Finding a Good Church?

Do they exist?  Where are they?

Vetting Churches

Based on readers’ input and some things I’ve learned from my own experiences with churches, here’s a list of things to look for when selecting a church home.

Good Qualities

Structural Qualities ¹

1. Look for an Open Network structure.²
2. Look for a wide assortment of ages and backgrounds in the leadership.
3. Key leadership figures in the church (e.g. pastors, priests, deacons, elders, etc.) are ALL MEN (no women) who fit the qualifications specified in the scriptures.³ (Women teaching preadolescent children is acceptable.)
4. Look for a church that honors and respects men, fathers, the elderly, widows, and veterans.
5. Look for a sizeable number of young couples with children.  The more, the merrier.
6. Look for churches that have small groups geared towards specific interests, e.g. men’s / women’s bible studies, Sunday school for children, singles group, youth group, etc.

Doctrinal / Teaching Qualities ⁴

1. In general, the sermons / teachings concisely assess real life events and situations through a Biblical lens, and apply Biblical principles and standards to the same.
2. Expository preaching. The difficult passages of the Bible (e.g. Romans, 1 Corinthians, and specifically passages concerning Headship) are preached verse-by-verse.
3. The church prioritizes growth (i.e. evangelism, family formation and support, ministry, prophecy) and is not afraid to embrace conflict and difficulty in doing so.
4. Doctrine which specifically stands against worldly philosophies (e.g. feminism, L G B T Q, progressivism, W0kism, etc.).
5. The pastor or elder can easily explain how a typical women’s Bible study fulfills Titus 2:3-5. (If he is defensive, hesitant, or hem haws, then it is doubtful that it is actually happening.)
6. The church has a history of success in tearing down strongholds (e.g. addictions, generational curses, gynocentrism, idolatry, habitual sin, etc.) and the destruction of arguments against God and Christian Headship through direct confrontation and with the intentional purpose of doing so.

Bad Qualities

1. Reject churches with a Closed Network structure.²
2. Reject churches that are dominated by one family or one generation (i.e. Boomers).
3. Reject churches in which women hold key leadership positions (e.g. pastors, priests, deacons, elders, etc.).
4. Reject a church that is converged, gynocentric, or too Blue Pill (e.g. defends women’s sins at men’s expense, glorifies single mothers, etc.).
5. A church that only opens its doors on Sunday will not be very lively.

This cuts down the number of qualified churches severely.

¹ This section collects the proceeds of the discussion under Who’s your sponsor? (2023/9/22).
² For a description of Open vs. Closed Network structure, see linked post above.
³ Qualifications for pastors / deacons / elders are given in 1 Timothy 3, 2 Timothy 2:22-26, Titus 1:5-9, 1 Peter 5:1-5, Hebrews 13:7,17, and the words of Christ in Mark 10:42-45 referring to the Genuine Authority of the believer.
⁴ This section collects the proceeds of the post, Case Study: The Problem of Female Pastors in the Church – Part 2 (2024/1/25), and the discussion.

Invitation to Submit Suggestions

Under the post, Current Homesteads for the Faithful Few? (2022/9/18), the question came up about whether there now exist churches and communities where a sizeable number of Christian young people are marrying in a timely fashion (i.e. brides are 25 or younger) and/or couples are having children in considerable numbers (i.e. 3 or more).

Several commenters replied in the positive, but other commenters refused to believe it, demanding to know the names and locations of these churches / communities.

In consideration of those who are seeking to join such communities, it would serve our interests to have a “map” of these locations.

If any readers are members of churches or communities where the Holy Spirit is moving, and young people are meeting, marrying, and having children, please send Jack an email with the relevant information listed here, or leave a comment below.

Jack’s email: sigmaframe@protonmail.com

1. Name of church or community.
2. Location: County / Township, City, State, country.
3. Denominational affiliation (Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, etc.) and/or sect (e.g. Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, etc.)
4. Estimation of the population of the church / community.
5. Estimations of the average ages of marrying couples.
6. Estimation of the number of children in the church / community.
7. Estimation of the divorce rate in said church or community.
8. Other information you believe is pertinent or noteworthy.

Thank you in advance for your responses.

Rolodex of Good Churches

The following is a list of churches that have been recommended by readers.

PROTESTANT CHURCHES

1. Name: Westminster Presbyterian Church (PCA)
2. Location: Vancouver, WA, U.S.A.
3. Denominational Affiliation: Presbyterian
4. Estimated Population: 250 (as of 2022/9/20)
5. Average age of marrying couples: ~24
6. Number of children: ~150
7. Divorce Rate: ~15%

Website: http://www.solochristo.org/

Comments

C. R. Wiley has been our pastor for a year. We just hosted Aaron Renn for a conference and have hosted Michael Foster in the past.

