What Do You Look For In Choosing A Church?

[Guest shiloh357]

Q: "Shiloh you crazy loon!!! You left 'Doctrine' out of the poll!! Why didn't you include that as one of the choices???"

A: Because I assume you have the sense to investigate the church's doctrinal positions, so that is a given. The poll assumes that once you have decided that a church is at least doctrinally sound enough to attend that there are other secondary matters that might influence you to attend or disuade you to attend.

So I am not looking for diatribes on being doctrinally sound. I am mostly curious about what kind of secondary matters go into how you choose which "doctrinally sound" church you would attend.

If you can, please explain briefly how you arrive at your decision.

Thanks.

[nebula]

Worship - that's important to me.

Location - I would prefer one closer to home than an hour or more away.

Denomination - prefer the "non" or "interdenominational" charasmatic types.

Missing from pole = Fellowship!

That's what hooked me to where I'm at, a group of people who brought me into their After-church fellowship.

[coelacanth]

Hmm well I can't say that I look for any of the choices that were presented here. I look for a group of believers who adhere to the truth of Gods word and His Son. That is the long and the short of it for me and if any of those other items happen to be available then that is just a bonus to being immersed in the truth of a bible believing congregation who is following Christ.

Oh after reading your opening statement again I can only tell you that there are no secondary considerations as far as I am concerned. My wife may have different ideas but if she does she hasn't told me, yet.

Edited September 6, 2011 by coelacanth

[~Shalhevet~]

I put worship style just because I tend to be very traditional. Denomination is also pretty important to me, as I belong to the Missouri Synod. I have attended other denominations and nondenominations and haven't found anything else I was comfortable in. I also prefer structure and liturgy as opposed to "winging it" like some of the new churches do. First and foremost, it is the Word that is the most important but that wasn't on the list.

[hr.jr.]

Doctrine by far outweighs all the others combined. Distance. Pastor.

[OneLight]

What I need is the confirmation of His Spirit that this is where He wants me. Nothing else really matters.

[stacey c]

I chose worship style because its worship and praise that brings us into the heavenlies and ushers in the Holy Spirit "God inhabits the praises of His people" and it is important for it to be at the begging of service (for me) because it opens up our spirit to recieve from the Lord during the sermon so it's not just head knowledge.

And by preching style I hope you didnt mean whether he was loud and rowdy or soft spoken, because I took it to mean it has to be indepth "heavy Revy" teachings backed by the Word.

[other one]

Actually I can't find any church that I agree with all it's doctrine, so for a while we didn't go at all. I don't think the Holy spirit liked that too well and put on my wife's heart that we should go somewhere.

We chose a Nazarene church for it is closer than most on doctrine and this small church as people who truly love one another and experess that love 7 days a week 'we are also very into mission work.

[Guest]

I think that size is important. Besides the fact that it is impossible to know a majority of the parishioners, and that it is usually full of clicks, but I believe that it affects what and how the preacher teaches. You have to be tickling a lot of ears to attract a large group of people who call themselves Christians.

[Fez]

For me it is nice if it has a roof and four walls, and something to sit on.

And coffee and donuts after.....

But seriously, it's about the belief of the church. Is it bible based, and is that what is taught. also the fellowship is important, are you made to feel welcome. Are you invited to partake in church activities. Are you willing to assist in day to day running of it?

The sign of a good church is the seasoned believers in the congregation, who have been taught the word in the church.

An example...

Last weekend we had a visiting preacher from Australia who gave a wonderful lesson. Except at one stage he said, You are sanctified, it is over!

After the meeting, dozens of people who had picked up on it approached the leaders of our church and said, you better correct him. It turned out to just be a poor choice of phrase, but I was really encouraged by the amount of people who picked up on it, and approached the leadership. As much as we love to hear visiting preachers, he was approached to ask what he meant, and it was straightened out.

My point being, how many churches do you know who act as one when they hear what may be a mistake in preaching the word, and act with grace towards it?

It means that as leaders of our church, we must be doing something right.

That's the sort of church I would choose.