret Scripture that way. Now, what are we going to do about it?"
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