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Faith1960

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Does anyone here watch the Duggar reality show “19 Kids and Counting,” on TLC? They mentioned that they “home church” – what exactly IS that? Someone on the show once said that they were Baptist but all the Baptists I know go to worship in a church.
 
Faith1960 said:
Does anyone here watch the Duggar reality show “19 Kids and Counting,” on TLC? They mentioned that they “home church” – what exactly IS that? Someone on the show once said that they were Baptist but all the Baptists I know go to worship in a church.
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A movement to supposedly move back to the early church when they met in houses, as in the book of Acts. It ignores the fact that the apostles and early Christians didn’t do this as a matter of doctrine, but out of practicality.
 
TriuneUnity said:
A movement to supposedly move back to the early church when they met in houses, as in the book of Acts. It ignores the fact that the apostles and early Christians didn’t do this as a matter of doctrine, but out of practicality.
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Is this family part of some kind of group or movement? I just can’t imagine choosing to belong to a church run by lay people and which takes place in a home. I would think that makes a fertile atmosphere for cults to form. 😦
 
Faith1960 said:
Is this family part of some kind of group or movement? I just can’t imagine choosing to belong to a church run by lay people and which takes place in a home. I would think that makes a fertile atmosphere for cults to form. 😦
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I am not sure if their particular church is run by lay people or not. The movement as a whole is very anti-clerical, though. I haven’t run across too many of them, but I suspect that most of them are not ministered by someone who has been ordained by an ecclesiastical body. From what I’ve seen Joe-Bob A grabs a Bible, a bunch of friends, or worse, a bunch of family members and says let’s start a house church.
 
TriuneUnity said:
I am not sure if their particular church is run by lay people or not. The movement as a whole is very anti-clerical, though. I haven’t run across too many of them, but I suspect that most of them are not ministered by someone who has been ordained by an ecclesiastical body. From what I’ve seen Joe-Bob A grabs a Bible, a bunch of friends, or worse, a bunch of family members and says let’s start a house church.
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That’s what I’ve seen, too. I think there is another man involved with the service but I don’t think he’s ordained – I may be wrong, though.
 
Faith1960 said:
That’s what I’ve seen, too. I think there is another man involved with the service but I don’t think he’s ordained – I may be wrong, though.
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What they fail to distinguish is the church gathering together, and the church as a corporate body assembled for worship. Sure, a bunch of Christians get together, that’s a gathering of the church. However, corporate worship is for the purpose of the preaching of the Word and the administration of the Sacraments. For this, the minister is called and sent. He doesn’t ordain himself. Everyone is a member of the church and the royal priesthood; not everyone is called to be a pastor.
 
Faith1960 said:
Does anyone here watch the Duggar reality show “19 Kids and Counting,” on TLC? They mentioned that they “home church” – what exactly IS that? Someone on the show once said that they were Baptist but all the Baptists I know go to worship in a church.
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I’ve seen their family in different churches on the show many times, so I never got the impression that they weren’t part of a church community. My inderstanding of what they meant by “home church” would be family devotions and multi-family Bible study and group prayer. 🤷

Gertie
 
TriuneUnity said:
However, corporate worship is for the purpose of the preaching of the Word and the administration of the Sacraments.
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Unless they’re of the Reformed variety, Baptists (and even less, non-denoms) don’t believe in “sacraments,” so they’d probably not agree with your definition of the purpose of worship. (I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with your definition; just commenting on Baptists, since I know them really well up close.) Also, some of the home churches DO use guys who are official elders.

Gertabelle, I know several folks who do home-churching (and several of them are Reformed in their leanings), all for different reasons: some of them are Harold Campingites, so for them, he’s the pope (and he condemns being part of any organized church); others are disillusioned H.C.'ers who nonetheless (go figure) still won’t attend any formal church; another couple I know (they used to be leaders in Campus Crusade) are so disgusted with the abundance of false teachings in many of the churches, coupled with deceitful leaders and Disneyland antix (“Hey, come join the spiritual carnival!”), that they simply have their own private service each Sunday morning.

It’s not that different (in spirit) from some of the really conservative Catholics who claim that the past 5 popes aren’t legit; the idea is, “We refuse to worship with falsehood.” (They get that concept from the verse that reads, “What fellowship has light with darkness?”) Maybe they’re misguided in the way they seek to solve the problem, but one can’t fault their motives.
 
I was once part of a home church. But really, the only difference from a regular Protestant church was the group was pretty small and met in a home. The pastor was ordained, by Open Bible (a small but mainstream Pentecostal denomination, almost identical in doctrine to Foursquare and Assemblies of God). That was the church I was baptized in. We did it in a pond in a city park. That was in the summer, in Florida, so the pond was plenty warm enough. It was a good church, I left only because I moved out of town.
 
