First off, I arrived to the new campus excited to see a new church in the area. The first odd thought was not seeing a cross which was rather unusual for a church but not entirely crazy. Upon walking in I was greeted by a...
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First off, I arrived to the new campus excited to see a new church in the area. The first odd thought was not seeing a cross which was rather unusual for a church but not entirely crazy. Upon walking in I was greeted by a more casual vibe and a coffee shop in the waiting area with outrageously priced coffee. Me and my family then walked into the main chapel which was painted all black and also again not a cross in sight.
When the worship started the songs were different but not like that’s a bad thing, just a change of pace and we were trying a new church.
Then one of the main members or people who work there said “if you have to leave the room, we ask you watch the rest of the service from the waiting area for the safety of the new members.”
This was incredibly strange and in any normal church everyone is welcome to sit in and possibly find a new home, but being told you can’t come back into a church is something you’d never hear. Then to the safety of the new members part, what does that even mean? Which is where I get to the next part.
We then had the church pastor Shannon O’Dell says “to everyone who brought your own Bible, we ask you don’t use it and download our app”! What real Christian church tells its members to not use a Bible. I further looked into it and Brand New Church uses the NLT version written in the 90s. Lastly as you exit the main worship room back to the main atrium they had their faculty standing in the door with buckets of money to donate and never said a thing about donations till you left seamed really unsettling.
So far I caution all potential new members to be aware of my experience as I grew up going to church in different states, many non denominational, etc and this was by far the weirdest cult vibe I’ve ever experienced preaching the prosperity gospel. More faith and more money donated = more success in life.