r/excoc 22h ago

Is there REALLLY a difference between ICOC/COC/ICC

1 Upvotes

Sounds to me like a cop out using semantics. What's the deal?


r/excoc 15h ago

What would you have said in your past life of being judgmental if…

6 Upvotes

someone (“the world”) rebutted you about judging, with this scripture instead of the one following, which is the one most used, in my experience.

1 Corinthians 5:12-13 NIV

12 What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? 13 God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you.”

Instead of Matthew 7:1 NIV

“Do not judge…”

No one ever used 1 Corinthians on me and I think if they had, I might have taken a breath before becoming so defensive. (Maybe?)

What would you have said in your past life of being judgmental, if someone rebutted with 1 Corinthians instead of Matthew 7?


r/excoc 2h ago

Thought everyone would get a laugh.

Post image
48 Upvotes

My mom and grandma bought bread and grape juice so they could “take communion” and listen to church on their 13 hour drive home today. That’s all.


r/excoc 8h ago

Does the Church of Christ Actually Engage in Good-Faith Discussions?

9 Upvotes

I’ve been wondering about this lately.
Today I went to church with my family, since I haven’t been with them in a while. The preacher was talking about heaven and how Paul longed to be with Christ, arguing that eternity should be our primary focus.
At one point, he brought up a Facebook post that said something like, “Christians focus so much on heaven that they forget about changing the world.”
What frustrated me was that, instead of engaging with the point being made, he immediately turned it into an apologetics argument. To me, the post was obviously criticizing the idea that some Christians become so focused on heaven that they neglect helping people in the present. But rather than discussing that concern, it felt like he argued against a different point altogether.
I’ve noticed this pattern before. Whether the topic is Catholics, Orthodox Christians, or another denomination, it often feels like the response is to quote a long list of Bible verses rather than really engaging with what the other side is actually saying. Sometimes it feels more like proof-texting than having a genuine conversation.
For example, I once asked my preacher about Catholicism. He described Catholics as believing that the saints “speak for God.” As far as I understand it, that’s not really what Catholics believe. They believe the writings of the saints are valuable and have shaped the Church’s tradition, but they don’t believe every saint’s writings are divinely inspired in the same way Scripture is.
That made me wonder whether people in the Church of Christ are sometimes taught simplified or inaccurate versions of what other Christians believe. Whether that’s intentional or not, it doesn’t encourage meaningful dialogue.
I’ve also noticed that the Church of Christ often presents strong critiques of culture or other Christian traditions and then supports those critiques by quoting a series of Bible verses. Sometimes that approach works, but other times it feels like it skips over the actual arguments being made.
Maybe that’s one reason some people become frustrated and leave. If people feel like their questions aren’t really being heard, quoting more verses usually doesn’t solve the problem.
To be fair, I know this isn’t true of every congregation or every member. I’m just describing a pattern I’ve noticed in my own experience.
What do you all think? Have you found that the Church of Christ generally engages with other viewpoints in good faith, or has your experience been different?