Izdaari said:
I was once part of a home church. But really, the only difference from a regular Protestant church was the group was pretty small and met in a home. The pastor was ordained, by Open Bible (a small but mainstream Pentecostal denomination, almost identical in doctrine to Foursquare and Assemblies of God). That was the church I was baptized in. We did it in a pond in a city park. That was in the summer, in Florida, so the pond was plenty warm enough. It was a good church, I left only because I moved out of town.
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ive been to florida. did they check the pond for gators first?!:eek: peace:)
 
Izdaari said:
LOL! It was in Pensacola, which is almost Alabama. There was no swamp and no gators there. 😃
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oh yes there are! I had a gator take a catfish out of my hand while trot lining as a teenager. Swallowed my chewing tobacco. Sick for a week. I still thank that gator for leaving my hand and helping me to break a nasty dangerous habit. At night on the river you can still hear them bellow, as my grandpa called it.

I grew up in Alabama, just over the line from P’cola and live close to the Escambia River today. Gators in the fresh water, sharks in the salt. Though a shark can come up the river ever so often. Gotta love the Gulf Coast…now let’s not start talking about the bugs and hurricanes!

Fr. Mark
 
benidict said:
whew! 😃 ok, had me worried there. ive seen some big ones down there. up to 12 feet! peace 🙂
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as a kid, I swam in the Alabama river. My grandfather use to sit on the pier with a rifle incase the gators got to close. If we had to clean fish at night at the cabin, keep you shotgun close, in case the bobcats decided they wanted a fish also.

Sadly, civilization has changed everything. where my family cabin is, there is now a subdivsion. Can’t fish for all the jetski.

I once saw a 15’ gator a commerical fisher man killed across the river from my family cabin. I wish my kids could have grown up like my cousins and I.

Fr. Mark
 
Gertabelle said:
I’ve seen their family in different churches on the show many times, so I never got the impression that they weren’t part of a church community. My inderstanding of what they meant by “home church” would be family devotions and multi-family Bible study and group prayer. 🤷

Gertie
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I was under the impression that they belong to a church but don’t attend often, instead choosing to have services at home. :confused:
 
MarkBrown said:
oh yes there are! I had a gator take a catfish out of my hand while trot lining as a teenager. Swallowed my chewing tobacco. Sick for a week. I still thank that gator for leaving my hand and helping me to break a nasty dangerous habit. At night on the river you can still hear them bellow, as my grandpa called it.

I grew up in Alabama, just over the line from P’cola and live close to the Escambia River today. Gators in the fresh water, sharks in the salt. Though a shark can come up the river ever so often. Gotta love the Gulf Coast…now let’s not start talking about the bugs and hurricanes!

Fr. Mark
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We’ll be taking our vacation in Destin, this year – any gators there? :eek:
 
MarkBrown said:
oh yes there are! I had a gator take a catfish out of my hand while trot lining as a teenager. Swallowed my chewing tobacco. Sick for a week. I still thank that gator for leaving my hand and helping me to break a nasty dangerous habit. At night on the river you can still hear them bellow, as my grandpa called it.

I grew up in Alabama, just over the line from P’cola and live close to the Escambia River today. Gators in the fresh water, sharks in the salt. Though a shark can come up the river ever so often. Gotta love the Gulf Coast…now let’s not start talking about the bugs and hurricanes!

Fr. Mark
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I don’t doubt there are gators near Pensacola, but (thankfully) there weren’t any in the park. :cool:
 
MarkBrown said:
oh yes there are! I had a gator take a catfish out of my hand while trot lining as a teenager. Swallowed my chewing tobacco. Sick for a week. I still thank that gator for leaving my hand and helping me to break a nasty dangerous habit. At night on the river you can still hear them bellow, as my grandpa called it.

I grew up in Alabama, just over the line from P’cola and live close to the Escambia River today. Gators in the fresh water, sharks in the salt. Though a shark can come up the river ever so often. Gotta love the Gulf Coast…now let’s not start talking about the bugs and hurricanes!

Fr. Mark
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:frighten:

Thankfully, I was baptized in a fairly large city church in the northeast at a baptizmal fount. :crossrc:

Jon
 
At the risk of sounding like a curmudgeon, what do gators and such have to do with the topic?🤷 For that sort of conversation, you’ve got the p.m. and email functions. Sigh.
 
awdbawl said:
At the risk of sounding like a curmudgeon, what do gators and such have to do with the topic?🤷 For that sort of conversation, you’ve got the p.m. and email functions. Sigh.
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Gators & wombats make 👍:thumbsup:regular appearances here at CAF.
 
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