Reply to Church that gets back to individual change, atonement, and redemption

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Any church that considers itself Reformed (look for the NAPARC churches) [i]should historically[/i] be more focused on faith than politics or the politics-adjacent type issues you're discussion. I also haven't seen what you're talking about in the ACNA.

I will say that evangelicalism as historically defined - the theological definition not the political one - has moved away from individualism a little bit. It's just not biblical to only focus on individual change.[/quote]

What do you mean it's not biblical? To me it is. When we die, it's just us and God.

The entire country has a problem with narcissism and it's flooded our local churches as well. I'm looking for a church that spends less time blaming others for their issues or ignoring issues and pretending they are great for how devout they are and spends more time admitting their faults, working on them in the world, and working in communion with others to spread god's love. [/quote]

DP, but do you see the irony? PP said "It's just not biblical to only focus on individual change". You disagree, saying "To me it is [biblical]". And then go on to decry the narcissism in our churches.

You are making his point for him. [/quote]

I see. I think you can only change how you act with others though once you've worked on yourself and actually behave differently. My main issue with my current church is that there is a lot of outside blaming, politics, and a lot of checking off religious items completed but not a lot of introspection and reform. Like the example of the hypocrites in the Synagogue Jesus talked about. I don't feel like I fit in. I'm looking for a new congregation that really focuses on the walk with Jesus and the reformation of the soul.[/quote]

First quoted PP here. The Bible focuses on the church (or in the Old Testament, the Israelites). Yes there's individual change, but there's also a lot of stuff about corporate change and God's people as a group. Trevin Wax had a whole series on "expressive individualism" for The Gospel Coalition that gets at some of the problems and solutions: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/trevin-wax/expressive-individualism-challenge-church/

As the PP you responded to said, there is a slippery slope between the idea of individual change and the narcissism you are talking about. Do you have to fall down that slope? No. Is it likely without an equal focus on God's people as a group? I think so.

What you want is a church that focuses on the church being the church - both as a group from member to member and outwardly in service to the world - and as part of that individuals changing. But God should be primary, corporate relationships secondary, and individual change flows from those vertical and horizontal relationships.

You want a place where you get both Philippians 2:12 ("[i]work out your salvation[/i] with fear and trembling [i]for it is God who works in you[/i]...") AND Ephesians 4:16 ("from whom [i]the whole body[/i], joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, [i]when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.[/i]")

This is a good article by a Christian from Singapore on the church and it's role as a global organization with lots of individual groups (churches) in it: https://www.esv.org/resources/esv-global-study-bible/the-importance-of-the-global-church/[/quote]

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