I wrote this but wrestled with the notion of actually posting it because it’s kind of personal. But it is my blog and my personal faith journey and maybe someone out there will resonate with some of this. Maybe not. Anyway.,.

I’ve been searching for a church for about 18 months. I’ve been unsuccessful. The journey has been interesting in terms of what has happened but I find myself in a place mentally and spiritually where I may try to start my own church. Why? What might that look like? Read on.

Background

I was part of a great church in California but I did have to suppress some of my personal beliefs because of their beliefs. It was secondary stuff but they had some important ministries that I consider crucial for a church to have and that I wanted to be part of. We had a chat with an elder about certain secondary doctrines regarding spiritual gifts where we had some disagreement. But we agreed to submit and remain silent about such things so as to not cause headaches for them. I completely understood the perspective and was willing to comply so we could join them.

In my old age, I’ve gotten to a mindset where I want to be with like minded people. I don’t want to have to suppress what I believe anymore. I love talking about what the Bible teaches and hearing other viewpoints. But I want to be free to practice my faith based on my convictions from scripture. Again, I’m not talking about the essentials required for salvation, the veracity of the Bible and other primary doctrine. It has more to do with focus and priority for me on other things the scriptures teach and how they are to be understood. They are secondary to the gospel but they are important.

What I’m Looking For In a Church

In looking for a church, the basics of essential doctrine are a must have. So screening churches based on solid essentials is the first step. These days I have to add additional screening to make sure we don’t attend churches that affirm the wicked if you get my meaning. I shouldn’t have to do that, but here we are. Heart breaking to see much of the church in the state that it is. But I do ask those kinds of questions of pastors and elders now as part of the church evaluation process. But once the initial doctrinal and moral-social screening are satisfied, additional requirements come into play. Here are some important criteria I apply in searching for the right church for us:

1. I want to be part of a small local church in my neighborhood. In my mind this means within 10 minutes drive from home. This excludes mega churches. The size that I’m looking for will be such that people know each other and ideally are from the immediate neighborhood and understand its needs, a maximum of about 120 or so total people.

2. Small groups. This is a must have for us. It’s so crucial to faith, practice, community, maturity, and accountability. It’s the most effective discipleship mechanism there is. If the church does not have small, home based Bible studies, it’s off my list.

3. Highly desired: I wish to be part of a church that has a pretribulational, dispensation view of biblical prophecy, taught often as a priority. The days in which we live are urgent and people want to know what’s going on and what the Bible says about our world today. They are not getting important information about the prophetic times in which we live because many churches don’t accept that viewpoint and even if they do, they don’t teach it.

I understand about expository preaching but I’ve been kind of let down by that approach. I was told that doing the book studies forces us to deal with the tough verses and all the topics addressed as they appear in the course of working through a book. But when end times prophecy or a teaching about demonology come up, they get about 30 seconds of air time and then on to the next verse. The promised unpacking of important doctrines doesn’t happen. So I have been a little disappointed with the unmet expectations of expository teaching.

4. The church I’m looking for will have a literal, supernatural component to the hermeneutic. The Bible is a supernatural book and must be viewed and interpreted as such.

5. The church I seek will have an active evangelism program. There should be proactive training and practice of evangelism as a top priority of church ministry. This is our mission from the Lord.

Could I ever find such a church?

My Search

We moved to Colorado from California about 18 months ago and have tried 6 churches. We actually found one that was good. It didn’t tick all my boxes but the church that ticks all those boxes may not exist.

Church 1. An evangelical free church that had in its mission statement “church planting”. Sounds awesome. We went several times and liked the church. Come to find out they were in the process of moving to another location. I thought that was odd since the church had been in that neighborhood for many years. It was a nice facility and the church had strong ties to the neighborhood. Why leave?

When I found out where they were moving it wasn’t going to work for us. They took over a building that was across town. It is a massive, multi story building that used to belong to a tech company. Clearly they were headed down the mega church path. Off my list. Way too big and way too far away.

Church 2. Small Bible church. Teaching acceptable but the pastor didn’t seem to get along with his staff. He would get impatient with them from the pulpit. Awkward…cringe worthy. 😬

Church 3. Small neighborhood independent church. The service was ok but the worship leader gave a 10 minute sermonette which was kind of annoying during what was supposed to be a time of worship. Roles and responsibilities. Went back to join them for pizza that evening to get to know them a little and was met with a bit of arrogance and a strange attitude towards us. Treated almost as if they didn’t want us there. Seemed more like a club not looking for new members. Poor marks for hospitality. Just did not get started off on the right foot. No home groups anyway. Best to find those things out early.

Church 4. Small Baptist church that wasn’t likely the church for us but worth a try. Outstanding hospitality. Very kind people. Bent over backwards to ensure we were welcomed. Teaching was fine but the services had too many people involved. It was like a tag team approach with each elder having a small role. I thought it hard to follow and a little irreverent with the joking around between the elders. It was funny and entertaining but awkward. The web site indicated there were home groups which is why we decided to try it. As it turned out, that was not the case. So it came off the list.

Church 5. Another evangelical free church. It met in a school, was very small, very quiet humble worship, good teaching, had small groups and some outreach. Literally could walk to church it was that close. Liked it a lot and this was the place for us. However, they were in a process of deciding to merge with a larger church. A vote was coming up soon.

It was very clear which way the pastor was pushing the vote. The process was very biased, never any debate about the pros and cons or spiritual issues on the line. So here was a church plant clearly holding its own, planted by a denomination that had church planting in its mission statement. Surely the members would vote to continue as is? Nope. The vote was unanimous to merge with the larger church ten miles away. I couldn’t believe it. Why was a a perfectly good local church plant deciding to close its doors in this neighborhood? It literally was against their own mission statement. Yikes. I don’t get it. What is it with e-free churches! This was my first experience with a large Protestant denomination. Weird.

Church 6. A missionary alliance church also small and in the neighborhood. Had home groups too. Went there for several months. Good hospitality but but observed some real issues with biblical interpretation leading to bad doctrine and lack of accountability and unity among the elders. They are going to have some problems unless they can get these issues ironed out. We really don’t want to be walking into the middle of potentially serious problems so decided to move on.

18 months. 6 churches. Came up empty. Now what? We have been attending the California church remotely online but this is stop gap until we can figure out what to do.

Way Forward

I am seriously thinking about starting a home church. We have one other couple that might be interested. I don’t know if it will work but I figure if it’s God’s direction for us then he will bless it as long as we are faithful to his Word and live in accordance with his ways and make the mission the priority. The criteria I listed above will define the home church and we’ll see what happens. Definitely pros and cons.