Try Out a New Church – part 2 – Wealth and Health

Well we tried another church this past Sunday. Online it looked quite a bit more modern than the one we attended last week. There was hope that it meant it would be a bit more modern in its thinking/preaching/attitude than the last one as well.

Well, it was certainly different in a ways. It was packed for the 9:30 service we came for. We dropped the kids off at their respective places for the service time and then headed to the worship center. At first I couldn’t find “B” at all. While looking I had a few people come up and ask if they could help me find a seat, but I said I was looking for my wife and they wandered off. Then we located each other and then found a place to sit. It was a very diverse congregation: old and young, white, black, asian, hispanic and mixed race. It was very nice to see.

The worship songs were going and it was a bit of a rock concert: lights, 3 guitars, drums, 4 singers, and a keyboard. But there wasn’t any smoke machine going and the lights weren’t turned so far down you couldn’t see anything else, so that was nice. I didn’t know any of the songs, but they seemed fine. They talked about praising God and how perfect He is – All good.

Then they prayed for the offering and explained where you could do it online or in the back. Again, no issues there. They gave a financial update on their contributions for a building expansion. They talked about it from a square footage perspective and I thought that was neat and different.

They did a baby dedication. There were 6 babies! The pastor said great things about how the dedication doesn’t save the child from their sins. That it was about the parents promising to raise their kids in a home based on God’s teachings, and that hopefully one day they would accept God and follow Him as well. Again all good.

Then it was time for the sermon. The pastor preached from Mark about the seeds being sowed. This was part of a series he is doing right now so we got just part of it. He spoke about the first two seeds and how they represent people that never accept the Word and those that initially seem very into it (accept with joy) but then fall away quickly due to persecution and tribulation. I was enjoying what he was saying for about the frist 10-2 minutes, and they he said something along the lines of, “Even other Christians will persecute you for your belief in the prosperity God wants you to have.” And then went on during the last 15-20 minutes to mention a few other times about how by giving your money to God will reap more for you (in terms of money) in the long run. While I believe that God wants us to give to His church He never says that if you give money you will get more money in return. He does promise to reward us in heaven (not on earth). He does promise that His glory will be done here on earth, but that doesn’t mean we will get more money.

Then at the very end of the service the pastor said that he needed to pray for someone in the service that had a hip issue, and they needed healing. Then he said that everyone with a hip issue, lay your hands on your hips and prepare to receive your healing. Then he prayed. Again I have no issues with praying for healing. I believe God listens to those prayer, but He doesn’t do it on our time table if at all. He does it on His. Then there was a call the front for anyone that needed healing to meet with their healing team.

When talking to the girls afterwards they said things were fine, but not great. When we mentioned the money thing from service they both said that it was mentioned in their classes as well.

So, very wealth and health (or health and wealth as it is commonly called).

So, Strike Two! (things aren’t looking so good so far for the churches I am finding and picking out)

We will be out of town for 3 Sundays to visit AZ and then the girls have a winter Girl Scout camp weekend as soon as we get back to Idaho so we will pick up the church trying come the second weekend in January. I have a couple more on my list.