Is it OK to stay with a church if you see God changing it and you yourself are helping that change? I was just wondering. There are a lot of downfalls at my church, but things have been looking better, not always just there. It is starting to get out of the state of being so light-headed with the gospel, not trying to offend anyone, to straight-up truth and bluntness but in a nice manner. I know there are a few churches nearby that probably are more decent and more on the right track, but at times I feel like going there but same time I know it is with time people change and even churches that have gone astray for awhile. But I don’t know, was wondering your thoughts.<\/p>\n\t
“You have a few names even in Sardis who have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy<\/em>” (Revelation 3:4).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Salvation is determined on an individual basis, not by the group with whom you worship. Some groups make it easy to remain faithful. Other groups make it near impossible to remain faithful, there are just too many wrong influences. Sardis was a dead church (Revelation 3:1), yet even here there were a few people who still clung to the truth and were found to be worthy of Christ.<\/p>\n
I would rather that you were with a strong group who made your journey to heaven easy, but that is not always going to be the case. There are going to be times you have no choice. There are going to be times when you might make a difference. It must be a personal choice.<\/p>\n
Look at the group seriously and as unbiased as you can. Is it a group you can worship with and be pleasing to God? There are many so-called churches where I could say, “No” without hesitation. What they practice and teach is so different from what God wants that being there would not allow me to worship God as He commanded. If you can worship acceptably, without violating what God teaches, and you are willing to be associated with what that church stands for, then the choice is yours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Question: Is it OK to stay with a church if you see God changing it and you yourself are helping that change? I was just wondering. There are a lot of downfalls at my church, but things have been looking better, not always just there. It is starting to get out of the state of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[20],"tags":[448,544,47],"class_list":["post-21805","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-church","tag-membership","tag-salvation"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":42981,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/my-mother-wont-let-me-change-churches\/","url_meta":{"origin":21805,"position":0},"title":"My mother won’t let me change churches","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 16, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I am 16 years old and I don't want to attend the same church as my family does. For a long time, I've wanted to change churches for my own personal reasons, but after going to this camp, I feel like God wants me to go to this certain\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9684,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/if-there-are-no-sound-churches-in-my-area-should-i-worship-with-a-liberal-one\/","url_meta":{"origin":21805,"position":1},"title":"If there are no sound churches in my area, should I worship with a liberal one?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 7, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I am disabled and would like to attend an anti-church but there are none nearby and I was wondering if it would be okay to take communion at a liberal church instead of missing communion with the Lord? Answer: All Christians are required to partake of the communion and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":69676,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/leaving-the-church\/","url_meta":{"origin":21805,"position":2},"title":"Leaving the Church","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 7, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"by Perry Hall Meditate on this thought: \"What I believe about God's word is more important than how people treat me.\" Many people will leave churches where they are mistreated and start worshiping with a friendly church that practices and teaches things contrary to what they believe. Whether they want\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5035,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-do-you-think-about-the-divisions-among-the-churches\/","url_meta":{"origin":21805,"position":3},"title":"What do you think about the divisions among the churches?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 28, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I wanted to ask you a question about Romans 16:17 and I Corinthians 1:10 about there being divisions in the church.\u00a0 I have been a member of the church since 1960, at the age of 13, and led singing most of the years since.\u00a0 My dad preached over twenty\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":59606,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-sin-of-small-churches\/","url_meta":{"origin":21805,"position":4},"title":"The Sin of Small Churches","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 26, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"by Mike Thomas It is not uncommon for people to measure a church's success solely by the numbers it has in attendance. One of the first things I am asked when people learn I am a preacher is how big the church is where I attend. They will then use\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":47844,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-i-leave-an-ineffective-discouraging-church\/","url_meta":{"origin":21805,"position":5},"title":"Should I leave an ineffective, discouraging church?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 11, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I was looking through your website and found someone asked questions similar to questions I had at this page: When should I leave a church?\u00a0But I'm not sure you fully answered some of the questions, so I still wanted to ask them again. If there are multiple sound congregations\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21805","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21805"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21805\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21805"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21805"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21805"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}