Bladestunner316
Puritan Board Doctor
Saw this at Monergism today. Have nto been able to check it out yet but I figured people here might be interested.
http://www.start.urclearning.org/what
http://www.start.urclearning.org/what
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Saw this at Monergism today. Have nto been able to check it out yet but I figured people here might be interested.
http://www.start.urclearning.org/what
The first question is what is a church? All sorts of groups claim to be Christian churches: Mormons, Roman Catholics, Baptists, Joe’s community church on the corner, etc. How do you differentiate a true church from a false church, otherwise known as a sect?
We would use the word “true” churches, distinguished by three marks, which you hear us talking about all the time: the pure preaching of the gospel, the legitimate administration of the sacraments, and the proper exercise of church discipline. Churches either hit these marks or they don’t, it’s not a sliding scale. All churches are very weak and have their share of problems, but some are “true” and some aren’t – that’s the important difference – you know Christ meets you at a “true” church’s worship service.
Some places that don’t meet the criteria will be better for you than others, but only temporarily. Maybe a confessional Lutheran congregation, or a confessional Presbyterian congregation would work for a time (and although they have important differences from our confessional continental Reformed churches, some of these may bear the three marks).
This is slightly off-topic, but does anyone else think they might be overboard on their "true church" thinking? They seem to think that nearly all non-URC churches are "false churches," including confessional lutherans, and even some confessional Presbyterians!
And I am very offended that Baptists are included along with Mormons and Catholics in a list of "groups that claim to be Christian churches."
Is this typical thinking in the URC?
http://www.start.urclearning.org/about/