I’ve been attending a church that I think is really a “chapel.”
Not that I think “chapel” is a bad word. Read on….
It’s primary mission seems to be to provide worship on Sunday -offering to God, and renewing our faith for the week ahead. Hence, my designation of it as a “chapel.” It has a very modest Christian [...]

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My family and I currently live on the island of St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands. We arrived here the summer of 2008 on what we call our “Great Adventure.”  StX is about 60 miles southeast of Puerto Rico, and 2000 miles away from Central Ohio where I grew up.
I’m mentioning where we live for [...]

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Having a “choice” to get up and go to church on Sunday morning has been one of the most interesting and unnerving experiences I’ve had since I left working “for” a specific church, and began attending church as a “volunteer” once again.
For over a decade I woke up every Sunday “having to” go to church because [...]

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…and what can be learned from our experience.
I have edited this thing ten times. I’m sure some folks aren’t going to like what I have to say, or think I’m just ‘bitter’ as a way of avoiding the lessons here. I’m one of those people who does try to learn from my experiences, and share what I [...]

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Back Door = The door your members use to slip away from the congregation.
If you suddenly stopped showing up, would anybody notice? More importantly, would anybody do anything about it? You’d like to THINK so. But our last three church experiences answer that question with an unfortunate “no.”
The Wide Open Back Door…
We attended one church [...]

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This is another installment in my “On the Lam” blog. The following is another post about something important I learned the hard way. I hope you can use these observations to improve your church’s ministry.
The Wide Open Side Door…
Sidedoor = the one visitors exit through.
After leaving the church where we had been members for 10 [...]

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The “On the Lam” Blog Begins…
I’m going to kick off this thread by telling you something not many people know about me.  I have tried three different churches in the 12 years since I left my full-time minister/parish work and moved my family back to Ohio to start my CE software ministry.  Each of these three church experiences taught [...]

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