Do we live our faith?

Henry Neufeld has food for thought in "Do we live what we believe?". He's editing a book that has some pointed comments. The book's author asserts that the problem with congregational decline may be that people attending church don't really believe what they say they do:

What I do question is how God can be especially present at so many worship services with so little impact. People go back again and again to experience the presence of God and then leave and go on living in the same way.

Either we are not experiencing the presence of God as much as we say we are, or that presence is having much less impact on us than it should.

Beth Quick picked up and expanded on Henry's posting.

Tony Campolo once quipped that Nietzsche came up with his formula that “God is dead” after observing a church service and noting how it felt like God’s funeral.

So ... are our worship services "dead"? Are the hearts of the "faithful" beating only faintly with the Spirit? How many truly feel the presence of God during worship versus how many say they do? Can anyone tell that we are Christians if we don't explicitly broadcast it?

Distinctive Methodist doctrine

What's distinctive about Methodist doctine? A good place to start your journey on the topic is Wikipedia's several pages on "Doctinal distinctives", which are listed in the "Methodism in America" section of the Methodism page.

• Articles of Religion
• Prevenient grace
• Governmental atonement
• Imparted righteousness
• Christian perfection
• Conditional preservation of the saints (not "Saints")

Serving others vs personal holiness?

In "Serving Others vs Serving Self", Allen McGraw relates an incident in which someone implied that he preached too much about serving others and not personal holiness. Allen is a United Methodist pastor and seminary student who authors the Methodist Corner blog.

He cites Mark 12:28-34 and states that you can't separate personal holiness from serving others.

This reminds me of the periodic tension between those fervently advocating an evangelism-only approach to outreach vs. those who lean toward a service-only approach. The reality of where Wesley fit was between those two extremes, folks. He preached the gospel and also served the poor and needy.

Allen has it pegged -- if you have real personal holiness, you'll have a true desire to help others. Good deeds flow from faith in God. Good deeds are then God deeds -- we are the vessels of his love.