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1. Name: King’s Cross
2. Location: Moscow, ID, U.S.A.
3. Denominational Affiliation: Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches
4. Estimated Population: ~500, 2 services (as of 2022/9/19)
5. Average age of marrying couples: Early-to-mid twenties
6. Number of children: 200-300
7. Divorce Rate: Not sure about the divorce rate, but I do know that they excommunicate both men and women who divorce for unbiblical reasons.

Website: https://www.kingscrossmoscow.com/

Comments

King’s Cross is an offshoot of Christ Church, pastor Doug Wilson’s church. They’re planting churches all over the region, so the community extends far beyond King’s Cross. There are multiple congregations within a 30-minute driving distance from each other that total over 3,000 congregants.

The congregations all support each other. Pastor Doug connected me with people who work at a local engineering firm, who helped me land a job there.

They definitely put their money where their mouth is. They strongly emphasize Christian education. Christ Church started Logos School (a Classical Christian school) decades ago. Local congregants started Jubilee School, which provides services for special needs kids that most private schools do not. There is also Pullman Christian School in nearby Pullman, WA. The deacons set aside funds specifically to help families that can’t afford to send their kids to these schools.

The deacons’ fund also helps families adopt, and there are many adoptive families in the various nearby congregations.

There’s also assistance for families with health, and/or financial needs.

Christ Church started and runs the local crisis pregnancy center.

The local congregations maintain classifieds where congregants can advertise goods and services.

In short, it’s a tightly knit, Christian community that is growing like crazy, and much of the growth comes from people moving here from all over the U.S.A. (like my family and I did) because they want to be part of it.

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1. Name: Christ Covenant PCA church
2. Location: Matthews, NC, U.S.A.
3. Denominational Affiliation: Presbyterian Church in America
4. Estimated Population: ~2,000 (as of 2022/9/19)
5. Average age of marrying couples: (Information Not Available)
6. Number of children: (Information Not Available)
7. Divorce Rate: (Information Not Available)

Website: https://christcovenant.org/

Comments

Verse-by-verse preaching and very sound doctrine. We’re not into infant baptism, but I don’t divide over that.

They have a very conservative school on campus. I think it is called Covenant Day School.

They strongly encourage bigger families, and there are tons of young families with many kids. For what it is worth, most pastors have 4-6 kids each, and the senior pastor (Kevin DeYoung) has 9. So he practices what he preaches. Kevin is ideal in the pulpit and what he has written, but for some reason, he is still into some things like the Gospel Coalition. (He doesn’t plug them or talk about them, but I wish he’d distance himself from them.)

They actually do church discipline. An affair by the woman’s director came to light a decade after the fact. They were gracious to her, but they also fired her.

I’ve been involved in the men’s ministry, and it is sound.

They have a thorough new member training series, so you don’t get a lot of false believers sneaking in.

They have all male elders and deacons. They have a solid elder structure. I think the odds are good that they will hold onto sound doctrine.

For what it is worth, my youngest daughter worked for them a while back as their HR person, and she said that the pastors and staff were as sincere day-to-day as they appeared on Sunday — i.e, no one is perfect, but there are no phonies.

They have a good structure for caring for members who need it. We’re pretty low maintenance, even during my current 4th bout of cancer, but the pastor assigned to us follows up regularly, and we have lunch together now and then. They have a “Hisabilities” ministry for families with disabled kids and give them nights off sometimes with free babysitting.

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CATHOLIC CHURCHES

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ORTHODOX CHURCHES

Scott: The Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR) is a synod which is part of the larger Orthodox autocephalous communion — there are 14 total (Albania, Alexandria, Antioch, Bulgaria, Constantinople, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece, Jerusalem, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, and the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Kentucky Gent: There is an autocephalous “Orthodox Church in America”:

Website: https://www.oca.org

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COLLEGES

Oscar: College of the Ozarks is a good example where most students get married, or at least pair up with their future spouses, by graduation.

Website: https://www.cofo.edu/

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Kansas State University, in Manhattan, KS appears to be an order of magnitude more civil and respectable than the average university.

Fort Riley, which is nearby, is known for young male officers finding wives and getting married, which is starkly different from most other military bases.

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OTHER

Eternity Matters: Stand to Reason is starting to offer “outposts” at various churches where like-minded apologetics types can get together.  Many churches, especially the megachurch variety, are intimated by those who are into apologetics and clear-thinking.

Website: https://www.str.org/outposts

Related

• Σ Frame (Scott): Scott’s conclusions on courtship and marriage incubation (2019/2/24)
• Σ Frame (Jack, Ed Hurst): Ed Hurst’s series: Return to Eden (2019/3/16)
• Σ Frame (Jack): Only God can grant a successful marriage (2020/5/20)
• Σ Frame (Scott): We can’t plant seed in the middle of winter. (2021/2/13)
• Σ Frame (Jack): Commonalities of Successful Marriages (2021/4/14)