Quote:
Originally Posted by Evangelical
It's not really circular because the definition of a church is straight from the biblical pattern. If the New Testament showed different churches with different names.. eg. Paul's letter to the "Baptist church of Ephesus", and Paul's letter to the "Faith Community Hope Peace and Love Center of Corinth" then we definitely would use that to define a church.
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There is no place in the Bible where we are commissioned to judge whether a group of otherwise good Christians is a church or not. And the act of doing so is against the whole spirit of oneness, tolerance and receiving that the Bible encourages us to embrace among one another.
To me you are straining gnats and swallowing camels. Worrying about names, taking it upon yourself to decide what are churches and what are not and generally being a childish nuisance and pain in the rear.