Is it possible....
...to find a church that is serious about the need to fish for men, and supports marriage (yes, even for those that are not already married!)?
Can anyone recommend one? Anywhere???
Can anyone recommend one? Anywhere???
posted by Captain Sensible at 4:45 AM
11 Comments:
I'm all for churches that support marriage, but do we need churches that "fish" for men? Let's not make churches inhospitable for women in the process!
"Lauren C" - Get a life, Daniel.
"Geniffer": Same goes for you, "Tarquil".
You know, you don't have to live this way, guys.
Choose life.
I just checked out Tarquil’s blog, and all I can say is, “Wow.” That kind of obsessive bitterness against 51% of the population (which includes his mother) cannot be healthy for anyone. I’d encourage him to check out Philippians 4:8, and then as C.S. put it, ever so delicately: “get a life.”
As to the subject of this post, I know of several churches that:
1) Do not condemn anyone for having a desire to marry, nor assault him with stupid platitudes like “learn to be content,” “wait on the Lord,” “this is where God has you right now,” “Jesus is all you need,” “don’t make an idol out of marriage,” “singleness must be God’s will for your life,” etc, etc.
2) Do not mistakenly think that Proverbs 18:22 says, “To him on whom a wife falls, a good thing has fallen on him.” In other words, if a man wants a wife, he actually has to look for one. He’s not going to miraculously bump into a girl with a note in her bonnet saying she is The One, in the frozen food isle. [On a related note, there is no such thing as The One -- but that’s another subject for another day.]
3) The members of the church actually try to help those singles who want to get married, to find a suitable marriage partner.
4) Those singles who don’t know whether or not they want to get married are encouraged to honestly assess whether or not they could live a celibate life without it being a serious moral struggle, and without bitterness [hint: the number is virtually zero].
5) Singles are discouraged from long-term courtships and long-term engagements. The phrase, “fish or cut bait” applies here. It’s understood that dating/courtship is for the purpose of finding a marriage partner.
6) There is a healthy male-female ratio in the church to start with, even without a dedicated outreach to men. Men are not repelled from these churches because Jesus is not presented as a passive, non-judgmental weakling, and because they don’t talk about “romancing” Jesus or singing love songs to Him, which utterly creeps out normal men.
Of course, these churches are few and far between; otherwise there would be no need for blogs like this one. Captain, I could recommend one -- or three -- but they are about 7500 km (4700 miles) from you.
Paul, any of these churches in Oklahoma?
Paul, please tell me you're referring to at least one church in Michigan. :-)
Lisa -- The specific churches I was thinking of are located in Denver, CO (several of them), Indianapolis, and Dayton, Ohio.
Well, I've been to Dayton and Indianapolis a bunch of times...I'm curious which ones they are.
I know of one in Monticello, Indiana (small town 100+ miles southeast of Chicago). I've never been to it, but my parents have and they report that the pastor preached against "choosing protracted singleness" (those that actually have a "choice") one Sunday.
They do exist.
David -- the church in Indy is called Open Fellowship Bible Church. The one in Dayton is Dayton Grace Bible Church.
I also know of a really good church in Goshen, IN, called Damascus Road Bible Fellowship. They don't appear to have a website. Depending on where your parents live, they could check it out. :)
I'd just like to add this for anyone who may live in (or may visit) the Denver, CO area -- one of the churches there that I referred to above is called Denver Bible Church. The pastor of the Church has a daily radio show you can listen to at KGOV.com. He is most definately not a "gift of singleness"/"wait on the Lord" advocate.
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