Why Jon left

[50heaven]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BvKqiqHPx8c

A COC friend shared this on Facebook yesterday. Thoughts?

[Opie]

As I watched, the thought popped into my mind that this was nothing more than a video version of the book Muscle and a Shovel by Michael Shank. So it was no great surprise when I looked at the comment section and saw Shank's name. Yep, we so are lucky and blessed that the CoC denomination is the only one that has ever been able to perfectly figure everything out! Meanwhile, the CoC is continuing to 'bleed' members who are dropping out and going to community churches, so it would only be expected that the CoC would come out with a video attacking all of those evil community churches.

[FinallyFree]

So do you think that was not real and just an actor portraying it? I have not read that book.

[MusicMan826]

I actually attend a community church. I'm not able to watch the whole video right now, but I did watch the first minute and that's all it took to irritate me. "I was going nowhere. It was teaching a happy good feeling instead of the truth."

How many people have said they felt like they were going nowhere in the COC and were given a harsh "That's because YOU'RE not putting enough into it!" response. When you're not getting anything out of a COC, it's your fault for not putting enough into it. When you're not getting anything out of any other church, it's because they're wrong and don't teach the truth. Good to know.

I also love how the COC always condemns other churches for being too happy and feeling good. At least they acknowledge that their teachings won't make you feel good or happy I guess...what continues to blow my mind is how they are so damn confident that the COC's teachings are 100% THE TRUTH on literally every single topic, no matter how trivial. Yet they seem surprised when "Everything you believe is wrong and you're going to hell. You must believe like me to go to heaven since your church is all going to hell for not teaching the truth" doesn't get people running from their old church and packing in the CoC pews.

And of course all the comments are, "So awesome!!" "Love it!!" but I guarantee if it was reversed and the guy was just as sincere about leaving the COC for another church, the comments would be full of "You knew the truth and rejected it!" "You need to come back before it's too late and you'll burn forever!" Geez, these people are ridiculous.

[Pitts S2C]

Are his tattoos scripturally authorized? Just ask the coC....

[williamray123]

Are his tattoos scripturally authorized? Just ask the coC....

LOL I saw your comment in the comments there... I left one also.. LOL

[KLP]

I think that is a well produced product for their target audience. It is sort of amusing to visualize some Podunk CofC on the decline to be inundated by about 100 community church types all with their ideas and questions.

[williamray123]

I think that is a well produced product for their target audience. It is sort of amusing to visualize some Podunk CofC on the decline to be inundated by about 100 community church types all with their ideas and questions.

LOL.. good point. Podunk CoC should start looking for verses to keep the new members from raising their hands during worship.

[Opie]

One of the reasons that "Jon" gave for supposedly leaving the CoC was the lack of biblical teaching that he failed to find in his community church. In my experience, just the opposite is true. The richness of teaching about grace, mercy, forgiveness and salvation I find in other churches is often very rich compared to the impoverished teaching that I find in the CoC. I am still a believer in Christ, but I continue to have struggles and anger issues about decades of things that happened while in the CoC. Glad that God is still good and faithful.

[Dawggone]

I'm surprised to see that this Jon video has had so much attention as I assumed it was geared for a local group. I'm just down the road from the coc in the video and now attend the "community church" I'm 90% certain he "left". My family and I have had some friends share the video with us on Facebook trying to "reach out to the lost flock". What's funny is that around five years ago we (CoC) had a men's meeting and all the talk was about the growth of certain community churchs. Even then I was thinking how I wished I could leave the coc and longed for change. I guess I'm a slow learner. It's funny how strong the confirmation bias is with regards to the video and book. I'm sure everyone is slapping themselves on the back when they discuss it on Sunday and Wednesday. All the while their numbers dwindling as people such as myself finally have the courage to "just see what's out there". If I had a dollar for every time I heard our elders say, " we're not in the entertainment business" I could supply Welch's for all coc's. The community churches are growing because they reach out and have friendly smiling people inside that find ways to make the church experience desirable. The coc's philosophy of "we're right and speak the truth now sit down and shut up", is failing and will continue to do so unless a major change takes place. I believe the future of the coc will become ever smaller ultra conservative churches while the bigger churches change and become more "community like" even to the point of dropping the coc name such as Oak Hill in San Antonio. But what do I know, I'm a lost heathen anyway.