1. I have a sense that the kingdom is bigger than just my local church, and I have an easy forum in which I can see and watch and help it grow elsewhere.
2. I have fellowship with great people that I don't go to church with. Andrew and I are connected with a network from our denomination who we meet with each quarter to eat, chat and pray. They care about how our church is going and we care about their churches.
3. I share a common enemy with others. My pressy friends and I can get together and whinge about The Denomination or The Code or The Confession or Presbytery or whatever demon is haunting us at that moment. This is fun.
4. I get to enjoy group jokes. (Anyone seen the latest newdirections?)
5. If we go all heretical, someone will (probably) pull us up for it.
6. Research* has shown that people in denominations feel more connected and loved than those not in a denomination.
7. Someone else cares about stuff that I don't want to care about (like money and insurance and child-safe).
8. Being part of a denomination makes you look (slightly) more legit and less cult-like to those on the outside.
9. There is money we can borrow for building projects and stuff.
10. All the cool people are in my denomination.
* Sample size, 2 people.
Maybe you should re-title this post '10 Reasons I like being part of MY denomination', because not all your reasons work for all denominations because some of it depends of the denomination's governance structure, size etc.
ReplyDeleteWe currently belong to a Reformed Baptist church here, but it is the only one in our city, so we don't feel overly connected/have much network with others in the denomination. Also there is no money we can borrow for building projects and stuff - each church is solely responsible for raising all its funds for all activities/projects.
Just looked at the labels you gave this post and realise that this is meant as a light hearted post.
With reference to point 4, I had a friend in a 'Christian' rock band back in the day who called their band New Direction. I pointed out to him the folly of the name. they changed it quickly... by memory to something far worse.
ReplyDeleteThat's ok, Simone - I can handle being uncool (pt. 10) - I've never been part of the "in" crowd in my life. :-)
ReplyDeleteI used to think the name of the paper was ironic (prior to Lawrence Leung's Choose Your Own Adventure) now I just think the person who named it had slightly sinister motives.
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