Quote:
Originally posted by Dionysus
I can't attend to ANYTHING more than an hour. Most of us can't. I have no problem dedicating more than an hour to church/God, but not at the same time. I'm both in a community group and in a college ministry at my current church. With that I spend the same amount of time (4 or more hours) as I did at my last church, it's just spread out.
I started going to my current church when I was almost 18 (3 years ago). I learned MUCH MUCH more in these last three years at this church, than I did in 17 years at my old one.
Also, just because the service is long it does not mean that you will always get more out of it. Both churches I attended did the same amount of things (i.e. songs, sermon), it's just that my old church fooled around a lot. For example, they took about a HOUR to make announcements, usually the same ones.
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IMHO
I don't think that those of us who complain that church is too long because we want to short-change GOD. But if within a 2 1/2 hour service there is only a 30 minute sermon and 30 minutes of singing, guess what the other 1 1/2 hours are spent doing?
Things that could have put in the church bulletin for us to read instead of taking away from the amount of time that could be spent on the sermon.
This was how things were at my old church, so I found a new church home that wants me to be involved EVERYDAY, and not just on Sunday. I have learned so much more at my current church that attend now (hour service) than I did at my old church (3 hour). One thing that I believe that helped me is the fact the UMC involves your whole life with worship activites, not just a Sunday worship service. At my church we have so many different types of ministries to serve on, missionary tribes, bible study's, support groups, classes, etc. that it keeps you involved in GOD's word everyday of the week.